January 2009
February 2009
March 2009
April 2009
June 2009
God's Heart, Jeremy and Jasmine Dean...serving Sri Lanka
By Eva Dunn
Jeremy and Jasmine Dean grew up in two different countries; both walked two different paths, neither serving God, both looking for answers to fill empty voids, God-shaped voids. She came from an abundant life, the other from missionary parents but he was not close to God, he rebelled. Both had no real purpose in life.
These two young people did not know each other existed and through a series of events, both ended up in Sri Lanka, across the world, helping Tsunami victims. Jeremy had cried out and found the Lord and went to this country to serve His Lord, his only focus. Jasmine had heard God's voice, and obeyed His command to go to Sri Lanka, to serve others.
Their story is full of miracles, hope and promise, and yes, love! Jeremy and Jasmine returned to the States and were married in 2007. But they never forgot what God had put on their hearts; to be His Hands and Feet in a third world country. To this end, they continue to raise funds to return to Sri Lanka in January 2009, to live among its people, to teach English, to reflect Christ's Love by serving the people of Sri Lanka. Jeremy and Jasmine have many other exciting plans to help the people; we will share those in future columns.
The Deans want to raise support and awareness for Sri Lanka. They have many people in their network and we would like to cast the net even further, asking for your support too. The Gold Country Times will carry the ongoing story of Jeremy and Jasmine Dean, God's young evangelists, answering The Call in Sri Lanka. Please pray about supporting this ministry as God leads you.
Send your check or money order to: Renaissance Church, The Deans, 745 Westminister Street, Providence, RI, 02903. Visit http://jeremyandjasmine.com for more information. Updates of their ministry at: www.srilankablogs.weebly.com. Life in Sri Lanka, subscribe to their blogs and http://YouTube. December 2008
Top Photo: Jeremy and Jasmine Dean, serving Sri Lanka. Your Kingdom Come, Your Will be Done, on Earth as it is in Heaven.
Second Photo: The children of Sri Lanka are excited to have someone come and live in their city, to be a help in time of need, to teach them, to care and love for them. Photos courtesy to the Gold Country Times.
The latest news: 'Live Your Love' is now a legitimate nonprofit organization! Live Your Love Update
JANUARY 09 - Our time in California has come to an end and we got back to the east coast in December 2008. This last 3 months have been great and we've enjoyed almost every single day that we were there. We were sad to leave but at the same time excited to move on to the next stage of what God has in store.
Looking back, we can see what a blessing our time there was; not only for the freedom it has given us to really focus on how and what we can do to be most effective in Sri Lanka, but also for all the relationships it allowed us to make and pursue. We met some amazing people and are totally excited for where God will take these relationships in the future.
We have our plane tickets and will be leaving for Sri Lanka for six months on January 20, 2009. We are very excited for what lies ahead, for what God has in store for us, following God's leading and purpose for our lives. We will be continuously updating our travels, adventures, and life in Sri Lanka once we arrive. We know SO many people want to help/support our trip to Sri Lanka but don't know what to do.
Here are a few suggestions.
1. Send us a one time, or monthly, financial gift. (check out where to send money on our "support info" link) Our goal is to raise $13,500 for our first 6 months! 2. Pray (check out our updated prayer list on our "FAQ" link) 3. Throw a Dinner Party o' Love. We have a friend who came up with a great idea for fundraising/supporting people we love. Let me explain: a. Invite a bunch of your friends over for a dinner party. b. Make a big dinner for them and enjoy a lovely evening with your closest friends. c. Share about your lives, your friends that are overseas and how much you miss them. d. At the end of the lovely evening, everyone pitches in the amount of money they would have spent going out to eat. e. Seal up the money in an envelope with a note about your lovely dinner and send it to Renaissance Church, c/o The Deans, 745 Westminster Street, Providence, RI 02903. If you have any fundraising ideas feel free to share them with us...or just go ahead with them. We're excited for all the creativity that's out there! We have a place for our blogs, Youtube videos, and new photos: www.srilankablogs.weebly.com. You can also read about Jasmine's Sri Lanka 2005 visit: www.jasmineinsrilanka.blogspot.com Also check out our 'Jeremy and Jasmine are going to Sri Lanka' Facebook page. The Fundraising was amazing.
What do you need prayer for? Good question! And one of the most important ones, too.
a. Peace in the country of Sri Lanka. There are over 460,000 internally displaced people around the country because of the conflict and violence of the 25 year-old civil war. This country is in desperate need for peace.
b. Money We need to have money to serve the people in this country. Please, pray that people will really feel called to support us financially and prayerfully while we are there and before we leave.
c. Safety For us as we travel and as we are there.
d. That we would be led to the "right" people. Right now we are just praying that we are led to the right people to work alongside and that we would find the right people to serve amongst the HUGE numbers that need help.
