Last week of vacations

Jason is better and learning to eat the food here. I have been working in the garden and loving it. I am learning so much about how to make a garden prosper. I am also able to see daily miracles of new plants sprouting up which is only possible with Gods help. Jason has been helping put up solar panels and wiring an electrical output for our room so we can sit on our bed and watch sermons on the computer. He also dug a 2 foot deep post hole, thanks for the training, Dad. Carrie has gotten hang of the Bolivian laundry service...put your swimsuit on go stand in the river, let your legs adjust to the cold water until you don{t feel them and then wash everything by hand. The nice part is you can finish with a nice bath in the river. Saturday Jason spoke for church! He spoke on Daniel 3 and encouraged the kids to spend time with GOd now so that when troubles and hard times come we will already have made the decision to follow God. The whole story of Daniel 3 has many parallels to the end of time. Go check them out! Saturday afternoon we walked to Yata which is a little pueblo (town) 4 miles from our school. The weather has heated up and there is very rarely clouds in the sky. The walk is mostly along a big, dusty dirt road in the middle of the day. Lets just say we were slightly sweaty with a nice dirt tan when we got back. In Yata the students went from house to house telling the people we were there to have a church service. The people started trickling in and the students proceded to put on a church service. They are hoping to build a church there within the next year. Last week Jerry, another missionary here, found a 8 foot long snake caught in the water wheel. They pulled it out and luckily it was already dead. Jason almost stepped on a little one yesterday as we made the treck into the jungle to get water. The cold showers are starting to feel good after long hot days and by 8pm we are ready to climb into bed. Then we have been enjoying watching sermons. In the sermons we have been deeply impressed that Jesus is coming very soon. The pastor giving the sermons is constantly saying we have just a few short months to a few short years. He has been studying prophecy and breaks down how the prophecies are being fulfilled rapidly. we know from revelation 13 that there will be a great change in the financial system because it says that no one will be able to buy or sell without the mark of the beast. the american economy reached a peak in 2000 and has been steadily declining until 2008 when it finally burst. we know the economy must fail in order to change it. why would you change something that is working so well? you wouldnt, so we know the economy has to collapse. baby boomers represent the largest group of people in america right now and the majority of them will be retiring from 2008-2011. there is no longer such a thing as a 401k. what is going to happen when so many americans come to collect their retirement and it doesnt exist? they are going to seek a solution to the problem and great changes are going to be made. we must be reading our Bibles so that we understand what is happening around us. we dont need to fear the things we read in the news because Jesus told us beforehand what would come to pass. What a loving God! but 1 Corinthians 13 1-3 tells us it is not enough to be able to understand all mysteries, fathom all knowledge, give all we have to the poor, or even die a martyrs death if we dont have love. Our characters must reflect the character of Christ. I have been impressed that everyday we need to learn to love like Jesus. We need to be living now like we will be living in heaven. I find myself often asking Jesus to come because im tired of living here in sin and i want my family and friends to be ready and to be saved from this suffering. but how often have i forgotten to think about the suffering that God is feeling because our sins have separated us from Him? It is all about a personal walk with Jesus. Here in Bolivia I am finding it is easier to study our Bible and spend time in prayer and meditation with God. It makes me realize the dangers that technology has brought into our society. Our time is eaten up by tv, internet, video games, and cellphones. It really is nice not to have them here. I encourage you to evaluate where you are spending your time and determine if this is where you want your treasure to be stored. We are spending time in prayer and study of Gods word and hope that you are as well.

South winds

Hello everyone! We went to Brazil today, all you have to do is take a 5 minute boat ride across the river. We just were seeing the area with Ruan and Tara. The south winds have been bringing cold weather!! We have been practically freezing. It is cloudy, windy and cold!! Praise God today the sun came back out and we are warming up. It might be time for a shower...4 days since the last one. :) The bad part is that you can't get away from the weather. Jason has been sick in bed for three days and then finally began taking cypro and is up and out today. (Thanks dad for sending the bag of medicine, we have been using it!) He has the stomach sickness. I had it but got over it and was not as bad as Jason. I, Carrie, have been helping some of the girls in the garden and looking over the math textbook. David Gates was here on Saturday and spoke for church. He encouraged/reminded us that Jesus is coming very soon! Make sure you are not getting caught up in daily life that you miss the special times with God which is the most important part of our life. We hope that each of you are being missionaries within your own walks of life. Internet should be coming soon to the school! Kids do not come back for another two weeks. We will see what we can find to do to keep us busy. Hope all is well!

