Do you drink it amargo or dulce?

This is a question that I hear whenever "mate" (maw-tay) is brought up. Do you drink it bitter or sweet? Mate is a very bitter tea that they drink here in Patagonia. To take off the edge some people put sugar or some sort of artificial sweetener.

I am a coffee drinker. I didn't used to be. However, the most beautiful woman I've ever seen started bringing me coffee when I was in Bible college. Let me show you some simple math...

Girl you like brings you coffee + desire to win her heart + incessant need for caffeine [projects+exams] = coffee addict for life.

Coffee was so bitter when I first started drinking it, and I hated it. However, after years of drinking it I have grown accustomed to it and I even like it now. I say that because mate was extremely bitter when I first started drinking it, and I hated it! However, now that I am here in Patagonia I want to be like the people here so that I may be able to lead many of them to Christ. Therefore I went out and bought my own mate (the cup used to drink mate), bombilla (straw), yerba (the herbs), and stevia (a natural sweetener since I already put enough sugar in my coffee). So the process of getting accustomed to it has begun, and I'm even starting to like it! And by the way, I'll take it dulce.

Attitudes

I've been listening to some podcast lessons on cross-cultural ministry and the last couple of them were about attitudes. Here are a few attitudes that are good for missionaries to have:

• You are a guest
• They did not ask you to come here
• America is not superior, and neither are you
• The doctors, mechanics, and other professionals here are capable
• They are not strange, you are
• The way they do things is now the way you do things
• Their language is your language, their culture is your culture, their food is your food
• You can learn from them, and make sure that you keep yourself quiet and listen to what they have to say
• Identify with them
• This is your home now
• Make friends
• Don't treat them like tourist attractions
• Like what they like
• Respect them, they deserve it just like anyone else
• Let them build trust, and, be trustworthy yourself

A lot of these are things I remember hearing from the podcasts, and some of them have just been my experience. If you are interested in hearing these podcasts that have been coming out weekly check out Pastor Austin Gardner's website: www.austingardner.net.

Lago Pollux

On Saturday I took a little time off and went to do some fishing. I fished a total of about 4 hours. Together we caught 9 fish, I caught 2 nice sized rainbow trout. Here is a picture of the smaller one I caught:

And to let you see what Pollux looks like, I grabbed a picture from somebody else's website:

It was nice to get away and relax a little. I must admit that it was not as "glamorous" as the fishing I am used to. I loved my new kind of fishing though! I filleted up those two trout and cooked them for lunch yesterday! Their meat was pink, as opposed to the white meat one might be used to in farm raised trout in California. Somebody told me that here in Chile they don't farm raise fish for lakes. Everybody loved the trout (I say everybody because we had Eduardo over). I coated the bottom of a casserole dish with olive oil, salted and peppered the fish, and then covered them with lemon slices, zucchini  tomato, a frozen veggie mix, and butter. 20 minutes in the oven and voila!

It's Dusk

It is 10:00 pm here in Coyhaique (which, by the way is usually called 22:00 here) and the sun is just barely starting to go down!

Fish

Fish is a funny thing. You grow up knowing certain kinds of fish. Some that I really remember are Rainbow Trout, Brown Trout, Cutthroat Trout, Large-mouth Bass, Small-mouth Bass, Salmon, and Cod. You get to the other side of the world and you eat fish and you wonder, is this Salmon or Cod? Haha...there are other kinds of fish. Some of the ones that I have eaten here in Chile are Congrio and Reineta. Neither of them are fish that you can readily eat in California, if you can even eat them at all there, and their names don't translate too well to English. However, when any avid fish eater things of the words, "Chile" and "Fish" then one very specific specie comes to their mind:

CHILEAN SEABASS

There have been times that I have sat at a restaurant eating a seven or eight dollar fish meal and wondered to myself, "Is this Chilean Seabass and would I be paying $30 for this meal in California?" Finally I took the initiative to try and understand fish in Chile. First off, Chileans almost NEVER eat Chilean Seabass. Second off, the Chilean Seabass that you eat in California is not really Seabass at all, its just that in the 70's a major fish distributor decided that in high end restaurants "Patagonian Toothfish" wouldn't sell very well.  For all you ecologically friendly readers, the Patagonian Toothfish is supposedly an endangered specie. If you go to some restaurants in Santiago you may get served "Chilean Seabass", but is not the same fish you pay an arm and a leg for in Los Angeles. They say that in Patagonia it is not to uncommon to find the right fish served in a restaurant, so I think now that I know the name I may order it sometime...that is, if it doesn't cost me an eye of the face (Chilean equivilent phrase to arm and a leg).

So Eduardo, a faithful man in our church here, brought us a box of Reineta filetes. Have you ever had, and please excuse the alcohol reference, a beer-battered fish? It is delicious, and definitely not healthy. I'm not necessarily referencing the specific batter that has beer, just the batter that has the consistency that a beer-batter has. The truth is, that I am very against alcohol, and so I always avoid beer. However, I thought that these Reineta filets would be very good in that kind of batter. I typed into google "How to make beer batter without beer", and conveniently I wasn't the first person to search for that. It looks like as a basic rule you can take any beer batter recipe and replace the beer with club soda. So last night we did it! It was delicious! And afterwards there was extra batter so Annie cut up a Zuchinni and did that too! It was very good!

While on the subject of fishing... I have heard that there is some good lake fishing not too far from here. The man, Luis, that I am discipling has a cabin at that lake. He also has a motor boat and fishing poles. He said he loves to fish and asked me to join him. It is trout fishing, and whereas the average trout in California is less than a pound, it sounds like the average fish he catches is more like three to five pounds (that's the average). Sounds like some good eating to me, and hopefully a good way to bond with Luis! I need to find some honey holes anyways before my dad gets here, so I can teach him how to fish. I'm not a huge fish eater, but my neighbor is fanatical about fish. I took him some of the reineta that Eduardo brought us and he was very thankful. I know I'd score some points if I brought him some fresh trout filetes.

Zeal & Potential

When I was going door to door and just leaving things on doorsteps (as opposed to trying to speak to everyone) I left something at Luis' house. About twenty minutes later I received a phone call from somebody I didn't know thanking me for the CD that I had left them, it was Luis. I got his name and address and asked if I could come by for a visit sometime. I went for that first visit last week and it went well. I thought they would come to church, but they didn't. I got a call from him this week asking if we could meet up. We met up and it went great. Luis has been saved for about a year, but he is not involved in a church. He has asked me if I would do discipleship with him, and of course I obliged! He has been unemployed for three weeks so he has an unusual amount of free time. He says he's become an expert in cleaning his house. He was a military instructor for artillery for nine years (we have a big base here in town), and after getting out of the military he worked for a mine. Because of downsizing they had to let him go. One of the exciting things about Luis is that he has a lot of zeal and he is just like a sponge. He wants more and more of the Scriptures. He came over for discipleship and we studied the Bible for over three hours. This was refreshing, because sometimes when you study the word with someone they space out after 20 or 30 minutes and you feel like you have to work extra hard to keep their attention. Luis was so lost in the study that he forgot he was supposed to pick up his family at 6; he didn't realize until he looked at his watch and it was 6:10. I have high hopes for him and am praying for his growth.

