IT'S JUST A PHONE

So....we all live in a time where we place a lot of importance on things.

For instance....most of us have come to rely on our cell phones as a necessity.

But, sometimes it takes a good slap upside the head to remind us what is really, truly important. Is it our cell phone? No, not really.

My old cell phone

So, last Friday, Jan 2nd, I was 'slapped upside the head'. Not literally, but figuratively.

I was out walking on the boulevard here in San Cristobal, as I often do, and it was about 

3:00 PM in the afternoon. I am always pretty aware of all that is going on around me, but I did not notice a young guy, about 18 - 20 yrs. old come up behind me. I just heard someone behind me say something, so, I turned around and saw this guy standing a few feet away. He then said to me, "give me your phone". 

It was about that moment when I looked him over and saw the gun in his hand pointed at my chest. I must admit my first thought was not fear, but I was amazed that someone would take a chance of going to prison for years over an old cell phone.

So, he points the gun more forcefully at me and repeats himself, "give me your phone".

Well, it's just a phone, so I handed him my cell phone. 

He took the phone and told me to continue walking where I was headed and he went the other way. He went down and crossed the boulevard and it looked like he got in a taxi.

Afterwards it hit me a little more what had happened, and I thanked the Lord for His protection from injury, or worse. Afterall, it's just a phone.

I also had some money on me, not a lot, but some, but he never even asked for anything other than my phone.

Unfortunately, thus is the state of affairs in Guatemala. Crime continues to increase here, as poverty and desperation also increase.

I now can say we LIVE in Guatemala, as it seems a majority of people who have lived in Guatemala at least 5 years, have at some point been a victim of crime. 

Please pray for Guatemala, for the crime and violence that keeps growing here. 

I continue to believe that most people are good, and I love Guatemala more than ever.

 I will continue to walk, carefully, not wanting to let the bad guys have the victory there.

The day after I was robbed, at our youth group meeting while we were taking prayer requests, my daughter Maria asked that we would pray for the guy who robbed me. I pass that request on to all of you, please pray also for him. 

Pray that God's light would shine on Guatemala.

My new phone

It's just a phone. I do have a new phone now, it is a very valuable tool. But.......

It's just a phone.

CHRISTMAS ACTIVITIES!

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

 

We want to give you an update on our Christmas Eve outreach dinner, and some events preparing for that. But, first.....

 

We hope that you all had a wonderful Christmas. We know many, many of you had weather issues to contend with and we were praying that it would not put a damper on your celebration of Christ's birth!

Yes, Christmas here was sunny and warm, I even washed the car in shorts and a tank top. But....we also were affected by the weather.

My sister Terry, and her son Cesar (Felicita and Maria's little bro), were scheduled to be with us Dec 22 - 28, but as they were waiting in line at Sea-Tac airport to leave, they were informed their flight had been canceled. So they never made it. We were all so very disappointed, but now look forward to their visit hopefully in February!

We had a very relaxed Christmas, Kimber is here with us so we were only missing our son, Jacob.

 

Family at Christmas missing Jacob

We know many of you were praying for our activities planned around Christmas, and we want to report that you were very effective! Things went even better than we could have hoped!

Quick rundown.....we began plans a couple months ago to hold a Christmas Eve dinner / outreach at Casita Benjamín, a care center for children located by the large Guatemala City dump in a very poor neighborhood. For many families in this area Christmas can be a very sad, depressing time. Many cannot afford to buy even one gift for their children, much less provide a typical Christmas Eve dinner of Tamales, Ponche y pan.

We began practicing Christmas carols with our youth group from church. They all are from a children's home, most are orphans themselves. The idea was for them to help with the program by singing, helping with a children's program while the adults would have an evangelical message, then to serve the Tamale dinner. For practice, we took the youth to Kairos House on the 17th to sing for the people there. It was a wonderful evening of Christmas carols and worship!

Some of our youth group singing and dancing at Kairos House.

On the 23rd we had all the girls in the group over to our house to help bake cookies for the Christmas Eve dessert! They made over 500 cookies! And we had a LOT of fun too! It ended up being an almost all day event, and we had flour ALL OVER! Pizza for lunch and a movie to end the afternoon. They also made a lot of decorations for Casita Benjamin.