Safe and sound at the school

We finished our paperwork on Monday and were headed to Guayara on Tuesday. Monday the south winds came in bringing cold weather! I, Carrie, was wearing long johns, 5 shirts and wrapped in a blanket. It was really windy. Tuesday we flew with Steve Wilson to Riberalta. He did a great job flying...unfortunately I did not do a great job riding. On the way down I threw up in my shirt. But we made it safely and were taken by motorcycle taxis to the bus station. Mind you we had lots of luggage and it was all taken on the moto taxi. One bag in front on the handle bars another between us and the driver and then one on our back. No helmets, dirt roads, squeezing past cars...quite an experience. We then took a normal taxi an hour up the dirt road to the school. We are literally in the middle of the jungle! The mile walk or ride if you are lucky into the school off the main road is surrounded by pure, thick jungle. Wednesday we got our house or more like room set up. Jason made some shelves and we put up our mosquito net which fit perfectly over our bed...thanks Ronda. The food was rice and potatoes for breakfast, rice, cole slaw, oatmeal patty and potatoes for lunch, and biscuits and gravy for dinner with a potato. But don´t get excited about biscuits and gravy...the gravy is flour, water, oil, and onions...and cold. Our stomachs are still trying to adjust. It is vacation time at the school so probably half of the students have gone home, the other half have stayed at the school to work. We came to town today to buy some necessities. Kayla and Lylie are showing us around.
Last night at worship, one of the students told her story and I want to share it with you all. A year and a half ago, Daniella heard about the school from her sister and wanted to come. She was afraid to ask her dad though. There were many problems in her house. She asked her mom and her mom asked her dad. Her mom took her to the school and she filled out the paperwork and had her interview and was accepted into the school. She was very excited. Her dad even took her the day she started which was the first time he had ever been on a christian campus. Later I found out that he often is drunk and beats her mom and her and her siblings. One time she was taken to child protective services because her back was beaten so bad. She is not for sure if that is even her dad, there are two possible men who could be her dad. She wanted to come to the school to get away from her family. She was nervous the first couple of days because they were talking about chapters and verses in the Bible and she did not know what a verse was. Since being at the school she has learned that she has a God that loves her and has a plan for her even amidst her troubles at home. She went home over break after her first year at the school and she had become accustomed to praying before each meal but she was afraid to do this in front of her father. So she prayed in her head with her eyes open. Her father realized what she was doing and laughed at her. When she came back this school year she decided to be baptized and start keeping the sabbath. She is very worried about the salvation of her family. She says her mom has been baptized but only because everyone was doing it, not because she had a relationship with God. Today on the bus she was headed home for a week. She was very worried about telling her family she has been baptized and that she is now keeping the sabbath. She does not know how she will do it, but she knows that God will sustain her. I prayed with her on the bus and she left to enter a world most of us have never and will never know. When I think about my problems they suddenly do not seem so bad. We have been blessed so much and yet we take so much of it for granted. Daniella wants to be a missionary when she finishes school. Please pray for Daniella and all the students who have gone home for the next couple of weeks to be missionaries in their own homes.
We hope you all are doing well and love getting emails from you...so please do email. When the school year starts Monday will be our day off. For now we do not really know a schedule, we just hope to stay busy. God bless!

Life in Santa Cruz

We arrived early Thursday morning at the airport without getting much sleep on the plane. Praise God! Customs let us go right through without even checking our bags after Carrie told them we were volunteer teachers! The car ride to the radio station was insane. Driving here is a completely different experience. Cars are flying everywhere and lines on the road are optional. Up to three people ride motorcycles at a time with one helmet usually strapped on the handlebars. Cars and people are everywhere and everyone is honking at everyone else. The city looks very poor and there is trash everywhere. Street vending is the only option for work for most people here. The couple we are staying with, Ximena and Eleazar, said somewhere between 50 and 70% of Bolivians are street vendors. We have done a couple things for our visa, but still have to get blood drawn and police records on Monday and then we will be able to go to the school while Ximena, our legal rep, continues to work on our visas. We are eating very well...lots of fruit, toast, oatmeal, rice, beans, pizza, lasagna, we even got Italian ice last night with some people from the local church(which is extremely nice). The church looks like a cathedral and has 500 members! Today we both woke up with hurting stomachs but other than that we have been fine. There is no internet at the radio station because they did not have the money to pay the bill so we are using it at Ximena´s parents house. We are going to watch the World Cup here today so that is very exciting. The shower is cold for Jason everyday but Carrie says for her it is warm. We just figured out how to turn the water on in the bathroom when it doesn´t come out of the faucet or the toilet doesn´t flush. We still don´t know if we are supposed to be putting toilet paper down the toilet, haha. We have worship every morning that includes songs, prayer, and reading a chapter in the Bible. We pray every morning when we get in the car, whenever we go anywhere and of course before meals. The tv station has worship twice a day. God is definately the center of their lives. Even if we are late for something worship is not cut short and no one looks at the time. We sing every line of the hymns here. The youth at the church here have their own church and they have a program starting at 4pm Sabbath afternoon for the youth. Last night they had Bible trivia that Carrie participated in and they had three people dressed as angels with smoke bombs walk through the church giving the 3 angel´s messages. Very dramatic! They had some type of object lesson with this liquid that you could punch and it would turn hard that I was invited up front to try. The lesson was that if we try and attack people with our message they will resist but if we become their friend and associate with them they will be more likely to listen to us. There are dogs everywhere here that are very skinny and not treated very well, rocks thrown at them, etc. We have seen a nice horse park, with jumps and everything, near where we are staying and some horses live next door that Carrie tried to get near but they ran away. The horses just wander wherever they want even if it is through the middle of a busy street. Our house is in the rich part of town and pretty fancy for Bolivia. We are learning lots about the culture and are excited about getting to the school hopefully next Tuesday. God has been blessing us and we praise him for his protection!!

