Water and Electricity (not)
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
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).
Two major activities in two days in two neighbourhoods! And both a great success.
Last night thanks to our visiting team we managed to assemble a set of wheelchairs to present to new friends in Las Palmas. The assembly process may not have been completely without its ups and downs, and I won’t say that every wheel was put on the right way around (but if it did happen, it was fixed). But eventually we succeeded.
Then this morning we had a program to present the chairs. The community centre was full of the recipients and their families. Rod shared a bit about the vision of the community centre, and Mayra shared from God’s Word, and then we made sure everyone had the right size chair, making adjustments as needed.
