Long Sunday, Happy Sunday

Well, they got married. I had a part but they are the ones making the big decisions. The groom and the bride are both active Christians and involved in the church. But Miguel is moving into a new home, much closer to the church where his new bride attends.

They say you don't lose a son, but you gain a daughter. I hope we may gain some more members that can continue blessing us with the kind of service our church has received from Miguel. At least we know other believers on the island will benefit from the labors of this fine Christian couple. I suppose we can view him a kind of missionary, receiving Christ in our town and going out from us to promote the Lord's work in other regions.

Everybody loves a Wedding!

This little girl is the daughter of a young man I led to Christ. I performed the wedding of her parents about four years ago. Now she is waiting to see her uncle Miguel get married. We led Miguel to the Lord about five years ago. It was a happy day for everybody!

Demolition Missionary

Company is coming! Our home church, Southside Baptist, is sending a group of 5 adults and 7 teens to lend us a hand. With a housefull like this on the way, we decided to make some improvements around the house. The old tub had to go. I discovered that it refused to go peaceably. The tub was 60" long, but the walls are only 58" apart! Well, after many tries ands a lot of help from Tina, together with many scraped knuckles and sore muscles , I got the old tub sawed in half, the walls widened and a new tub set were the old one sat.

Part of the Problem or Part of the Solution?

Is the Church Part of the Problem or Part of the Solution?

I saw this sign and was grateful that our church has helped a good number of people overcome personal problems. It is one thing to read a missionary story, but another thing to be in one! But the great part of being here is that we get to see the power that the gospel has to change lives.

Sunday afternoon I will see Miguel Fontanes get married and be in the ceremony. We led him to the Lord five years ago. He completed an alcohol rehabilitation program, came to our church, was baptized, and got involved. Ever since then he has served faithfully in our church. As his old beer-belly got smaller, Miguels life got better. Now he is getting married, has a good job and is a much happier man today than when we met him five years ago.

It sure is great being part of something that is a part of the solution and not part of the problem!

Scary words, "I took your advice, and...!"

I stopped by Puerto Rico Baptist College to do some work yesterday and got a surprise. A student from Grenada named Eorl said, "I did just what you told me to do last year when I returned to Grenada. What you said would happen, happened exactly as you described it!"

Well, I was a bit nervous about what was to follow! He told me that I had advised him to speak to all the pastors in the area where he wanted to start a church. The reason being that he might pick up some useful local news and maybe even find a group of Christians left over from an abandoned work. It sometimes happens that a missionary or pastor has problems and leaves an area and a group of believers before a church is successfully formed. By asking around you might find such a situation, or maybe a group about to be abandoned. If you can find one of like faith and practice, it can give a real boost to your church planting activities.

Eorl told me that he did the survey as I suggested and ran into just this situation. A local pastor said to him, "I am leaving this town. You can take the work I have started!"

When he told me that he took my advice, I remembered the poster that shows a group of managers watching some employees and crying out in panic; "Oh no! They did it just like we told them to!" I felt a bit like that first, and was nervous about him following advice I gave out in some forgotten conversation. But I am relieved it turned out well. We are happy to find students putting into practice what they learn from us and especially when it results in advancing the work of church planting in another island in the Caribbean. Amen!

Helping Hands Need Attention

I knew something was not right when Tina said I should go to town and get a haircut. Tina has been cutting my hair for the last 20 years of our marriage, but lately her hands have been bothering her. More than one person has suggested she get checked out for Carpal Tunnel Syndrome. Tina has been reading up on it and is planning on seeing a specialist to check out if this is the problem.

Please pray for her. Tina plays the piano and clarinet for church, paints, does needle-work and many kinds of handicrafts for others as well as for her own personal enjoyment. If an operation is needed, please pray that she may come out it well and enjoy many pain free years in her labors of love.

I Heard a New Christian Confess a Bad Habit

I met William Baez in town yesterday and he said to me: “Pastor, I have a bad habit. I don’t go out at night for church activities. But if you will be patient with me, I hope to mature and get more involved. Maybe by the end of the year I can go out with you all on visitation. I want to go with you all at night and witness to people in our town.”

I wish I would hear more confessions like that one!

Happy Results from an Uncomfortable Moment

Communion Confusion Has Unexpected Happy Ending

I led the church in a celebration of the Lords' Supper this morning and an awkward moment arose. I usually give a general admonition about self examination before the elements are passed out, but leave it to each person to decide to either partake or let the elements pass. Today I gave these instructions and had a deacon pass out the bread and then an elderly gentleman named Joaquin pass out the communion cups afterwards. Well, Joaquin, forgetting our policy, took it upon himself to skip a man named William Baez in the distribution of the communion.

Now Mr. Baez is a man I met during visitation about two years ago. After much visitation he finally came and really liked our church. He told me something like this: Just let me take it all for a while and I will let you know what I think. I think I might like it, but do not try and get me or I will get scared and run off. Well, I continued to encourage him, but was cautious about being too forceful after this declaration.

