Regions Beyond Baptist Ministries - Honduras

May - August Prayer Letter

2014-09-22T12:54:00.000-05:00

Below is a copy of my husband's prayer letter for May - August:

May-August 2014

Dear Partners and Co-laborers with God,

“TO EVERY THING THERE IS A SEASON, and a time to every purpose under the heaven: A time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, and a time to pluck up that which is planted;” (Ecclesiastes 3:1-2)

Unless you are very young, we all tend to agree that time seems to pass so quickly for us. Fall is already upon us; a favorite time of year for me, cooling weather, a time of harvest and thanksgiving. While we patiently wait for certain things to pass (like the heat, unless you live in Alaska) and new things to come, one thing is always in season and ready to harvest, that is, souls!

Jesus admonished, “Say not ye, There are yet four months, and then cometh harvest? Behold, I say unto you, Lift up your eyes, and look on the fields; For they are white already to harvest,” (Jn.4:35)

Thank God that we don’t have to wait for Fall to go fishing or hunting for souls! Amen? I recently talked to a young man named Nick on a Walmart parking lot in Texas and was able to lead him to Christ. Several weeks later in train station in Sacramento, California I was privileged to lead a very needy man by the name of Jay to the Lord. Souls are everywhere, waiting for a courageous witness to tell them of a Saviour who died for them! We need to pray as the Apostle Paul requested, “that I may open my mouth boldly, to make known the mystery of the gospel.” (Eph. 6:19)

We came back in July for what I had hoped would be a brief visit of two months to visit some of our churches and get my annual exam in for prostate cancer. Thank God the exam went well and is unchanged from last year. Also, a heart stress test revealed no obvious problems, but for Debbie, my wife, this year has certainly held it's challenges. As we reported before, in February she experienced erysipelas, a strep infection that completely covered her face with blisters, accompanied by intense pain that lasted about two months.

When she shows pictures of herself, no one can believe that it is her. Thankfully, it is essentially all healed. However, in July, when we were in Tacoma, Washington, she became ill, passed out and broke her fibula close to the ankle when she fell. A CAT scan revealed several suspicious swollen lymph nodes near her kidneys. The Doctor wants to see her again in three months, soooo….that means she waits here for her leg to heal and, the first of December, will get a follow up CAT scan. Meanwhile, I will be going back to Honduras the first of October. Not what we had planned, but God is still in control!

Pray for Hotir as he ministers and
directs in our absence,
not only in our main church,
but in ALL the works.

The works and workers are still growing in Honduras. I recently encouraged a men’s fellowship among our churches in our department, Intibucáa, and currently have 6 involved. Seven were saved in one of our mountain works, Ojo de Agua. Remember Cecilio, their leader in prayer for continued spiritual growth. He and my associate, Hotir will be going to a conference and taking 10,000 New Testaments to be distributed. Thank you for all you do to help make this ministry possible.

Loving serving Him,

The Lanes

**************************************************************************

I ask for your prayers that I might return home ASAP and in good health. I miss my Honduras "family" and "kiddos" and the work that God has given us to do.

Also, coming up in December, we will be having our second annual Christian Youth Leadership Conference AND I NEED TO BE THERE! I am in charge of registration and scheduling all competitions.

Last year (which was our first year) we had around 150 young people. Our prayer is that we see many more teens in attendance this year and that they may accept the call of Christ to serve Him full time.

A transformation: From Classroom to Castle for THE CHILDREN OF THE KING

2014-08-25T19:51:00.000-05:00

I wanted to do something special for the precious children in my Sunday School class in Honduras... something to remind them that they were loved and very special. Something that would say, "You have value because you were made special by God Almighty"! So, with the help of one of our young men in the church, I transformed their classroom into a castle... a castle belonging to the King of Kings!

I began by searching the internet and downloading all the pictures and examples of castles and castle 'elements' that I thought my work for my idea. My next step was to take photos of each of the walls in the area in which I would be working. Then, I ran the photos off on plain paper. Selecting my favorite elements from the internet examples, I sketched onto the photos what I wanted I wanted to do. Next, I duplicated my sketches on to the wall... and began to paint.

