Don't rebuild Haiti; reimagine it

Last month we wrote a blog about Haiti.  You can go here to read it if you missed it.  

Jesse had a good, life changing trip and made it home safely, and it looks like my cousins will have James and Pharah soon. Thank you for your prayers for them. 


I was reminded of them yesterday when I saw a news headline on the internet yesterday which said there will probably be 300,000 dead in Haiti because of the earthquake.  I can't even imagine what it must be like there. 


The article yesterday reminded me of something I read from Steven Van Zandt.  He is a guitarist for Bruce Springsteen's band.  Other than that, I don't know anything about this guy.


I'll admit that whenever I hear some "wisdom" coming from an actor or musician I normally quickly turn off the radio or shut off the site online.  Their insight, normally, doesn't have anything to do with the way we try to live our lives.  I won't go into who my top 5 are that make me want to puke when they open their mouths.  


So as you can see it would be weird for to me to actually read something serious from someone in show business.  But there was something about this article that caught my eye and had me reading it.  


I personally would add different people to his group but his overall idea, to me, is pretty good.  


Here is what he wrote:


I watched “Meet the Press” host David Gregory recently ask former Presidents Bill Clinton and George W. Bush what it’s going to take to restore Haiti to how it was, my heart started paying attention.

Gregory was asking the normal questions, and Clinton and Bush gave the appropriate answers. But it occurred to me that, my God, unless something radical is done, that’s exactly what’s going to happen. Haiti will be restored to what it was. And that’s the last thing Haiti needs.

I won’t bore you with statistics — well, OK, just a few. From the Congressional Research Service before the earthquake:

• 76 percent of the population lived on less than $2 a day.

• 54 percent lived on less than $1 a day.

• 81 percent did not receive the minimum daily ration of food as defined by the World Health Organization.

• 66 percent had no access to electricity.

• 52 percent did not have access to clean water, basic sanitation, basic health needs and basic education.

Haiti doesn’t need to be rebuilt. Haiti needs to be reimagined.

The Haitian people need a partnership with a group of individuals that will help them, for the first time in their existence, establish a state-of-the-art infrastructure that will last 100 years, unencumbered by political and economic corruption. Then let the ingenuity, work ethic and spirit of the people do the rest.

So it’s time to call on Warren Buffett, Bill Gates, Larry Ellison, Sergey Brin, Larry Page, Michael Dell, Jeff Bezos, Oprah Winfrey, Steve Jobs, Paul Allen, George Clooney, Robert Johnson, Angelina Jolie, Jay-Z, Brad Pitt, Wyclef Jean, John W. Thompson, Bono, Bruce Springsteen, the Beatles, Sean Combs, the Rolling Stones, Jonathan Demme, Steven Spielberg, George Lucas, David Geffen, James Cameron, John Lasseter, futurist architects and engineers, and anybody else with expertise, vision and passion to organize a summit of Haitian leaders, with Clinton as chairman, and design a new Haiti. Let’s make it the high-tech capital of the world.

We need to start solving problems permanently on this planet instead of wasting time, money and energy on temporary Band-Aids that make us feel good.

This horrible event will be all the more horrible if we don’t learn from it. Either tens of thousands of lives have been lost in vain, or they have left us the one chance to begin to build the archetypal country of the future.

There will never again be an opportunity so obvious or a people more deserving of a chance to prove what they can do.

All the symbolic gestures are nice — and even important — but they will come and go.

Whatever money gets raised is vitally important right now, but it, too, will come and go.

For once, let’s do all those things, and then let’s do something that helps permanently.

Let’s not rebuild Haiti; let’s reimagine it.

And then make it happen.

Different Stuff

We had another busy weekend.

Benay, Bronwyn and Auristela had a "Tea for Rwanda" at our house on Saturday afternoon.  You can click here to go to Bronwyn's blog and read the last couple of entries to find out about the tea.

Hard to believe that in one week Bronwyn will be in Rwanda.

Please pray for her.  She is very excited and a little nervous about the traveling.

Today is the first day of the new school year for our kids.  Ansley will be starting her last year of high school.  Anderson will be starting kindergarten.

Garrett, Carys and Anderson will all be starting at a new school.  This new school is actually a school we almost sent them to when we moved here almost 8 years ago.  Our final choices in 2002 ended up being this school and the school that most of them have attended since we moved here.

Carys knows a couple of girls in her new class already and Anderson has been in preschool, at another place, with 3 of his classmates for the last 4 years.  He already told us there is no need to walk him into his classroom today because, "It's okay, I can do it by myself." He's a funny kid.

We ask for your prayers for all of the kids but especially Garrett.  It's tough for a 13 year old to change schools and not know anyone.  He's a little anxious about it.  We know that by the time he gets home today he will already have new friends but that first step into a new classroom is always a tough thing for most kids.  We would appreciate your prayers for him.  We are proud of him for deciding for himself to make this change.  It seems to be a better fit for him academically.  It's a better school with a really involved teaching staff.  He hasn't really had that since we've been here.  I proud of him for seeing the benefits academically in switching.  He went to the new school, met with a supervisor, we had some good conversations and then he decided on his own.  Pretty mature.