Eduardo (from the independent Baptist church in the next biggest city north of us, Puerto Montt) continues to be faithful. He is a great encouragement to me. He wants to be more involved in ministry and he is just a person who wants to help. He also has a gift for giving. He works in the fish and game industry down here, so I thought he'd be a good person to ask where to get good fish. The next thing I know he shows up with a box of Reineta! Which is not a fish that you can get in the U.S. as far as I know. Because of my attention deficit, I'm going to end this post and continue the next one about fish! On one last note, Eduardo is such a giver and I'm very thankful God put him into our lives here.

Christmas is a most wonderful time

It's Christmas time! I love Christmas time. I love how people are generally nicer. I love the music, yes, the music might be my favorite. I like the decorations: lights, ornaments, wreaths, etc. I like the drinks: hot cocoa  coffee, eggnog, etc. I find that people are more likely to listen to you talk to them about Christ. I know that the push of the political right is the put "Christ" back in Christmas. I kind of just feel neutral about all of that. There is no mandate or prohibition in the Bible about celebrating the birth of Christ, and that's why I feel fine about it all. On Sunday one of the boys in our church here asked me if Christmas was the day that Jesus was born. I told him, "Maybe!" And in my head I thought, "there is a 1/365 chance he was born that day!" I have read from differently people arguing about what day Jesus was or wasn't born, but at the end of the day none of them know when He was born either. Whenever He came, I'm so glad He did! And I'm so thankful for what happened the week of Passover (when He gave His life) and on that first Easter Sunday (when He resurrected)!

Down here in Chile we were invited to celebrate either Christmas or New Years with a family that isn't Christian. I asked a Chilean pastor friend of mine if he thought that one of those would be calmer (like, less drunkenness). He said that Christmas is better because people don't want to get crazy when baby Jesus was born. I thought that was interesting...almost superstitious. Drunkenness is listed as sin at any time (Galatians 5:21). There is a lot of superstition here. When you drive along the road there are a couple of things you see that show you some of the superstitions. One of them is little altars where you can park and light a candle to a dead "saint" in hopes that they will watch over you. Some people put cards with a picture of a saint and a prayer to him/her in their vehicles hoping that it will protect them. Another thing that you see driving is little homes that look like they could even be dog houses. They aren't dog houses though. They are built where a family member or loved one died, and it is because they believe that after the person dies their spirit stays there. So they take food and drink for their deceased one's spirit. It is a great comfort to think of the words of of Scripture that teach us to be absent from this body is to be present with the Lord (2 Corinthians 5:8 & Philippians 1:23).

Christmas will be different this year being far from so many that we love. I think it will be very special though. I see it as a time to form new traditions, and, while not replacing those we love who are so far away, a time to forge new relationships and love people here in Patagonia. Annie has some nice decorations up around the house, and we are planning to make paper snowflakes and watch Christmas movies. Sounds like a blast to me!

Belt loops

Since we got to Chile I have been buckling my belt with an extra loophole. Once we got to Coyhaique I started doing a second extra loophole. In the last few days I have been losing my britches and so I decided to do a third extra loophole, but I was surprised to find that there's no holes left! I better start eating more junk food ; )

We have two visitors with us this week; a man from South Carolina and a man from Santiago. They came down here with the express purpose of helping us distributing the Bible story/Gospel CDs with invitations to our opening service. The invitations also have a gospel presentation on the back of them. They have been here for four days and we have gone to about 4,000 homes; with the 1,000 that I did that totals 5,000 homes in this city of 50,000 people. If the average of each home is three people then that would mean that there are about 17,000 homes. I think the average would be more than three people per home so there are probably less than that.

I'm pretty sore!

Today we went up to a high point that overlooks Coyhaique. I went to the edge of the cliff and took this picture.

I knelt down at this cliff and prayed over this city. I begged God to give us this city.

A pretty shot

I'm not much of a photographer but I saw this flower up on the hill we were at earlier today and snapped the shot.

Ibuprofena

There is this restaurant in town that Annie and I used to go to to order coffee and then use the free wifi (funny, it's free, as long as you pay...). There was this sweet lady named Patricia, and we got to know her a little bit. Well we got our own internet like a month ago or so and so we haven't seen her. Tonight we decided to grab a bite there. I asked her how she was and she said that her whole body hurt from the busy day (she always talks about being sore so she may have arthritis or something). I asked her if she had tried take ibuprofen and she said no. After we had paid our bill I slipped out and ran up the street to the corner farmacy and got her a pack of it. She was in the changing room getting ready to go home once I got back so I left it with her friend to give to her. I thought, "What a hassle to run up there, but definitely worth it to show love and make a friend for a lifetime."

Discipleship

Tonight I did the first discipleship lesson (of 16) with a young man named Gaspar. Also, I had to put the CD/invitation project on hold for awhile because I sprained my ankle badly. For the first couple of days I could hardly walk around the house, but I've been getting better slowly. It's been a couple of weeks and today was my first day to really get out in the streets. I went to about two hundred homes, and my ankle is doing pretty well. Although it is still very sore this was definitely a positive step.

Micah walking to mom

I put Micah down in his crib today and he walked across to his mom while holding the side. I thought it was pretty cool and one of those moments that family would want to see. I grabbed the camera and decided to experiment and see if he could do it again, he got it first try! Pretty cool. Enjoy!

Tonight's Bible study was great

We just finished taking people home from tonight's Bible study. We studied five names of Jesus Christ and how those names show that He is God. Next week we are going to be studying the impact of the name Emanuel. This was our second time since we started that we didn't have any visitors, but it was definitely our most attended service. Nine people came, and with our family that makes a total of twelve. Great night!

I'm so happy!

I was just singing this song to myself:

"I'm so happy and here's the reason why

He took my burdens all away
Now I'm singing as the days go by
Jesus took my burdens all away
Once my heart was heavy with a load of sin
Jesus took the load and gave me peace within my heart and
Now I'm singing as the days go by
Jesus took my burden all away"

You reap what you sow

I remember many Saturdays going out to the streets of Pomona with my wife and my in-laws. Often times we wouldn't see any visitors come as a direct result of us having visited their home the day before, but my mother-in-law would often say, "I just think God sees how hard we're working and rewards us by sending visitors." I thought of her this last Sunday. We did not visit anybody in Coyhaique, in fact we spent the entire day visiting in Cerro Castillo. To my surprise two first time visitors showed up! That was really a blessing. They are 17 and 19 years old, and we had them stick around after the Bible study to play games. We taught them Dutch Blitz and they caught on pretty well! We had a good time, and they said that they are going to start congregating with us.