Please join me as we change a 'Classroom' into a 'Castle':

I began the transformation with the entrance to the classroom.

The hallway did not afford much room for taking a photo, but this is outside the classroom looking in.

#1 The first thing was to give our castle a heavy wooden door encased in a stone arch.

#2 Then I began to add the castle wall around the door.

#3 Since I was only doing the one room, I did the wall only around the door to that room.

#4 Torch and tree details. ( The hardest thing was getting the shadows right.)

#5 The first thing they see as they approach their classroom is this
"royal decree" from the King of Kings welcoming His children.
It says, "Welcome - Children of the King"

Next was to begin the transformation on the inside of the classroom.

This is the inside of the classroom looking toward the entrance. As you can see, this area is still under construction. The area above the door is open to the hall. Eventually, there will be a

drop ceiling in the hall that will provide a small "attic" area. That area will be used to

store mattresses so that we may provide free accommodations for our mountain people to attend

conferences and institute classes. We will be able access that area from the classrooms. Double doors will be added over the classroom door to close off the "attic" from view.

#6 The door...

#7 ...and beginning the surrounding wall.

#8 Details are added.

#9 The finished wall after adding torches and towers...

After working for a week on the project, Obdulio offered to help me. Even though he had never done anything like this before, I gave the back wall sketch to him. Obdulio is our music director and one of our dedicated young preacher boys. He also teaches Sunday School, plays keyboard, guitar and... he likes to draw. So, looking at my sketch, he drew it out on the wall and, after some instruction on mixing the paints and some painting techniques, he completed the back wall on his own. And, as you can see, he did a wonderful job!

The back wall with just a simple louvered window.

#10 Obdulio did a great job drawing and painting the back wall and window.

#11 The finished back wall and "deep set" window.

#12 A closeup of the banners.

"The Victorious King"

#13 Welcome to the King's Castle!

The result: A bunch of VERY happy kiddos!

January - April 2014

2014-08-19T17:42:00.000-05:00

Here is a copy of Mike's latest prayer letter:

January-April 2014

Dear Co-Laborers,

Greetings in the Name of the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords. Psalms 2 speaks of the sovereign God accomplishing His will in spite of man’s best attempt to resist Him. Verse 4 says He sits in the heavens and laughs at their puny attempts to thwart His purposes. I don’t know about you, but as I see the world mounting its opposition to God and Christians, it helps to remind myself that we’ve ALREADY WON! We give thanks NOW for the “victory through our Lord Jesus Christ” (I Cor.15:57). I especially like verse 8, “Ask of me, and I shall give thee the heathen for thine inheritance, and the uttermost parts of the earth for thy possession.” I know that one day Christ will return and rule all the earth as King, but even now He has sent us to the far ends of the earth to proclaim the Good News of the saving Gospel and God is taking possession of hearts and lives and gaining an inheritance among the heathen(all the unsaved) through the co-labor of God, churches, and missionaries. Thank you so much for your love and faithfulness to God, to us, and to the unreached of the world.

We thank God for at least 15 more that have accepted Christ and a number of others that have reconfirmed salvation or recommitted to Christ. I am pleased to see the growth among several of our leaders. Especially pray for my associate, Hotir, Obdulio, a talented young man who directs music, preaches, and teaches children in the mountain works, and Cecilio, the leader in the mountain work of Ojo de Agua, who I see as becoming key to the whole area there, called Opalaca.

This year started with a bang, as we began a Youth Leadership Conference, the first week of the year. We offered preaching, creative teaching, song leading, music specials, instruments, Christian art, Bible quiz, Bible memorization and drama. The idea is to develop abilities that can be used in the ministry of the local church. It went very well with about 150 in attendance. The next one will be the last week of December.

The theme of the conference was
'Champions for Christ!'. A trophy
was awarded to the church that
best exhibited Christian character
throughout the conference and
competitions.

There were about 150 teenagers in attendance the
first annual Youth Leadership Conference.

Last minute "cramming" for the
Bible Quiz Competition.

Bible Quiz playoffs

Choir Competition

A couple of the happy winners.

Two of our own:
Victoria and Obdulio

Winners of the Christian character trophy.

