Thanks so much for your prayers! Aaron has been found! He is alive and well.
God is good.
A little more information: Aaron took the kayak from Raotan Island, off the north coast of Honduras. He stayed with his kayak, and was found about 29km NNW of Utila Island. It had been about 15 hours. What a journey!
Please pray for Camino missionaries Mark and Michelle Fittz and their family today. Mark’s sister and her family were visiting from Texas. Mark’s nephew, Aaron, went out on a kayak in the Caribbean Sea last night around 6pm and has not returned.
The search had to be called off last night, but is resuming this morning. The search will now be extending to Belize as well.
This from Aaron’s Dad, Daniel:
Please continue to pray for Aaron to say afloat on the kaiak, him to have peace as he remains lost on a huge sea at night, for Mary Beth and the kids. Also that The Holy Spirit with guide the rescue effort straight to Aaron’s location. I am eternally grateful for the prayers and the outpouring of love and support from both those who know us well and those we have never met. May God richly bless you. Hug your kids.
Update: Aaron has been found!
. . . your faith in God has gone forth everywhere . . . (1Thes 1:8)
Summer may actually start on the 21st of June, but the season of summer activities begins here in only 13 days – the 11th of June. Lord willing, our first intern (Abby!) will be arriving that day, followed on the 12th by a team of 20 from Mt Calvary Church.
It’s always nice to have graphic designers around, and we’re thankful to Samuel again for coming up with a logo for our summer, which should explain itself –
So what are some of our goals for the summer? Well, we want to see cross-cultural relationships built for the glory of God. We want to see some major steps forward taken in the construction of the ministry centre and church meeting place in Jesús MarÃa. We want to serve our community, helping people in practical ways as well as giving spiritual food. We hope to reach out to those with physical and mental disabilities, and to city street kids. We hope to see the work in Las Palmas grow, as relationships are built with believers, unbelievers, and ultimately with their Lord. We want to know our God better, worship Him more completely, and serve Him in love.
We can’t do it on our own – so join us in prayer, that the Spirit will open doors and hearts, give wisdom and strength, and do what we could never do.
At the moment we would especially appreciate your prayers for the intensive time of ministry right at the beginning. Safe travels for those coming on the 11th and 12th, and then for all the activities over the next week – a soccer tournament, baking, English, and craft classes, construction, wheelchair distribution, and time spent just being with people.
May God give us all an infectious faith!
Found out today – after a few very stressful moments – that there are still HONEST people in this world! 🙂 I left my little change purse sitting on the counter at a supermarket after paying for the stuff I had bought. (Hang in there for this story… It has a happy ending!) 😀
(Now, that may not sound like a big deal, but change is valuable in this Mexican culture – you HAVE to have small change with you wherever you go, cuz it is used for everything! So I had quite a bit of coins in there, as well as a couple of bills – probably about the equivalent of about $30 in pesos, so not tons, but enough!)
The problem was that I didn’t realize I had lost it until at least an hour later, when I went to pay for something at another store! Couldn’t find it, was madly searching through my purse, slightly mad at myself for being so careless! 😥
I almost didn’t even go back to the store to bother asking about it, because, I thought, why even waste the time? For sure it’s gone…
HOWEVER, I went back, found the cashier who attended me, and asked her if they had seen it. Her face lit up, and relief flooded over me! I had to describe the change purse, and tell them what $ was inside, but I got it back! So grateful for HONESTY tonight, and for people in our corrupt world who go against the flow and put that value into practice! 🙂
Some of you may have heard that we had an unexpected candlelight service on Resurrection Sunday. Or maybe I should say, candlelight-cellphone-light service.
It was going to be a sunrise service, except that we were inside the virtually windowless cement box that is our temporary sanctuary, and the night before the power went out and did not come back.
In the end, it turned into an especially memorable service, because we don’t usually have that much ambiance on a Sunday morning.
Now the electricity that we normally use (except when it doesn’t work) is provided due to the generosity of a neighbour. In actual fact, the property doesn’t yet have power. Before that, we used a generator.
And water? Well, we don’t have that either. We do fill up a tank so that there’s something on the property, and we use an elegant bucket-carry-and-dump method to flush the partially-functioning toilets.
As you might guess, these inconveniences do not mean we can no longer enjoy our time together worshipping God. However, they are time-consuming problems that we hope to solve, one of these days.
You could pray that we could get the water and electricity hooked up soon. It’s a matter of getting them hooked up from the city, which actually shouldn’t be too difficult – we have a lot of paperwork, legal paperwork, and after all we’ve been meeting there for – how long now? Over a year.
I’m not sure how long it takes in the country where you live, but that seems a little extreme to me.
So, we would appreciate your continued prayers that obstacles would be overcome and that we would soon have these little things that make a meeting place functional.
For more on the construction and the Ixtapaluca Project, visit the main page here.
And now, a reflection about the most important Light…
In him was life, and the life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it…
The true light, which gives light to everyone, was coming into the world. He was in the world, and the world was made through him, yet the world did not know him. He came to his own, and his own people did not receive him.
But to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God, who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God.
from John 1:4-13
Last month I started teaching Sunday School for the older youth at our church. We were continuing the study that they had been doing before, on the life of David.
After getting some feedback from them, we’re going to be starting a new series for the next four months on teens and young adults in the Bible (otherwise known as jovenes).
It was the idea of someone in the class, and it’s interesting, partly because sometimes it’s hard to tell how old people were. For example, we picture David and Jonathan as two teens, but really Jonathan was old enough to be David’s father. Jacob fleeing from his brother Esau was likely long past his young adulthood.
Anyway, I’ve narrowed it down to ten people who were likely in the 12-25 age range, and we’ll be focusing on their lives during that time (no, of course I won’t tell you who they are. That would spoil the surprise! But David isn’t one of them; we just finished with him for now).
Coming to the Bible, whether it be a specific passage or character, is always a surprise. You just never know what God has hidden in His Word!
Do pray for the teens in our church. Many of the challenges that they face are the same as those in the rest of North America. But they are also dealing with things that are probably quite different from what you may experience in Canada and the USA. But our foundation is the same, and our hope is the same, even if the details and strategies of everyday life may be different.
I don’t think any of us need another “how-to” list – not unless it starts with “It is Finished!”, and continues and finishes with the same supernatural power of God. But from that starting point, I have a feeling I have a lot to learn from some of the good … bad … and sometimes all over the place … people we find in the Bible.
Anyway, I need to go and study person #1 – a woman from Genesis, whose life, I’m sure, was not turning out as she had expected…