Sorry Miriam

I've been reprimanded for not updating the blog. I'll try to do better but face it, I'm a slacker!

This is what we "have" to look at when we step out of the classroom... EVERYDAY!

This is a picture of 2 gringos at the language school where we will be studying. All they have to do is turn around and they will have seen more mountains than most Texans will see in a lifetime. All that while leaning on a palm tree:)

This is just a taste of our new ministry setting. Now that I know how to post pictures I'll try to put them on regularly.

Thanks for noticing.

We're still alive

We're finally in Costa Rica after 3 1/2 weeks of travelling the US. We visited most of our family on the way home from VA. We made stops in WV, KY, LA, and TX before boarding the plane on Sunday April 27. We threw in one last stop in GA and saw one of our old friends Tyler. His church was such a blessing to us and another family that flew to Costa Rica with us. Westhills Church paid for our stay in Atlanta at the Airport Hilton and treated us to one last meal at Chili's. God uses his people to minister to eachother for sure.

Our new house is really cool. We have two palm trees and two banana trees in the backyard. The boys have caught 2-3 geckos in the yard already. We have an old rusty machete in the backyard as well. Every boy needs a "lucky machete." So far it has rained every afternoon but the temperature has been very nice overall. From our front yard we can see the mountains which are very pretty. As the day progresses you can see the clouds roll in and the mountaintops become difficult to see. Its really cool looking. It reminds us of Hawaii.

We are in language school orientation through Tuesday. Classes will officially begin next Wednesday. We are ready to get going on the Spanish. We have been brave little soldiers since we arrived, making several trips by bus, taxi, and mostly on foot. We will not have a car until we get to Peru in another year. Maybe that will help me lose the 10 lbs. I gained at orientation in VA.

I'll post some pictures of our new life, house, etc. as soon as I can get to it. Until then just use your imagination:)

P.S. We have a new phone # with an (817) area code. It is a free call for most of you back home, especially if you call from your cell. IF you want the # e-mail me and I'll send it to you.

Almost finished

We are happy to report that we will be finished with orientation in one week! Next Wednesday 4/2 to be exact. Our time here has been a blessing for sure. However, a man's stomach can only handle so much cafeteria food and then it goes on a hunger strike. My limit is drawing very near.

If you had our Vonage ph.# and tried to use it, you quickly realized that we disconnected it. The internet out here is so slow we couldn't even use an internet phone. We are trying to decide what service to use when we go to Costa Rica & Peru. We are leaning toward using Skype. That is basically a computer to computer call over the internet. We will even be able to make video calls using our webcam. It is pretty sad when you have to move out of the country to get high-speed internet.

As far as the family goes, the boys are having a great time here. We have seen God working in both of their lives over the past few weeks. Trevor read all 507 pages of his Beginner's Bible in less than one week. His teacher said that he would lay under the table and read it during playtime. He also surprised us one day when he just started quoting all of these long Bible verses from memory. We were like, "What in the world?" I have been praying that God would give Trevor a hunger and passion for His Word and the Lord keeps answering, "YES, YES, YES!"

My prayer for Jordan has been that God would make him a bold witness for the Lord Jesus Christ and that God would use him to witness to his new friends overseas. Already, Jordan has been learning how to share his faith with people. His favorite method is using Chronological Bible Storying. He asked me one day if he could share the story of Jesus' baptism with our small group which consist of 19 people. He did a great job! He also told me the other day that he wanted to get a Beginner's Bible in Spanish so he could tell the stories to the children in Peru. God answers prayers!!!

Thanks for all of your prayers.

Lessons from the Wood Shop

We continue to be blessed and challenged daily. We just had the privilege of sitting under the teaching of Dr. Tom Elliff for the past several days. We learned so much as he shared with the group. He is one of those guys who knows the Lord so intimately and knows the Bible like the back of his hand. Usually, those are the kind of guys that are really annoying and can't relate at all to the common man/woman. This guy is awesome though. His teaching style is to break everything down to most simple form instead of talking over everyone's head. He also had a ton of really cool stories that he used to reinforce his points.

He told a story about a time he and his granddad were in the wood shop building a piece of furniture together. His granddad was holding two pieces of wood together and asked Tom to hand him a certain tool. Tom wasn't sure what tool he was referring to, so he guessed and began to reach for the wrong one. His granddad said, "No, the one right up there." Tom took another shot at it but still guessed wrong. Again, his granddad tried to point him in the right direction. On the third try Tom got it right. When he went to hand the tool over, his grandad said "Never mind, I already used this screwdriver to do the job. It wasn't the best tool for the job, but it was the one closest to my hand." His grandad stopped and told him "God doesn't always use the best suited tool for the job but the tool closest to his hand." He explained how so many people in this world seem more gifted/qualified for certain tasks but they will never be used because they are far from God.

