Esta tiempo es un tiempo muy bueno en nuestras vivas, y para el Reino del Dios.

(This time is a very good time in our lives, and for the Kingdom of God.)

I know that I have to keep up on my blogs, but to be honest this is not easy. I keep falling behind, and then when I seem to find time, something always comes up. I cant hardly remember the last time that I sat down to blog, and I have so many stories that I don't know where to start. I will just fill you all in a little bit of over history from the past few weeks.

I want to fist start out by saying "Thank you Jesus, we have water again..........................kinda" We have been without water now for about 2 or 3 weeks. Well, that is not entirely true, we have had water on and off for about the last two weeks. It was 10 days with no water all, then the last week or so it has been on and off. One hour on here and half an hour there, or maybe 15 minutes, or whatever it feels like. As soon as everyone in the building flushed there toilets, we are about done. It was all good though. God is faithful and it was a miracle that we had water at all. Of all the neighbors around us, we were the only building getting a little bit here and there. God is so awesome!! Talking about the neighbors we have to tell you about our friends.

When we first moved into Mexico City we had several people that did not like us. The first reason was that we were Christians and the second was that we were Americans. We tried and tried to make friends with them. It has taken along time to get into the these families, but I have a story of something that happened a couple nights ago. We were sitting at home getting the kids ready for bed and getting ready to call it day for us as well. Soon there was a knock at our door, it was our neighbors (across the hall), and they told me somebody was downstairs waiting for me in front of our building. So I went down there and found a neighbor from across the street waiting for me. This is one of the guys that we have been talking to since we first got here. He told me to come to his house. I was kinda apprehensive at first but then I realized that this is what I am here for. When I got there his wife and kids had supper waiting for us. He told me that he had remembered me talking one day about our favorite food here in Mexico. His wife and kids had prepared us a homemade traditional Mexican supper. Mandy and I spent the night eating and eating until we were stuffed!! He told me that we were so different from all the other people in the church because we would stop and ask him about his family, his kids, and ask him how he is really doing. He said that we would stop and take the time to care for him, and because of that he was welcoming us into the community. Another neighbor told us that in 18 years this family has never given anything away to anyone. We were blessed to have that warm welcome by him. He is not a Christian and makes it very clear to everyone what he believes. We were told by the church, in the beginning, to just be careful because of the clash of religions here in Mexico. Now the very people that we were told to be careful of, are the ones that have accepted us into there homes. It is so wonderful to see the hand of God working in the lives of those that He has chosen to place in our path. I feel humbles that He is using us to touch the lives of the people that are geographically close to the church that have rejected "Christianity". I have decided that they have not rejected Christianity at all, they have just rejected the lifestyle of a "Christian in the the church, but a sinner outside the church". They all want to know the true savior they are just looking at the actions of the people that call themselves Christians and are rejecting that lifestyle. This is a HUGE open door for us because we are saying the same thing. These friends are listening, and this also keeps us accountable.

I also wanted to talk a little bit about the missions trip that I just got back from and the next one that I am planning now. We went to a place called Tlapachaloya, in the mountains of Mexico. While we were there, we did a church support mission. We went to basically the end of the road to offer support to a struggling church. While we were there we did a training program for the leaders of the children's ministry (all 3 of them) and we put on a children's activity time concurrent to the adult training time. We had stations with dancing, music, arts, games, crafts, teachings, and etc. We got the whole community involved in what the church is. We also had a doctor and a dentist with us. They worked tirelessly for 3 days helping as many people at they could while they were there. There is no doctors, no hospitals, no medicine, no police, no nothing that we consider "necessity". It did however, much to my shock and horror, have Coca Cola, and Pepsi. This was a church started by a Christian missionary from the U.S. about 20 years ago and now I have the privaledge to carry on that torch a little further. The Americans are now gone, but the church still remains. It is a testament to the importance of the American people and the opportunity we have in our country to send missionaries in the middle of nowhere with the ability to help. With our technology and money in our system we are able to bless others with that and see many people enter heaven because of it. I am humbled and blessed to be a part of it.

Anyhow, we went there, and we are now planning another trip back up there. This trip however will be a bit different. We are going into that village and meeting up with the pastor. I connected well with the Dentist and he asked me if I would go with them on trips in the future. We are going under the leadership and guidance of CNM (Christ for the Nations, Mexico). We are going back to the village and putting all our stuff on pack mules, and horses. Then we are going to walk into the jungle from this village. There are mountainous tribal people that have no connection to the outside world. It is hard to think that there are people like that living so close to us, but in the jungles of Mexico they are definitely there. There is a group of 3 ladies that has been coming out of one of these villages looking for help (food and when we were there medical). They found that church was open and willing to help them, and they have accepted Christ because of it. Because we have helped them, told us that they would come out of the jungle and get us, and take us in with them. We are prayerfully considering this, and planning on going in, around the middle of Feb. Please keep us in your prayers as we work towards making this happen. We want to do medical and dental work first and foremost because most of these people have never even seen a doctor before. If this goes well and we get this accomplished we are going to go back in a few months after. Our goal is to first help with food and medical, and second reach them with the gospel. Lots of these people don't speak Spanish, but we are blessed that the doctor speaks the native tongue. God is SO AWESOME how he is connecting all our paths and making Himself famous in the world that we live in. They told me that they need someone who knows about mechanical, and electrical on there team because this is a huge problem they have with all there equipment. Keep in mind all the doctoring and dentistry equipment needs to fit on the back of a mule, but it isn't there first time doing this. They just got back from Morocco Africa doing this so it isn't completely uncommon. I will tell you more as the time draws closer.

