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| No photos for you today. Things continue to go well,
and we are finding plenty of ways to stay busy. August and Addie
returned from camp Friday and reported having a great time. Lord
willing we will be able to have some additional children go with them
next year, but were unable to get anyone registered this time
around. Braden and I have begun our guitar lessons and are doing
well with them. We have another lesson tonight. The actual
playing so far is not all that difficult, but it sure makes your
fingers sore! I've found that after about 10 minutes of playing
my fingers become so grooved and sore that I can't hold the string in,
no matter how hard I press. I know that this will change
eventually, and look forward to that happening! Braden and I
went out this morning on our regular visitation. I have targeted
some specific areas to begin with, and those seem to be responding
well. We've had a few "difficult" contacts, but most
of the people are friendly and willing to receive our materials.
We will be returning to each of these different areas once a month for
the forseeable future, trying to build a bit of a relationship with
each family. It will take time, but we firmly believe the Lord
will bless these efforts. Nothing else to report at this
time. Have a good day!
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| What can I say...not much different here. Still hot,
still dry and still no visitors as of yet. We did get
the signs and the posts in place, and were able to use them this
past week. They seemed to work well, but still no
visitors. We went as a family up to Wal-Mart this past Friday to
try again and get kids registered for summer camp. We actually
faced a stiffer crowd this time, with far more people even refusing to
take the information that we offered. Tomorrow morning I am
going out with Hmo. Saenz to do some more house-to-house
visitation. Braden and I will probably also go out Thursday
morning. It's my desire that this will become part of our weekly
schedule. Braden and I also begin guitar lessons tomorrow in
Mexico with Hmo. Ulises. I know it will take a while, but I'm
looking forward to being able to use that ability in the ministry here
as well. We just returned from Camp Loma de Vida where we
dropped August and Addie off for their week. Braden enjoyed his
week last week, and the other two were certainly looking forward to
their time at the camp as well. We pray that they will be
careful with the heat. Today marks the 24th straight day with
temperatures at-or-above 100 degrees. In fact, today it was
113. No change is in sight....the next 10 days are all forecast
for highs between 105-110. This is actually an unprecedented
heat wave for this area, and I could certainly do without it!!
Since I don't have anything else to share at this time, I'll just say
- more to come later!
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| Last week
our new flags arrived and we were able to get them mounted on the front of
the garage, facing the road. Their is the Christian flag to the
left, the U.S. flag in the middle and the Texas flag on the right. |
Braden,
August and Addie stop for a shot in front of the Camp Loma de Vida sign. |
This
summers theme for camp is "The Ultimate Battle". |
Braden
plays a game of ping pong while waiting for others to arrive. |
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| Greetings from Texas. In my last report I mentioned
a missionary by the name of Bro. Marvin Hooge. I was able to get
together with him last week and travel over to Mexico to visit his
work in Miguel Aleman. We went on Wednesday and he showed me the
facility and introduced me to his national pastor, Bro. Ulises.
We also had the opportunity to speak some about our respective works
and histories. On Thursday bro. Hooge invited me back with him
to attend their mid-week service. A couple of interesting things
about that service were 1.) though the building has "swamp
coolers", they do little to really cool the air and 2.) though
these people are just across the border from us, they spoke almost no
english. So, it was different, but still a good visit.
Bro. Hooge, Bro. Ulises and myself also had the opportunity to share
some leads, and Lord willing we may be able to see a visitor or two
during one of our upcoming Wednesday evening Bible studies.
Braden and I are also considering the possibility of travelling over
to Miguel Aleman once a week for guitar lessons that Bro. Ulises is
offering for free. It seems like a good opportunity, we're just
trying to make sure all of the incidentals, such as how we would be
transported inside of Mexico, are worked out. Otherwise,
property work continues here. Braden and I have finished the
vast majority of the "trim" and "cutting in" for
the remaining painting. I am planning to roll the walls
tomorrow, which will bring us very close to finishing this
project. I can't say I will miss painting! This afternoon
Braden departs for camp. We will leave here around 1:30 and drop
him at the camp at 3:00, then pick him back up on Friday around 12:00
noon. We know he's excited about this week. Below, you will see in the photos below that our new banners arrived.
We're placing one in front of the house and one on US83 (the main
expressway) to direct people onto our road. The sign on US83 is
actually on our neighbors property, but he gave us permission to put
it up weekly. I set plastic tubes in the ground, with removable
caps, so that I can just take the cap off and slide the post into
place each Wednesday morning, and then take it back out that
evening. These signs will help
somewhat with advertising, but are primarily intended to help people
locate us, as most visitors miss the road the first time they try to
come here (and sometimes the second, third, fourth, etc). Also
below you will see photos of Melissa's Sunday School class. In
closing, we're happy to report that one of our supporting churches
recently increased our monthly support, bringing us up to 62.45%
support.