EVERYTHING was centered
around the Word of God.

Our ONLY reason for this conference is to
encourage and train teenagers to use
WHATEVER abilities God has given them
for His honor and glory.

Our prayer is that these young people will be spiritual leaders in their churches... now AND in the future. We pray these young people will become pastors, teachers, missionaries, leaders and faithful witnesses for Christ.

Also in January, we enjoyed a visit from two young men from Grace Baptist Church of Surrey, B.C., Canada (Pastor Steven White) in preparation for a visit next year of a group of their Bible Institute students."

This was Debbie at the
height of her illness.

After cooking and serving students and teachers for a week long intensive Bible Institute the last week of February, my wife, Debbie became sick with Erysepelas, a disease caused by strep that broke out on her face. It was very painful and left her very weak. She couldn’t get out of the house except to go to the Doctor for over a month and a half. Thankfully, she is feeling better, there is little scarring, and most of her energy has returned, although she still can’t accompany us to the mountain works on Sundays. Keep her in your prayers. "

Privileged to Be Serving the King,
Mike and Debbie Lane

My Husband's July 2013 Prayer Letter …….. (photographs & video added!)

2013-07-30T21:34:00.000-05:00

Below is a copy of the latest prayer letter written by my husband and sent to our supporting churches. The ONLY difference is, that I have added photos and a video to give you a better idea of what is going on here. So… here you go!

July 2013

Greetings from the “white unto harvest” fields of Honduras. We arrived in Honduras the first of January and I can hardly believe we are now already into the month of August. It has been a great year, although it had a trying and sorrowful beginning for our churches here with the final struggles and home going of our beloved Leonidas, a deacon in New Hope Baptist in La Esperanza and leader in the mountain church, Calvary Baptist of Ojo de Agua. The family continues to adapt and remains faithful, and thanks to the generosity of Liberty Baptist Church, Kingston TN, a home is being built in Ojo de Agua for the family.

It has been a productive year in the winning of souls. I have been privileged to win 15 adults and teens, some to which we have witnessed for years. Our very traditional Indians in the mountain villages can be especially tough. Belief and trust in Christ alone for salvation, laying aside Catholic tradition, like works for salvation, faith in Mary, saints, priests, the church, and the Pope. is very difficult for them. However, especially in the Calvary Baptist Church in Ojo de Agua, we have seen steady growth, with an average of 50-60 in attendance each week.

Recently, we had a wedding there (the first non-catholic Christian wedding in that county) with over 200 in attendance. I was also able to lead 3 women to Christ after the wedding.

Wedding decorations were streamers, balloons and flowers.
The floor was traditionally covered with pine needles and flowers.
Our only addition was the unity candles on the front table.

The sign at the front of the church said,
"Welcome to the Wedding of the Gómez & Rodriquez Family"

Many who attended the wedding had to stand outside
and look in the windows.
Some were there more out of curiosity than anything!

Cecilio and Belinda had the VERY FIRST
non-catholic wedding EVER performed in the
Lenca department (county) of Opalaca.

The following week, five followed in Biblical baptism. At least 23 children and teens have been saved in the classes in our various works, and recently over 70 received Christ in a Baptist medical- dental brigade held in Ojo de Agua. They held their services each night in our church building, and since then, we have seen a change in a number of people.

Another pastor, Florentino, whom we recently helped in the rebuilding of his motorcycle engine (only $150), has been using it to evangelize in different communities and has won 17 souls in two village campaigns within the past weeks.

Altogether, in all our works and evangelism efforts, we have seen at least 125 saved this year. This doesn’t include the other churches that are now independent or have been turned over to other missionaries. I know the count would be much higher, to the glory of God!

My husband, Mike, rides his Rokon to Zapotillo for the first time.

In April I had an interesting experience. A “friend of the ministry” (who wishes to remain unnamed) bought two Rokon motorcycles (moto-tractors) for us. They are two-wheeled drive with fat tractor treaded tires on the front and back. We used them to climb to a remote village, Zapotillo, with whom we have worked for 10 years. It physically very hard for me to make the climb. It usually takes about 2 hours of steady climbing. The trail is so steep and the switchbacks are so tight that no vehicle has EVER been able to reach the village, but with the Rokons (and a little help from Salvador and Obdulio), I and my assistant pastor, Hotir, made it.