He was upset about what happened and wanted to know why he should have been passed by in the communion service. He spoke to our head deacon about it after the service. Luis calmed him down and showed him from scripture the symbolism of communion but how much more critical it is to have the relationship with God of which communion is the symbol. In short, William Baez bowed his head and asked Jesus Christ to be his Lord and Savior.

I was afraid we scared away a potential church member. But God used this bit of drama today to bring a soul to Himself. What a privilege to serve a God who, in spite of our errors, is able and gracious enough to bring success out of our efforts to serve Him. Amen!

Winning Friends or Winning Arguments?

Galatians 5:15 But if ye bite and devour one another, take heed that ye be not consumed one of another.

I studied a bit this afternoon to try and make some progress in my Doctoral program. I enjoy studying Apologetics (defense of the faith) and meditated today on this thought: "It is more important to make a friend than to win an argument." Though not always true (Sir Neville Chamberlain found that it didn't work with Hitler), I feel a lot more heat is generated than light in many debates and both sides forget that good men can disagree on difficult issues.

We are working with students from many different churches and rub shoulders with different missionaries as we endeavor to work together to train believers through Puerto Rico Baptist College. A Bible college is not a one man show. I am thankful to God that we have been blessed with many seasons of peace in working with each other. My hope is that in our witnessing and evangelism may be as equally effective. In our work of church planting, we must find ways to go on the offense with the gospel without being unnecessarily offensive.

Come on down here and help us! We don't bite!

(I borrowed the photo from the blog of Joyce DeWeese, http://joycedeweese.blogspot.com/ Joyce is on staff with Continental Baptist Missions and is the mother of Leann, our intern last summer.)

We Made It! Prayer Protection Kept Us in Good Hands!

We just got our internet connection installed and running, so now we can update our recent activities.

We spoke at Amazing Grace Baptist Church in St Cloud, Florida, and the next day flew to Puerto Rico. The flight went so smoothly that the Puerto Ricans did not give the usual applause to the pilot and crew for a landing well done that they customarily do if we suffer a bit of turbulence in route.

We found the house in good condition and were happy it was not robbed in our absence. But 6 months away do make for lots of dust. Our cats apparently did not make it, but the next door neighbor has some cute kittens almost weaned, so it looks like we won’t have to endure a cat shortage. Our dog Cookie was well cared for and was ecstatically happy to see us.

There was some wear and tear on some items that we will need to replace. Kristin’s computer monitor had a bad contact and damaged the video circuits in her machine. I had an extra small monitor on hand but had to replace her machine. I got one from Sam’s Club for $550. Our dryer belt broke, but we bought a new one and will try to get it installed this next week. Our landlord raised the rent $50 a month. But that is the first raise in rent we have had in the last 8 years, so we are not complaining.

Our church people rejoiced to have us back. The attendance was low, but I have spoken to a good number of people in the last week and anticipate a rise in attendance, Lord willing, in the weeks ahead.

Conners Prairie, Indiana

The Kennedy family treated us to a visit to Conners Prairie, a living history community. It has two time zones, 1830 and 1880. There are actors in the many businesses, homes and schools that stay in character and answer questions, give demonstrations (Blacksmith, potter, oxen trainer, etc.) and even a small Quaker church where I preached a very short sermon to my family and friends. If you are ever in the Indianapolis area, this is a great place to visit.

Tonight we will attend a graduation ceremony for Sandy Kennedy, then drive 14 hours back to Pensacola. Please pray for our safety on the road.

Family Reunion

Our family at Pensacola Christian College. They even have an Ice Skating rink!

Family Reunion and Road Trip: From New York to Pensacola, to Indiana

From New York to Pensacola is quit a drive, but we made it safe and sound. We enjoyed seeing Bethany and Rachel again and the Pensacloa Christian College is very impressive. We attended a Shakespeare play, music events and the graduation of the Binzel brothers, whose parents served with us in Puerto Rico. Also, a family we know from Indiana (the Kennedys) were there visiting their sons, so we were able to enjoy there company as well.

We then drove a van full of teenagers to Indiana to visit the Kennedys on their home turf. We will be here a week and then have a meeting in Saint Cloud, Florida Sunday the 21 and will fly out to Puerto Rico the 22nd. Lots of miles on the road and in the air, so please keep us in prayer!

Long Lost Relatives Found

I have a computer program that helps you do a family genealogy and took some time off the other day to see how far I could go with it. It turns out that my wife comes from Pilgrim stock and that a group of her relatives from the early 1800's were from New York state. I looked up the little town of Bolton, where they were buried, and it was only an hour from the missionary apartment we are staying in. So I decided to take a little side trip and pay our respects to Tina's great-great-great-great grand parents. The cemetery is just a spot alongside the road out in nowhere, just a bit south of Fort Ticonderoga on beautiful Lake George. We took lots of pictures of tombstones and felt awe-struck, touching those stones and walking between the engraved names of these early pioneers who payed such a heavy price looking for a better life for themselves and their families.

After that we lightened up a bit and had some ice cream and a nice walk past an old fort that was made famous by James Fenmore Cooper in his Deerslayer novel.

Other news: I met a number of pastors at a missions conference in Akron, NY that may schedule us for some future meetings. Also, we have bought our return tickets to Puerto Rico. We will be leaving for the field May 22. Come and visit! We stayed with so many folks here, we will look forward to returning the favor!