We think this new school will be a blessing for Garrett, Carys and Anderson.  Our family has already been blessed with friends from Anderson's preschool that will be going to this new school as well.  We know that soon we will all have many new friends because of our kids.  Most of the Brasilians who have given their lives to Christ since we've been here or who have participated in different activities (house church, bible study, etc.) have come because of knowing our kids.

They don't even realize it sometimes but they are great seed planters for the kingdom.

Garrett, Carys and Anderson can also learn German and Spanish at this new school.

We had a heat index of 111 yesterday but with school starting we kind of unofficially end our summer.  Benay did a blog yesterday about our summer and the new school year.  You can click here to read it.

Should be a busy week for us.

A bazaar was held in a village in northern India. Everyone brought his wares to trade and sell. One old farmer brought in a whole covey of quail. He had tied a string around one leg of each bird. The other ends of all the strings were tied to a ring which fit loosely over a central stick. He had taught the quail to walk dolefully in a circle, around and around, like mules at a sugarcane mill. Nobody seemed interested in buying the birds until a devout Brahman came along. He believed in the Hindu idea of respect for all life, so his heart of compassion went out to those poor little creatures walking in their monotonous circles.


“I want to buy them all,” he told the merchant, who was elated. After receiving the money, he was surprised to hear the buyer say, “Now, I want you to set them all free.”


“What’s that, sir?”


“You heard me. Cut the strings from their legs and turn them loose. Set them all free!”


With a shrug, the old farmer bent down and snipped the strings off the quail. They were freed at last. What happened? The birds simply continued marching around and around in a circle. Finally, the man had to shoo them off. But even when they landed some distance away, they resumed their predictable march. Free, unfettered, released . . . yet they kept going around in circles as if still tied.


Until you give yourself permission to be the unique person God made you to be . . . and to do the unpredictable things grace allows you to do . . . you will be like that covey of quail, marching around in vicious circles of fear, timidity, and boredom.

2 Films and a biased opinion

My girlfriend and I try to have a date night every week.  It's really important to our marriage.  It helps us, we believe, to be better parents.  We also believe it sets a good example to our kids.  So many people we know put their kids above everything else, including their marriage.

We want our kids to grow up believing that no other person in the world is more important than their spouse.  It doesn't mean they don't love their kids.  In fact, if their marriage relationship is where it needs to be then then I believe everything else will be right or on the right track in the family.  The kids will feel loved and they will see a good example of what God wants in a marriage.

Okay, back to our date night.

We try to go out on Tuesday night.  Why?  There is a new movie theater that is close to our house.  Every Tuesday you can watch a movie for 6 reais (our currency).  Right now that is about $3.25 in U.S. currency.

About a month ago we saw Avatar.  We read so much about how awesome it was and how much money it was making and how James Cameron is a genius.

We went expecting something incredible.  I, personally, really didn't like it.  The blue people just didn't do much for me.  I don't know if anyone else felt like you were getting the "Mother Earth" and "America is Evil" themes subtly and not so subtly forced down your throats but I felt it in different ways going on throughout and I didn't really like that.  Maybe I read too much into it but those were my thoughts.

A few days later I took our older kids to see it.  After a second viewing, my impressions were the same.  I hadn't said a word to the kids about what I thought before they saw it.  When I asked them what they thought after they watched it the general consensus was that it was just "okay" and nothing more.  Definitely not something we wanted to buy when it comes out on DVD.

Last week me and my girlfriend went to see Inivictus. The movie about Nelson Mandela and the 1995 Rugby World Cup.  Amazingly powerful story.  We both loved it.

I took the kids to see it this week and they loved it as well.  It was a great chance for them to talk and learn about Nelson Mandela.  It's also exciting to know that Bronwyn will get to spend a couple of days in South Africa on her way back home after her trip to Rwanda.

I did a little google search yesterday and found out that Avatar has made over 2.3 billion dollars (671 million in the United States) while Invictus has made a little over 90 million dollars (with only 36 million coming in the United States).

I realize that one is complete fiction and the other is a true story and that the thoughts above are completely my feelings.  I also realize that Morgan Freeman is one of my favorite actors.  I'm biased.  I get it.  But can someone explain how a movie (for those that have seen both) as good and inspiring as Invictus makes less money than say Beavis and Butt-head do America made 14 years ago.  Nelson Mandela draws less of a crowd to the theaters than Beavis and Butt-head?  (That double reference was just for you Birdwell.)

I'm a history nut and no movie critic.  I will go see a true story movie any day over some fictional movie (especially science fiction).  I know I'm biased.  I guess I'm having a tough time trying to understand why hardly anyone had an interest in seeing the story of Mandela and Francois Pienaar.