Tonight was a special night

Tonight I invited Eduardo over and we talked over some things with the ministry and then I asked him to accompany me on some visits. I had the privilege almost two months ago to lead Jenifer to Christ. I have visited their home several times. Two weeks ago their whole family visited us for a Sunday meeting. I have been praying for the man that she lives with named Jose. Eduardo and I spent about two hours in their home tonight. After about an hour and a half Jose bowed his head with his family present and he prayed to confess faith in Christ and ask for Him to be his personal Saviour. What a wonderful joy! Eduardo was so excited that he jumped out of his chair and gave Jose a hug - this was funny to watch because Jose is kind of the macho type. What a blessed night.

Evangelistic trip down south

I am sitting here on a cold morning with fresh brewed Juan Valdez coffee and a fire going, what could be better? Yesterday was a very encouraging day! Lot's of great things happened. It started with a productive morning. I went into town to run some errands and two noteworthy things happened. I met a gringa named Ally from Ohio. She's living here for work. She said she'd seen us around - we are kind of hard to miss. I gave her our info and said she should come over sometime for a meal.

Quick break because I threw another log on the fire. You want to know what is a blessing? Big thick gloves. I got sick of burning myself!

Back to the productive morning. Where were we? After I got to my car to pay the parking attendant (a half hour is about $.60) I gave her a comic book tract as I usual give to the folks collecting money for parking. She took the tract, flipped it over, and just stared at our logo. As she looked confused I said, "It's a little gift for you, something to read." She looked up and said, "Is it the new?" I didn't get it at first, so I asked her what she meant. She said, "Well the other day someone left a CD at my house, is this from the new church too?" I couldn't believe it, I had left and invitation to our opening service and a gospel CD on this lady's doorstep! She said that tried to watch it, but could only hear, so I explained that it was only a CD and not a DVD. She said, "Thanks, my daughter really liked it." This is wonderful for so many reasons, but one is because it means that our logo is unique and distinguishable. We had our logo on the CD, and on the flier she received, and so she immediately recognized it on the back of the Chick tract I gave her.

Later we took a three hour drive south to a town called Villa Cerro Castillo. It's named after a mountain peak it sits under called Cerro Castillo. Here is a picture of Annie and I from yesterday in front of a small lake, you can see the mountain in the background. Unfortunately a cell phone picture doesn't truly communicate the beauty of Patagonia, but it'll do.

Villa Cerro Castillo has a population of about 500 with somewhere around 150-200 homes. These numbers were more than we planned for, but I had extra tracts in the car which was really a blessing! Yesterday Annie, Micah, Eduardo, and I passed out about 350 gospel tracts in that community including at least one in every home. They need a church there. There is not one church anywhere near them that believes is salvation by grace through faith in the finished work of redemption of Jesus Christ (biblical salvation). How will they hear?

After Cerro Castillo we drove to Puerto Ingeniero Ibañez while still a small community is considerably larger than Cerro Castillo. It resides on the coast of Lake General Carrera which is the largest lake in Chile. It's water is turquoise, very beautiful. This city needs a Bible believing church. Who will go?

Villa Cerro Castillo

About two hours south of Coyhaique there is a small community that needs a church. There are somewhere around 100 homes there and about 450 people. We are going to be visiting there this Saturday. We are taking 200 gospel tracts with us which is enough for 100 people on the streets and one for each home (I think I'll throw an extra 300 in the car just in case). This will be a great opportunity and maybe even be a foundation for a future church plant. I told a pastor friend of mine about the trip and asked him to pray for us. His response was, "I am in Peru picking up 250,000 tracts. I will pray. You should start several churches simultaneously." I had never heard somebody suggest that before, and it caused me to think. It seems like the more you are focused on one goal then the more you will potentially accomplish that goal. My goal is to start many churches in this region of Chile and also to stir up Chilean churches to send foreign missionaries all over the world. I have always seen the best way of doing that as pouring all of my attention into this one city, Coyhaique, which is a strategic hub for Chilean Patagonia and then reaching out from here. I'm not making any changes, but I want to be very careful to not be so glued to my "plan" that I am insensitive to what God wants to do. His ways are always higher than our ways.

Who knew?

Who knew that there was life after fast food? And probably a longer life at that... Being on deputation for about a year, Annie and I did a lot of eating out. The fact of the matter is that so often fast food is more economic and more convenient so we so often ate at fast food places. Well now I am happy to say that its been about three months since I have seen any of these old friends.

It was a male lamb

The lamb that we ate on Saturday was definitely a male lamb! You ask me how I know? I know because they served me its manhood. Missions 101: eat what you are served. Unfortunately, I took that class. I must say that this goes on the list of the grossest things I've ever eaten. Maybe it'll make for a good story sometime?

Two recent ministry pictures

Here is a picture of Eduardo, Annie, Marisol and Annie's two visitors Vanessa and Rose. 

Remember Jenifer? She and her family were first time visitors tonight! Jenifer, Jose, Juaquin, and Carla.

A good day in the streets

Yesterday I visited a little over 200 homes before lunch (yes I am very sore). It was a good time, and it felt good to be back in the streets. One man was very receptive and so I took the opportunity to continue our conversation. Thirty or forty-five minutes later Felipe bowed his head with me in prayer to profess Christ as his Saviour!

This morning we are all packed up for an excursion into the wild. We are going to the national park where my neighbor works and we're going to wood-fire cook a lamb!

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My stamping muscles hurt

I ordered a stamp for the church and have gone to town preparing tracts and cds. I have also printed and cut hundreds of our opening day fliers. My plan is that before February, every home in Coyhaique will have one of these cds and one of these invitations.

The invitations all have a gospel presentation on the back. To put something in every home in this city and not make sure the gospel is on it feels like a waste...so while I know it takes twice as much ink to print on both sides, I really believe it "vale la pena" (it's worth it). Never under estimate the power of a seed.

Now it is time to hit the streets!

Our new building

Here is a picture of our building!

It needs some work! We are downstairs with a tenent upstairs. We will scrape the internet paint off of the windows. The owner is painting the yellow part upstairs and we are going to paint our bottom part with a fresh coat. There is an old base for a sign in front with some green patches around it...that needs to be removed and cleaned up. The owner said that he will let us put our sign up above in the yellow part. It will be between the address and the windows. That will be very good because it will make it more visible on this very busy street/intersection, and it will be in a place that's difficult for taggers to reach. Lot's of work to do!