Making lots of cookies!

Making decorations too!

Frosting some of the 500+ cookies!

Watching Polar Express and eating popcorn!

Christmas Eve we picked up the youth in a rented bus at about 1:00 PM. We were at Casita Benjamin by 2 and began decorating and preparing. This being the first time this has been done there, we had no idea how many people would come, it could 40, or 175.

The people began arriving about 4 in the afternoon, as it was scheduled for 4 - 6:30. It is a very dangerous area, and everyone arrived by foot, so we wanted them to get home before it got too late.

Decorating Casita Benjamín

Practicing songs before people arrive!

Our youth were FANTASTIC!!!! I am so proud of them. They did GREAT. They sang beautifully, kept the children entertained during the adults program, and served everyone there with a smile and with joy!

We never got an actual count of people (it was a little busy) but estimate probably around 100 people not including our youth and some other helpers, Casita staff etc. Maybe 130 in all. It was so well received it looks like this will become an annual event!

The adults loved it, and we know the Lord is working in many hearts. Everyone there, adults and children received a gift and the smiles were EVERYWHERE!

Singing carols before dinner

Some of the children's program

Singing Noche de Paz (Silent Night) with candels

After the people left, we cleaned and returned by the bus to our church for a Christmas Eve service and, you guessed it, another Tamale dinner! Again our youth served the meal. That hadn't been planned because we knew we would be arriving late, but they just did it on their own!!!!

Bus ride home after a FANTASTIC outreach!

 

It was amazing, God was very evident through it all. THANK YOU ALL SO MUCH FOR YOUR PRAYERS AND SUPPORT OF THESE EVENTS! Many, many people were reached.

Again, Thank you, and may the Lord bless you each and all, now, and in the new year to come!

GRADUATION! November / December 2008

In Guatemala it is a big deal to receive certificates or diplomas of most any kind.

They even have a BIG graduation ceremony for the kids leaving 'Day Care' to begin regular school!

In mid-November the Casita Benjamín held their graduation and I was invited as an honored guest! They even made me sit in the front row!

Casita Benjamín Class of 2008!

The graduation was held at Iglesia Nazaret which is in Zona 3 fairly close to Casita Benjamín. 

It was fun also for our two interns, Megan & Amy, who were serving at the Casita during this time. Amy even taught the kids a song to sing which they performed at the graduation!

Early in December, Megan & Amy returned to the States after 2 1/2 months of serving here in Guatemala. It was sad to see them go, but......they will be back!

Mid-December brought us two new interns! Sisters Amy & Grace Emtage arrived to serve for 5 weeks over their Christmas break from college. They are serving at Casita Benjamín, and were a HUGE help with our Christmas Eve outreach dinner we held at the Casita.

More on that in the next blog!

OH GO FLY A KITE! Nov. 1, 2008

There is a tradition in Guatemala to fly kites on November 1. There are big competitions all over the country, with communities building kites that can reach more than 20 feet across!

This year, Oscar Jr and I had an all day event with our youth group to build kites, and then go fly them. It was an awesome day, and the kites (well, almost all of them) actually flew very well!

Building the initial kite framework

We started from scratch with some type of long grass? where we used the long stem to make the frames. Then everyone could personalize their kite with different colors of 'papel china'. Then you need to make very looooooooooooooooooog tails for the kites!

Iris showing off her completed kite!

After we finished making the kites, we of course, needed to eat having worked up an appetite, so we had a pizza party before going out to fly our kites!

Most of our gang displaying their kites before the launch.

We went to a spot with few trees overlooking a huge ravine to fly our kites. There were few trees, but lots of bushes, so we did need to rescue several kites.

My kite just before it escaped!

I may have won the prize for flying the farthest, but we will never know for sure, because it never came back!

It went up, up, up, up and up some more. Eventually there was so much string out that the string broke, and the kite kept going up, up, up, up and more up until it was out of sight!

It was a fun day that we will all remember for a loooooooong time!

A Slow Season?

So...this is supposed to be our slower time of the year, and I suppose it actually is, but we've been busy enough for the time to fly by! Yes, we have fewer numbers of people coming through right now, but still trying to catch up on everything that got behind during the very busy summer months. 

