Following the Father

Friday, July 10th 

Yesterday I did more painting on the iron in the courtyard wall.  The paint is so runny I end up painting my hands as well, and since it is oil pain it does not come off easily!    Like before we worked on various projects around the church all morning then ate lunch.  After lunch we all took turns in the showers.  There is a separate building where the showers and toilets are. There is a boys side and a girls side with two showers in each.

After showers we packed up and headed out to the community for VBS.  The road into the community is a winding thing made out of dirt and chunks of concrete that you can never drive more than 5-7 miles per hour on.

The kids wave and get excited when they see the two big white vans coming.  One little 5 year old boy named Thomas is usually waiting for us at the site where we set up by the mission.  I enjoy interacting with him, he's so cute and funny.  After we arrived we got in a circle to pray before setting up.  Someone from Merge or the church gives the kids name tags as they start pouring in.  I went behind the canopies to the little area where we do games and played with them while things continued to get set up. The girls enjoyed the jump ropes we brought and were very good with them.  Thomas enjoyed throwing and kicking a back and forth with me.    He grinned the entire time and would run to get the ball whenever it would get away from us and roll down the hill.  He is probably about the size of a 3 year old and has darker complexion like that of the Mexican Indians.

We did our VBS routine and rolled with what came.  I think things went pretty well and we all did better at just making the best of whatever happened.  The kids that have been there before also remember how things went before which is helpful.  I smiled as much as possible since my facial expressions are my only means of communication.  Some of the kids are really getting the Bible verse and everyone loves coloring, which is what we do to fill in time after we practice the verse. Milford and I actually have broken the Bible verse into 3 parts.  We did the first part Tues, second part Wed.and the Thurs.  Today we'll practice the whole thing.

The language barrier is driving me crazy as usual.  I think I'm OK at doing the sign language type communication but I just want so very bad to talk with kids at VBS and Pastor Thomas' family and those from the church!  I feel very used to it in a way after Ghana and Taiwan but the frustration of not being able to fully commune with everyone is still there.  I remember now why I wished when I was little that I knew all the languages of the world.

In the evening we ate a wonderful dinner that the pastor's family made outside.  Everyone had a nice bug hunk of grilled chicken.  Every evening we eat a delicious Mexican mean. After dinner our group, the family, some from the church, and Merge drove to a high spot in the city.  We drove up as far as you're allowed to drive and hiked the rest of the way (on pavement) to the top of hill where there is a large platform with a massive flag pole in the middle.  The flag wasn't flying that day which was a disappointment but the view from up there was not.  Ben got some good pictures of the city and mountains.  As it grew dark the city lights made even more incredible.  After everyone had a chance to walk around and look at the view and take pictures we gathered together to split up into groups. The real reason we went up there was to pray over the city.  We split into 4 groups, one to go to the north, south, east, and west sides of the platform.  My group, I believe, was on the North side.  Our prayer group had Milford, two men from the church, Gadiel, Niel, Ben and me.  We wrapped arms around each others shoulders and each prayed as we went around the circle and also during each others prayers.  You could feel the Holy Spirit moving as we prayed for the church, mission, our church, and the city of Monterrey.  After the groups were done praying we gathered together as one big group and prayed all at one time out loud.

Sometimes in the evening after we get back to the church compound (the Pasor's home is on the same lot) some of us will sit outside on benches with the pastor's 3 sons Joel, Gadiel, and Niel and they'll bring out their guitar and play and sing some songs for us.  If we know them sometimes we'll sing along in English.  It is fun to get to know people in casual yet deeper way.  The guys actually have their own Christian band with their first C.D coming out soon.   

Wednesday, July 8th

Yesterday was our first fully day in Monterrey.  It was busy and completely fascinating.  I am already wishing that I could have longer to get to know people.  In the morning we worked under the direction of Emmanuel of the Merge staff to scrape and sand the old peeling paint off in the church.  We also cleaned up windows and washed dusty curtains and décor and started putting on the new coat of paint.

In the afternoon after we got cleaned up we all went to the community where this church has set up a mission.  It is a very poor community, most homes are built out of what people in the States would consider trash and are the size of a large (or small) bathroom.  When we got there we split up into 3 teams.  Two teams to go invite mothers to the womens ministry and their kids to VBS and the other toset up the shelters for us to work under and get all our supplies pulled out ofthe trailer.  Since Milford can actually speak Spanish he did more of the inviting in our group as we made our way down the streets through the trash and mud.

VBS officially got under way at 4:00 though plenty of kids showed up long before that and jumped on the rented trampoline that the pastor's family had set up in advance. After we got things together we started the VBS by showing the farming/story time video that the Reiths had recorded and Ben help put together.  That taught our lesson for the day and all the other activities built on that.  Milford, Jordan, and Kristen led the kids in a song and then we slit them up into 3 age groups.  Each group went to a different station, either craft, games, or scripture memory.  The age groups would then switch stations every 15 minutes or so.  Milford and I were in charge of scripture memory, and though it was interesting trying to teach the kids a verse in a language I didn't know I believe we did reasonably well.  We a snack at that station for after we had practiced the verse but from now on we'll leave the snack for the end.  It is much too big of a draw to try to hand out food to one group at a time.  We believe about 90 kids showed up plus babies that were held by mothers and older siblings.  The pastor's wife, Ava was in charge of the womens ministry that took place during those couple of hours.