Influencing people

I have found that one of the best ways to influence people and make friends is simple: care. These are a few ways to communicate that you genuinely care without saying the words, "I care about you":

1. Remember
     their name.
     their story.
     their needs.
     their burdens.

2.Write them notes

3. Give them gifts

4. Visit them

Cookies and contracts

This week Annie made some very yummy cookies. We had the idea to take a container of them to a lady that we had met with a handwritten note from Annie  Annie wrote the note and I translated it on the other side of the paper (so that she still got Annie's handwriting too) and we dropped it off. It turned out to be her birthday! She felt so special to get the gift from us. Her name is Vanessa. Vanessa came to our Bible study last night with her daughter! She was really "jiving" with the message, and even asked some extremely pertinent questions. God is doing great things in Patagonia!

Also, we sign the contract for our building on Wednesday. I am planning my schedule for after that. I plan to leave an invitation to our first service along with a very nice gift (audio CD) on the door of ever home in the city before we have our first service in February. I was thinking possibly 8-12 and then 2-6, but I'm considering getting out there at 7 if that will mean that I hit more feet traffic on their way to work. I think experimenting with prove helpful.

Auntie Annie's

Tonight Annie made pretzel bites, and they were delicious. In honor of the occasion I took the liberty of producing this original logo for a potential new pretzel business.

You're all invited!

This is a flier for the opening service of the church. It is the first draft...nothing too special, but I'm constantly amazed by what you can do with Paint and Microsoft Word. These are just low quality screen shots, obviously, but they show the idea. It'd be on a half sheet with the plan of salvation on the back.

We found a property

Last week Annie and I found a property that we liked a lot. I tried calling several times, but wasn't able to get a hold of the owner until yesterday. He wasn't around, but his handy-man was so he showed me around inside of the building. I liked it and so I made an appointment to go back with Annie and Eduardo. We saw it last night at 8:30, and after some negotiations we came to a fair price.

It is 86 square meters which comes out to about 925 square feet. They say that 1 square meter is about enough space for one person to be comfortable at a church (and that leaves space for aisles, pulpit, etc). They say that if you need to squeeze a bit then you can take that number down to 3/4 of a square meter. This means that the building could comfortably fit 85, and we could squeeze in about 115. I believe it will be a wonderful place for us to start. It is on a very busy street where all of the colectivos (a colectivo is like a taxi that runs a route) drive through. In the area of town that we will be in, this is the busiest street, and it is at a pretty important intersection. This building used to be an internet cafe that was in business for about 4 years, but had to close two months ago. It is almost double the size of the other property we were looking at and it is a much better location for only about $100 more a month. My wife thinks I am funny, but here is a "to scale" model of the building that I made this morning on paint. It can give you an idea of the layout (the numbers you see are centimeters).

We are supposed to write up the contract this week. The building is undergoing some remodeling and won't be available until January, which is perfect because we don't "need" it until February. This will give us a month to get things set up for our inauguration. I am also very please that he will be allowing us to put our sign up in the meantime while we do promotion for the first service. This will give us great visibility for the next few months as we leave an invitation, gospel tract, and CD with Bible stories on every door! Real pictures to come as things start to happen at the property. The momentum is exhilarating. I have to remind myself that you can't function on adrenaline though, and the business can make it easy to forget your personal walk with the Lord. There is the old saying, "If the devil can't make you bad, he makes you busy." So daily I am focusing on abiding in Christ.

We're not in the big city anymore!

Annie and I are used to big city life. Going from the 10,000,000 Los Angeles metropolitan to the 50,000 city of Coyhaique is a big difference. It's even a great change from what I was used to when I lived here before in the Santiago Metropolitan. That was very evident yesterday when I went into the regional governing building of our state. I went in to check on what needs to be done for our visas and the entire line that I had to wait it was two people long. When I visited the foreign affairs building in Santiago there were somewhere around 100 people in line. The waiting room is a little larger in Santiago. What does this all equate to for us? Life is slower here. That has its positives and negatives. For example you may have to wait an extra five minutes in line while the cashier asks about the sick dog of the customer in front of you, or drive really slow behind a couple of men on horseback. But it also means that there aren't very many people here trying to get visas. The man who I dealt with yesterday assured me that the process would be very simple and that he would personally be handling everything. This is wonderful news for us! He was very kind and said if I ever need anything to just let him know!

Maybe if life is slower you can enjoy it more. You just have to learn to balance diligence and hard work with assimilation and learning to not live by the "time is money" policy.

Attendance doubled tonight!

Tonight we had 5 in attendance at our Bible study. Plus our little family of 3 makes a total of 8. Praying for several others who should be with us each week too..

I will very gladly spend and be spent

For two weeks in a row now we have had people promise to be at the Bible but they flaked out. I must admit, on both occasions my heart was really excited and both times I was sad that they didn't go through with it. It does cause me to evaluate. Am I doing something wrong? All I can control is my own actions. Love thinks no evil and believes all things so you expect people to go through with their word. Pesimism isn't the answer. You just keep loving, spending, and being spent.

"who hath enabled me"

When you think of the task that has been given to the New Testament church, it can be somewhat daunting. We have been commissioned to take the gospel to every creature in our generation. I realize that this is a collective task, but I believe that things really get done when individuals own that corporate responsibility as their own. As Paul said in God's inspired words, "my gospel". In this commission we cannot trust the generation before us because they're dead now and they had their own generation to reach. Today a new generation has arrived. We cannot trust the generation that is to come because our generation will have passed and they will have a generation of their own to get the gospel to. The task can seem overwhelming. Truthfully, I am just trying to do my part. The task at hand can make you feel...insignificant, incapable, insufficient. I am insignificant, incapable, and insufficient on my own, but I find my sufficiency in Christ, He enables me, and that is significant.

Tonight I received an email from Dori, my sister's mother-in-law, who is a precious member of our extended family. She was referring to our ministry and said, "I believe God created you, prepared you and fully equipped you for this." I felt so blessed by this as it resounded with something that God has been showing me in His word the last couple of weeks.


2 Corinthians 3:6  Who also hath made us able ministers of the new testament; not of the letter, but of the spirit: for the letter killeth, but the spirit giveth life.

Romans 15:14  And I myself also am persuaded of you, my brethren, that ye also are full of goodness, filled with all knowledge, able also to admonish one another. 