If you haven't seen Invictus and it's still on where you live then I (we) would encourage you to go and see it.  Incredible insights on an incredible man.  As a Christian, you will learn much about forgiveness and reconciliation from Mandela.  I know he has his faults, as we all do, but he is a very unique man and I believe that God put him at the right place at the right time for his country.  He led with humility and not anger.

You probably won't hear from me ever again about movie criticisms.  I realize nobody cares about what I like and don't like just as I really don't pay much attention to others and their movie preferences, but I found myself kind of amazed at the differences (on many different levels) between these two films and the surprising impacts (or little impacts) that they are having on people.

Security

Security is a big thing here.  Unfortunately breaking into peoples homes is pretty common.

So Brasilians, as well as our family, do all we can to deter a break in from happening.

Most homes, like ours, have bars on the windows and doors. The property lines of most homes, like ours, are surrounded by a 8-9 foot tall metal fence. Usually on top of the fences, like ours, is a 2-3 foot high electric fence. Electric wiring going all around the house set to give someone a good shock if they try to go over the fence.

We also pay for a street guard.  Most people who live in homes pay a man to guard the street.  His job is to keep an eye on the homes he is being paid to watch.  He will then call the homeowner, he will act or he will call the police if he sees something that isn't right. We are blessed to have our guard literally about 30 feet from our front door.  His guard shack is on the corner right in front of our house. He's been the guard here for many years.  He's a good man.

Most apartments also have fences and electric fences as well.  They also have guards at the doors.  No one goes in our out of the apartment complex unless you see the guard first.  Some are more strict with requirements than others.

A lot of people have dogs.  Some are, obviously, for pets but some are for the purpose of being a guard dog.  Most criminals don't like the presence of any type of dogs.  Either way its a good deterrent. In our case I'd say that right now our dogs definitely fall on the pet side and not the guard dog side.  The very pampered pet side.

In our house we have all these security measures in place and, praise God, we've never had anyone break into our home.

We've also been blessed with an extra security measure that most people don't have.

Our very own super hero.

If you know Anderson very well then you know that he IS Wolverine.

So, if you need a body guard you can give us a call.  You can believe that Wolverine is up for your challenge.

Penn Jillette

I don't know if you've heard of Penn & Teller.

They are a magic/comedy team.

Penn Jillette is the talkative one of the duo.  In fact, I'm not sure if I've ever heard Teller say a word.  It's part of their act.

Anyway,  Bronwyn showed me the video below the other day from someone else's blog.

Penn Jillette is an outspoken atheist.  He believes there is no God.  He also, from what I've read, seems to like to have discussions with people who believe in God.  He encourages discussions, not fighting, about this because he believes it's too important not to discuss.

Apparantly a couple of years ago he made videos and posted them online.  He made the following after a conversation with a believer.

I strongly encourage you to watch the whole video and especially listen to what this atheist says about why we should share our faith (the 3-4 minute mark).

Here is someone who doesn't even believe in God and his logic for us evangelizing will smash you on your head like a hammer.  It makes perfect sense.

If you are in need of a hammer to the head reminder today of the importance of our witness to everyone around us then watch the following video from the unbeliever.  You will be amazed and, I think, inspired to go do what God wants you to do.

Simple but true words weren't they?

You may have felt uncomfortable to hear them.  That's okay.  I believe our faith grows when we are challenged and made to feel uncomfortable when our faith walk is challenged.

Let's start today by refocusing on sharing the love of Christ to this world.

Join me in thanking God for being able to use an atheist to wake up His people.

Now, let's start praying for Penn Jillette to, one day in the near future, make a decision for Jesus.

Yesterday

Yesterday was a holiday.

We celebrated by having a churrasco (Brasilian bar-b-que).

We invited a few friends over and had a great time.

Freitas gave Garrett grilling lessons.

Freitas makes some of the best churrasco you have ever eaten.

We enjoyed lots of good fellowship and relaxing.  We had a great time.

It's always good to have a holiday to recharge your batteries.

Next churrasco, Garrett cooks.

The Heat

We shared how unbearable the heat was a couple of weeks ago.

Last week was still hot but the temperature was down in the 90's with the heat index around 95-100.  It was still hot but, honestly, it felt more like our regular summers.

Two weeks ago, if you remember, the temperature was around 102 with the heat index between 115-120.  Not a regular summer at all.

I grew up in Tennessee and thought I understood about humidity.  In reality I knew nothing about it until we moved here.  It was terrible here two weeks ago.  I honestly have never experienced heat like that before in my life.  No relief either unless you found a pool to stay in, drove over an hour away to get to a beach or just lived under a cold shower.

The girls got back form São Paulo state on last week (thank you for your prayers for their safety and the test that they took) and they just melted when they got off the plane here.  They talked about how much cooler it was there than here.

But it isn't just us here in the deep southern part of Brasil who are experiencing this heat wave.  Rio is getting it worse than us.  Go here to read more about it .  This is an article about their heat wave last week.

Read it and you'll get an idea of what it's been like here.  All of this is being blamed on El Nino.