We also had some health issues to deal with. Sandi begin to have some abdominal problems so we went to see a Doctor and it was determined that she needed a hysterectomy right away! So after a few days of tests, etc, Sandi entered the hospital and had surgery! Praise the Lord we had so many people praying for her and the Doctors that everything went as good as it can go. Sandi is getting stronger each day and in another week or two she should be cleared to do anything she wants to again! 

That is a good thing because next week a group of ladies from our home church, Northlake Community Church, are coming to Guatemala for 11 days! Sandi is planning to be working with them for most of their time here!

I somehow during August developed something that was causing me to have severe vertigo. There was no infection in my ears etc. but every 3 - 5 days I would have a severe case of vertigo. I tried an ear Doctor here, but did not care much for him and the treatment he gave me made no difference. I went to a different Doctor and she has been very thorough, and I am optimistic things are getting taken care of. In the last 4 weeks I have had only 2 smaller 'attacks'.

Now, we are working on planning upcoming events. We are already working on plans for the Summer Intern program in 2009. We are having to make adjustments as CAM is having a Convocation, with ALL CAM personnel going to Texas for a week in July '09.

We are also working on a Christmas Eve evangelical outreach dinner for families in the neighborhoods around the dump in Zone 3.

We also have 4 interns here now! Megan Goodwin, Amy Seebeck, Becky Soyster & our daughter Kimberly! Megan and Amy spent 2 weeks in Language school and our now serving at Casita Benjamín. Becky just finished 4 weeks of language school and is serving at The Oasis home for girls. Kimber has another week of language school then will join Becky at The Oasis.

Megan, Amy, Kimber and Becky (l to r)

We continue with our other activities and ministries. We go into Kairos house weekly to visit and lead a worship time with the people there. Many times we enter and you can feel a depressed atmosphere when some kids are not doing well. Usually after an hour of singing to the Lord and a time of prayer it is so much lighter! For a short time the focus is lifted to heaven and the burdens become lighter. It is such a blessing to be there with those families.

Worshiping at Kairos House

We continue to be involved at our church - Comunidad Cristiana 'Pueblo de Dios'.  I continue to help lead the youth group and it is going great. I was invited to the "SOS Las Aldeas", a children's home that most of our youth come from, last week for the 15th birthday of one of the boys in our group. It was a great time to see how the youth that have been coming to our church are really growing in ways the kids that don't come are not. 

This coming week is a traditional time here in Guatemala where everybody goes out and flies kites! We are having an all day activity this coming Saturday for our youth group where we will meet in the morning and build kites, then go out in the afternoon and fly them!

Hugo's 15th birthday!

Last week we also had a very sad occasion. The 15 yr old daughter of one of the elders in our church died. She just had what was thought to be a small cold, and then she died Friday night at about 8 PM. I went to be with the family until about 4 AM and then Saturday at 11 AM was the burial. It was so sad. Things move fast here in Guatemala. Death is never convenient and so here you drop what you are doing and go to the funeral. She was the sweetest girl you could ever meet, and it is very hard on the family. Please remember the Melindez family in your prayers.

More Interns, including our daughter!

September is here and we are looking forward to more interns arriving.
We have 4 interns set to come to Guatemala very soon. Megan Goodwin and Amy Seebeck will arrive Sept. 20 and after spending 2 weeks at language school in Antigua they will serve at Casita Benjamín until early December.
Also arriving Sept 20 will be Becky Soyster, she will spend 4 weeks in language school then will serve at The Oasis home for girls until the end of April 2009!

In addition, our daughter Kimberly has recently been accepted for an internship to also serve at The Oasis for 6 months. Kimber's arrival date is not set as she still needs to raise some more support. She only needs to raise less than $400 in monthly support before she can come, so we are hoping the Lord will provide quickly so she can join Becky soon. Please pray with us that the Lord will provide these needed funds quickly, and about another $1000 in outgoing expenses to cover language school, airfare, visas, etc.
Kimber has received some very encouraging gifts recently and our home church, Northlake Community Church, has pledged to help monthly also!

Kimber with Teresita at Kairos House

Please be praying for all four of these young ladies as they prepare to come. Pray for their health and safety, and that their hearts will be prepared for what God has in store for them in Guatemala!

