A Wonderful Gift

A few weeks ago, Pastor Ken Herfst (the former pastor of this church who now works in another area of G.) came to visit and brought with him five boxes of kids books! Pastor Ken and his wife have only one daughter still living with them so they generously passed on this wonderful gift for the missionaries here to enjoy. Since we have older kids and lots of empty bookshelves, we have the books in our home.
Nathan had just finished reading all the books we had brought along from home (we didn't bring many) and I was wondering what we would do for more reading material. Isn't God good to provide for us? Nathan has been reading up a storm ever since. He had difficulty choosing a book for his picture, so I let him have two :)
In the first picture, he is holding a book from a series published by Focus on the Family. There are also alot of educational books-great for homeschooling and fun for the kids to read and learn.
I loved the "Grandma's Attic" books as a girl and now Kris is enjoying them as well.

Brad had just about finished the ABeka readers I had brought for him. Now we have all the ABeka readers-plenty for the whole year!

There are also a lot of books for little kids-Magic School Bus, Franklin, Winnie the Pooh and many others. Ryan didn't always like to be read to, but he is enjoying it now!
Our special thanks to the Herfst's for this wonderful gift.

And this precious "Gift" isn't interested in books yet-except to maybe chew on them! Lauren is almost eight months old and has six teeth already :) She isn't crawling yet, but she does get up on her hands and knees, pull herself to standing in her crib and wave bye-bye.

"Praise the Lord! Give thanks to the Lord for He is good. His love endures forever."

Psalm 106

Horseback Riding

Some young ladies that come to our church have a beautiful property just outside of town. They invited us to come over on Saturday afternoon and ride one of their horses.

None of the kids had ever ridden a horse so it was very exciting for them!

The horse we rode was a very gentle mare-perfect for kids to ride. She was seven months pregnant. Her one year old followed faithfully behind where ever she went.

I got so carried away taking pictures of Nate and Kris, and I didn't realize the camera battery was very low. So I didn't get any pictures of Brad or Ryan on the horse! Brad was very nervous (which shouldn't surprise anyone who knows him :)), but the horse was so gentle that he ended up enjoying it. I went on with Ryan and he told me enthusiastically that he loved it!

Nate rode the horse without anyone leading him!

Day of the Dead

Instead of Halloween, G. celebrates the Day of the Dead on November 1st. In the town we are living in, they stretched the event over two days since they have two cemeteries.

Saturday evening, we walked down to the first cemetery to see what it was all about. The cemetery was further away then we thought, so we arrived in the dark. The streets were packed with people! A lot of people were selling food, some with a proper food stand, and others with a fire right on the street with a huge pot of tamales on it.
The people believe that the spirits of their dead relatives are very near on this day. They paint the large tombstones, and decorate them with lots of flowers, evergreen branches and candles. When we approached the cemetery in the dark, it looked really neat with hundreds of candles burning. Although you would assume it would be a sad occasion for the people, it actually is very festive and people sit eating and drinking on the tombstones. Some people even hire musicians to come and play by the graveside.
November 2nd the same event happened at the cemetery on the other side of town.
In the foreground of the picture above, is the local laundry mat. Water is continually running into the basins and people come to do their laundry there.

There is a Catholic chapel on a small hill right across the street from the cemetery. I climbed the stairs a bit to get a better view of the event. As you can see in the picture above, the tombstones are very large and colourful.
Although it was interesting to see, it is a very sad reminder once again, of the emptiness of life without Christ. Drinking is very common here, but events like this only bring it out more. Just taking a brief walk through the tents, I felt very sad. Unfortunately, the 2nd was also a Sunday and church attendance was definitely lower.

Later in the week, we hiked up the hillside to visit a man who was in a car accident 5 years ago. He broke his back and is confined to a wheel chair. Wilf has visited with him on several occasions, but we all went along this time. He lives with his wife and 8 children in a house overlooking town. They have a great view! But they are very poor and of course it is very difficult for him to get around. The road doesn't look too bad in this picture, but it is really very rough in spots.

Here is the view from their house. The large white building is the Catholic church. Our house would be over to the left (you can't see it on this picture).

Happy Birthday Nate and Brad!!

We've been celebrating birthdays here for the last few days!
Brad turned 5 on Saturday...

and Nate turned 10 yesterday!

We had a birthday party for both boys on Saturday.