The result: Four adults and teens accepted Christ and the church was reestablished.

Since then, they have had weekly services, thanks to two of our dedicated young men, Salvador and Obdulio, who walk up there and back each week to hold services, eventually meeting up with us at one of our mountain services to catch a ride back to La Esperanza.

Obdulio and Salvador.
Salvador preaches there every Sunday.
Obdulio leads singing and teaches the children.

The work there has been VERY HARD, with many threats (still going on) and recently, a man with a machete chopped up all the adobe blocks that they were using for seating in the building. Please pray for them and the work in Zapotillo.

Thank you so very much for your faithful prayers and support. We couldn’t do what we do without you.

In Christ’s Love,

The Lanes

The 'Soul' Reason Is Our Sole Reason!

2013-05-05T01:51:00.004-05:00

It seems that, no matter how organized I am, how well I try to plan my time, or even if I get a little ahead of schedule on something, there is always something else that is calling for my attention - something that I should have done yesterday!

Of course, there are some things that can’t wait, like Bible study and lesson planning, as well as developing object lessons, illustrations and competitions to accompany those lessons. Then there is teaching the Sunday School classes, the Youth meetings, church attendance and visitation. These things are essentials and cannot be neglected nor put off. If you are active in your church where you live, you understand the time commitment it takes. However, when you multiply that by four (because that’s how many of our works in which I am involved either teaching or responsible for preparing lessons), it takes a big chunk of your time!

Neither can meal preparation, a clean house and clean clothes be postponed. Even though I have a girl that usually comes 2-3 times a week to dust and mop the tile floors throughout the house, I do everything else. The floors alone take about 3 hours, and we’re talking about someone doing them who is much younger and stronger than I! Washing clothes also takes an extended amount of time. I thank the Lord that I am one of the blessed missionary wives that has a washing machine, but time must be taken to hang them on a clothes line, retrieve them when they are dry, fold them and put them away. (I would imagine that probably 95% of those of you reading this don’t even have a clothes line anymore!).

Food preparation is another time consuming chore. You wouldn’t necessarily think so, but let me share this current observation from someone who recently visited.

This past January, we had a couple of young adults come and spend a month with us. Rachel and Caleb Hamman (brother and sister) come from a family with 11 children. We met their family last year while presenting our ministry at their church in Wasilla, Alaska, where their father was the pastor. We knew that we were to eat lunch with them after church. I had been thinking to myself that, as a pastor’s wife, what a chore it would be to know that when church was over I had to go home and feed 15 people! Having said that, you cannot imagine my shock when, at the conclusion of their service, their father invited the entire church to their home for lunch! Now, grant it, it was not a large church, but I would say there were about 30 or more people there! However, his dear wife and the older girls didn’t seem the least bit concerned. Apparently, this was a regular Sunday occurrence.

Later, Rachel, who likes to cook and, apparently, is usually in the kitchen helping out, informed me that it really wasn’t that big a deal. So, knowing all of this, you can imagine my surprise when, after a couple of weeks with us, she commented to me about the amount of work and time we had to spend in the kitchen to get a meal out for just four people! I guess that, after nearly 16 years here, I really didn’t give much thought anymore to the time consuming things that must be done before eating the food.

We are always telling people who come to visit us on the mission field that they must be flexible! Always expect the unexpected! Things very rarely happen in the timely manner that you would commonly expect, and interruptions to your planned and organized day are the norm; perhaps suddenly you are without electricity for several hours, you have unexpected visitors, you have to go look for a cow that got out of the fence, someone needs a ride to the doctor, etc, etc.

That’s when I have to pull out my “To Do” list and start prioritizing. Usually, the first thing that gets moved to the bottom of the list is correspondence, meaning my email and keeping this site up.

In the last four months there have been SO MANY THINGS that I wanted to write about, but when I finally had time to sit down and DO it, I was so tired I couldn’t even think straight. However … today is the day! I am reclining on the couch and recuperating from the “creeping crud” that I’ve had for nearly a week. My body is weak, but my mind is ... well … it’s about as strong as it’s ever gonna be. (Take that for what it’s worth!) So, I will try to catch you up on a few things.