Pray also for us as we prapare to receive them and help encourage them as they minister here.

CHURCH ELECTIONS - but...stay within the lines!

We are members of "Iglesia Evangelica, Comunidad Cristiana, 'Pueblo de Dios'" here is San Cristóbal and we love our church.

We love our church family here, and the wonderful way they do things "Guatemalan".
They have accepted us just as anybody else, not treating us differently, or 'special' because we're North Americans, or 'missionaries'. When we started attending Pueblo de Dios, we told them we just wanted to attend, not be expected to do much for awhile. We needed time to fit in, we needed time to learn more Spanish, and just how things are done here. Many times in churches here, when a North American or missionary becomes part of the church, they are looked to for answers to everything, to be in charge of things and to lead. There is an attitude toward North Americans in situations like that of "they can do anything, and know what should be done".
Our church was so gracious, they gave us time to just fit in, and they loved us just like anyone else there.
We have gradually become more involved, and the church is growing! We have had a few groups come and work in the church, and that has really made our church come together in a lot of ways. I am helping lead the youth group, and when I started we had 4 youth each week, now we average between 15 - 20, and are seeing changes taking place in our youth!

Youth at Pueblo de Dios

I have become more involved in some leadership, and am gradually being asked to do more.

Mike presenting a group to the church

Sandi has been involved with a womens bible study that meets weekly and we have hosted a few church functions in our home.

Then, just recently our church leadership has been preparing to form a new board. We need a "Board of Directors" to replace our "Board of Service" for some legal reasons to resolve some long standing issues and get everything back under the "official" direction of the church. They asked me if I would be willing to serve and if they could put my name on the ballot with 3 others for position of Tesorero (Treasurer). I said yes, and so they put me on the ballot.

You gotta love the way they do things here...They asked me on Thursday and Saturday we had a congregational meeting to elect a new board! After a lengthy explanation of the procedures for choosing a board and how to vote, each member of the church over 18 and baptised, was given a ballot and a.........CRAYON!

"OFFICIAL VOTING INSTRUMENTS"

We had plenty of pencils, but no sharpener it appears. So...improvise! I LOVE IT!

Anyway, when the dust settled (or crayon shavings) out of 29 ballots cast I received 25 votes, so am now the new Tesorero for Pueblo de Dios.

Fortunately, the previous Tesorera will now be the Pro-Tesorera (vice-treasurer) and will help me a lot. I do not know the tax system or how church finances work here in Guatemala. (Not that I know much of that in the USA either)

Of all the jobs I could have in a church, being the treasurer is probably not the one I would seek, however, they have asked me to do this and I consider it a privilege to serve our brothers and sisters at Pueblo de Dios is this way. They have shown great love for us, and great confidence in us and we consider it an honor and a blessing to be members of Pueblo de Dios!

Doing the "MAINE" thing

So....again it's been awhile since our last post, and yes, it's been fun!

We returned from Texas July 26 and had a group here waiting for us! It was a group from a church in PA that supports another CAM missionary here, and he asked my help in leading half of the group in construction projects in the music dept at SETECA. We built cabinets for instrument storage, shoe racks for childrens classes and painted a lot of the music dept.


We had a few days after they left to prepare for another group from Wilton MAINE! That's a long ways from here! They are from Calvary Hill Baptist Church in Wilton, and this was their first trip to Guatemala! There were 30 people in the group, with ages from 8 to 64!

The "MAINE" group at our church 'Pueblo de Dios'

We started out with two days in the capital, visiting some sights, learning about and praying with the people at Kairos House, a home for kids with cancer and their families.

Kairos House

Sunday morning the group attended our church 'Pueblo de Dios' and led some of the worship time! After church they climbed on the bus for the long ride to Huehuetenango. In Huehue, the group worked during the days at Berea Bible Institute, painting, plastering, sewing, sifting sand, building closets, playing fútbol (soccer) and having fun!

Sifting sand for mortar

Sewing new curtains for Telma, who works in the kitchen and whose husband is a teacher

The youngest boys worked the hardest!

We also spent some time doing things besides work. One evening we visited a local church, Nueva Jerusalén, where the group sang some songs, gave a couple of testimonies, and Mike Wolfe gave a great message!