2 Peter 1:3  According as his divine power hath given unto us all things that pertain unto life and godliness, through the knowledge of him that hath called us to glory and virtue: 

1 Timothy 1:12  And I thank Christ Jesus our Lord, who hath enabled me, for that he counted me faithful, putting me into the ministry; 

I once was listening to some teaching on the family and the guy said, "Your daughter's greatest need is that she learns from her dad that she is beautiful. Your son's greatest need is that he learns from his dad that he has what it takes." I am not really into popular psychology and that kind of stuff, so I don't know what my opinion is of this man's statement, I just try to stick with the Bible. However, when I read the verses I listed above I can't help but think that my Heavenly Father is telling me, his child, that I have what it takes. I have been equipped by Him. He has enabled me!

Los Angeles County

I am very burdened for the county of Los Angeles. It is unbelievable how many people are there. Who will go plant a church in the city of angels? There are about 10 million people in the county which means it is the most populated county in the United States. In fact, Los Angeles county is more populated than 42 individual U.S. states. The need for church planting in LA is tremendous.

Mathew 9:37-38

Then saith he unto his disciples, The harvest truly is plenteous, but the labourers are few;

Pray ye therefore the Lord of the harvest, that he will send forth labourers into his harvest. 

Medical Mission

In January a group of doctors and nurses from the United States will be coming to Chile to provide medical aide for free on one of the islands of Patagonia. There is a very large island (3,545 sq miles) in southern Chile called Chiloé. This isn't the island that the medical mission is going to. Chiloé is 3,545 square miles which is about three times the surface area of Rhode Island (to give you some reference). This island has many large cities on it. One of the smaller cities is a fishing town called Achao. My neighbor Fernando is from Achao. Not too far off the coast of Achao is an island called Isla Butachauques. This medical team is efficient in medical aide, but they aren't in Spanish! That is why my phone rang with a request to come along as a translator. I accepted and am so excited! It is for a week long the third week of January. What an opportunity! Pastor Reinhardt told me that the last time they did this they knocked on every single door on the island and over 50 people got saved. I am ecstatic for the opportunity. I know I will learn so much about Patagonian island culture. Maybe I'll even get to eat a curanto. Here are a couple of photos of curanto:

Curanto is a food that originates from Chiloé. I don't know the process too well but I know that they dig a hole, get rocks very hot, put giant leaves down at one point, and then they cook a mixture of seafood, pork, chicken, beef, and veggies in it for hours. My neighbor said that they're going to feed that to us there!

When you say yes to one thing you say no to another

I have entered a new time in my ministry. Up until this point I have received a lot of invitations to preach in different places. I don't remember turning down an opportunity, unless I already had a commitment. It is different now because I have responsibilities that weigh in the balance. If I say yes to an invitation to preach, then it is possible that I won't be there for my family or the church we are starting. Today I received an invitation to preach an anniversary conference in Monte Águila which is several states north of us. I was very humbled by the invitation but I had to turn it down. If I were to go then Annie would be left alone in this strange place for four days by herself. Also, we are just starting with our weekly Bible studies here in Coyhaique, and how can I leave them without a Bible teacher? It wouldn't be appropriate for Eduardo to be at our house alone with Annie, so what does it communicate to him if I teach "not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together" and then I cancel on him? Another tempting invitation I received was in Iquique where our friends the Reinhardts live. It was to preach the week of their teen or family camp. I was so excited to receive the invitation, but if I accepted then that meant that I would miss a week during the first month of our church (we plan to have our first service in February and that's when the invitation was for). We originally planned to start in January but my friend Dustin's dad Dave Reinhardt asked me to accompany him on a very special trip (I'll write about it in the next post) in January. Since the January invitation is potentially a once in a lifetime event I accepted and we are going to move the inauguration to the first Sunday in February. But how could I miss a week during one of the most important times of our new church? I am learning that when I say yes to one thing, it is often to the exclusion of another. Its so important to say no to the right things!

A new haircut

I gave Micah his first haircut this morning! Wow he looks so different! I figured I'd kill two birds with one stone (or, as they say in Chile, shoot two birds with just one bullet) and put a picture of him sitting up on his own as well as his new haircut!

Tomando once

"Tomando once" translates into English as "taking eleven". To give you some background to once I'll explain how meals in Chile are.

As an American, you can expect a great change in food when you come to Chile. It is not so much a change in food as far as what you eat, because the chilean diet is not all that different from the american diet (apart from much more coffee/tea and bread here than in the USA). The change you can expect is in when you eat. In the morning you can expect to have a light breakfast consisting of coffee or tea, bread, and any of the following: jam, cheese, slices of deli meat, butter, etc. This holds the Chilean over until lunch which is the main meal of the day. Lunch is eaten at around two in the afternoon and it is normally a salad, main course, and dessert (often times accompanied with bread). This is where once comes in. Instead of eating dinner, most Chileans just eat a meal in the evening known as "once". It has been my experience that once is very commonly identical to breakfast which means...yes, more bread.

I remember one day several years ago when I was visiting Puerto Montt, the capital of the region above us. I had eaten bread at breakfast, bread at lunch, and then bread at once. The whole day I was looking forward to accompanying the pastor to discipleship in the homes of some of the believers from the church. We went to two or three homes. Little did I know that at discipleship we'd be eating once! Wow. Here in Chile it has been my experience that pastors and missionaries always get served a double portion of food. As you can imagine, I had bread coming out of my ears that night. Chile is second only to Germany in most amount of bread eaten by the average person. I guess Robert Atkins (the Atkins diet) wouldn't survive in Chile!

A new prospect

My wife loves to design. Here in our city we do not have much when it comes to national chains, malls, etc. We do have a national chain though called Homecenter/Sodimac. It is basically your home improvement store. Think about my wife running wild in that store...I know, scary. I'm just playing around though because she is a very frugal person. All kidding aside though, the other day we went to the store and since I knew she was going to take a long time trying to decide what she wanted to by I went upstairs into their small cafe. There I wrote our church info on the backs of about twenty-five or fifty tracts while enjoying a juice. At the end I payed my bill and left a nice tip for the girl working. I also gave her a tract and said, "Here's a gift for you". That was that.

About a week went by, and Annie wanted to go back to the candy shop, I mean Homecenter. So we decided to grab a sandwich at their cafe and then do a little shopping. The same girl was working! This time when I went to pay I said, "Did you get a chance to read the book I gave you?" She said she did and that she liked it. Then she asked if we had a church and I told her that we did and that we'd just started with meetings the Sunday before. After conversing for a bit and witnessing to her our conversation was naturally coming to a close. She said, "I hope everything goes well for you guys with the church and that it grows." I said, "I hope so too. Why don't you join us?" She said, "That's why I asked if you had a church"! Praise the Lord! She, Fernanda, will be joining us for "once" with her husband and daughter, right after Sunday night Bible study. To see what "once" means, check out my next post

The end of the world

This is a short excerpt from my newest prayer letter I am writing: "We made it! Three weeks ago we arrived to Patagonia. As most of you know, Patagonia is a vast region in the southern part of South America. It extends into both southern Chile and southern Argentina. In Chile, Patagonia comprises the two furthest southern states, the 11th and 12th regions. Coyhaique is the capital of the 11th region. It is from there that I write this prayer letter. "

If you are curious to see where we are, click here.

