January 31, 2012

Great day in Juarez Jail today on my birthday.  Pastor Julio, brother Marcos and myself drove down to the local jail share the gospel with some prisoners who were behind bars inside.  When we arrived we walked around the building to a cross street where we met up with another pastor and his group of people that were their for the same reason.  This was the 3rd consecutive time I have been blessed to have been able to join these dedicated men and women of God who each week make their way to this jail to share the love of God with the men who have been incarcerated there.

This third time  turned out to be a very special morning for us.  Our friend and brother in the Lord from Pastor Julio's church joined us for the first time and before long he had an opportunity to preach to the prisoners for about five minutes.  Other men and even a women were afforded the same opportunity, then came Pastor Julio's turn and finally mine once again.

Just as I was concluding the message God gave me in that moment to give based on two portions of Scripture I felt led to turn to in John Chapter 1:1-5  and Psalm 46

John 1:1-5   

The Word Became Flesh

 ¹ In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. ² He was with God in the beginning. ³ Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. ⁴ In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind. ⁵ The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome^[a] it.

Psalm 46
 ¹ God is our refuge and strength, 

   an ever-present help in trouble.
² Therefore we will not fear, though the earth give way
   and the mountains fall into the heart of the sea,
³ though its waters roar and foam
   and the mountains quake with their surging.^[c]
 4 There is a river whose streams make glad the city of God,
   the holy place where the Most High dwells.
⁵ God is within her, she will not fall;
   God will help her at break of day.
⁶ Nations are in uproar, kingdoms fall;
   he lifts his voice, the earth melts.
 ⁷ The LORD Almighty is with us;
   the God of Jacob is our fortress.
 ⁸ Come and see what the LORD has done,
   the desolations he has brought on the earth.
⁹ He makes wars cease
   to the ends of the earth.
He breaks the bow and shatters the spear;
   he burns the shields^[d] with fire.
¹⁰ He says, “Be still, and know that I am God; 
   I will be exalted among the nations,
   I will be exalted in the earth.”
 ¹¹ The LORD Almighty is with us;
   the God of Jacob is our fortress.

  

A New Cross for Our Church Here in Juarez

This morning after breakfast of scrambled eggs wrapped in tortillas we made our way to the church where the project that awaited us was the exchanging of the small white cross that we installed several weeks ago for a slightly larger one.  Things went well.  Once again we unraveled the electric wire from Sister Flora's house on the other side of the dirt road from the church and we connected the two bare wire ends to the wire cable from the church.  The electricity and lights went back on and we were able to use our skill saw to cut a small section off the bottom of the cross that we had put together from scarp wood and painted white last week.

In the photo's above you will see the dusty dirt road that we drive up that leads up to our church.  Their are homes on either side of this road that we pass each time we go to and from the church and some of the people we know live in them.  Every once in a while we stop and talk with someone about God and invite whoever we see out walking to come and visit our church and we tell them we have two services; Wed. evening and Sunday morning.

Another photo is of the giant garbage hill that exists behind the church.  Every day dump trucks such as the one you see in the photo arrive to either add more garbage to the hill or to dump dirt to cover the garbage.  That hill has been steadily growing and steadily creeping closer and closer to the boundary line that marks off our church property.  I've been wondering since I arrived here when they will stop coming closer to us but so far they still keep dumping and getting closer.  We are guessing that one day someone will say, "Ok boys, that's close enough, let's find another place to dump."  That's our prayer anyway.

We found some long screws and after a while we were able to fasten it in place to a board that extended from the peak of the church.  Our little work party consisted of myself, Pastor Julio, brother Marcos, and two of Pastor Julio's sons; 7 year old Sami and 4 year of Joshue.  Of course they were busy playing while we did the light work of installing the cross.  I took some time to take some more photos this morning around the church and here they are.  Afterwards it was time for another hambergasa for me and Julio and the boys.  

Communion Sunday in Juarez

Today we had another great Sunday meeting with Pastor Julio's church. It was decided that this would be Communion Sunday and last week the folks were reminded to prepare for it. My meeting with brother Cesar in El Paso yesterday went very well and he was able to bless us with a new box of communion cups and wafer's that he was able to purchase from a local El Paso Christian bookstore. The small plastic cups contained the dark grape juice and attached to the top was the wafer. We stopped off at a local bakery on the way to church and Pastor Julio was able to purchase a small symbolic loaf of bread and once we arrived at church we were able to borrow a nice wine glass from a neighbor at the church.

I was given the opportunity to share a teaching on communion using Scripture chapters and verses from both the Old and New Testaments, while Pastor Julio interpreted for me that tied what we were about to do all together. Twenty or so minutes later we partook of the Lord's Supper as a family of God.