Singing at Nueva Jerusalén

Another highlight was visiting a Mayan community and the CAM church there and holding a VBS for the kids! There were about 150 kids there, and many accepted Christ for the first time!

A few of the kids at VBS

On the return to Guatemala City from Huehue, we spent an afternoon in Antigua so the team could do some shopping and sightseeing. While in Antigua, one of the team, Barb, was pushed from behind in a crowd, and moments later discovered her bag had been cut open and her wallet and passport were gone! So...after filing a police report, we said goodbye to 29 of the team the next day and Barb got the privilege of spending a couple more days in Guatemala! We got her a new passport on Monday and she finally got home to Maine on Tuesday.

During all of this time with the wonderful folks from Maine, we still had one intern here with us...Molly Perara, aka...Guatemolly! We took Molly with us and the team to Huehue, and Molly got a special treat! Molly is a linguistics major at WWU (that's Western Washington U for you East coasters) and is very interested in the Mayan dialects. There is a CAM couple in Huehue, The Ekstrom's, that have helped translate the bible into several Mayan dialects. They took Molly to the town of Nebaj, where they attended the dedication of the New Testament into the local dialect. This does not happen very often, takes years and years in fact, so the timing to have a dedication while Molly could attend was God sent!

Molly worked at Casita Benjamín while here except for our trip to Huehue. We truly loved having Molly here, she became like part of our family, but, she too has returned home a few days ago.

Molly with kids from Casita Benjamín

Next up, a 17 yr old friend coming to stay and work with us for 3 weeks. We will host 4 men from World Orphan visiting to see about partnership possibilities here with CAM. We have 4 interns arriving in September, 2 for 3 months, 1 for 6 months and 1 for 8 months!

POST SUMMER INTERNS 2008

Well, I haven't updated our blog since shortly after our summer interns arrived, and now they are already gone! (except for one, Molly)
The time went very fast, as happens when you are incredibly busy, but it was fun, very rewarding for us, and we saw some lives changed!

Our 8 interns were involved in many different ministries, serving in many different locations, which is one of the reasons we were always on the go.

We had two serving at Casita Benjamín, and visiting Kairos each week with us.

We had two serve at The Oasis, a home for girls located in San Lucas.

We had two girls in Patzún, helping in various ways at the Alfa y Omega church.

And, last but not least, we had two guys who traveled all over, visiting many different places and missionaries to make videos for the various ministries.

We also tried to get some of them together from time to time, for some fun.

Leslie Anne, Grace, Molly & Heidi visit Mayan ruins at Iximché

We also were able to visit Panajachel and Lake Atítlan, maybe the most beautiful lake in the world! We also went to Antigua, and even spent a morning at the zoo!

Elliott, Matthew, Molly, Leslie Anne, Grace, Heidi and Lynn at the ZOO!

As the interns time in Guatemala came to an end, we brought them all back together for a couple days here in Guatemala City for a mini de-brief. This started with a big surprise! Without Heidi knowing, we brought all of the interns to Casita Benjamín to surprise her on her birthday!

Loyda, the Casita's director, brought Heidi out blindfolded as we lit firecrackers!

FIRECRACKERS

We then had a birthday party with the Kids and staff at the Casita.

¡FELIZ CUMPLEAÑOS HEIDI!

Wouldn't be birthday party without cake!

However, all good things come to an end, and we move forward to the next good thing! After 2 days together all of the interns, except Molly, left for Denton, Texas, for "Next Step", a 2 day time together with CAM interns from Guatemala, Mexico, Honduras and Spain. We shared, processed and planned what it all means and where do we go from here.

Check out the video of CAM Summer Interns 2008

Click: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kV602xZLEmM

Sandi, me and Felicita and Maria all were a part of Next Step also, and were able to spend some time with friends from St. Andrew Presbyterian Church, and also some time at CAM headquarters in Dallas.

Break time at Next Step

Guatemala Summer Interns 2008

We still have one intern with us, Molly Perara, who will be here until August 21. She is helping at Casita Benjamín, and will join us in Huehuetenango August 10 - 17 to help us with a group of 30 coming from Calvary Hill Baptist Church in Wilton, Maine.

