We made it home, safe and sound!

 

 

WOW

Tomorrow I head home. The time has flown by SO fast! I look forward being home again and sharing my adventures with all of you. But I will sure miss the people I have come to love as family!

 

Here is a picture of the summer workers on top of the mountain. Top row from left to right:   Aaron, Caitilan, Josh, Ruth.

Bottom row: Rachel, Amanda, me, and Allie.

print shop

Hello! Good news, my computer was fixed, by God! :)

For the past week, we have been working in the print shop laying out the word of God. Mostly putting the main frame together until we have enough to put through the machine to staple and cut. Then we package the finished books in boxes ready to be shipped out to those who are thirsty for the Word of God.

So far, over 2,000 John/Romans booklets are ready, and hundreds of bibles packed. Praise the Lord! God is good.

Praise the Lord!
My computer is working!!

Update

Hey ya'all!
Good news and bad news.
The great news would be the fact that we are keeping busy in the print shop. Making thousands of John/Roman books written out in Spanish. I've been able to help put the booklets together and staple. Tomorrow some of the guys are going to run the cutter (gulp).
The bad news:
my mousepad on my computer quit working! I can't figure out what happened to it. It will not allow me to move the mouse or click on the screen. Anyone have an idea how to fix it?
In the meantime, I am borrowing a friends computer.

Next Tuesday I'll be home! I will miss this place I've come to love. But it sure will be glorious to see home again!

At least it was a lizard and not a scorpion!

One of the boys was actually fast enough to catch a lizard! He brought inside for a short time and it was so funny so see the girls frightened from such an innocent critter!

Having some fun with the children before the meeting. They REALLY like soccer! Especially since the world cup is playing at this time!

 

Candy and shoe polish at the market

On each Thursday, we make a trip to the Mexican market. By my second trip there, I had found everything that I had my eye on, and was trying to find more adventurous things to do.

Aaron, Allie, and Ruth each had their foot gear polished. I agreed with them that the shoes look better now than at the time of purchase.

Then David (my faithful follower of 8 years old) and I found a candy store. We oohhed and ahhhed at the large variety of different kinds of candy. I had a few pesos, so I got a chocolate covered wafer and Duvalin candy. The duvalin was multi colored, pink,white and brown. It was soft and tasted very similiar to powdered sugar icing. Upon purchase, the cashier gave me a tiny plastic spoon to eat it with.

 

Soriana

Ok, I have to tell you about the Mexican store called Soriana. A very good description of the store would be to say it looks just like Wal-mart, except everything is in Spanish and the money is in Pesos.

    12.50 pesos is equivalent to $1.00 in American money. It's certainly different to see a candy around $30.00-$50.00!! (pesos)

I found it absolutely ridicules in the baby clothes department! We were looking for a gift, something authentic to show and tell the gift bought in Mexico. EVERY OUTFIT WAS MADE IN MEXICO WITH ENGLISH WORDING PRINTED ON THE OUTSIDE. If you ask me, I wasn't impressed. The puzzle pieces were put together in my mind- no wonder so many people wear English shirts. If that is your only option, you have no choice.

Another crazy matter that I saw took place in the food department.  It did not look sanitary at all!
In the bakery department, all the homemade bread were placed out in reach of anyone and anything with no covering. The cheesecakes did have packages, but they were displayed of a table for all and NOT in a fridge. The fruits, veggies, and herbs were set out without any fridge of any sort. The meat were worse! Fish, pork, and other meats were just set out. Eggs piled high in the middle of the aisle. Premade dishes set out with no covering or glass in front of the showcase. And salsa in bowls for you to measure out your desired amount (no covers).

I know, it's Mexico. BUT, the way food is in display, I PRAY before I eat!

update

News on the Ohio bus:
Radiator fixed. Group is leaving now at 10pm , Friday. Easier on the engine to drive at night.
God is good!

Missions trip week two

Dear friends and family,

 

" Let God arise, let his enemies be scattered: let them also that hate him flee before him.....

But let the righteous be glad; let them rejoice before God, yea let them exceedingly rejoice."  Psalm 68:1 & 3

 

Week 2...    Started with the bus that the group was driving from Ohio, breaking down... about two hours away from BPS.

 (the one radiator quit working....and the bus did not have windows to open up, so when they had to stop the air conditioner, it got HOT... it was about 105 degrees outside that day.)

So some of our workers and some of the men, took one of the buses from here and rescued the group.  :)

The more struggles and "reasons not to come" the groups have, and they still come, the better the week is going to be!
When people are totally dedicated to serving the Lord no matter the cost, satan is going to try all the harder to stop them.

As we heard later, there were some in the group who did not think they would be able to come because of finances, but at the last minute God provided for them.. there was one lady who has been trying to stop smoking for the past few years, God told her that as long as she stayed focused on HIM, she would not need the ciggarettes. So she left them behind, and she has not "needed" one since she left her home!  God is so faithful!!  