The things they describe in the article are the things that we were feeling two weeks ago except we were about 10 degrees cooler than where they were. Their high last Tuesday was 115 degrees with the humidity making it feel much hotter.  The article said only one place in all the world was hotter than Rio last Tuesday.

Their heat put our heat in perspective.  I can't believe they were that much hotter than our worst days here.  It must have been miserable for anyone there.

There is a lot of poverty in Rio.  Benay and I were talking about how the poor there would have tried to cool off with no air conditioning, no breeze, etc.  I can't describe how bad 90+ degrees in your house feels.  We at least have an air conditioner that we can turn on in a room and get some relief.  Those people in the favelas there have nothing to combat the heat.

A favela (or for lack of a better term, slum) there might look like this......

....or this.....

......and be spread out like this.  They are, literally, their own cities.

There is much poverty in Rio.  There is also great wealth there.  This extreme poverty and great wealth live side by side in many ways.  It's like many big cities in Brasil.  

We have a friend that lives here but is from Rio.  All of his family still live there.  His son just got back from a visit to Rio and he said our heat was nothing compared to Rio.  I can't imagine the suffering going on in that city.

Please pray for those who live in Rio.  Especially the elderly.  We've finally broken out of our El Nino heat wave here and we are praying for it to break in Rio soon. We are actually experiencing some rainy days and temps in the 70's. Hallelujah!

We've been getting emails from people in the states saying they will send us some cold if we send them some heat.  A few days ago we got an email from our brother-in-law (who lives on the outskirts of D.C.) and he said they got about 35 inches of snow in 5-6 days.

I can honestly tell you that for people in our city and Rio, we would make that trade in a second.

Weekend

We had a really good weekend.

On Friday Benay and I celebrated our 22nd anniversary of the night we got engaged.  I can still remember calling her dad and asking his permission.  The drugs I put in his food must have worked because he said yes.

I was in my last year of college at the time and Benay had already graduated and was working in another city in another state.  We only saw each other on the weekends.  We met that weekend at my parents' house which was kind of in between where she and I lived.

We got there on a Friday (the 12th).  I think my intention was to try to wait until Valentine's Day to ask her but that ring was burning a hole in my pocket.  I knew I couldn't wait once I saw her.

We got there and that night I asked her if she wanted to take a walk with me.  We walked down the street (Okay not that romantic. Like I said before, the ring was on fire.).  It was cold and snowy.  I asked her and she said yes.  Still unbelievable. I put the same drugs in her food as I did her dad.

After we got home, and they found out she said yes, my mom pulled out a "congratulations" cake.  The kids asked me the other day what my mom would have done with the cake if Benay said no.  Good question.  Cake for dessert for a few days.

I guess I was walking by faith then more than I realized.  That someone as good as Benay would actually consider marrying me and who I was then.  Wow.  God is good.

I am a much better man because of my wife.

People who knew me in college still laugh when they think of me as being a missionary.  It just doesn't fit who I was in college.  I'm sure there are people that are also still shaking their heads in wonder that Benay said yes to me.  I'm so glad she did.

On Saturday we asked some of our very good friends (Freitas, Auristela and Maurício) to get out of town with us for the afternoon.  They own a hardware store in our neighborhood and rarely get the chance to get out of town and leave their work behind.

They closed their store around 12:00 on Saturday.  We loaded up old Blue (our 13 year old school bus) and headed off to a place about an hour and a half outside the city.  It's really good to get out of the city and the noise and the heat and the traffic every now and then.

The place we went is an amazing escape from all of that.

It has waterfalls.  One that is 16 feet high:

And one that is about 8 feet high.  Anderson said he was going to go off this one this year and he did.  He actually went off twice.  Hard to believe that a year ago he was scared to get his face wet.  Now look at him.

This place also has a little creek that runs through the entire camp and provides the water for all the falls.

At the top of the creek it gives the little kids a chance to go down a natural water slide.  It's not fast or dangerous but the kids love it.

The creek is also a great place to just hang out and talk.  Which we did.  Some other people from our church family also went with us (João,Clarice and their son).  It's always good to fellowship together.

We had a lot of fun.

Yesterday we had our house church.  Almost everyone is out of town because of the Carnaval (we've explained it before but if you don't know what it is then think Mardi Gras on massive steroids) holiday.  Most people went to the beach.  Freitas and his family were the only ones who were a part of house church.  We were very happy they were here.  They are a blessing to our family in many ways. We had a very laid back worship time together.

When it was time for them to leave, Giovanni wanted to go with them.  Freitas made the mistake of inviting Giovanni in his car.  He didn't want to get out.

Just say the words "boom-boom" (car) and Giovanni is walking towards the car.

Last night Ansley made milk shakes for everyone to celebrate Valentine's Day.  Anderson came in, as he was sucking his down, and said, "Oh boy this milk shake is out of a world!"

Later Benay and I made the kids shut their eyes and stick out their hands.

We then gave them all some little candy for Valentine's Day.