Molly Perara at Casita Benjamín

While we were in Texas we spent some time with the team from St. Andrew that had been in Guatemala last March. It was great fun to see most of the group, and even more special was that several of the girls traveled to Denton just to see us! Alyx actually flew up to see us, and Sarah drove about 5 hours to get there!

Sarah, Brandi Lynn and Alyx with Felicita and Maria

So...what's next?

Well, Molly is here, we just finished helping with a group from PA for a week, working at SETECA. We have the group of 30 from Maine coming in less than a week, 4 men from World Orphan are coming to meet with us for a few days who are interested in partnering with CAM for some projects in Guatemala. Then we have 4 more interns arriving in September. 2 will be here for 2 1/2 months, 1 for 6 months and 1 for 8 months!

It's busy, but, we love it...we are seeing lives changed and people in Guatemala being blessed by all that is being done! God has been so faithful, and He is doing great things here in Guatemala!

We continue to be involved with our church, Kairos Ministry and Casita Benjamín while all of the activity swirls around us!

SUMMER INTERNS 2008

We had 7 interns arrive June 4, and 1 more on June 18, for a 6 1/2 week internship program.

The interns in the pic are (L-R) Heidi Harriman, (our friend Oscar), Kelsey Kromminga, (our daughter Maria), Christine Piwonka, Elliott Ince, Leslie Anne Mathews, Grace Park and Matthew Nelson. Not in the picture is Molly Perara.
We began with a 4 day orientation which included things like cultural awareness and do's and dont's. History of Guatemala and the church here. Safety and security. We ate good food. We did some sightseeing, visited Antigua. We ate good food. We got to know each other. We ate good food. We sang together. Two afternoons of Spanish lessons. Did I mention we ate good food?

The interns all joined us at our church youth group meeting on Saturday, where we sang, played volleyball and fútbol and had a birthday celebration.
Sunday the interns attended our church, Pueblo de Dios, and sang a few songs for the congregation!

Monday they all began serving in their ministries. Grace and Leslie Anne are serving at The Oasis Home for Girls in San Lucas. Kelsey and Christine are serving at Alfa y Omega church in Patzún. Heidi and Molly are serving at Casita Benjamín. Matthew and Elliott are visiting several different ministries and missionaries, making promotional videos for each.

They will be in Guatemala until July 20, so please keep them and their ministries in your prayers. Sandi, myself, Felicita and Maria will join the interns for a de-brief time in Texas at the end of the internships here. Molly will be here until August 21.

We will have several more interns arriving in September.

Tragedy For The Rain

This has been one of the rainiest Junes on record here in Guatemala City. Through the first 20 days of June, we have had rain 18 days. The average rainfall for the entire month of June (during the rainy season) is 250 mm. So far after 19 days we have had about 350 mm!

This has caused problems. There have been several small landslides that have buried a few houses with several deaths. Last Wednesday, June 18, a section of the large wall surrounding the General Cemetery in Zone 3 fell on several houses killing 3 people. This happened about 2 blocks away from a child center, Casita Benjamin, where we help. There are other problems also in these neighborhoods that I have been asked to help with. Many single mom households, very, very poor area, with roofs that leak, drains that don't drain, etc. I will be meeting later this week with some to see what we can do to help.



Then, last Friday, June 20, another tragedy caused by the rain. A large section of the main land fill dump, right alongside this same neighborhood in Zone 3, slid down in an avalanche of garbage and mud. Hundreds of people eke out a living by digging through the garbage daily for anything of value that can be recycled, etc. The avalanche buried many. So far they have recovered 6 bodies with at least 18 people still missing. They have called off more searches as the area is still considered a very high risk for more slides.

Just to personalize this story, here is a picture of Juana Cecilia Ventura. She is 15 years old.

Juana was injured in the land/garbage slide, but will recover.

Her mother, Catarina Ventura Ventura, and 10 yr. old brother, Francisco, were killed. Now, she will take responsibility for her 7 younger brothers and sisters.


Please pray for these people, and remember all of the people in this wet season when there are always problems with landslides, etc. It is always the poor, where the only available land for them is usually in hazardous areas, that are effected the most.