To put some perspective on that:
We are 676 miles from the furthest southernmost city in the world: Puerto Williams.
We are 6,211 miles away from Los Angeles, CA where we both grew up.

New milestones for Micah

The last couple of weeks it has been fun to watch my son grow. He's hit six months now and Annie has been saying for the last six months that she wanted to feed him when he reached this age. Last week he ate his first thing that wasn't his mother's milk: Nestle Nestum Arroz. Translation: rice cereal...I think. It looks like the malt-o-meal I used to eat when I was little and it smells really good. He likes it! We recorded a video of the first time to show to our loved ones back in the U.S. Once we get good internet I will upload the video to youtube and send it out. Right now I am using the internet from my cell phone which is very slow, but it gets the job done. Another development was yesterday. Micah was in his pack n' play as we were eating breakfast. I look over and he had moved himself to the sitting up position all on his own! It was such a shocker because we've never really tried to make him sit up or anything and he just did it all of the sudden! It's fun to watch him develop.

You might just make a Patagón out of me yet

A Patagón is the Spanish term for somebody from Patagonia. Since my last post about fire building I have mastered the art (well, maybe "mastered" is a bit of an exaggteration, but I've gotten it down). Yesterday I was chatting with my neighbor who is from Achao, a city on the large island called Chiloé. I asked him if he knew how to do cordero asado (which in this region is where you butcher a lamb and prepare it on a pole to where it sort of looks crucified and the you cook it over wood for four hours) and Fernando, my neighbor, looked at me and said, "of course", like, "who doesn't?!" We made a deal that if I buy a lamb he has to cook it for our families and teach me how to repeat the process.

You don't need a wood stove in California

The week that we left California the temperature was above 100. Last night the temperature in Coyhaique was under 40 degrees...and its spring. The homes here are heated with slow combustion wood stoves. Using one is an art. If you were to have asked me what would be the most difficult part of moving to Chile a typical answer one could expect would be one of the following: money changing, the language, the culture, the food, etc. No, none of these has been the most difficult for me: it has been starting a fire! I tried what I learned from camping/boyscouts/summer camp: the teepee method. No luck. I have also had three people who have lived in this city for many years teach me. Do you know how humbling it is for a grown man to go to his neighbor and admit he doesn't know how to start a fire? Well, I have officially achieved the position of sissy gringo in his eyes! One of the three people who tried to teach me said to tear up some cardboard, pour some kerosene on them, stack smaller pieces of wood on them, and then light them before the kerosene turns to fumes. No luck. Another one of them said to drench some ashes in kerosene, put torn cardboard on them, stack smaller pieces of wood on them, and then light it. No luck. The third person told me to tear up cardboard, to absolute not use any kerosene, stack the wood, and light it. No luck. Each time I've been able to get some flames going, but they eventually go out. There are a lot of other things involved like knowing when to put larger wood on and knowing how much to keep your chute open or closed, but after much internet consultation I have come to the conclusion that my wood is wet. Somebody suggested these little bricks that continue to burn for awhile and that really help you to start a fire. I bought a couple of packs today. They come with 32 bricks each and they cost about $3 a pack. The man who sold them to me said that you only need one or two bricks per fire started. I must admit though, I am so determined to start a fire tonight that I will use all 64 bricks if I have to. I will persevere.

Saturday visitation

This last Saturday we had Eduardo over to our house and then he and I went door knocking together. By the end of our time door to door I had run out of tracts, but there was a man washing his car. Although I really love tracts and carry them around all the time, you don't need tracts to preach the gospel! There was evangelism before the printing press. Eduardo and I approached the man who we came to find out was named Rodrigo. Rodrigo listened to a very clear presentation of the gospel for about 20 minutes and really seemed to be on the fence about making the decision to trust Jesus Christ as his personal Saviour, but he just wasn't ready. He was very friendly and extremely receptive. I'll be back to that home. Eduardo seemed captivated and that was really a blessing. I hope that soon when we go out together he will be doing the talking as well.

Oh that every born again child of God would loose themselves of the plague of muteness!

First Bible study

Yesterday marked the commencement of the ministry of Central Baptist Church of Coyhaique: to my knowledge, the first independent Baptist church in Patagonia (on the Chilean side, I know of one 8 hours east of us in the Argentinean side). I suppose you could say the public ministry of this new church started a couple of weeks ago when our family walked the streets of the city preaching the gospel from door to door.

The meeting went very well. We had one in attendance! Eduardo came, who is from the church in Puerto Montt. The Bible study began with a time in prayer. We passed around the prayer card for the Kuhlman family, church planters in Seattle, WA. Then we took prayer requests and spent a time in prayer. We then sang O Love of God, I Stand Amazed, and I Love You Lord before studying love for about 30 or 45 minutes. It was a great start!

Getting accustomed to the region

Today we were introduced to "mate". It is a type of herbal tea that is normally drunken out of a dried gourd, although today ours was our of a ceramic type of mug. Here is a picture of what it typically would look like:

I was taught a few very important things about drinking mate. First off, if somebody has welcomed you into their home and offers you mate, it is extremely important to accept it. If you don't accept it, there is an immediate barrier placed. Although it is extremely bitter, and isn't pleasing to the typical gringo pallet, I believe it can grow on you. Everybody passes it around and drinks from the same metal straw, so I'm sure my brother-in-law Russell wouldn't like it! I find this next piece of information to be very important... Once you drink the mate down, you pass it to the next person and they fill it up with water only to drink it down and pass it again. It goes around till it gets to you again. Well the important thing to note is that if you pass the mate back to the person with the kettle and say, "muchas gracias", that means you've had enough and they won't pass it to you again. Otherwise you may get it handed to you all night, and then it'd be important to know where their bathroom is!

In other news, we met a contact given to us through a missionary in Puerto Montt (the capital of the state above us). His name is Eduardo and he lives here in Coyhaique. Eduardo committed to attend our weekly Bible studies, which are scheduled to start next Sunday afternoon at 5 pm. It will at least be he, Annie, Micah, and myself. I visited Jenifer's house, the gal who I led to Christ this week, but she wasn't home. I hope to establish contact with her and see her continue to grow. Hopefully she will be the other person attending and I hope that eventually other members of their families will get saved and be become a part of the church.

