1More4Christ

I love these shots of people talking, walking the grounds of the places God is and will touch.  Here Tracey and Roxanne check out Kikomar, a campground we visited on the weekend to join the celebrations of 20 years of service to the community.  Love this!

Together Again

 We got to see the Palumbo young people once again as they visited Mexico.  It was good to see each one and to have some time to joke, take photos and eat tacos together.  Wow, what a “blast from the past!”

A New Union

Blessings to Mike & Nancy who tied the knot on Thursday.  May your lives reflect the grace and love of our Lord. 

All Done

Our class on homiletics had its last meeting on Monday.  While the group was smaller than at the start, several got a chance to give their last sermon and a chance to hear from the teacher what they need to be working on.  It’s been a long haul and folks have been faithful and busy.  We want to thank Bob for teaching, Bet-lehem Baptist for sponsoring the activity and a group of 8 that attended from our church plant in Los Heroes.  Thanks for your prayers.

PluggedIn

Keila’s been gone to Veracruz on the Gulf coast to help a team of Canadians finish building the camp’s dining room.  Last summer our team of youth painted the kitchen, but now the larger structure is going up and it looks huge.  Keila along with friends got a chance to work on the roof.  We’ll pick her up on the weekend when the camp celebrates 20 years of service to the community.

UnPlugged

Our new place has some serious power problems, or better yet a lack there of, power, that is.  We held music classes but with keyboards unable to play music, so we just went through the motions of finger exercises without the sound effects.  Pray with us that we’ll soon resolve this issue.

The KEYS at last

We got the keys to our newly rented hall and decided to open up this last Sunday.  I prepared our team by saying, “It’s been about 20 days since we handed out flyers in this area.  Don’t expect anything."  We probably started on the worst day.  This was a long weekend where most probably left the area.

As we hauled stuff from the van to the hall, a lady and her kids were hanging around the hall probably waiting for someone.  After inviting her to our music classes, she left.  To our surprise she returned with her eldest daughter to enroll her in our guitar class.  Well the guys got going, teaching her to play.

A small, but great start to services in our new place...

On the courts

Our youth enjoyed getting together with another like-minded youth group to play outdoors games.  It was fun to see a big group of kids even though it was a cold, wet and dreary day.  We all had fun and made new friends.

A lesson on Cain and Abel helped us to remember the paths before us and what pleases God.

Prayer for the Dark

I was thinking last week how easily the “dark” creeps up on us.  Bad thoughts that cross our minds, bad habits that suck us in or even our environment that deceives us into believing that what we experience is the norm, the dark continues to work away at the light in us forcing our weaknesses to be seen.  We have been praying for the congregation in the areas that we see the dark creeping in and realize that we need to be supporting each other in prayer before it takes its toll on us.

Looking for MORE disciples

Two of the young people that I’ve been discipling have finished their first set of studies.  I’m sure they weren’t easy to do, but I am impressed with their commitment and their willingness to finish up.

End of the Tunnel

 

We finished up teaching the doctrines for our exam on May 16.  Things are underway for that day, inviting all those who will witness the event.  Even Pastor Manuel of the founding church will travel from California where he will be on furlough to join us.

We are now reviewing the doctrines and asking several to examine them a little more closely to have them memorized for the exam date.

Another Year of Service

Our second anniversary wasn’t complete without a video produced by Keila helping us to remember what we did throughout the year in 2014.  It's "titled" in Spanish, but take a look and see all the lives we touched.  Thank you for your part.

Moved by each moment

Aside from the food, our service had a special invited guest, Pastor Manuel Vivanco E. who gave a challenging, funny and moving message.  Several testimonies, great worship and the music students performing worship songs made for a memorable and moving meeting.  Thank you for your prayers for another year of service to the Lord and to our community.

Will there be food?

As preparations were made for our second anniversary as a church family, I was unawares of all the work that was being put into the celebration.  My questions during the week were, will there be enough food and do we have enough chairs. 

 

On the day of the event, there were plenty of delicious foods to be shared and lots of wonderful conversations held before the service time.  God raised up leaders to take care of the details of the “fiesta.”

Time with equals

Prayer for Seniors

As I hear it from my daughters who went to a missionary camp this last week, they value the friendships of youth who have experienced the “third-culture” phenomena as believers and many with parents in ministry.  While it was an enjoyable time for them, it was bitter-sweet for Keila and the seniors in  high school who marked their last visit to the camp.

Burning the midnight oil

 

Our study group that meets on Monday evenings to review what we learned that morning about how to prepare a sermon, met to prepare mandatory messages to be given next Monday.  The group worked on different passages of scripture and got together to see if the sermons were shaping up.  We spent from 8 p.m. until almost 1 a.m. going over each message to see that things were understandable and easy to share.  Talk about burning the midnight oil.  I haven’t done this in years.

Looking Hot!

Looking at the past couple of weeks, there seems to be no doubt that we’re ramping up to summer.  We’ve had temperatures in the upper 70’s and low 80’s with blue sunny skies.  I love this weather and it looks like we’ll have some very warm temperatures for our anniversary.  Thanks to all for your prayers and your words of encouragement.  This will be a celebration to be remembered!

All 4 1 and 1 4 All

We had our first “leaders” meeting to discuss the plans for the second anniversary.  They were all thinking ahead as to their tasks and who to ask to help.  We also spent time sharing a core value of our congregation and some basic responsibilities of each leader.  It is a pleasure to see their willingness to work together and their excitement to do the best in their areas.  This lightens our load, yes!

Quick outing

We made a quick dash for the U.S. Embassy on Wednesday to get the girls some new passports for their travels this summer.  One will be going to Africa and the other will be going to either Taiwan or Columbia depending on the decision of the mission.  We don’t want anything stopping them from serving God this summer.  

When I mentioned to a Mexican friend that the U.S. government requires 4-6 weeks to process the application, he said, “I guess we’re more efficient in getting passports than the U.S.”  In Mexico, a person can get a passport the same day that they apply for it.

Doing our share…

The youth got together this last week to play and to prepare some decorations for our second anniversary.  They teamed up in groups of two and created posters to be taped on the walls offering best wishes to the congregation.  Everyone is doing his share to make this a wonderful celebration.

1 More? 4 Christ

Our men’s group which swelled last week added one more this week and grew to 11.  Now our men’s leader is in a quandary.  “I guess we need to divide the group to have more valuable sharing time,” he commented.  On that same note, another suggested that we begin early morning prayer meetings for the men who can’t attend in the evenings.  This has been a desire of ours since the end of last year and now appears to be a felt need.

Men Growing

I was “blown away” on Thursday when I got to the men’s meeting.  Assuming to see our regulars which average between 3 and 6 of us, there were 10 that showed up, all due to the efforts of the men inviting their friends and neighbors.  While it was a pleasure to see our table full of men, looks like we’ll have to consider dividing up the group in two so that each gets an opportunity to share.