Centro Cultural Tiempo de Vivir

10 December 2015

You Can Help!

If you’re wondering how you can give at the end of the year, here are some ideas for you related to our ministry in Mexico. These are probably the three biggest ways you could help today:

1) Ixtapaluca Project: This project was set up to help the church with their construction. We would love to see this project finished off at the end of this year, and we’re close! Your donation will help us get permanent electricity to the site, and help us work toward our permanent sanctuary and other rooms. This week they’re actually working on Sunday School rooms!

2) Community Centre: Did you know that you can give directly to the community centre? Your gift will help us pay the rent, and also go toward materials such as wheelchairs, hearing aids, and repairs (we have quite a monumental leak at the moment!)

3) The Cottrills’ Support: As always, you can give toward our personal support. We rely on the extra gifts that come in during December to get us through the “lean months” later in the year, and also help us cover ministry expenses such as the purchase of Bibles, printing of Bible studies, and so on.

Thanks so much for your support and encouragement!

8 December 2015

English Class: Christmas Vocabulary

Jim Just for fun, Ministry glimpses, Prayer and Praise 1

Tonight is the last English immersion class of the year, and we’re going to be learning some Christmas vocabulary. I zipped over to Tagxedo and made some word clouds to share with them (and you).

First is a word cloud that comes from the commonly read Scriptures about Jesus’ birth, as well as five of the most popular Christmas carols. The second word cloud comes from other common Christmas songs (maybe you can guess which ones they were!) and “‘Twas The Night Before Christmas”.

Personally, I think the first cloud offers a lot more hope than the second!

I chose 15 words from each word cloud, and we’ll be doing some games with them tonight. 🙂

We would appreciate your prayers this week as we wrap up our classes and have our closing program on Thursday. We haven’t been getting a lot of sleep at our house for various reasons this week, so we’re just trying to keep going!

Christmas Word Cloud 1

Christmas Word Cloud 2

5 December 2015

Upcoming Activities in December (and things to pray for!)

Jim Ministry glimpses, Prayer and Praise 0

The season of – extra activities – has certainly arrived! We would certainly appreciate your prayers for a very busy day tomorrow, and a busy week to follow.

Tomorrow morning I’ll be teaching adult Sunday school again – we’re at the 8th Commandment, “You shall not steal.” As usual we’ll have far more to talk about that we’ll have time for, but that’s what makes it interesting. 🙂

Then we have our last “Adoration Service” of the year. We’ll be talking about the first and second coming of Christ. I’m going to try to do something a little extra. It’s – well, I won’t say. But let’s just say I’ve been learning quite a bit about sheep this week.

reindeer with guitar Now Shari and I agreed to sing in a choir for an evangelistic concert (two performances, actually) in a park in Mexico City next Sunday afternoon. This morning I discovered – suprise! – we’re going to have another concert tomorrow too!

So we’ve been frantically trying to get the songs figured out. Tomorrow afternoon is a special dinner for leaders of various churches in Mexico City. We were planning to go anyway, but not we’ll be running out right after our morning service for a practice.

So tomorrow in particular is going to be pretty busy!

This coming week we also have our final community centre classes. On Thursday after the baking class we’ll have a special closing program for all our students, with some fun and some ponche.

Nathanael also has some practices for a Christmas program, but his program isn’t until the 20th. Needless to say, there’s lots more coming up this month!

Thanks for your prayers!

20 November 2015

That’s a Switch

Jim Ministry glimpses, Prayer and Praise 0

One thing we’ve learned during this semester of classes – people don’t seem to like classes at 6pm. And what time is my English class and Bible study – yep, 6pm.

Well, that’s how we learn – by trying!

Sweets-making at English Class — Making sweets at English class

But I have had people at the English class and the Bible study, though not every week. And we’re looking at making some changes for the next semester (which starts in January). We have three weeks of classes left before the Christmas season begins.
So what’s the “switch” I was talking about in the title? Well, we’ve had quite a few people who aren’t from Las Palmas in our classes. Out of the 8 people I’ve had in my English class, I don’t think any were from Las Palmas.

The other classes have had a mix.

Because Las Palmas is actually connected (you can walk from one to the other) to Santa Barbara, we do get a few from there.

And lately we’ve actually had some neighbours from our street come to classes, which has been fun! Four of the people in my English class are friends from our street. And two women from our street came to Shari’s baking class this week.

That is a switch – but it’s a fun switch! It’s been great to get to know some neighbours in a different context. And we’ve had some interesting conversations!

We’re planning some fun things for the semester ahead – we’ll see how it goes! Meanwhile, three more weeks and then our closing program on the 10th of December.

11 October 2015

The Last Two Days (with the Brubachers)

Jim Ministry glimpses, Prayer and Praise, ST Highlight 1

Lee Climbing Walls We were without internet for a couple of days, so I haven’t had a chance to write about the last two days that the Brubachers were here.

On Wednesday, we went to the community centre to do some fixing-up and cleaning-up. To the right you can see Lee playing Spiderman, trying to do the impossible and seal some leaks on from on top of the roof.

Below you can see Lee, Kyle, Carter and Nathanael pulling some weeds to make the front of the community centre look a little more presentable.

Pulling weeds At the same time, the women were baking up a storm. They also had a devotional time. Boy, those cinnamon rolls smelled gooood! 🙂

Baking Cinnamon Rolls That evening we enjoyed a prayer meeting with some church people in JesÃºs MarÃa.

The next day we went to the senior’s shelter, where the Brubacher family gave a concert and shared the Gospel.

Then we did a craft (which was a decoration with a combination Mexican/Canadian Flag), and with the help of some women from the church served lunch for everyone. There aren’t enough tables at the shelter, so some benches were used to set the plates on.

It was a long day for the Brubachers – we did another English class after that, went out for wings (LOTS of wings), and then went to the airport, where they hopped on a red-eye flight.

Thanks again, Brubachers, for having a part in the ministry here! We hope we can see you again soon!

6 October 2015

A Lot Of Activity – with the Brubachers

Jim Ministry glimpses, Missions, Prayer and Praise, ST Highlight 1

We’ve had a lot of activities this week in Ixtapaluca with the Brubachers!

Lee at the English Class — Lee helping with the karimbas at my English class.

We had a very musical service on Sunday, with the Brubacher family joining the worship band and bringing some special music of their own.

On Monday we did some site seeing and orientation, driving all over the city and topping it off with some souvenir shopping.

Today was quite a crazy day of activity! Cheryl and Sierra led a baking class, with Cheryl’s Dad’s Cinnamon Rolls. 🙂

At the same time Lee, Kyle and Carter went with me to an English class, where we learned about Canadian food and Canadian geography, went through some sailing terms, and learned a song in English.

In the afternoon we madly prepared for the next classes, and were blessed with some wonderful food at the Frys’ house.

In the evening, more English classes. In one of the classes we made wooden karimbas, which was fun. And Sierra led the craft class, with Hannah translating. They made some little figures with clay.

We just dropped the Brubachers off, but they were still going strong – making a meal for their hosts. 🙂

Meanwhile we went back to JesÃºs MarÃa to get some things ready for our visit to the senior’s shelter, which will happen on Thursday.

Brubachers with tacos — Out for REAL Mexican tacos!

Tomorrow – well, lots on tomorrow (Wednesday). But first, a little rest is in order.

Seirra at the craft class — Sierra’s craft class

Don’t forget, you can find out what the Brubachers are thinking on their blog, posted on their church Facebook page here >>> Burrito Blog with the Brubachers

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