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| Braden
"cutting in" the grooves on the siding. |
I'm testing
the position of the sign, while Melissa evaluates. |
Starting to
dig the hole for the first post. |
Okay, the
post hole diggers weren't working, so let's try the pick. |
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| Okay, the
pick didn't work either, so we changed locations (I hit asphalt on the
other spot). |
This hole
is working better. Time to set the pole. |
Tamping
aroung the pole to get a good seat. |
Braden is
still painting those grooves. This is really not his favorite job. |
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| The sign in
front of our house is up. |
A closer
view of the sign. |
A further
view of the sign, showing the position in relation to the other buildings
(the sign is to the right of the road). |
Melissa's
Sunday School class singing "He's Able". Some of the girls
help out by holding the words. |
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| These are
the girls in Melissa's Sunday School class working on their workbooks |
A closer
shot. This is Addie, Emily and Priscilla. |
Here's a
shot of the boys working on their workbooks. |
This is
Silemy Torres choosing a game piece during the review game. |
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| Here's a
shot of the class as they volunteer to answer the tie-breaking,
game-winning question during the review game. |
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| Ugh, is it HOT! The last couple of days we've been
hitting 109 degrees for the high temperatures. Fortunately, it
"cools off" to the lower 80's and even sometimes the upper
70's at night. But, the days have been brutal. Not a lot
to report today, but we can share a few things. This past
weekend we enjoyed a special "4th of July" service at
Iglesia Bautista Betania. They had "patriotic-themed"
services and then after the morning service they had a large
"cookout" under the tent. They were serving free
Hamburgers and Hot Dogs, with chips and a drink. The food was
good and it was a chance to spend time with some of our church friends
as well. Today we had to continue with property work, despite
the heat. Braden and I started painting around 6:30 this
morning, but had to stop by 10:00. We are trying to touch-up the
walls on the garage and casita and also paint all of the trim.
It's hard to see the difference in the photo below, but the trim is
now the same color as the "blocks" on the garage door.
Tomorrow I will paint the other door, but by the time I got to that
point today the paint was literally drying as soon as it was
applied. We also began scraping the remaining walls so that they
can be painted as well. After we stopped painting for the day I
moved inside to the "cooler" office. I say cooler
because it was much more comfortable, but it wasn't altogether
cool. The AC in my office struggles once the temperature outside
tops 100. But, I was able to install the two new bookcases,
giving me room to finally finish unpacking all of my boxes from
Virginia. I'm still working on organizing everything, but am
glad to have my space finally coming together. Also, this
afternoon I spoke with a fellow missionary that lives here in Rio
Grande City. His name is Marvin Hooge and he and his wife are
veteran missionaries with several works over in Mexico. I
offered our services to help him in any way that we can and look
forward to the possibility of spending some time with him. He
also mentioned that they occassionally have leads of individuals that
move from Mexico to our side of the border, and that therefore he may
be able to direct some individuals to our ministry here as well.
Have a great day.
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| Standing in
line yesterday waiting for lunch. By this point it's about 103
outside. |
Braden
chats with one of his teen friends while waiting in line. |
Some of the
people sitting and eating. There are so many people that they have
to eat in "shifts", with people vacating their seats as soon as
they are finished. |
The newly
trimmed front of the garage. Everything will need a 2nd coat, but
it's looking a lot better. It actually looks better in person. |
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| This side
wall of the garage has to be completely scraped (it's 24' long). We
also have to scrape part of the back wall as well as part of 2 walls on
the casita. But, progress is being made. |
Newly
installed bookcases in my office. |
Another
shot of the office. Very soon I hope to have the blinds
installed. We already have them, but I've been putting this project
off due to having to drill into the concrete to install them. |
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| Well, it's now July and our ministry has
"officially" begun. Not that we haven't been busy the
past few months preparing, but now we are actually conducting our
weekly Bible Studies and moving forward with the direct aspects of the
ministry. That said, preparations in other areas are
continuing. While the group from Holly Hills was here they were
able to clear an Aloe Vera flowerbed along the fenceline beside our
enclosed trailer. They also moved a large pile of dirt that was
beside another flower bed. Both seem like simple, unimportant
tasks. However, because of that work being completed we were
able to move our trailer about 5' closer to the fence and then move
the bus into the grassy area beside the trailer (their was not enough
room before). That change, combined with the removal of the dirt
pile in the driveway freed up parking for at least 3 more
vehicles. This will be very important as we begin to have
visitors, as previous visitors (workers from Betania) didn't really
have a place to park and it confused them greatly. So, this will
certainly help. We will eventually improve the parking more,
either with cement or gravel, but this arrangement will work for the
time being. Today I am also ordering signage for in front of our
property as well as on the main road, which will help people locate
our facility and understand where to go once they arrive. Our
neighbor was gracious enough to grant permission to place signs on his
property along the main highway, which will help direct others onto
our road. Last night we held our first "service" here
on the property. There have been others, but July 1st was the
date we gave to the general public as far as our first service
date. We did not see any visitors, but are not letting that
discourage us. We are willing to wait as long as it takes for
this work to move forward. We are already conducting the
services in Spanish, even though for now it is just our family .
This is excellent practice for me, and will help the rest of the
family as well. Until we have visitors, Melissa translates
everything into English, which allows me to double check that I said
what I intended to say!! I am very thankful for a wife with a
gift in the area of languages. Yesterday afternoon I re-arranged
the casita and moved our "meeting room" into the smaller of
the two rooms. Because of the dimensions of the room we are
actually able to seat more in there, plus it is the room with the Air
Conditioner! At this time we have seating for 14 people, but
will be able to add about 2 more seats in the near future. As we
grow we expect that Melissa will take the youngest children into the
other room for a more child-oriented service, which will increase our
capacity even more. We will probably "max out" at
around 25-30 people, but by then should be ready to begin pursuing
other arrangements for a meeting facility. Not much else to
report at this time. Have a great
day!
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| Due to the
work done by Holly Hills, we were able to clear the driveway to make room
for future visitors. |
Another
shot of the new parking arrangement |
And yet
another view |
The county
finally removed our brush pile, cleaning up the entrance to the
casita. Our neighbor wants these big "stumps", so they
will be removed very soon as well. |
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| Another
shot of the casita, now that the large brush pile is removed |
August
waits for the service to begin as we make the final preparations with the
projector and audio equipment |
Melissa and
the kids are ready and we're about to begin. |
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