Today's Northern Ireland final recap is provided by ETBU Head Women's Basketball Coach Blake Arbogast.
 
"As I look back on the last 10 days, I am in awe of what the Lord did during our time in Northern Ireland.
 
The opportunities to serve at local primary schools, attend a Sunday service at a local church, and have other local believers come in and worship with us will be memories our team will have forever. The ability to worship in a Cathedral, pray for peace at the peace walls, and soak in the beautiful presence of the Lord's creations in 'thin' places are things that highlighted the trip for me.
 
On one of our last days, we worked with a local church, Lagan Valley Vineyard, where our group was divided and served in two different places throughout the community. One group served at a prison ministry where they helped clean and prepare the new facility the ministry would work out of, while also learning about the mission of the ministry in meeting prisoners where they are at and sharing the Gospel with them in that way. The other group stayed at the church and put together craft boxes for the families of the prisoners, along with creating flowerpots to send out to local members of the community as an expression of love.
 
To watch our team serve and share the Gospel in a country that is divided by hatred based on what street they live on, the school they attend, or even what side of a wall they live on, was very powerful. We are grateful for the work that our partner, Salt Factory Sports, is doing to further God's Kingdom through sports ministry in Northern Ireland (Matthew 5:13).
 
We came into this experience thinking we were going to change the lives of people in Northern Ireland, which I believe we did, but found out quickly how this experience transformed us from the inside out. I truly believe that the 'mission' of this trip wasn't just to serve in the communities of Northern Ireland, but instead to prepare our hearts to be better than when we left to come back and serve the communities of East Texas Baptist University and Marshall, Texas.
 
We are more than grateful to the individuals that worked tirelessly to make this trip possible through prayer and donations to allow our group of 26 people from small town East Texas to travel to one of the most beautiful place I have ever seen."