I was the deliverer.  While the chocolate deliverer was being attacked with hugs of happiness.....

.......a certain one year old was in deep thought as he thought of ways to open up his M&M's.

Like I said at the beginning, we had a really good weekend.

"In living out our union with Jesus one day at a time, the most decisive issue is believing.  In contrast to the domesticated, feel-good Jesus of TV evangelism, who is committed to our financial prosperity, the Christ of John's gospel who has made His home in us invites us to walk with Him daily in humble service even unto death."

From The Furious Longing of God by Brennan Manning

Chile Video

As we were getting yesterday's blog ready to post, I was reminded that Deanna has a blog of her own.

I started checking it out again and came across a video.  I liked it and so I mooched it (I'm definitely not above mooching stuff) so that we could put it on here.

As you continue to pray about this mission team going to Chile, and if whether or not you feel a prompting to help them financially, we thought it would be good for you to see and hear these guys instead of just looking at a picture.  They made the following video to use in their fund raising and to show to anyone who might be looking for some general information about who they are.

If you are interested in looking at their video then just click here .

Fundraising

Note:  (This blog is going to be a little longer than normal.  Please don't bail out before the end.  It takes a little setting up to get there, but it's important that you read to the end.  Thanks in advance.)



Last year Benay did a blog and she got a very encouraging comment from someone named Deanna.  It was the first time we had ever gotten anything from her. You can go here and read Benay's blog if you like .


Deanna wrote the following:


"Thank you so much for this post and especially the link to your 2007 post. I am on a team training with ACU to go to Concepcion, Chile and we are currently wrestling with the issue of church models. All we hear is that churches in South America need a building, so it is encouraging to hear of a house church network that is thriving. What ever direction our church plant goes, this inspires me to think out of the box and not do things they way they have always been...while being culturally sensitive of course.

Thanks for your thoughts. Blessings to you, your family, your team and your church!"


I'm not even sure how she found our blog but God used her greatly to encourage Benay and myself and our team through her comments.  Not that we need continuous pats on the back to continue on but, as we've shared before, being real church through house churches is not exactly an easy thing to do.  One comment like that can really lift your spirits as well as negate negative (is that a double negative?) comments or actions.  Thanks Deanna. 


Anyway, we became friends with Deanna through Facebook.  We also traded emails and stayed in touch.  Through those emails we have found out a little bit more about where her team is going:


"This is a town of a little over a milllion and it is about a 6 hour car drive south of the capitol, Santiago. We have all visited the city and love it and feel strongly that God is already at work there and we are exited to join him. We plan to arrive in Santiago January 2011 for a maximum of 6 months language training before transition to Concepcion."


She found out that we would be coming to their city on our last furlough.  She said the team would love to talk to Benay and myself about our experiences if we had the time.   


While we were in Abilene, Texas we were blessed to spend a night with some from their team.  We loved their hearts and their willingness to be open to whatever the Spirit leads them do, irregardless of what it looks like. 

I don't share all of this just to be sharing.  This team, like any mission team, has a need.  They all have differing levels of financial needs that need to be met for them to be able to move to Chile next year. 


Benay and I understand how hard fundraising is. We've been here almost 8 years and because of changes (inflation, devaluing of the dollar, etc.) that we can't control, we've had to fundraise a few times.  I don't know if it's pride that makes it so tough but, for some reason, it's hard for us sometimes to ask for financial support.  It's good to be reminded that a group of women even provided financially for Jesus' ministry (Luke 8:2-3). 


God has been very faithful to our family.  As you can imagine, the financial needs of a family of eight are quite large.  Our family has actually grown by two since we moved here in 2002 and yet we have never had a financial need that has not been met.  It has been hard at times but God has always provided for our family.  God has blessed us with so many different people (small groups, individuals, families, churches, businesses and church classes) who faithfully give sacrificially so that our family can be here.  We understand how much it means to have people support you.  It's a humbling thing and a powerful faith builder of God's goodness.  


Even though we only spent a brief evening with some of these guys, we love their hearts and how they are confident that God will provide.  We would love to see their faith-filled walk be blessed and encouraged by financial supporters.  


We told them we would do a blog about them to see what God might want to do through this website.  So, we just wanted to ask that you prayerfully consider helping these guys in any way possible.  


Maybe you support our ministry financially, but your church family isn't currently supporting anyone and is looking.  Maybe you don't support our ministry financially but you've been praying about helping in some way on a more personal way than just tithing on Sunday.  Maybe you do both and still want to do more.  


If just one of these guys get some or all of the support they need through this blog then it will, obviously, have been worth it.  


Here is a picture of the entire team:

Their names from left to right are Wes and Ellen Shutt, Meriden and Reid Overall, Deanna Meredith, and Sara and Chad Lukkason. 


Okay, we ask that you pray about it.  If you then feel led to support them in some way or if you have questions you can contact us and we'll get you in touch with them personally, or you can also go directly to them . The team has an email.  The address is: conceteam@gmail.com  If you go to their email they can then put you in touch with who has the most pressing financial need or to a specific couple or Deanna if you feel led to someone specific after praying.   