One of the young men is on dialisis, but that did not stop him from coming.

One of the ladies told us later in the week, that satan had been trying to tell her that she is too old to be on a missions trip...like when her ankles swelled, or it was really hot... but God gave her strength, and she stood up and testified in front of the group about what the Lord taught her through this week, and then she said; I am here to tell satan I AM NOT TOO OLD!!!  :)   Praise the Lord!  God can use ANYONE no matter what age they are, as long as they are willing.

That Saturday night when we went up to the mountain it was touching to see one of the young ladies looking at the cities of El Paso and Jaurez, with tears streaming down her face as she thought about all the spiritually lost people.  

Do you cry over the lost?

Sunday Morning, there was a missionary and his wife, who are working on going to Paraguay.  

(Rachel was born there, and her parents were missionarys there.)  So she and Ruth felt right "at home" ! :)

Sunday evening, we went to Jaurez, to the church that we would be working with that week...there was a sand/rain storm, so everything got covered in dust. :) The advantage to the sand everywhere, would be one of the prettiest sunsets!                   

The pastor from the ohio group, (Pastor Slabaugh- sp?) preached a very good sermon about consecrating your whole being to the Lord. How each of us has a leporsy called sin and we need a touch from Jesus called salvation.  Two people from the mexican church got saved!!!!  PTL!

The lady who got saved that night, came all week and helped with going door to door, along with her husband who was already a Christian, and their three adorable little children. 

What a blessing to see her grow in her faith, even in 4 days!

I think the young man who got saved, also came the next few nights.

Monday night, Ruth, Justin (from Ohio) and I, were in a group together, with a lady from the Church in J. going door to door... the houses in that community were different than I have seen before, and a lot of them were empty... but the Lord brought about 200 people that night, even though the sky was threatening to rain... when one of the men saw the clouds, he came and told Ruth that we needed to pray that the Lord woud keep the rain away.   So  Ruth  found Amanda, and Allie also came over to where they were, and prayed.  (having faith that God would show Himself mighty)

The result was amazing!!!  There were clouds and lightening all around us.. except  for right above the park where we were! it was basically clear sky.. and the sunset was AWESOME!  There was a pink sunbeam that came right up behind the Chalk drawing!!!  God blesses you abundantly when you are doing HIS will, and we could all feel His love and favor that night!  When the people pray for salvation, it is such a holy moment, it is hard to explain!

A motorcyclist had stopped to watch the program, he was farther back and away from the group. But the message had touched his heart and the expression on his face was humble and sorrow. Later, he walked up to the pastor to talk with him. It was so good to see him give his life to the Lord. 

(oh, the "park" Monday night, was more like an open lot/garbage dump.) 

 

One of the nights, brother Joe (from El Paso) was able to lead a young man to Christ!

 And that young man brought a bunch of his friends to the next meeting! 

Ruth, Justin, and I, all had instruments along, so we played for the meetings.. (Justin had a guitar,Ruth had a mandolin, and I my violin)  I would pretend that her violin was not working right, and would make screeching sounds with it, and then Brother Hector would take it from me, and say I think I can fix it... and then he would raise it in the air, and almost smash it....the first night I did not know he would do that, so my reaction was great to see! :) A big NOOOOooooo! and  grabbed it back..then proceeded to play I'll fly away. :)  the children loved it!

Justin (15) has a amazing gift from God in the area of music, and he is also a very comical type of person, great with children! :)  Brother Hector would be telling a story, and Justin would come up playing the guitar, and "interrupt"...after a few times of that, Brother Hector would include him in the story, and Justin would play, and act out different things in the story. It was great!

Tonia (Jarvis) Reed, (the Jarvis's one daughter,) and her husband, and 2 children were with the group from Ohio.

Tonia used to do the chalk drawings in the past, so Rachel let her do the drawing on Tuesday night, it is always fun to watch different people draw, with their own unique styles.

Wednesday, was awesome!! The Lord gave us a great meeting that noon, and again in the evening! 

There were 2 ladies who were selling newspapers,or magazines,(I think) who were invited to the meeting, but they did not seem to want to come,  the one young lady ( from Ohio) Nicole, who had invited them,  saw them watching from a nearbye store...and then after a little while, they came to the meeting- and they both got saved!!!  PTL!

 

That afternoon at Soriana's, Ruth had a mexican experience... ordered a lime slushi,  thought it had strawberry in it.. Ruth watched the lady make it, and saw her put salt in it... ( thought ok...) and it turned out that the red was chili powder!

It tasted interesting! Ruth was able to eat most of it, but I thought it was soooooo gross. :s Ruth said it was pretty good (it also came with a popsicle to dip in it).

I stayed with and innocent frozen cappacino, I'm curious but not desperate.

