This Week

This week has held blessing and struggles for us.

Sunday we got to church to see a truck of our Sunday School students being driven somewhere else. We asked them where they were going and found out that Iglesia Bautista Nuevo Camino was picking kids up on a "truck" route for their church. This church is part of Baptist Medical and Dental Mission and they have a habit of going into an area where there is already a good Baptist church and stealing all of the members. They have done this many times and as they have all of their funding come from the states, they can do whatever they want. This is not a missionary run church, but a church with a pastor that gets support from the states. They are Baptist in name only. They do not have the same beliefs that we do. Their pastor even believes that if one person from the family attends their church then the whole family is saved. This in direct contradiction to what the Bible says. Last week we had 9 kids in my Sunday school class. While I know it is not about numbers, it is nice to see a full class. I am so thankful for the 9 kids that came knowing that all they were going to get was love and teaching from the Bible.

Sunday morning during our church service we had a baby dedication service. We dedicated Ruben Isaac Zelaya Santos, Jason Alex Rodriguez Lopez, Joey, and Matthew. It was so sweet to see the tears in Ruben Sr's eyes as Jason told how God had used their lives in our church. Jason preached that morning on what it means to dedicate your child to the Lord. Even though our Sunday School attendance was low, the Lord gave us a great adult attendance even though several of our faithful were out sick.

After church, Chad Minnick came into town. He and his wife, Julie, are adopting a girl from Honduras. Normally he stays in a motel, but we offered to let him stay with us and he accepted. We had a great night of fellowship. They needed a place for Magda, the girl who they are adopting, to stay. So he was coming down to get her situated in the house of the uncle of the other girl they adopted a year ago. It wasn't the best place for her to go, but it would be a home where she would get at least food every day.

Monday morning as Jason was talking to Chad, he offered to let Magda stay with us. He didn't talk to me first, so when I heard it I was stunned that he had thought of that as it hadn't entered my mind. Then, almost instantly, my mind went back to the boy we had living with us a few years ago and all of the problems that we had. I felt bad because I am sure the utter terror showed on my face. Magda is 14 years old, but emotionally she is about the same age as Audrey. Chad decided to let her stay with us. I was so glad we could make a difference in her life even for a short time.

Magda has been having a great time. She loves playing with Audrey and they are two peas in a pod. They only time they are separated is when they are doing schoolwork. Although Magda is taller than Audrey, her diet hasn't been great lately and she is super skinny. They wear the same size at this time. They have been sharing clothes and everything. We know that the first few weeks are easy and calm and so we are perfectly ready for things to take a turn for the worse as that is what happened before. Magda is so eager to please and is such a joy that we are hoping that she will make the transition smoothly.

Wednesday I came down with a cold and had to go into the doctor on Thursday as I could not stop coughing. My doctor gave me several medicines as well as a prescription for a nebulization medicine. I am feeling better now, but on Friday Magda and Matthew got sick too. We had to take both of them into the doctor. Thankfully, Dr. Munoz saw Magda for free and gave us her medication is samples too so it didn't cost us anything.

It has been a fun time of adjusting for us with having Magda in the house. She is a HUGE blessing. She helps with the dishes and laundry as well as any time Matthew cries, she picks him up and holds him until I can take care of his needs.

To cap off this roller coaster week, I got a call yesterday as we were working on a homework project for Audrey. Jason called and told me that he had just gotten in a car accident. He asked me to call and have Alan Jackson come and help him and then he hung up on me. I am a pessimist and so therefore I assumed the worse. I called Alan and then called Jason back. He told me where he was and asked me to get the police and then hung up on me again without giving me any more information. I hurried and got the kids in our other car and drove to the police station. Once there I ran inside and talked to the two police officers that are assigned to the town of San Buenaventura. They told me that they were not transit officers so they could not help me, but they gave me the phone number for the police in Sabana Grande (a town about 20 minutes away) where there is a transit police station. I called them and they told me, "We will send someone out as soon as we can." When you know how the Honduran system works that is not very comforting. I drove to where Jason was and was relieved to find out that he was ok. The accident wasn't as bad as I was imagining. He was dropping someone off and so was stopped on the side of the road. A driver coming along was not watching where he was going and slammed into the back of Jason. Two ladies flew out of the truck bed and landed on the grass, but they got up and walked away. We tried to get them to go to a hospital to be checked out, but they didn't want to. One man who was also riding in the back, was sore and pretty cut up on his arms. The man who caused the accident took him to the hospital. Our truck (the small one) is pretty damaged. The back end is all crushed in and something is loose on the front of the truck that causes it to rattle pretty badly when it is running. Jason and Alan took the truck to a mechanic/body shop near our house and the owner told us that the man who caused the accident is a friend of his and he will make sure that he pays. Once everything was worked out the police finally showed up. Since everything was already decided they just left again. Jason is very sore today. His back and neck hurt a lot, but we are so thankful that he was not hurt worse.

It seems like the discouragements always come right before a great victory. Our soulwinning program in Ojojona has picked up and we have seen faithfulness in many people. Many people have visited our church for the first time. The church is growing and we are excitedly waiting to see what God is going to do through us in 2009.