This post by: Sean Frankenbach is an Agribusiness Management and Agricultural Education major at the University of Missouri.  From Palmyra, Missouri, Sean is the Treasurer of Mizzou´s Lutheran Student Fellowship, a member of the College of Agriculture, Food, and Natural Resources Student Development Board, and is Mizzou´s mascot, Truman the Tiger. When he finds time, he enjoys playing tennis, going on road-trips, and playing the piano.

Our day started in Telica, a town known for its competitive baseball. Our team was prepped, stretched, and ready to go when we took the field. Here we were, on the nicest field we had been on all week. This field had chain-linked fences, dug-outs, foul poles, and even bleachers for spectators! This game of baseball had the ambiance of a championship game....or at least in the beginning.


Wearing flip-flops and hopping out of the bed of a pick-up came eight Nicaraguans, about high school age. After the first inning, the game was tied in a dead heat at 0-0. But in the second inning, the team from Nicaragua found the holes in the United States defense to plate their first of what would be many runs on the "gringos." At the end of the game, the final score was 17-1 in favor of Nicaragua. Like I said, the championship ambiance didn´t last too long.


And just for you Dad, I want you to know I played second base and went 2 for 2 at the plate. But at the end of the game, I was brought in for relief as our team´s pitcher. Scary thought, I know.

It was great to talk with these young men about God´s grace using a more adult version of our witness bracelets. Personally, what stood out to me the most was when we asked this group of eight, none of them knew what forgiveness was. Could it actually be that we were exposing these boys to the Gospel for the first time? However, our team has faith in the seeds we planted with those few Telican baseball players.

A Lutheran Church and school and food program are planned to start being built in January 2013. We actually had the opportunity to visit the approximately 1.5 acre plot where the facilities will be built. Hopefully this community will be continually blessed throughout the construction as it grows in faith.

In the afternoon, we traveled to another area in Telica to present to some small children. Just as in previous days, we performed our skits using our witness bracelets. Our last time seemed to go well.

With this being our last time, upon arrival back at the mission house, we said our final good-byes to our three interpretors; Jose, Franklin, and Jorge. They have been an integral asset to our team and we were very happy to have gotten the chance to work with them.

As our last day in the mission field has come to a close, it has created many lasting memories for our team to look back on. Our team will be able to remember all the laughs we had (and there were MANY laughs), the communities we worked in, and the people we worked with. But most importantly, we will be able to look back on this week and see all of God´s glory through the mission and the people of the Lutheran Church in Nicaragua. And who would of thunk it? We were able to accomplish service to God by simply playing the game of baseball.