Wednesday evening, was the biggest meeting yet!  with about 350 people that came... and MANY got saved!! 

When the children were brought into seperate groups  from the adults,to lead them in the salvation prayer, the adults quickly swarmed closer to the chalk easel to see and hear better.. it was so delightful to see their hunger for God's word!

This week, about 425 people were saved at the meetings!!! 

 (and who knows how many will, or have come to Christ, just by reading the John and Romans and tracts!!)

This church was in a very poor area, and we were so glad to go to an area where people were poor in the things of this world, and to be able to share the Love and riches of God with them!

I think there is more that I am forgetting, but I guess I need to save some to tell when I get home!! :)

 Thank you for your prayers!  

Please don't worry about our safety, God is protecting us, and when you are in the center of HIS will, NOTHING can harm you, unless God allows it, and it will all be to HIS glory!   Pray for our safety yes, but pray more that people will be saved!
Dios Te Bendiga,  (God Bless you!)

               Joyfully serving Jesus,    JoyAnn

 (thank-you Ruth for writing so much of this letter!)

roadrunners

These bird are quite a common occurrence around here, but since their so fast, I had to take a picture of a painting to show you what they look like! :)

random photos

Today has become an interesting one... The mission group from Ohio came down last Saturday. Their plans were to stay a week and leave today ( Friday ).  But on the way down, the radiator in the bus they were driving decided to die two hours before arriving here in El Paso. Of course on one of the hottest days of the week! So some of the people that are working here, went to go rescue them. During the Ohio groups stay, a couple of the guys worked on the bus. We found out that it needs a new radiator, and the one that fits this bus needs to be custom made. OH BOY! One of the team leaders was able to contact the factory and have the two radiators for the bus sent here, and they would plan to work on it as soon as it arrived here on Thursday.

The plan sounded very good, but if one radiator gets sent here and the other to Louisiana, it doesn't work very well.

Instead of having the one radiator from Louisiana sent here, it's shorter time frame to have the company make a new one and send it overnight.

Plan B: part #2 is due to arrive at noon, and hope that the shop in town will work on Saturday or wait until Monday-Tuesday.

In the meantime, the Ohio group has been very helpful on getting the place clean for the next group to arrive tomorrow, we aren't sure when the Ohio group will be able to go home. No-one is worried about it, everything is in God's hands and the fellowship with others is sheer joy!

 

During the week in Mexico, we passed out tracts and John/Romans books and invited the neighboring Mexicans to come to the children's program that the Americanos were having. With such a good amount of people helping, we got done a little earlier than usual. Someone brought a soccer ball with and had a great game of soccer with the children that arrived early.

 

Something even more wonderful than all of the things we have done, was to see around 425 people give their life to the Lord this week! AMEN!

Last nights meeting went so amazing! The church that helped us out, turned out to be a relatively good number. Mr. Jarvis (director) instructed each American that came on the mission field to line up. We numbered of, from 1 to 6, then divided into six groups. A Mexican church member was assigned to each group and we headed off to invite the neighborhood to come to our meeting in an hour.

The community homes are SO close together, the pictures can't explain it well enough to show how crammed all the hundreds of houses are. Not to mention the small space!

  I grabbed a stack of John/Roman booklets, and stuck a tract in each one. Ruth, Justin, and I, were to follow Carmen from the Baptist church in Mexico. We only could say a 'pequeno' of Spanish and the same with Carmen for English. When she introduced herself to us, we had a trouble trying to explain Ruth's name. Justin's was easy, and the Spanish name that is closest to Joy, it Josefina ( !I have adored and LOVED that name since I was young, so you can't imagine my excitement when I found this out!! ). But Ruth's name is very difficult since the R is rolled and there is no TH. HMMMMMM.

We did our best to explain, but Carmen seemed confused. We continued on the rough sidewalk, when it dawned on me that she had her Spanish bible. OF COURSE! I could show her the book of Ruth! It is awesome to communicate with people, have them understand, and not say a word :)

 

 Anyways, about the meeting.   We had walked into the neighborhood with time to spend before we started. Some of the Mexican ladies brought face painting supplies to give the people something to do if they came early.  I wasn't planning on having anything on painted on me, but when I saw the enthusiasm in Carmen's determined, joyful expression, I couldn't turn the Mexican people down.

The Meeting started with Brother Hector speaking an asking the children questions about this and that. Then the Americano group sang a song in Spanish with Ruth on her mandolin, Justin on his guitar, and me on the violin.

It went ok, considering that the pronunciation was different from the usual "Lord I lift Your name on high".

Another person from the Ohio group, whose name is Anne, played a song with me, I on the violin, Anne of the flute.

Brother Hector asked the kids what language we  should play in. Chinese? Spanish? French? NO! The children wanted INGLES!!!!! OK, we will... :)

 Day by day was our chosen song before going on to the puppets. This is what brings all the children, PUPPETS!