In the next weeks we will be sending out our last mailing before we leave for Sri Lanka. We will share details about what we'll be doing for the first 6 months and a request for support as we only need about $10 from each supporter to achieve our goal. We are so blessed by the way so many of you have already supported us. Thank you! Love, Jeremy and Jasmine January 2009
Live Your Love! Hello Friends, Our three months in California came to an end and it was incredibly productive. We are amazed, every day, at how things have come together over the past couple of months. We arrived in Sri Lanka on the 22nd of January, and we are over-whelmed with ideas and excited to get to know the country. Our purpose in Sri Lanka is to find the greatest need of the poor and help them out of poverty. We plan to do this one person at a time by getting involved within the community, building relationships with the needy and finding practical and attainable ways to aid those in need. We want to Raise Awareness for the need in Sri Lanka for education, livelihood projects and for the people themselves.
We know that you have such great hearts and desire to help those in need. We are so blessed to get to be the ones to facilitate those needs. We want to Empower the People by creating micro-financing projects, and getting involved in the garment and tea industries that produce most of the countries exports.
We are scheduled to teach English to college students and volunteer with kids in the city slums as well as Community Concern Society in their schools for poor children. Our vision is still to be in Sri Lanka long term but, for our first trip, we will be in the country for six months. The focus of our time will be to start laying the foundations for our long-term vision called Live Your Love which embodies everything we hope to achieve in Sri Lanka. We are most excited about the future of Live Your Love and how it will not only impact the lives of Sri Lanka's poor but also the lives of people around the world...including you.
Our goal is to have about $13,500 for our first six months and we only need $3,000 more! Although this may seem like a big number, we know that it is 100% attainable considering we have almost 400 people involved and even $10 from everyone would surpass that goal. We pray that you will believe with us as we step out of the boat. ‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’
As we settle into our new home, please pray for safety in our apartment and our neighborhood as we travel the busy city every day. We are meeting people almost every day and we're praying that God will open all the opportunities to move forward. Please pray along with us that God will continue to open all the right doors and close all the wrong ones! Love, Jeremy and Jasmine Ready, Set ... Sri Lanka!
Contact Jeremy and Jasmine at: Renaissance Church, c/o The Deans, 745 Westminister Street, Providence, RI 02903. Their blogs, Youtube videos, and new photos are online at: www.srilankablogs.weebly.com You can also read about Jasmine's Sri Lanka 2005 visit: www.jasmineinsrilanka.blogspot.com February 2009
The Indian Ocean
On the 17th we took a trip down to Hambantota with a friend of Jeremy's parents who runs a program for Smile International. 
It is a preschool in the morning, after-school classes for older kids in the afternoon and they have a monthly program for widows and poor women in the community--giving them food and teaching them to sew. It's a wonderful program and I think we'll probably get to go down again soon. We fell in love with the kids too.
Photo: Two of the children that are helped by Smile International in Hambantota. The kids in the program are chosen to get an education and daily meals from the facility. Photo courtesy to the Gold Country Times
Prayers
We have now been here a month and have made some friends but they do not live in the city. Please pray that God brings us wonderful friends to hang out with and share life with. We are beginning to miss just "hanging out" with friends.
Sometimes I get so lost in what I'm doing, I forget I'm in an entirely different world. I'll be unpacking, reading one of thousands of articles on Obama or just thinking about something when I'll be thrown back into reality by the smell of the city, the lack of warm water or the extreme humidity that sticks to my skin for all but the 10 minutes that I'm actually in the shower.
I've decided to share some of my top differences about Sri Lanka so far. I figure that in a couple of weeks, America will be a distant memory and life in Colombo will almost seem normal. Life here, right now, is definitely different – that's an understatement.
*There is no food that tastes like it does at home. Even the apples don't taste like apples. Spaghetti sauce costs way too much to buy and the irony is that the most comfortable, easy, safe thing to cook is spaghetti.
* My hair is constantly frizzy; those of you who have thick hair know what I mean. There is no adapter powerful enough for me to use my hair dryer or straightener and I'm forced to live in the frizz.
*Bugs are the rule, not the exception. When you see one you don't think, "Why is there a bug in my kitchen?" You think, "Where is the rest of their family hiding?"
*Three-wheelers are the main mode of transportation and you willingly give your life to the random stranger who is driving. Trust me, any ride could be my last.
*Rupees are the currency here. One US dollar is equivalent to about 114.034 SL rupees and I'm constantly trying to do the conversions. It's kind of exhausting.
*DVD's are sold in stores that only sell DVD's and CD's. They're bootlegged and legal. You pick out your movie of choice, check it on the DVD player in the store and buy it for 200 rupees.