As I looked at their team picture I realized they had the same number of people that arrived here with us in 2002 (minus all the kids).  We also arrived with three couples and one single person.  It's a hard thing to leave family and friends and everything comfortable and move to  another country and culture and learn a new language.  Those things are enough to create a little anxiety in your life as you prepare to move.  Lack of funds, as you can imagine, doesn't help that situation.  


As always, thank you for praying about this.  We believe that God is going to bless these guys. 

Birthday Activities

Benay had a good birthday.

She received some calls from her Brasilian family.  She had people take time out of their busy schedules to stop by our house to give her a birthday hug.  She got lots of emails and messages from friends and family in the United States and Brazil.

She also got to spend lots of fun time with her boyfriend and kids.  We had fun.

I think she liked her birthday but don't just take my word for it.  Go ahead and see what she had to say about it.  She actually blogged twice about her special day.  Just go here to check it out.

(P.S.-Thank you for the prayers for Carys.  She still has fever and is still holed up in her room recuperating but she is starting to feel better.  She is really hungry and requested spaghetti, chicken noodle soup with those big fat noodles, or a McDonald's cheeseburger and fries.  Since we don't have any groceries in the house, we're going for the McD's.  Sounds like she's on the mend.)

Prayers for healing

Carys started getting sick yesterday afternoon.  She had a stomach ache and a little fever.  Benay gave her some medicine and her fever got better for a little while.

When the medicine wore off the fever came back.  Carys wasn't able to keep any of the medicine down through the night.  She got up 5-6 times to throw up.  So her fever has come back and stayed.  She's just kind of whimpering around. She feels pretty miserable.

Her fever was 100 degrees yesterday afternoon and it was over 102 this morning.  If she can't keep any medicine down this morning we will take her to the doctor.

We would appreciate your prayers for her.  That God would take this fever away and that she would feel back to normal.   That would be a big blessing because our temperatures are supposed to be in the mid 90's today and tomorrow.  High fever and really hot house are not a good match.

Thanks in advance for praying for our little squirt.

Birthday Girl

Today is my girlfriend's birthday.  She's a pretty special person.

The kids agree.  Here is what they think of her:

Bronwyn:  "She is one of my best friends and I love her."

Ansley:  "She is the best mom ever, really. None of my friends have a mom that cares this much about them, or that is this gorgeous!"

Garrett:  "She's the best mom in the world and I love her."

Carys:  "She's the best mom ever!  If there is a big line of moms and mom was in the line and I didn't even know who she was,  I would pick her."

Anderson:  "I like her and she is my favorite mom.  She does a bunch of fun stuff with me.  She does activities and fun stuff with me......and that's all I need to say."

Giovanni:  He was taking a nap when I started this but he already told me he loves her peanut butter and jelly sandwiches.  He loves her taking him for a ride in the stroller and the "boom boom" (the car).  He loves how she reads to him.  He thinks she's pretty.

The kids used pretty and gorgeous to describe her physical features.  I would definitely agree.

I would also use them to describe her spiritual features.

I'm a very spoiled man and I know it.  I am blessed with an incredibly beautiful girlfriend.  She is an incredible wife and mom.  Her kids will never forget the Spirit filled way she has raised them.  We have all learned much from her Christ like example.  Our kids are kingdom workers because of her example.

I get to do what I love and do it side by side with my best friend.  Not many people get to say that.

My girlfriend is such a strong spiritual influence in my life.  She has taught me more about grace than anyone I know.

I see how she impacts the lives of others by the gift that God has given her to teach His word.  It's unbelievable and yet she's never once said anything about the gift.  She is far too humble to ever talk about her giftedness.  She quietly uses her gifts for the kingdom. I also see the difference she makes in the lives of others just by the way she lives her life for Christ.  She lives Christ.

I know I am biased but I know the world is a better place because of my girlfriend.

Happy Birthday!

"It's who you are and the way you live that count before God. Your worship must engage your spirit in the pursuit of truth. That's the kind of people the Father is out looking for: those who are simply and honestly themselves before him in their worship. God is sheer being itself—Spirit. Those who worship him must do it out of their very being, their spirits, their true selves, in adoration."

John 4:23-24 (The Message)

Updates and Prayer Requests

Here are a couple of updates.

We've been in touch with the girls and they are really having fun with Mark and Ali.  

They've also done a little last minute studying for the test.  They are ready.

Today is the day that they take the test.  We would appreciate prayers for them during this time as well as for their safety coming back home tomorrow night.  

We've also gotten a couple of notes from Leni.  She really needs your prayers right now.  She has been studying the Bible and praying with the housekeeper of the lady she is working for.  This lady wants to become a Christian and be baptized, but so far they don't have a place to do the baptism.  Leni asks us to pray for her, the lady who wants to be baptized, and especially the sick lady that she is taking care of.  As in every mission that God sends us on, there have been some hard times for Leni, but she remains firm in her belief that God called her to this job and He has a purpose for her being there.  Of course this is true as evidenced by the housekeeper's desire to follow Jesus.  We praise God for how He has already using Leni. Please remember Leni in your prayers.