God has really used that story to issue a challenge to my heart. My prayer is that I will be close to the Lord's hand, that I will make myself available to Him.

True Followers

This has been an interesting week. We have been studying the persecuted church. We had 2 days of sessions on what God is doing in countries where following Jesus is hazardous to your health. The things that believers go through in some of those places is unbelievable.

In the US, we worship in freedom so it is hard for us to picture anything different. However, persecution is the norm for a large part of the world. I get a little irritated when I hear people in US churches talking about how hard it is to be a Christian, or how much persecution they experience at their job or school. In the states, it is illegal to do to people what is being done to believers around the world. In some countries, when a family member decides to follow Jesus his/her father (or another relative) is obligated to kill them. This usually occurs within the first 72 hours after their conversion. Others are tortured until they deny Jesus. Others have bones broken, houses burned, or property stolen. The locals will no longer sell them food in the markets.

My God is the God who brings life out of death and He is showing himself faithful among those under persecution. Church planting movements are springing up in some of the darkest places. Their church looks different than what we are used to and it has to. Many of them meet under the cover of darkness. Most of them meet in houses. They baptize new believers in bathtubs. In the midst of danger, they boldly tell people about Jesus Christ. That is very humbling to me.

This Sunday as we sit in our comfy chairs/pews let us remember our bruised and scarred brothers and sisters who are literally in dark, rat-infested, confinement cells singing heart-songs to Jesus.

Drama and Stuff

Well, we are in the swing of things here in VA. We have kind of settled into somewhat of a normal routine. The Lord has been faithful to us as we have gone through some testing of our faith. We were without any way of calling home to family for a couple of weeks and everything we tried just seemed to fail. That is a long story and I don't want to bore myself with it so just trust me on this one, OK? Then we had car trouble and almost got stranded (without a cell phone) in the middle of who knows where. Eventually, we had the car towed and I had the opportunity to share a little bit with the tow truck driver about what we were doing out in the middle of nowhere in a "compound" that looks like it was designed by David Koresh (sp?). In the end, I prayed for him and his mother who had just broken her back after falling off her horse (insert joke here). Ask the Lord to use our conversation and prayer to stir his heart to know more about the Savior.

The focus on this week's sessions is being a cross-cultural witness. Today, we studied a lot of anthropology. It was interesting if you like that kind of stuff. We are also studying the book of Acts from the point of view of a church-planter. Basically, we are studying the patterns that Paul and the disciples used as they planted the early churches. It has been good to really get into the Word through a book study. It has been a little while since I have done that. Our final month before moving out here was so hectic, I let my quiet time dwindle down to next to nothing. Thankfully, God has been teaching us a lot from His Word since we've been here. It's amazing how you can be spiritually revitalized when there is no TV around to distract you. Do TVs still exist? I was just curious because we've been a little out of touch with reality lately.

Thanks for the prayers and everything.

In the Beginning

We have reached our destination in VA and have started our training. Everything is going well and the boys are having a lot of fun meeting new friends and playing sports everyday.

Here is our typical schedule (in my opinion):

1. Get up way too early (and you still miss breakfast)
2. Go to morning seminars
3. Go to lunch
4. Go to afternoon seminars
5. Play with the kids for an hour or so
6. Go to dinner between 5-6pm only (that's just crazy)
7. Play basketball for an hour or so (not nearly long enough)
8. Campus turns into a ghost town at 8pm sharp (weird, huh?)

That's basically our life for the next 7 weeks. The seminars are very informative and usually very challenging spiritually. I have already felt hugely inadequate to carry out the task set before us. I have said this over and over but I'll say it again: I am just a regular, common, ordinary person just like you. There is not one ounce of 'super-spirituality' in my whole being. I simply said, "I'll go where you send me Lord." Imagine if the Lord sent you half way around the world to make his name known to a people who have never heard. Think of how dwarfed you would feel from such an awesome responsibility. Now you are beginning to get a glimpse of what is going through our hearts and minds.

Here are a few things that we would ask you to pray for:

• That we would fall deeper in love with the Lord Jesus than we ever have before.
• That we would seek His face in earnest prayer everyday.
• That we would weep over the lost like Jesus did.
• That we would boldly share the message of the cross.

Thanks for caring.