Serving Christ in México
We have just arrived back in Mexico from our furlough in Canada. A furlough, or at least this furlough, is a time of vacation, work, rest, presentations, visiting, meetings, and family, all mixed up and spread over a two month period. It is a time of coming home and missing home at the same time. A time of easing back into the familiar, yet still feeling out of place.
Continue reading “Seven Differences “
Furlough is on the near horizon. We are a week away from loading kids and suitcases in our van and driving across the country to Puerto Vallarta. After some time with fellow missionaries we will board an airplane and take a direct flight to Edmonton. A few weeks on the prairies and then it is off to Abbotsford, a trip up to Vernon, a quick couple days in Hamilton.
Continue reading “God At Work”
I tried to refuse his offer, but to no avail. So I reluctantly sat down on one of the white plastic stools and he ordered fried fish and totopos for me. When they plunked the plate down in front of me, I turned to Mario and repeated what I had told him earlier, that normally when it is someone’s birthday it’s them that get treated to a meal, not the other way around. He waved me off and pushed the salsa my way.
Continue reading “The Birthday Fish”
Last month we ran, what we hope to be, our annual Easter kids’ club. It is more-or-less a Vacation Bible School that we do for two hours in the morning of the second week of Easter holidays. We begin with games, then a craft followed by singing and finish with a gospel message.
Continue reading “Kids’ Club – Easter 2023”
“I have a little bit of god in me and a little bit of the devil.”
I raised my eyebrows. “Really?”
He smiled and continued on. “We are all part of god, don’t you see. The ants, the trees, the jaguars, everything.”
Continue reading “The Conversation”
Back when I was single and living in Edmonton I got involved in a sports outreach run by an evangelist named Pete Wright. I was looking for opportunities to meet people from outside the church and to learn how to share my faith. Pete Wright organised a community soccer league in the summers and was looking for people to help.
Continue reading “Full Circle”
My aim in the past year on this blog was to write at least one blog-post every month related to the mission work here in Queretaro. However, not every post is an update per-se. Often, I write about some specific aspect or story related to our work, instead of giving a general update. That is intentional, not only because specifics are more interesting, but also because at times a traditional update can be hard, and boring, to write.
Continue reading “Year in Review – 2022”
One of the fascinating things about crossing over into a different culture is thinking through how to live as a Christian in your adopted culture, and how that process sheds new light on living as a Christian in your home culture. As we encounter different cultural customs and celebrations, we have to work to understand what they mean and then, informed by the word of God, determine how we may or may not participate.
Continue reading “On the Day of the Dead”
This past summer we ran a week-long kids club (vacation bible school) in the neighbourhood where we are ministering and one of our goals was to follow that up with a weekly kids club. We were not quite decided on the exact format, but in the weeks that followed the kids club, we made sure we were at the sports court on Thursday afternoons with soccer balls, basketballs, chalk, and skipping ropes so we could play with the neighborhood kids.
Continue reading “Kids Club Continued…“
About three weeks ago we ran our first ever kids’ club event here in Santa Barbara. There was a moment during that kids’ club that will stick with me for a while. It was the third day of the club, which was two hours of games, crafts, singing, and a bible message, and I walked over to a corner of the sports court to take a picture. As I held up my phone and looked through the screen, I could see about thirty kids running about, a handful of parents watching from the bleachers, and all the volunteers overseeing the whole operation. I felt really grateful and silently thanked God for answering our prayers.
Continue reading “Kids’ Club”