Quote for today from our ex-intern Leann: "You can't change the wind, but you can adjust your sails."

Hope some of you will sail our way soon!

Pause in Perth, NY

We are now in Perth Bible Church, in Perth, New York, about 40 miles west of Albany. We will be here in a missionary apartment for all of April and use it as our center of operations as we visit churches around New York state. We may even get a chance to rest before our next meetings in Florida!

Furlough Advantages: Washington DC Field Trip

Inside the Smithsonian we saw some amazing things, but some fun stuff too. The ruby slippers from "The Wizard of OZ," the first Apple computer, the Wright Brothers Airplane, hundreds of stuffed animals, even a 12 ton elephant! There was even a moon rock that we got to touch!

DC is a city that is wonderful to visit, but most every thing was open from just 10-5, giving us only 7 hours a day to see so much. I would like to return and see some of the things we missed, the National Art Gallery, a few more Smithsonians and a visit to Mount Vernon.

I saw a statue outside the National Archives with these words engraved on the base: "The Price of Freedom in Eternal Vigilance." If that is so, then maybe the price of eternal freedom is supernatural vigilance! Please pray for us on our travels and that we may be a blessing to the various churches we are visiting

Furlough Advantage: Super Field Trip

We got up bright and early and got on the DC Metro Subway ready for another big day. We arrived during the peak of the cherry blossoms, but before the festival, so we were fortunate to avoid many of the expected crowds. We walked everywhere that day. Our feet paid a heavy price, but we saw a lot of great stuff: The Smithsonian Museums of Natural History, American History and Space and Technology, the National Archives with the Constitution, Bill of Rights, etc. and close-up looks at the Washington Monument and Capitol Building, not to mention the worlds largest McDonalds! Almost all the stuff in DC is FREE, but the motels and food seem to make up for it. I am not complaining, an expensive cheeseburger is a small price to pay for this educational, patriotic and emotionally impressive experience!

Furlough Advantages: Extra Special Homeschool Field Trips

We were just a few hours from Washington, DC so we decided to take Sarah and Kristin to see our nations capitol. They were born in Costa Rica and raised mostly in Puerto Rico, so we wanted to show them some impressive things in the US before we returned to the field.

We stayed in Frederick, Maryland and drove 20 min. To the DC Metro station and took the DC Subway into the heart of Washington. The first day we took a night tour of the monuments and memorials. I always find the Lincoln memorial impressive, but this was the first time I saw the WWII memorial, the FDR memorial and the Vietnam memorial.

All these places are very touching and impressive. The most beautiful was the new WWII, with many fountains. The Jefferson memorial is good too, especially the view of the Washington monument reflected in the bay that separates them. We were very tired, but each place was fascinating and drew us to explore till we took the midnight train back up the line to the Shady Grove station and drove back exhausted to our hotel in Frederick, MD.

Hershey, Pennsylvania

We drove by Hershey, Pennsylvania on the way to a meeting and took a few hours to visit Chocolate World. Impressive! They had a little car you go into and it takes you past singing cows and you enter a ride/demonstration exhibit of how chocolate is made. You get free samples and then of course there is the gift stores and food area full of chocolate goodies everywhere. The entrance and exhibit is free, except the 3D corny movie, but that was well worth seeing. I think it was better than the Disney 3d we have seen. It was a nice two hour side trip on our 7 hour drive to Perth Bible Church, about 40 miles W of Albany, New York.

Furlough means Family

Our daughters, Sarah and Kristin, got a chance to met their cousins, Emily and Sarah. Our thanks to Wendy and Keith and our aunt Marlene for the hospitality and family fun we had during our meetings in Pennsylvania.

Signs of the Times?

Pennsylvania apparently has a sense of humor. We saw many odd signs. One official sign read "Seat Belt Zone: Next Million Miles" We saw many Amish buggy warning signs. The oddest signs were these signs directing folks to the towns of Paradise, Panic and Desire. Look where we ended up!

Family Time: Cousin Reunion: Groundhog Greetings

My cousin Wendy and her husband Keith put us up and put up with us for just over a week. It was a lot of fun seeing them and being shown around the sights of central Pennsylvania. We saw lots of Amish folk, and of course the famous groundhog, Punxsutawney Phil!

Pennsylvania Passage: Ministry and Family Time

Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania (Groundhogs Day Capitol) is near the town of Dubois. We presented our field at First Baptist of Dubois. The Pastor and church made us feel right at home. I have an aunt and a cousin who attend, so it really was a great blessing to see them all. They took us to see the groundhog and we spent a wonderful week with them all in central Pennsylvania

Niagara Falls Between Sermons

We spoke at two churches pastored by a very busy pastor, Jose Rodriguez. He has two churches, one in Buffalo and another in Rochester New York. He preaches two services in Buffalo, first in Spanish and then in English during the next service. Afterwards, he drives to Rochester and preaches a third time in both languages, translating for himself as he goes. I got a real work out visiting and ministering with him recently. And in between services, they even took us to Niagara Falls! No siestas that Sunday afternoon!