Finally we are going to a funeral today.  One of our closest friend's father passed away yesterday.  It might seem strange to Americans that the funeral would be so soon but Brasilian funerals usually happen the day after a death.

We will be with our brother, Sergio, and his family as they mourn the loss and celebrate the life of his dad.

We would appreciate prayers for that whole family.  

More Venting and a little relief

I mentioned yesterday that weather forecasters are stupid.  I need to apologize for that comment.

They aren't stupid; they are dirty, stinking, rotten, no good liars.  Boy it felt good to get that out.

Okay, I apologize if you are reading this and you are an actual weather forecaster.  But even you have to realize that only God can forecast the weather.

Why the anger?

Yesterday's predicted high of 91 degrees became an actual temperature of 102 again.  With the heat index of 120!!!  120?!  Seriously, are we in Kuwait now?

Garrett spent the night at a friend's house two nights ago and his friends mom told him she saw a report on tv saying this is our hottest summer in 49 years.  Great.

Awful is the only word I can come up with .

Here's what the heat has been doing to us:  Lucky the dog puked 4 times (because of that, Carys gave both Lucky and Rex a bath),

Carys the child puked once, Benay the wife took 3 cold showers in one day and Anderson and Giovanni cried about almost everything.

Heck, even our shredded cheese has given up and is just melting as it sits on our dining room table.

We are having tons of fun in this heat.  As Anderson would say, "That, my friend, was a joke."

We did have a water fight in the back yard yesterday and we did have fun.

We were reminded of these verses in the afternoon:


"On your feet now! Look toward the sea."
    He went, looked, and reported back, "I don't see a thing."
    "Keep looking," said Elijah, "seven times if necessary."
 ⁴⁴ And sure enough, the seventh time he said, "Oh yes, a cloud! But very small, no bigger than someone's hand, rising out of the sea."
    "Quickly then, on your way. Tell Ahab, 'Saddle up and get down from the mountain before the rain stops you.'"
 ^45-46 Things happened fast. The sky grew black with wind-driven clouds, and then a huge cloudburst of rain...... (1 Kings 18: 43-46  The Message)


Okay, we weren't in the middle of a drought but we really needed some rain and cooler temperatures.

In the afternoon God blessed us.

What started as this......

......ended up as this.

It rained for about 45 minutes and the temperature dropped to around 90 degrees. It was a very welcomed event.  Funny how a few days of being at 102 degrees can make 90 degrees feel like a cool spring day.

Even the dogs cooled off and wanted to play.  Here is Rex chasing Giovanni so he can take a bite of his diaper.

They say three more days like this before the temperatures drop back down to around 80 for Benay's birthday on Monday.   As those words are typed I am reminded that the forecasters actually know very little.  Again, no offense to any meteorologists who might be reading this.  I'm sure you try your best.

Even so, we will be praying that Monday will be 80 degrees.

Until then, we will keep trying our best to stay cool.  (Obrigado pela piscina Auristela!)

Hotter!

I just thought I was done whining.

Yesterday we were lied to.  The Weather Channel said the high would be 95 (35 celsius).  They were wrong.  Stupid weather forecasters.

The high was 102 degrees (38.8 celsius) with a heat index of 113 (45 celsius).

At 8:00 last night it was still 102 but the heat index had cooled off to 110 (43.3 celsius).  At 9:00 last night it was 93 (33.8 celsius) in our room.

It hasn't been this hot here in at least 7 years and I'm beginning to think that it is now hotter now than it was during our first miserably hot summer here.

We went to the pool again around 5:00 in the afternoon and ran into a lot of friends that we know.  Everyone seemed to have the same idea as us on how to keep cool.  The pool was full.  Check out an aerial view of the pool we went to.  This was a photo taken on Tuesday and it was published in one of our newspapers yesterday. We are under the trees on the top right.

I don't know why they didn't move the game to a different time but our arch enemy (gremio) had a game yesterday at 5:00 here in Porto Alegre.  It was 102 when they started the game.

I can't imagine running for 45 minutes then taking a 15 minute break and then running for 45 more minutes in that heat.  Only 4,000 people braved the heat to go watch the game.

On our way home from the pool we listened to the last little bit of the game.  When the game was over we heard the radio announcers interviewing the television announcer to make sure he was okay.

The tv guy kind of joked about what happened and said he was fine.  What happened?  The heat made this happen before the start of the game.

Our team also played last night and won. We played in another city. Here are the highlights:

We are trying to think of and do anything that will take our minds off the heat. Not sure it's working but we'll keep trying.

It's only supposed to get up to 91 degrees (32.7 celsius) today. We've heard that before. Stupid weather forecasters.

HOT!!!!

The heat has returned.