*Most things that you'd think might be expensive are pretty cheap and others that you might think would be cheap (like Spaghetti sauce) are over the top, unaffordably expensive.
* Most showers, excluding ours (thank God) have zero hot water. You'd think that wouldn't be a bad thing considering it's usually between 80-90 at all times of the day and it's never below 80% humidity.
*We keep our garbage in a tight bin on our back porch to keep some creatures out of the kitchen if at all possible. This, I think, is wishful thinking.
*Things are dirtier here, to say the least. Cows roam the streets and there's no such thing as recycling.
*When we're awake, most of our friends and family in the States are asleep and vice versa. This makes me sad when I want to talk to people I miss. We are 10 ˝ hours ahead of the East coast and 13 ˝ hours ahead of the West Coast.
*You can't find anything to eat that's not spicy. If they say it's not, it is and if they say it is than watch out. I will conquer the spice!
We are in the process of filing Live Your Love as a non-profit. Live Your Love is a practical way for you, whoever you are - wherever you are, to support someone in need by a product with a message. Imagine going into a store, picking up a piece of clothing and finding out that buying it would not only make you look super cool and feel comfortable but it would also benefit a third world community by creating commerce and jobs in a poor community, a means for an impoverished person or community to start their climb out of poverty. To support this outreach, send checks payable to The Renaissance Church at: The Deans, c/o Renaissance Church, 745 Westminister St, Providence, RI 02903.
March Prayers
The Heat: It has gotten so hot here in the last couple of week that even locals think it's hot. Please pray for either a break in the heat or some miraculous sleeping because the hot days take all the energy out of us. Rain would bring a break from the heat; there are talks of turning off the electricity (most powered by water) if rain does not come this week.
We would not have fans at night, no refrigerators and possibly no water. God's teaching us to give up some luxuries but that could possibly be miserable.
Editor's Note: since this report on the unrelenting heat, Sri Lanka has received some showers giving them some relief. However, the heavy heat continues to be a constant.
Check in next month when these young missionaries ask: "Pray we can have incredible wisdom in how to "Love our Neighbor."
HOMELESSNESS
This is a loud part of every day for me. If we go down the road to grab lunch or catch a ride in a 3-wheeler we are guaranteed to see beggars at any point during the day. They approach cars, stick their hand in your face as you walk by and call out to you from afar. The beggars may or may not work for someone else so it's not a good idea to give them money because we have NO idea where it will go. Sometimes they won't even take food when we offer it to them.
The night time is a different world. As we walk home at night, the main road in Colombo is lined with homeless. They are not the beggars we see during the day. These people do not have a place to sleep. Young and old create makeshift beds, even if it's just a sheet of cardboard, and hunker down for the night. It is a painful and gut-wrenching, in-my-face reality.
The beggars are usually deformed in one way or another: facial growths, missing limbs, enlarged or swollen appendages and even open wounds. The homeless at night, however, are just individuals and sometimes families with nowhere to sleep. We are praying about whether we should hand out food to the homeless one night a week but this could turn into a dependency issue. This is a constant prayer for us: how can we help those in desperate need without enabling them to become dependent on us?
HEAT - Like I mentioned in our prayer requests, it's been unseasonably hot here. The hottest part of the year is usually April. We don't have air conditioning so sleeping can sometimes be a challenge. It rained the other night and cooled it down for about a day. Looks like temps are rising again and makes things a bit more difficult. It drains our energy during the day and it's hard to sleep at night. I know, I know...most of you are reading this, buried under 3 feet of snow and have zero sympathy. I'm pretty sure I'd be thinking the same thing. I'm not complaining...just sharing the reality of life in Sri Lanka. I didn't say I wanted to jump back into the snow or anything : )
JOY IN THE MIDST - As depressing as all this may sound there are some beautiful and amazing things already happening in this country. Yes, there is a lot of sadness, chaos and confusion in this country - that is quite evident. But, when there is hurt, joy is close behind. God promises to be near to the brokenhearted. There is still a lot of progress to be made in this country but there is a lot of joy too. As you can see from some of the pictures last month, we were able to visit Smile International in Hambantota.
The kids in the program are from the poorest families in the community and chosen to get an education and daily meals from the facility. The joy on the kids faces makes the sadness almost obsolete at moments. I would literally forget where I was when I would see those kids laughing or eating or enjoying the one-on-one attention from "Sudu Auntie." (They call any visitor or friend auntie or uncle and sudu auntie means white auntie - I'm still not used to being called white; I guess I haven't spent enough time at the beach).
There are also a group of the poorest widows in the community, chosen to participate in their program that provides them with sewing classes, monthly fellowship at the facility and food to last almost a month. The women and children are so incredibly enriched and blessed by this outreach and it is OBVIOUS by the looks on their face when they leave. One step at a time, right? April 2009
Back to Top