Here we go!!

We are leaving for Bolivia today!! Our bags are stuffed full, but not over 50 lbs :) We are very excited! We will arrive in Santa Cruz tomorrow and work on our visas for a couple of days and then take a small mission plane flight 3 hours to the school. For those of you who do not know our story or much about where we are going I have posted a small sermon I gave on our mission journey. God bless and thanks for the prayers!

Our mission story begins a little over a year ago. Before we were even married; we knew that we wanted to be missionaries. We applied through Adventist Frontier Missions, Gospel Ministries International, and Adventist Volunteer Services and searched hundreds of calls. We never seemed to find one that fit our needs and that would allow us to go even though we had not been married a year yet. It was nearing the end of my school year and after praying and searching for mission opportunities. We did not seem to get an answer or a call so it came time to re-sign my contract at the school. We made the decision to stay in Athens and I signed the contract for another year. The very next day we got a long distance call from Gospel Ministries International in Bolivia wanting to know when we could come be missionaries there. The call was from a mission school that was in the Amazon near the border of Brazil. The school is a Seventh - day Adventist boarding academy that is free for the students. It provides education opportunities for children that might otherwise be on the streets. The students come having never held a Bible and most knowing nothing about God. It is a great opportunity to teach these children about God’s love for them. The school is focused on community service with one day a week devoted to outreach in the community. The goal is to graduate students who will go out and be missionaries in their own communities. The mission sounded awesome but we were committed to stay in Athens for another school year. We didn’t really understand the timing of the call, but trusted that God is never late rather always on time. So we stayed in Athens, while keeping in contact with Bolivia.

During this past school year it has been amazing to see how God has used me in my classroom. I had so many opportunities to share my faith with my students that I knew exactly why the call from Bolivia had come the day after I signed my contract. We also had the privilege of helping put on a revival and evangelistic series at our church in Athens. We have learned so much this year and grown in our walks with God that we knew He had wanted us to stay in Athens another year.

Throughout our year in Athens, we stayed in contact with our new friends from Bolivia. We even got to meet them at the Generation of Youth for Christ meetings in Kentucky. At the time of GYC we were praying about three different locations for missions, one being Bolivia. We ended up being able to talk to a person from each location and realized that Bolivia was the only call that fit our skill sets perfectly. I am a 6^th grade math and science teacher and I am going to be able to teach math and science to high school students that are on the level of my 6^th grade students. I am fluent in Spanish, so I will be able to jump right in and teach. Jason graduated with a degree in finance, which is hard to find a mission call that involves finance. In Bolivia, Jason will be teaching English, which he is fluent in as you can tell and help with the accounting. The need in Bolivia is so great, practically every week we get an email from Ruan and Tara telling us they are counting down the days until we get there. The timing worked out perfectly for when my school ended, our apartment lease ran out and the students in Bolivia had a break from school for us to arrive right as second semester began. There is even an empty house for us to stay in in Santa Cruz while we get our visas. God has worked so many things out for us to go to Bolivia.

Let me tell you a little bit about Guayaramerin, Bolivia where we will be going. We will fly into Santa Cruz and then take a small mission plane 3 hours into the jungle to reach the school. At the school we will live on campus in a brick house with a thatched roof. The windows are open and we will sleep under mosquito nets. We will eat meals with the school, unless we want to cook our own. They make their food in a huge brick oven. We will have running water in our house, but we have to wash our clothes in the river. We must take clothes for all temperatures, because it can vary from day to day. One day it is in the 90’s with high humidity and then the next a cold front will come through and everyone is in sweaters and jeans. We will be there for part of the rainy season so we will need rain jackets. We also need lots of bug spray. The closest town is 18 miles and we get there by hitching a ride with an open truck bed passing by. The town is where we will buy groceries and use the internet. We have one day off a week to take care of any business.

The school in Bolivia is a mission project began by David Gates. It is through Gospel Ministries International. Gospel Ministries International, or GMI, is a Seventh-Day Adventist, faith-based, volunteer-driven organization which seizes opportunities to carry God's love, through sacrifice, to the world. Education, prison ministry, health care and care for the abandoned and needy are some of its priorities, while utilizing technology such as aviation and mass media to leverage the impact and influence of its mission. GMI has been a completely faith-based organization from the start. David Gates and the GMI board and administrators manage GMI with a financial philosophy built on prayer and faith. No fund raising projects are undertaken, and no funds are explicitly solicited. Through this philosophy of simply making people aware of needs, and reaching out to God in prayer, GMI has grown in leaps and bounds. We are going to Bolivia completely as volunteers and are completely responsible for all our financial needs while we are there.

Through our searching and praying about missions we have discovered that God has a need in Bolivia that we can fill, God has a message for Bolivia that we can preach; so where God has prepared the way, we will follow.