Yesterday at 4:30 it was 99 degrees (37.2 degrees celsius).

Last night at 9:00 p.m. it was 88 degrees (31.1 degrees celsius).  In our house!  Two nights ago Benay had to get up in the middle of the night to take a cold shower just so she could go to sleep.

This morning at 5:00 it was 82 outside with a heat index of 91 and it had "cooled off" to 87 in our house.  That's at the coolest part of the day.

A Brasilian national news channel said yesterday was the highest usage of electricity in the country.....EVER.

It is stinking hot or as Anderson would say, "smoking hot."  I may have shared before but if you put smoking in front of any word it makes it more powerful....at least in Anderson's world.

We haven't had any wind, or any rain (longer than 5 minutes that just make it more humid) or any way to cool off our entire house.  The sun is brutal. We don't have central air and it's too expensive to run our window air units for very long.

We are, as you can imagine, always looking for ways to cool off.

Most days we take two showers.  One when we get up and one right before bed.  We only use cold water.  I've never been in a habit of just taking cold water showers before but it's that hot.  Even after the cold shower at night you still sweat in your bed.

The other day we took the kids to the mall to enjoy the air conditioning.  While we were there Carys and Anderson got to be mini movie stars.  Benay blogged a little bit about that on her blog.  If you haven't read it you can go to her blog here .  The heat seems to be a common blog theme for us right now. If you take that link to her blog then you just need to scroll down to her post on February 1st.

Yesterday we went to the pool.  It was a holiday.  We didn't go until around 5:00 p.m. because we thought most of the crowd would be gone by then.  We were wrong. We obviously weren't the only ones who had that idea. The heat and day off from work brought a bunch of people out.

You can see Benay and the kids in the front of this picture. 

Today it's supposed to cool off and only get up to 95 degrees (35 degrees celsius).  Actually the forecast calls for highs between 95-98 every day until Sunday.

I spoke with one of our neighbors this morning and she said the heat is coming from Argentina.  It's already killed some elderly people there. She told me the heat index in our city yesterday was almost 115 degrees (46 degrees celsius).

It'a so hot that last night we even had to break one of our rules.  We actually slept with the air on all night.  We just couldn't stand the heat. I think our first summer here was the last time we ran a window unit all night.

Not all the rooms in our house have window units.  Our bedroom and Carys and Giovanni's room don't have them. Garrett and Anderson's room and Bronwyn and Ansley's room both have them.

So with the two teenage girls gone we shifted some folks around.  Benay, Giovanni and I slept in Bronwyn and Ansley's room.  Garrett, Carys and Anderson slept in the boys room.

We have a control knob on the little units.  Once the room gets to a certain temperature it automatically shifts from cold air to fan until it gets hot again and then the air comes back on.  The units never switched during the entire night.  They only blew out cold air.  I thought there might be a problem until I realized that the little units never were able to cool off the rooms below 80 degrees so they never shifted to fan mode.

Even the dogs are trying not to move to conserve energy.  This is what they do most of the day.

I've always heard about the "dog days of summer" and now I guess I understand.

We've been here before and know that we can survive this heat but we would appreciate prayers for a little relief.

Okay, I'm done whining.

Okay no I'm not.  As I was finishing this post Benay was looking at the Weather Channel on the internet and told me it's 15 degrees cooler right now where Bronwyn and Ansley are.  Our heat here is also supposed to end about the time they get back home. Not fair.

Okay, now I'm done whining.

Prayers for the girls

We just put these two goobers on a plane......

......to hang out with these two goobers for the next six days.

They are going to a city called Campinas to take the ACT on Saturday. Our buddies, Mark and Ali, are missionaries in a city near Campinas called Itu. They have graciously agreed to pick up/drop off our kids from the airport and to take them to their test.

It's safe to say this goofy couple are some of our most favorite people to hang around with.

The girls will have a ball with them this week. They won't just be hanging out with Mark and Ali. They told the girls what they will be involved with this week. Some of the things include being Christ to the homeless on Friday, hanging out with the youth group on Thursday and going to a birthday party together on Saturday.

We haven't met many people who just come right in and roll with our schedule and who aren't intimidated by the size of our family. Mark and Ali have always been a natural fit with our family. We love those guys and are thrilled that Bronwyn and Ansley get to be with them this week.

They also have a blog. Go here if you want to check it out.

Please pray for our girls to be safe this week, to have fun and to not worry about the test they will take on Friday. They've studied enough and they don't need to study anymore. Our prayer is that they relax and just do the best they can.

More important than this test and any scholarship is the fact that they get to be a part of Mark and Ali's ministry this week.

The other kids are already missing them.

Well, sort of. 

We know they will have a great week.

Rwanda

More than one person from the Aggies for Christ group that was here last year is involved in Bronwyn's ministry to Rwanda.  

One of them sent Bronwyn an email the other day with a link to the video below.    

The only words this person put on the email were, "Be inspired."

You will be.  Here it is:

In case you have forgotten, you can follow Bronwyn's blog here.