In the evening the church had a small service outside where our group introduced ourselves, Mike shared a small message, and we all sang a song for them.  Some kids from the church also sang I Am a Friend of God for us.  (in Spanish)

Thursday, July 9th

Yesterday was another full day of work, VBS, and a fun outing in the evening.  After another hot night without electricity (not that they have air conditioners but there are fans mounted on the wall in the sanctuary where the ladies are sleeping.) we got to work again in the church.  Anna and I were assigned to painting an iron gate in the courtyard wall.  All the iron window and gate openings in the courtyard concrete wall are rusty and the paint that was there is flaking off.  It is actually quite hard to get the paint on all the sides and in all the little crevices of the swirled iron.  Joel came out and "chatted" for awhile.  I guess you can still call it that when we're speaking half one language half another and sign language.  He's very laid back though and doesn't seem to mind much.  He brought out some of his paints and doodled on a corner outside on the courtyard wall.  I felt guilty for awhile about stopping my job to watch him draw and interact.  Then I remembered what Merge said in their handbook about people being more important than the jobs we're given and relaxed.  He brought out some canvas paintings that he'd done to show us as well.

The young ladies of the group quite early that day to get showered before lunch so that we could go to a girl's house from the church who had befriended the girls in our group. That ended up falling thru but we did see her in the evening. 

VBS at the mission was even more crazy than yesterday due to rain and a projector that wouldn't work. The kids still had fun and we're trying to communicate through the chaos that we care.

That evening our group and several people from the Spanish church and the pastors family went to a beautiful riverwalk in downtown Monterrey.  The whole area around the man-made river was lit up and there were fountains spread throughout the park.  What made the long walk so enjoyable and memorable for me though was building relationships with the people from the church.  The lights, clever fountains, green grass, and cute boats floating down the glossy water will only last for so long.  God's kingdom however is eternal, and so are the people he has created.  There is an amazing bond that crosses all cultures and languages in the world when people are in the body of Christ.  I could see it as I watched people from both churches talking with one another.  It may have taken 10 times as long to communicate one sentence as they tried to use their bit of English and we tried to use our bit of Spanish but I think we still learned a lot about each other that night.  There was plenty of laughter and good memories that I believe will stay with people from both churches for the years to come and be a sourceof encouragement.  I spent a lot of time walking with a new friend form the church named Yenni.  She's 13 and found me over and over againwhen we'd get separated on our walk. She was very patient with the language barrier as well.

Sunday, July 5th 2009

Today is my birthday. I didn't think much about that fact when I got up this morning, my thoughts were more occupied with getting out the door with all my stuff and to the church parking lot by 5:30am.  Today I and 16 others from church left Mac for Mexico!  I've been planning on this trip for the past several months but I didn't foresee that Ben would be going as well.  He didn't know either until Saturday! (Yesterday)  Someone from the team canceled last minute and Mike offered Ben his spot.  God allowed him the ability to finagle his schedule and pack last minute to go.

I'm right now riding in the smaller of the two vans we're taking.  One is a 15 passenger with a borrowed trailer hooked up to it, and the other is a 12 passenger with it's back seat taken out for luggage.

I didn't care for the way so many special events were crammed into June and July with no breathing space.  I felt like I haven't been able to focus on this trip as much as I'd like.  But here I am anyway, I pray God can still use this humble vessel.

Tuesday, July 7th

Last night we arrived in Monterrey around 5:45pm.  We followed Alex and the others from Merge Ministries to the church that we ware staying at and partnering with.  Alex met us at the border town in Texas that we spent the night at in a church.  We didn't really get going again yesterday toward the border till around 10:30am.  There is a paper that we didn't know about that we were supposed to have for the borrowed trailer when we cross the border that we were trying to get faxed to us.  It took about 2-3 hours to get completely across the border due to more issues with paper work for the trailer.  Dale (director of Merge Ministries) ended up having to drive to the border (He lives in the border town we slept at) with another paper that they said we needed.  We did make it across though without having to have the vans searched by the military checkpoint. 

When we arrived at the church in Monterrey the pastor and his family came out to greet us with a little more than a hand shake.  The pastor had an accordion and one of his sons had a large 12 string guitar and they played and sang some songs to welcome us.  We then all lined up and shook hands and were introduced to everyone.  Later in the evening some of the other church members came to greet and eat supper with us.  They had long tables and benches set up outside in the courtyard where they were planning for us all to eat but it started to storm so they moved things indoors.  It poured like the storms I remember from the rainy season in Ghana. 

After we ate and were getting our things unloaded and put into the church where we were going to sleep we saw lightning strike the power box and line across the street.  It knocked our power our and we are still without it.  After the rain stopped the kids from the church started a football (soccer) game.  Hannah, one of the pastor's granddaughters, spent a lot of time in her extremely expressive way trying to communicate with the group.  She finally got across to Tyler that she was asking if they would play football.  Tyler said yes and she spun around from him and shouted "FOOTBALL!" and all the kids came running.  It was a great icebreaker.

Again it has been awhile!  I keep telling myself I'll do better with consistent blogging but I keep having technical touble and it discouraging me!  I have the most trouble with pictures and blog posts aren't nearly as interesting without them.

I'd been planning for the last several months to go with my church on a short missions trip to Monterrey Mexico.  The team was meeting every Monday evening to plan and train for our time there.  The day before we left one member of team cancled, so who do you think hopped on the tain?  Ben!  He had thought about going but never signed up thinking it just was a little too much after going on the Columbia vision trip recently.  Our youth director (he was leading the trip, though it was a youth and adult combo) offered Ben his spot the day before.  Ben pulled some VERY last minute strings and God made it work out!

I'm going to put up a series of blog posts with entries from my journal.  I figure that's the easiest way to share about my time there.