So, Hang on! Here we go! I’m gonna try to play “Catch Up”!

Our original plan last year had been to be back in Honduras by Christmas, but God gave us an unexpected surprise and blessing. We got to spend Christmas with both our children and all our grandchildren! (It had been seven years since our last Christmas together!) Although the change in schedule jammed some things together and left us huffing and puffing to get things done, it was such a sweet and blessed time that, I would do it again in a heartbeat! So, instead of arriving in Honduras the first week of December, as originally planned, we arrived a month later.

Me with all our grandchildren!
Esther, Hannah, Brayden, Dakota
Josiah, Abigail and MaKayla

We had just spent nearly six months traveling in the States visiting churches in Alaska and Florida. However, our arrival back home in January did not give us much respite from our hurried schedule because we were immediately in another whirlwind of activity. As a result of our schedule change, we had very little time to get ready for our coming visitors. (Check out my June 11, 2012, article Home Invasion! to see what we always face in our home after spending time in the States.) However, God was gracious, my neighbor was helpful and our guests were forgiving. So, six days after arriving in Honduras, we made the trip to back to the airport in San Pedro Sula to pick up Rachel and Caleb, as well as a pastor and his wife from Canada.

We had met Pastor White and his wife, Monica, a few years back through my very dear friend, Bev. We were privileged to be there when Bev joined their church, Grace Baptist, in Surrey, Canada. We felt an immediate connection with this dear man of God and his precious wife. They were to be with us for four days before going on to the capitol city to be with fellow missionary Jason Tate, and then they would go to El Salvador to visit one other missionary that their church supports. During their time here, I felt our friendship deepen, and who could ever have guessed that they could be such a tremendous blessing in such a short period.

Rachel and Caleb would be staying with us through the month. What fun we had with these young adults! And again, what a blessing they were.

While here, Rachel was a tremendous help to me on several projects. The main one was some mission bulletin boards for our main church. I had been wanting to do this for some time. With her help, that task was finally accomplished!

In their month here, they had such an impact on our young people that, here it is, four months later, and we are still seeing the effects of their visit! Just let me explain.

Both Rachel and Caleb are accomplished musicians and singers. Mike told them that he had a guitar here that Rachel could use, and asked them to be ready to play and sing during their time in Honduras. Before coming though, their sweet church also bought a key board as a gift to our ministry. But it just so happens that the piano is Caleb’s area of expertise, and he was able to make full use of their generous gift while he was here.

Therefore, that first service after their arrival, we had live music and Mike and I joined all our guests singing a special! There was a little twist though. Instead of Rachel playing guitar and Caleb playing keyboard, Pastor White played the keyboard! (Some people can do just about anything!)

Some of our teens admiring the new keyboard.

Our teens were duly impressed by their playing and the instruments, and they had to gather around after church was over. Everyone especially wanted to touch and see the keyboard. It’s not that they had not seen one before, they were just excited that there would be one around permanently! Different ones asked us to find out if Caleb and Rachel would be willing to give guitar and piano lessons while they were here. Both were more than willing to give of their time and talents to our excited young people, although I was a bit dubious as to how much they could really learn in just one month.

Victor and Salvador take guitar lessons
from Rachel

Consequently, for several evenings a week during the month January, Mike and I were busy interpreting music classes, usually one of us in the dining room with Caleb and the keyboard students, while the other was busy in the living room with Rachel and the guitar students. The four of us were pleasantly surprised by their eagerness, their commitment and, with several, their natural God-given ability. For Rachel and Caleb’s last Sunday here, our young people did an instrumental special in church. I must tell you, they did surprisingly well, too.

Obdulio with Caleb at the keyboard.

It was a difficult time for all of us when Rachel and Caleb’s time with us was over. Several young people came by the house just to express their gratitude and sorrow at their leaving. They all said that they would miss them and never forget them. Rachel, especially, encouraged them to keep on working and use their talent for God. They promised her that they would.

