Fun Times with Poo!

matthew didn't poo for a week...but when he did he was on my lap in the living room and it was an explosion of great magnitude!

while changing him i saw poo on his back, his hands, his onezee, his pants, his shirt, and his sweater...it literary passed through all six layers. while taking his clothes off it got on the back of his neck, his hands, and his forehead and feet...cuz we all know how babies stay still when you change them.

when i "finished" i noticed it had also passed through all his layers onto my pants. took them off and there it was on my boxers. took them off and noticed it was on my leg also. so i was half naked and there I noticed another spot (or shot!). took off the shirt and i stood there in my socks with a pile of dirty poo'd on clothes of two sizes, baby and mens, with poo on my left thigh, stomach (actually passed through the huge happy trail), and on my chest...

and Matthew cracking up laughing the whole time!

Depression and Hope

It has been a tough first year in charge of the church in Ciudad Nueva. There have been some really great moments and some days that just take it out of me, days when I could get on a boat in the middle of a storm and fall asleep.

These last couple weeks have been just that for me.

We have a new family that has been coming every week the last month and they are great. We have two single moms that are getting more and more involved in the church and going to seminary classes. We have the husband of a long time member beginning to come more faithfully and showing a lot more interest since we had a men only BBQ the day before Father's day, and he wants to be involved in our house visit ministry and study at seminary next semester.

We have also had two members get into a really bad fight and are having a real hard time reconciling. That can be tough on a small church. There is a member who has caused a lot of strife with stupid comments at inappropriate times. We had a total of 6 men at our Father's day service that we had to start an hour late because there were only 6 people at the scheduled service time. Our youth group has practically vanished within 6 weeks and we have not been able to pinpoint why. Our musicians were from Local Central and they no longer will be playing for us...but I kind of like singing to a CD.

Ups and downs. Moments of great joy and great sadness. It seems each time that something goes really bad God shows a little spark of hope. We know that this is a new year with a lot of things that will change. Our hope is that we can now follow Jesus' example of multiplying and not adding members. We are dedicating to a small group of men and women to equip and empower them to take of ministries responsibly. It is just the seed and I know that God will cause it to grow...but we are so impatient to want to see the fruits sometimes.

Thank you all for your prayers and support!

World Cup

So I will be trying to get as much free time as possible during this month...World Cup Soccer! got to go the US is playing England right now.

Violence

After the other night some of the old thoughts started coming back to me...

"Up to what point is violence okay?"

"Is violence okay?"

I was thinking the whole night about the event, but not so much in the best way. There is this innate thinking process that keeps me thinking about different ways that I could've handled it...sadly, I spent little time thinking about anything else but a violent ending. Maybe it was the excitement of the moment...maybe it was all the violence seen on TV and in movies being brought out of me through this moment.

What could it be?

The more I think about it I think about more bizarre outcomes...

How about inviting him for a bite to eat and giving him a couple bucks to do it? That would at least allow me to talk to him for a few minutes and try to plant a small seed that could make a tree of a difference, each branch reaching out to a part of his life. Maybe he would have said no and just kept on doing what he does. He probably still still is now, so what I did do hasn't changed much.

Anyway, God did not call us to change the world. We are to love and be a light and allow Him to do any changing the can be done. Did it feel good to do what I did? You bet it did! Do I think it was the best thing to do...let's just say I don't remember reading Jesus doing anything like that except to the religious.