We started off the celebration by playing musical chairs. Even Ryan played although I don't think he had any idea what he was supposed to do :)

Next we bobbed for apples (Nate wanted to do this! I had some difficulty finding nice apples and I had to filter all the water in case the kids drank some of it.) Only Nate and Kris had ever tried it before, but all the kids succeeded in getting an apple using only their teeth....actually, I notice that Ryan is in the picture and, although he did try it, he never got an apple :) He likes to be a part of everything!

Nate easily got his apple on the first try!

Then we divided into two teams and did an obstacle course-all with some of Wilf's clothes on!! It was very cute to see the little guys with the large clothes on.

Conner trying to pop a balloon.

The birthday boy with his spoon of beans, racing to the finish line!

Finally it was time for cake!
It was quite funny because, without realizing it, I had bought candles that keep relighting!! The boys had a very difficult time blowing them out...and getting them to stay out!

And of course we had to have a pinata. Nate picked out this huge dog pinata and the kids all had a great time wacking at it.

We are so thankful to the Lord for our children and we are reminded of that again as we celebrate these milestones with them. We are really enjoying the extra time we have to spend with the kids this year. It is exciting for us to celebrate birthdays in G. this year and think about where we may be for these events next year.... :)

Antigua

Last week we had to return to the city to renew our visas. On Tuesday we went to the nearby city of Antigua. It is about an hour drive from the city. The drive is very beautiful, and the city is really colonial. It was built in the 1500's and originally it was the capital city of the country.
Unlike the town where we live, the central park is very pretty!
The city is in a valley surrounded by mountains as well as three volcanoes. The pictures above and below show two of the three. There is smoke coming out of the volcano on the left.

There are a lot of old buildings in the city. My Dad would like this city and the old architecture :)(we hope to visit Antigua again with my Mom and Dad when they come to visit).

Above is the remains of an old Catholic church and monestery. Below is the "newer" Catholic church that is still in use.

All of the streets in the city are cobblestone-a bit of a rough ride for Lauren. Thankfully, she didn't seem to mind :) Other than the old buildings, a major tourist attraction are the artisan shops. There are a lot of them in Antigua! It was fun to look at all the beautiful and very colorful things they make.

We had a great family outing, and we thank the Lord for this opportunity to see new places!

Pressing On

We were not sure how many people would come to church this Sunday after the difficulties of last week. The above picture is our walk to church. We live very close by and can easily walk over for the services. The church is the pale yellow building. (another time I will post of pictures of the front of the church.)
The group for Sunday school this morning was definitely much smaller then usual, but we were very thankful for those who came. We adjusted the Sunday school classes a bit, then immediately following Sunday school, we had a mainly Spanish worship service, with a translation of the message in Achi. The encouraging part was that everyone stayed for the worship service! In the past, all of the young people and a lot of the town people would go home because the morning service was only in Achi. Sunday evening there is a service in Spanish, but very few people attend it.

And so, with strength and wisdom from the Lord, we press on in the work before us. Thank you to those who are praying for the church here.

Recent Events

I thought I would start off this post with this beautiful rose! It is blooming right outside our front door. Often I miss beauty like this because it was the only bloom on a large bush. But isn't it awesome how God made so many beautiful things for us to enjoy....when we take the time to look?
This bunch of bananas had fallen from the banana tree in our yard. We have them hanging by our front door now until they are ready to be eaten.

Last Thursday, the Regional Committee met in our yard. The Regional Committee is made up of the obreros (Bible teachers) as well as a few others. Nico is sitting at the end of the table and the man in the center is Pastor Ken. Pastor Ken was the pastor of the church here for about ten years. He is now working in a seminary about an eight hour drive from here. He came to help out with a difficult situation in the church. After lengthy disscussion (they met all day long!), the committee wrote a letter to an elder in the church stating that he was no longer qualified to teach in the church or lead as an elder.
It was a very tiring day for everyone. The letter was delivered and we are very sad to report that it is most likely that the church will have a split. We are not sure how many people will leave, but it was a painful day here for many.

After the morning church service, some members of the church met in our yard to pray together. We ask for your prayers as we continue to work through these difficult days and begin to rebuild the church. We praise God for the confidence that we have knowing that He directs even these things.

"The Lord is my Light and my Salvation,

Whom shall I fear?

The Lord is the strength of my life,

of whom shall I be afraid?"

Psalm 27:1