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!