We are working on making the performance better, but the children still like it very much!
When the puppet show was finished, Ruth and I were invited to play something else, this song was not preplanned, just on the spot! I was quiet nervous, but I relied on the Lord to use these hands as He has always done, to make the music. Before playing the song, I really wanted to make the children laugh, so I screeched notes that certainly not make a 'joyful noise!' . Finally, Hector said to the children, "I can fix it". So I handed it over to him, he then raised it up, HIGH in the air to bang it down hard on the ground ( all in joking manner of course ), I made a terrified response to rescue my treasured item ( I knew he would never do it for real, but it was sure fun to be in the action! ). Well, all of a sudden my violin worked pretty good, so we played, 'I'll fly away". This song fit the moment, as many were familiar to it.

While we were playing, the guys behind us got the chalk easel up and ready to go. Chalk talks are so neat, they have a ministry all to themselves!

This night, seemed even more special. During the chalk talk, clouds built up, threatening to bring rain, but God held it back! In fact, right at the time of showing the black light of choosing which way we need to chose. The well worn wide road? Or the thin narrow path? Rachel was just about to put the backlight on to show glorious Heaven and destructive Hell at the end of each path, when a brilliant sunbeam came out of the sky, shining upward right in the middle of the picture!   Only God could be the planner of that!
So many people gave their heart to the Lord that night. Something in the air was so Holy, the presence of God was there.

How could I not come? How could I not see that the people were hungry for the Word of God, that even a motorcyclist had to stop and see the peace of his decision to give God his life.

How could I live a life and never grasp the opportunity to do something eternal?

   Go into all the world and tell the good news.

Last nights meeting

 

Week #2

Nothing is impossible with God!

Ruth is one of my dear friends, and she is gathering Gods word to pass out to the neighborhood in the location of the meeting we had.

The picture right below is one of the houses we knocked at to invite the household to the evangelism meeting. These pictures is of one of the meetings that we had during the afternoon service, each meeting is ended with a chalk talk- which is a message all to itself!

**********************************************************************************

Hola!
Oh! I'm having such a wonderful time here! The people that I am working with are ready to serve God, and we have found muchos things to talk about.

The mission trips into Mexico have gone very well also! We had 2 meetings yesterday, Wednesday. Our day started at 9am with all of us trooping into the bus that is used to bring the groups over the border. Every week we work with a church for the three days that we go of that week, and each meeting is around the area the church is located, at separate parks.

By the time the bus arrived to our destination, it was an hour before the meeting was planned to start. John/Romans and tracts were passed out to every individual in our group that did not stay behind to set up the speakers, puppet stage, chalk easel, and tents. We assembled into groups of at least 3 and at least one gentleman. Agreed on a street to go down, and knocked at each gate to invite the people to a childrens program that was a held by the Americanos and all were invited to attend! When we got back, and praying hard in our hearts for people to come!

Oh the joy that is shared when people start coming and a program is successful!!
I need to go now, but will tell more later!

And sadly, here is one of the homes in the poorer part of town. The people that live in this area will most likely stay here all their life- in a house made of cardboard or anything they can get there hands on.

day #1

WOW. Our group went into Mexico this evening and ministered to the people there.

The trip started at 3:30 and when we got to the border, the bus had to stay for over an hour while being searched and looked up in their  record history.  By then, we were wondering if the border patrol would let us in. Mr. Jarvis told the group that we needed to pray until they let us in. The noise in the bus came to a sudden stillness while everyone sought the Lord in prayer. I had no fear or worry, there is no mistakes with God!   After five or ten minutes, the gates were let open and we continued on our way.

Juarez, Mexico, was our destination. Bearing Precious seed ( BPS ) had made contact with a church near the area, so when we got to the public park, some of the Mexican church members were waiting for us. We split into 5 groups and went door to door, inviting the community to bring the children to a program that we were having.

The program started at 7:30ish, with a speaker and singing, puppets, and finally a chalk-art.

I helped out with the singing (I only know the tune and read the words in Spanish) worked in the puppet stage ( FUN! ) and then when it was time to watch the chalk-art, I sat down right in the midst of the group of children who came. OH! The pleasure it was to be with children!! Never mind that I didn't speak a bit of their language except "Hola". It just made them come closer to hear me talk funny :)  By the time it was time to go, I had a swarm of children ranging ages 4-8 gathered around me. Through gestures and basic words, I explained that I didn't speak Spanish, but Jesus Christ LOVES you! And showed them John 3:16. At least 4 little girls had to give me a hug before we left, and I said "Adios", they said, "bye!".

Please pray that the word of God did not go void and that His seeds fell on good soil. Of the children and their parents.

Tomorrow is another AWESOME day the Lord has made and I get to serve in MEXICO!