Our house is coming along. The only thing that we're missing now is firewood (yes, it is wood heated, like pretty much every home down here), gas (for hot water and the stove), and we're set to go (apart from a few minor details like installing appliances and getting a couch/dining table)!

I'm loving the adventure! And I know God is with us! (Matthew 28:20)

The firstfruits

In the time of harvest, the firstfruits are always very important. We read about a feast of firstfruits in Leviticus 23:9-14. We see in Proverbs 3:9 that God is interested in our firstfruits financially. Jesus, in relation to His resurrection from the dead, is called the firstfruits (1 Corinthians 15:20).

It is with great rejoicing that I write this entry. Yesterday I experienced the firstfruits in relation to the harvest of souls in this city. We have been here for 9 days. One of our first days here I gave a gospel tract (the Chick tract, "Guilty?") to a lady on a sidewalk near the plaza. Yesterday as I was parking my car a woman kept staring at me. I wasn't sure if she was just shocked to see a gringo or what. She was a large Mapuche woman. The Mapuche or an indigenous group here in Chile; some would call them Indians, like the American Indians, but they really don't like that word so I stick with Mapuche. She approached the car and said to me with absolutely no emotion in her voice, "I read the little book you gave me. It was beautiful." It was then that I remember who she was, asked her name, and she said Jennifer. I began a conversation with Jennifer about how to have her sins forgiven. It was very well received and she understood clearly so our conversation ended with her taking my hand as we bowed our heads to pray. She asked the Lord Jesus Christ to be her Saviour! It was wonderful. She didn't have a Bible so I have her a book of John and told her to start reading it. She gave me her address and told us that Saturday evenings or all day Sunday is a good time to visit. We'll be seeing her soon. Praise the Lord!

Once upon a time, in a far away land

This is going to be a long post, because it’s the first time I’ve had internet on my computer in a while. I think the trip can be divided into the following cities: Santiago, Loncoche, Lanco, Panguipulli, Puerto Montt, Puerto Chacabuco, and Coyhaique. As you read, keep in mind that this is roughly 1,000 miles of travel. Another thing to remember is that the words I will use could never truly describe the trip. Chile is one of the most beautiful places on earth and we saw about half of the country (the longest country in the world).

Santiago

We left Santiago early Friday morning. It was a great trip! There’s a very tasty sausage in Chile called a longaniza…not to be confused with the Mexican longaniza that you can get in the states. Well everybody in Chile knows that the best longaniza in the whole country is in the city of Chillán. I decided that we couldn’t drive through Chillán without trying their longaniza! So we made a little stop there. In the afternoon we visited a place called Monte Águila. There are two Mexican missionaries there, and I was there specifically to meet a third who we found out is back in Mexico right now. I enjoyed meeting the others anyway. One of their names was Rodolfo Ventura and the other’s first name was Roberto.

Loncoche

Our first stop to stay overnight was in Loncoche. It was there that we met up with Jody Ray. She is a great example of what a Christian lady should be and we sure love her. She opened her home to us Friday and Saturday night. There we also made a couple of other friends named Cyntia and Cristian, a young couple living with her. Cyntia has a brain tumor and is taking medicine that makes her extremely ill so I have been praying for her.

Lanco

Iglesia Bíblica Bautista el Calvario is the church in Lanco where Jody attends. It is about 15 minutes or so from Loncoche. Her son-in-law Neil Arias started the church. He is now pastoring a Spanish department of a church in Tucson, Arizona. I was invited to preach at this church on Sunday morning, and we also sang.

Panguipulli

After Sunday lunch we left Panguipulli to meet some new friends, Steve and Sandra Reyes. They have 3 adorable children, and they’re funny kids too. Their son said to me, “You’re stomach is big, you must have eaten too much fish.” Then the next day he said, “Carl, you have a funny name, but it’s a good one anyway.” We attended church with them Sunday night and sang in the service. After church and the next morning we played games with them. It was refreshing for all of us, and I think it will be a good friendship in the future. The highlight of my stay with them was late Sunday night. There is a lady in their church whose mother was ill to the point of death, and the doctors said that she’d never wake up (I’m not sure if it was a comma, or if she was just sleepy/incoherent for a long time). Steve received a phone call informing him that she had woken up, so he and I headed out to the hospital and I stood next to her bed as Steve led her to Christ.

Puerto Montt

Our plans changed a couple of times as we tried to determine what would be the best way for us to get to our destination in Patagonia: Coyhaique. It was a blessing to cross paths with Cyntia and Cristian in Loncoche because as it turned out they had a lot of family that had made the trip to Coyhaique. The trip is not as straight forward as one would think because of the Andes. You can’t just drive there. Instead you have to either travel through Argentina or take 1 or several boats to get there. We determined that though it was a little pricier, taking one boat from Puerto Montt to Puerto Chacabuco would be best because of the gas we would have spent, the uncertainty of travelling the other route, and because of the dirt roads we avoided with our excessively loaded vehicle. Pastor Louis Long and his wife Kathy received us into their home on Monday night in Puerto Montt. Sweet couple. We shipped out Tuesday night at 8 pm.

Puerto Chacabuco

The boat trip from Puerto Montt to Puerto Chacabuco was a 24 hour trip. We were very comfortable in a cabin with four beds and a private bathroom. I loved the trip, though I must admit I’ve never really developed my sea legs. I saw dozens of islands on the trip. On one of the islands were two populations: one by the name of Puerto Aguirre and the other by the name of Caleta Andrade. We really need to plant a church there…maybe two.

Coyhaique

Late Wednesday night we got in to Coyhaique. Home sweet home. This is where we will live and do ministry. Coyhaique is the capital of the XI Region of Chile with a population of over 50,000. We were received into the home of some friends and are there until we move in to our own place. I believe the Lord ordered our steps to a certain home and we sealed the deal with evangelism in that neighborhood on Saturday. We write up the contract this Tuesday and move in whenever we are ready. I can’t wait to get settled in and start a weekly Bible study that will pave the way for the church we are starting in a few months.

What an adventure! I’m so glad to share it with my best friend, Annie, by my side.

We made it

I have really missed blogging this last week, and boy they've been exciting days. There is so much I plan to say, but blogging from my cell phone just doesn't cut it. I hope to have internet with my laptop soon and then I can write something substantial. For now it'll suffice to say that we made it to Patagonia safely and we're now looking for a place to live while we stay with a friend.

1 Peter 2:2

Yesterday Micah spit up and some of it hit the edge of my Bible. We cleaned it up and no big deal. Today as i was opening my Bible to read i notice that the place where the spit up landed was a different color than the rest and i said to myself, "it brings new meaning to the verse that says desire ye the sincere milk of the word". Oh the irony. I love being a dad.