I wanted also real quickly to tell you about the food and ministry program that we went on in the north part of the city. We were blessed to take around 30 pre-teen, and teenagers on a day of social help. We went into a part of the city that is much less fortunate than we are. I was surprised at how different parts of the city are so much different. When we were about 20 minutes away from the place that we were going (driving time) my eyes started watering, my neck started getting itchy, and I started feeling bad. This was because of the amount of pollution there. It is bad here, but it was horrible there. We blew our noses for 2 days after that and had black stuff in our Kleenex's. It was amazing! We once again did a children's ministry running stations for the kids to go through. Before that however we did a time of praise of worship to get things started right. Then after the time with the kids we went back inside and did a drama. While we were outside with the kids, the pastor of the church gave a message to the parents. We then did a drama about how it isn't important if you live on the street, or what you have, but what is in your heart is the most important thing. This was a reality for the people that we were working with. Then we fed everyone, nobody was left out. The food was not exactly what Mandy and I thought was good or actually even edible, but the people there, and our friends Loved it!! ((For all our friends from Mexico reading this, I am sorry, but in my culture, this is just wrong))They said that it was great. It was a traditional meal of spicy salsa covering soggy pig skin cut into strips. (People here love it, it just is hard for me to understand some things.) That wasn't what was important however. After they got done eating we took bags of food that we had prepared before hand, working at AINDAC. We had a bag of cereal, a kilo of beans, a kilo of sugar, powered milk, some crackers, some soup, and some candies in every bag. We then handed them out to the people as they left. This included the people that worked in the church because a lot of them were just as destitute as the people coming for the help. What a blessing that was to do. I was brought to tears as I watched the smile on the faces of the people that were going to be eating a hot meal that night. It is quite possible that except for the meal at the church this may have been the only hot meal that they have had in a long time. I have pictures of my kids drinking coffee. That is because all the kids there drink coffee. It is cheap, and warm. They have no milk, and the water needs to be boiled to kill some of the disease in it, so they just make coffee. I was amazed at all the 3, 4, and year olds drinking coffee running allover. My kids thought it was great!! This is a hard thing to grasp for us because we came from an area of such wealth and blessing. I have more photos of that on our flicker if you want to see them as well.

People often ask me what the hardest thing about living here is, and I am beginning to think that the answer to that is the injustice in this world. When we as humans begin treating people like dogs in the streets, or garbage that needs to be taken out. That is the hardest thing. I have many, many other stories about that as well, for instance my wife picking the local drunk up out of the road and cleaning the puke off his face, and giving him bread and coffee because, "He is a person before he is anything else". This has made even me stop and think, what is the hardest thing in this type of life that I live? I think it is that. Because of us living in the biggest city in the world we see the biggest crimes against humanity here, and that is the hardest thing. The thing that drives me the maddest is when it is seen in the homes of the "Christians". We are supposed to know better. I never dreamed, when I said that I would take this job, about the amount of ministering I would do in Christian homes. I should have known, but my eyes are being opened to reality the longer that I do this job.

Thank you all for the love and support that you are showing our family here. I can assure you that your prayers and sacrifices are being felt in the south of Mexico City. This is not because of how cool we are, or any amount of anything like that. It is simply because living in the center of God will in the most rewarding, most fulfilling, and the most powerful place to be. When we learn to submit to God wholeheartedly he will begin using us for the furthering of His Kingdom way beyond anything that we could hope or imagine. As the passage in the Bible says, can a pot look at its maker and say that it doesn't know what is best for it? This is the same in our lives. We cannot look at our maker and say anything about our lives except for I am Sorry, because when we pull away from Him we will always fail. But when we walk in his path, and let Him lead the way we can become a very powerful tool to reach many for His Kingdom.

I want to finish tonight repeating the words of My Lord and My Savior, "My King I worship you, not for me, but because you are worthy and you paid a price for me which is far over and above anything that I will ever have do. I dont want my will, but your will to be done, right here in this life at this point in time, just like it is being done in heaven at this time. If you choose to give to give me food and life for another day, it is yours, and if you choose to take this food, or this life from me, it is yours to take. But please forgive me from all the stupid things that I have done and all the times that I have turned my back on you and hurt you. As you forgive me, I also forgive those that done anything painful, hurtful, and evil against me. Please help me keep my eyes, my hands, my mouth, and especially my mind clean before you and free from evil. Keep me pure and search my heart O God, and know that every breath I take has your name written on it." Amen

Luke 11:2-4
Our Father in heaven, Hallowed be Your name. Your kingdom come. Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us day by day our daily bread. And forgive us our sins, For we also forgive everyone who is indebted to us. And do not lead us into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one.”
Lucas 11:2-4
Cuando oréis, decid: "Padre nuestro que estás en los cielos, santificado sea tu nombre. Venga tu Reino. Hágase tu voluntad, como en el cielo,así también en la tierra. El pan nuestro de cada día, dánoslo hoy. Perdónanos nuestros pecados,porque también nosotros perdonamosa todos los que nos deben. Y no nos metas en tentación, mas líbranos del mal".