Been a long time

Hey all, sorry for such a long time between posts, but between not having reliable internet and working with a short term high school team for the last week I haven't had many chances to update things. To go back a bit, on Sunday the 13th I went with Paul, my leader, to La Presa, my first church for their grand opening of their new church building. It was great to see and just awesome to see the huge smile on Pastor Ignacio's face (also one of my Mexican dads). A few young people from the church and the two spearheaders working there as well as myself performed a skit about not wearing masks and pretending to be someone we are not which seemed to go over very well. After the skit I spent a bit of time explaining it and talking about how we no longer need to pretend to be someone if we know that we are loved by the creator of the world. It was a really neat time to see people I hadn't seen in three years as it seemed like all of La Presa showed up even those that hadn't been to church in forever. I would ask for prayer that the church would continue to grow and God would use them to bring his good news to La Presa. All last week I worked with a team of 23 high schoolers from the New England area who came with a program of Gordon-Conwell seminary with their mentors who are seminary students and a seminary professor. I had a great week working with them and getting to know some of their leaders. A couple of them really challenged me a lot and gave me a lot to think about as far as my future and perhaps full time ministry. It is a thought that still scares me, but I feel like God might be pulling me there. I was surprised by how much I enjoyed working with the high schoolers and it was great to see them in spite of language and cultural barriers interacting with the youth at the church we were working at. We spent most of our time doing street preaching in their neighborhood, in the center of the city and by a dump just to the north of their church. We went to the Alameda (sort of a central park) and to Bellas Artes (a big Kennedy center sort of thing) one day to sing some songs and do some skits and I was amazed by the crowd of 50 or so that gathered to watch the skits. Afterwards I was shouting translations of what the seminary professor was preaching and then gave a little message myself when he was done and many people prayed with us which was really cool. The next day we went to visit a landfill where a lot of people live to collect various things to sell. We played a lot of soccer with the kids and presented some songs, skits and told some stories to them. It was a good time, but very eye opening. Afterwards we took a tour of the dump and met a few people who lived there and its just really sad to realize that people live like that. During the week I also celebrated my 23rd birthday and two of the other leaders (one mexican, one from the US) blindfolded me and took me on the metro where they got a bunch of people to sing happy birthday to me before getting me in a taxi, still blindfolded and taking me to Garibaldi which is the most famous plaza for mariachis. They took off my blindfold as the mariachis began to sing the mexican birthday song which was really sweet. On Sunday we went to the church we had been working with (one I have also been working with this summer), they generally have 4 hour services with about 2 hours of singing. It was a really neat service for the kids as most of them had never been to anything like that and it was cool how the church sang a lot of songs bilingually so that they could understand. I translated several testimonies and a message which was cool and just had a great time. I am actually leaving tomorrow to go on their camping trip and share a message there too. i will be there on thursday, friday and leave early saturday morning to make a clown show in La Presa before leaving for Guadalajara to go to a wedding on Sunday, driving back late sunday night to be able to go to the pyramids with the summer team monday morning. It should be a busy but good week. Today I spent most of my day trying to get my visa at the Brasilian embassy. After getting lost trying to get there I waited in line two hours before being told as the first words something about a bank deposit slip which I didn't have, I thought I could pay with cash ($130, all other countries pay $20) but Brasil has a program of reciprocation where they do to your people what you do to theirs which I actually think is a a good policy. I ran to the bank and ran back to get there 15 minutes before closing and find that they had closed early. It was kinda a bummer, but gave me an appreciation for the process most people have to go through to get to the US. Hope that update wasn't too long, but to end I just want to give praise to God for all He has been doing in and through me and continue to ask for prayer for guidance for the future. Much love and God bless.

i'll post more pics later, when I have time, but you can see the ones i have by clicking below
You can see more La Presa pics by clicking here
Or more pics from this past week's team clicking here

paul to the left and my pastor in the middle
the new church building
selling freezer pops at the dump
my birthday mariachis
the group from the week

La Presa, Ignite and Brasil

Hey all, thanks for your continued love and support. I can't believe how quickly my time here is coming to an end. On Sunday I had the chance to go to Puebla and visit my old church and hang out with some good friends which was really refreshing and just nice to catch up. I really miss those guys a lot. On Saturday I took my team to a retirement home outside the city and we sang some songs we had prepared, shared a message and a testimony and then just spent time with the older folks there getting to know them and just showing them that we care. It was neat to see their faces light up and hear the same story about climbing the volcano in Puebla about 6 times in a row from the same guy, but I could tell they appreciated our visit. This coming week is about to be crazy for me as I will also be a leader for the 10 day program of LAM called ignite. I will be pulling double duty as a leader for both programs and will be very busy with the group of 20 something high school students. I'm not really sure what to be expect, but it will be interesting. We will be working with one of the churches that I have already been working with during the summer. The church is called Dios es Amor (God is love) and I would ask for prayer for the church and the group coming down that God would guide their steps and use this time to be of a big impact in their lives and also in the lives of the Mexican people they will be working with. On Sunday I will be going up to La Presa (my first home in Mexico, where I was my first summer her) to celebrate the grand opening of their new church building. I'm really excited for them and its crazy to see how far they've come from that distant dream of a new church building three years ago when I was working there. We are performing a skit called Masks which I think is really powerful and I hope will be of benefit to the congregation and the hopefully many visitors there. I have been in contact with Brasil and it seems I will probably be going, but due to Brasilian immigration laws probably only for 6 months instead of the year I was hoping for. I will keep you all updated. Much love and God bless.

you can check out some other pics here

an arrow to God, recreating Rich Mullins last picture
a great pic that I have the same one from 3 years ago with the same guy

some of my boys from La Presa
my team

John McCain visit

So I don't have a lot of time right now, but today I went with one of the other summer leaders, Kevin to the Basilica of Guadalupe to try to see John McCain who was visiting and we managed to see him. It was really cool because outside of the press and normal basilica goers there was pretty much no one there. We just followed him around with the press, took a bunch of pictures. When he showed up I was shocked to see Lieberman with him and Jeb Bush too. There were a ton of secret service and scary looking dudes with automatic weapons. When he went up on top of the chapel for a photo op I said to my friend that I wanted to say something, but I couldn't think of anything good. Finally on a spur of the moment inspiration I yelled up "Lieberman for vice president". Lieberman looked down at me, gave me a salute and a big thumbs up. It was kinda cool, then as they were leaving I wished them a Happy 4th of July and McCain looked at me and waved. I followed that up with a good luck and another plea for Lieberman for VP. The two of them looked at each other, exchanged a few words and then both waved at me and gave me a thumbs up. It was a pretty impressive spectacle. I mean I do not particularly support him, but I have to admit seeing someone so powerful with that much security, entourage and precision was impressive. It was cool talking to some of the press both from the US and Mexico (not officially, just chatting) and was an odd experience to be able to be that close to a presidential candidate with almost no one around. I will give a better more pertinent update soon, but I just thought that was a cool story. You can check out more pics of John McCain here:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2286641&l=b1cd4&id=5706269
and some other pics from various things here:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2284615&l=de40c&id=5706269

Notice Lieberman, McCain and even Jeb Bush


not a stellar picture for the Republicans, but I went to Trotsky's house here in Mexico where he was killed which was sweet
a funny picture at the Basilica, I always saw these places that offer pictures and finally decided to get one taken with my co-leader for the summer, Stephanie