New heights

The feelings I am feeling are difficult to put into words. I feel like sometimes life has its climaxes and it feels like I’ve arrived to one. But even climax isn’t the right word because it implies that there is a plateau or downhill coming up and I don’t believe that’s the case.

I believe that this moment in life is an accumulation of everything that’s happened since that decision I made 8 years ago when I asked Jesus Christ to be my Saviour and I believed in His death, burial, and resurrection for my salvation. I never imagined the path it would take me down. I was just a broken, hurting, and lost teenager who finally turned to the Lord because of His goodness and love. I can truly say it was the best thing that ever happened to me. I remember writing to a man who had a large part in my conversion to Christ and thanking him for everything. He humbly replied, "God's love was just chasing after you and I was happy to tag along for the ride." He is still chasing after me and I hunger for Him.

As I look back and reflect, it feels like the last 8 years have been a wonderful story being written. Some of the recent additions have been my beautiful bride (definitely the second best thing that ever happened to me) and my precious son.

We are all packed up and ready to head for Patagonia in the morning. What does it feel like? It feels like it’s just the next chapter in this wonderful adventure waiting to be written.

 

Contentment

Something that happened recently caused me to remember a Sunday School lesson that I taught at Grace Baptist Church in Corona. I reflected on the truths from God's word that I had the privilege to teach. I taught on how godliness with contentment is great gain. I taught that having food and clothing let us be therewith content. I shared two quotes that I learned from a mentor of mine: "contentment is realizng that God has given me everything I need for my present happiness" and, "the enemy of contentment is comparison". Lately I was asked a list of ten questions that were supposed to make me think. One was, "If you could be any age what would it be?" I responded, "25". Another question was, "What is your dream job?" I responded: "missionary" I am so happy with the lot I've been given! And I am determined that when things change I'll be content then too! May the Lord keep us from discontentment, comparison, and coveteousness.

Today was a nice day. Kind of a long one, but definitely enjoyable. We took a trip to the coast with the Mcbryar family. Some highlights were Mexican food for lunch (sort of a rarity in chile), the pretty coasts of Viña Del Mar and Valparaíso, buying a neat coat for Micah for ten bucks and a beenie for three, having ice cream at the (cold) beach, and eating dunkin doughnuts. To think, I had to come all the way to South America to have dunkin doughnuts for the first time. Today was a relaxing tourist day. Here's a couple of pictures:

Other news-we got our car! Now its just a matter of getting a few things ready to go, packing, and heading to the tip of the world! I downloaded an app on my Chilean cell phone that allows me to text U.S. cell phones at no cost and vice versa. This basically makes me accesible to people in the states 24/7. Email me to get the number if you want to be able to text. Technology is amazing sometimes. I think to myself that Carey, Judson, or other missionary greats of yesteryears would look at us today, shake their heads and call us pansies! But then again, had the tehnology been available in the 17 & 1800's I'm sure they would have taken advantage of it too.

Language blunders

Last night at dinner I made two funny mistakes:

1. The waiter asked me how something was and I said that it was a little too raro for me. I wanted to say rare (which looks a lot like "raro", that's what we call in linguistics a false cognate), but instead I said strange.

2. I asked the waiter if when he brought the check we were supposed to pay at the table or if we were just supposed to leave (implying without paying). I meant to ask if we were supposed to pay at the register...luckily our waiter had a good sense of humor!

Date night

Last night was really fun. Annie got a baby sitter (Delaney, the McBryar's daughter) and organized for us to go out to dinner. Before we did that, we went to cerro san cristobal (saint christopher hill) which is where there is a giant statue depicting the Roman virgin Mary. We did all public transportation to get there. For Annie, this was really a new experience. For me it was my typical life when I lived here a couple of years ago. Here's some pictures from the top of the hill

Random fact: I have a cell phone now...it has internet, I've never had internet on a cell phone before.

Last night after heading to downtown Santiago we had a date. It was a blast. Annie planned two games that were real fun: one we had to guess what the other would answer to ten questions and the other was called like shopping bingo or something. We went to the mall and had to observe people doing things like a kid trying on a hat or a parent with three kids; as we observed that we got to ex a square until we got bingo. It was fun and we laughed a lot.

Pastor Elias Huenulaf

Last night we visited a great church in Lo Espejo, a commune next door to the one we're staying in. The church is called Bible Baptist Church and the Pastor is Elias Huenulaf. He had us sing and he also asked me to address the congregation. I shared our burden for Patagonia. His two sons are fluent in English and we enjoyed conversing in English. He has a son who is very talented on the piano, he played a couple of pieces for us including Chopin's Nocturne (I especially enjoyed that). His other son is named Andres. Andres actually went to an independent Baptist Bible college in Florida. He is very interested in going to the 11th region of Chile to start a church. I couldn't be more excited because the church that we are starting will be the only independent Baptist church in that entire state. The state below it doesn't have one either. Andres is planning a survey trip to come check out the state. We've offered our home to him and told him that in any way we can be a help, "cuenta con nosotros", or, you can count on us.

Weep No More

Tonight we joined Iglesia Bautista Amistad again and sang this song called No Temas Más or the title of the English version is Weep No More. The song is composed of music is from an old hymn called O Word of God Incarnate with new words written by a Baptist evangelist named Steve Pettit. The new version is a beautiful song about the resurrection.

Speaking out of turn

The oddest thing happened to me yesterday...I was sitting around with a bunch of Americans, and started my sentence in Spanish. About 15 words into it me di cuenta (i realized) that I was speaking Spanish. They got a good laugh out of it. I hope this is a positive step towards Spanish becoming the norm.

This little laugh has stolen my heart

Materials for the church in Patagonia

The hymnals are all finished and I think they look pretty good! We got 75 of them.

We are also order several banners for the church. One with the church logo, one with the schedule of services, and also one that has a missions emphasis for inside the building.

I was able to obtain 1,000 quality copies of the gospel of John at 5 cents a piece! What a deal!

Chilean Independence Day

Today marks the start of Fiestas Patrias (Patriotic Festival) here in Chile. The 18th of September is their 4th of July, except rather than just celebrate is on the 18th it becomes basically a week-long ordeal. Today was a special day here for chilean churches. Pretty much all the churches have some combination of the following happening after service:

Choripan (barbeque'd chilean sausage served with bread and pebre/a chilean pico de gallo)

Traditional chilean outfits

Emboque (a little wooden toy)

It was a fun day for us. I preached at the church that I helped to start, Iglesia Bautista Vida (Life Baptist Church) and then afterwards we had an asado (bbq). I got the emboque on my first two tries...everyone was impressed of course (I guess this gringo has what it takes!). I got to see many of the people that I ministered to when I was here before. One of the dear women in the church brought some pretty pink flowers of Annie. And of course, as always, Micah was the life of the party!