Enjoyed the rest of the evening after church by stopping off with Pastor Julio and his wife and four boys at a streetside hamburgesa stand and we ordered some nice big and tasty burgers to take home with us. Another Sunday in Juarez with Blessings from God. Thankful for a Christian family both in regards to the church family and Pastor Julio's personal family to share life here with.

Missions Work in Juarez

Today is cold morning in Juarez.  I live in a cement block one room house with a small kitchen and bathroom and no heat and currently no electricity for lack of funds. Living by faith on the mission field means depending on others for your support.  When others come through for you things get easier but when those that you would hope would help don't then you just wait on the Lord until they do.  In the interval you serve the Lord as best you can as He leads. At night I have a little light from candles and a flashlight that hangs from my ceiling.  If you think missionaries have it easy, come and join me for a few weeks.  

Last night I hosted class number 8 of Libros Romanos ( The Book of Romans ) which is a bi-lingual 10 week video teaching series taught on video by Rev. Paul Johannson former president of Elim Bible Institute of Lima, NY.  This has been a very well received course and I may have the opportunity to teach it again in another church before the time for this mission comes to an end.  I am currently praying about a return to Buffalo around Easter time.  

This is a photo of the  church that I am hosting this video series in led by my close friend here; Pastor Julio.  Pastor Julio had the electricity in his church turned off before I arrived back in October due to lack of funds on the church's part.  The people that he ministers to each week are very low income people and the offerings that are received are not enough to keep the lights on there.  We have to run an electrical cable from the church to a home across the dirt road.  Each time we have church we run the cable from her house to the church and connect the two wires to two wires from the church and bingo we have light.  We we are done with church or whatever meeting we are there for we disconnect the wires and ravel up the cord and store it for next time.  After our meeting last night Pastor Julio and I stopped off at a local hamburgesa place in Juarez and got ourselves two burgers for ten peso's each, about $2.00 total.  They threw in a couple of jalapeno peppers which were very good with the burgers, not too hot, just right to add a little zing to the burger.

This morning I am on a mission to secure some small plastic communion cups in El Paso to bring back to Pastor Julio.  A week or so ago God put it on my heart to confront Pastor Julio with the revelation that God awoke me with one night of not having received communion in his church since I arrived back in October.  I began to explain to him the importance of communion on a regular basis and he agreed with me that he had been lax in that area.  The Holy Spirit renewed the importance of this sacrament to his heart and he made an immediate decision to offer communion on a more regular basis beginning with communion tomorrow.  The first thing we realized is that we didn't have communion cups so the search for some began.

After several unsuccessful  attempts in downtown Juarez to find a source I remembered a mutual friend in El Paso named Cesar.  Our friend Cesar has agreed to help us out in that department.  I am on my way to meet up with him this morning.  I have just crossed over the Juarez bridge and am sitting in a local MacDonald's with free wi-fi writing this before making my way to our agreed upon meeting place, the local post office in El Paso where I will also check my P.O. Box to see if any one I know has sent me anything.  Hopefully that will be the case instead of another empty PO Box,  something missionaries don't look forward to but nevertheless, is a reality more often than not.

Before I cross back over to Juarez I will make my ritual stop at Church's Chicken where I can get a thigh and a biscuit for $1.00 and a free cup of water.  Looking forward to that later on.  Meals are not something I worry about here.  God has a way of providing through the people we minister to.  If you are wondering what its like to do missions work in a foreign country stay tuned.  I'll tell you as time goes on.

Before I bring this post to a conclusion I'd like to mention a prayer request that both Pastor Julio and I have.  We need more folding metal chairs for his church.  Since I have been here our church attendance has grown and now we are finding that people enter on Sunday morning and we have no seats for them to sit down on.  Keep us in prayer for that as we ask God to provide either the finances for more chairs or more chairs from whatever source He can locate for us in Jesus name.  Amen.

Homes of Juarez

You will find hundreds of homes like this one in the desert colonias of Juarez.  Common building materials include pallets and tin roofs and any kind of scrap materials that suit the purpose of attempting to keep the weather out.  A shelter for the family inside.

Here we are praying with the prisoners...

Several of us had the opportunity to preach a five minute message to the prisoners here in this Juarez jail.  I was the last one to share with them and I felt led to offer them their opportunity for salvation through Jesus Christ.  They all one by one stood to their feet and we led them in the sinners prayer.  Praise the Lord!

Sharing The Good News with Prisoners in a Juarez jail

The other day I had the experience of sharing the "Good News" the gospel of Jesus Christ with prisoners in this Juarez jail.