True to their word, they have continued to practice and work, improving and building upon those things that Rachel and Caleb so patiently and lovingly started with them. This past Sunday, they did a beautiful job on a special! Although I was not there to hear them (for I was at home ill) Mike took the camera and made a video for me. It brought tears to my eyes! What a tribute to, not only the Lord, but to two young people who were willing to spend their money and a month of their lives to make a difference here in Honduras!

- Leonidas -
A real man of God!

On a very sad note, just a short time after the Hammans left, a precious friend and coworker of ours went home to be with the Lord. Leonidas and his wife, Silveria, have been the most faithful of all our families, and Leo has been one of the hardest workers and strongest witnesses we have ever had. Although poor and uneducated, for Leonidas and his sweet wife never learned to read nor write, he was one of the wisest men I have ever known - wise because he loved the Lord with all his heart and did his best to serve God with all that he had and all that he was. He was a bold and outspoken witness, and an encouragement to those struggling in the faith. Often, without embarrassment nor hesitation, and with tears running down his face, he stood up and gave testimony of God’s bountiful blessings and goodness to him and his family. All who have been here to visit remember Leonidas, for this poor, uneducated man had a testimony that touched hearts and made a difference in the lives of all with whom he came in contact. This simple man had a testimony that crossed all borders and language barriers. I cannot tell you how deeply his absence is felt nor how much he is missed. He had no fear of dying, just a fear of leaving his children without his loving, godly guidance. How I praise Jesus for the blessed hope that we have in Him. I ask that you, please, keep in your prayers his dear wife, Silveria, and their children Miguel, Hector, Raul, Cesar, Lillian and Carla.

Raul, Hector, Miguel, Leonidas, Silveria,
Carla and Lillian

All the children have accepted Christ, Lillian and Carla doing so within the last month. They know their daddy is in Heaven today walking on streets of gold. Furthermore, they have no doubt that, because they, too, have accepted Christ as their Savior, they will see him again in glory! What a precious comfort it is to know Jesus Christ!

As you can see, since our return from the States, there have been many positive things, as well as several negative and discouraging things. After over 40 years in the ministry, we have certainly learned that, when God is at work, Satan and his cohorts, too, are working!

I will close this article with this one praise item:

Since the last of January, we have had 27 souls that have accepted Jesus as their Savior and been born into His family!

This, my dear friend, is the sole reason we live and work in Honduras. What’s more,

it is the ‘soul’ reason for which we live …

… period!

What a mighty God we serve!!

I Never Promised You a Rose Garden

2013-03-29T08:50:00.002-05:00

“And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose.”

Romans 8:28 (KJV)

I have been struggling with a situation for some time now for which I have been searching God’s Word for answers and have prayed without ceasing for a solution. So far, instead of things getting better, it seems that the problem has become more complex and difficult with which to deal. At this moment, I see no solution and no end in sight. All outside research about this dilemma, leaves very little hope of things ever getting better. To be really honest, I feel very helpless and hopeless at times.

Just because someone is a pastor, pastor’s wife or missionary, does not mean that they do not flounder at times and have a hard time understanding why God would allow certain things to into their lives. I will honestly admit to you that it is sometimes very difficult to comprehend just what it is that God is trying to accomplish in our lives.

Of course, God never promised us a rose garden. In fact, He says in John 15:

“18 If the world hate you, ye know that it hated me before it hated you…

20 Remember the word that I said unto you, The servant is not greater than his lord. If they have persecuted me, they will also persecute you; if they have kept my saying, they will keep yours also.

However, you do realize that if you did live in a rose garden, even that would be a very “prickly” situation - because roses have thorns!

Just as I have encouraged others to have faith, to trust the Lord and wait on Him to answer their prayers, I, too, must remind myself at times, that He loves me, He is the blessed Controller of all things, and He does has a plan. Not only does He have a plan, but His plan is always best.

I hope you are not shocked or disappointed that someone in my position (a missionary) would, at times, falter and stumble a bit. But missionaries, pastors and their wives (even those well known in Christendom), if they are honest, have all gone through times of weakness - because we are all frail human beings!

Even those who walked and talked with Jesus Himself struggled, and their faith faltered at times. Yet, the disciples heard His teachings and saw His miracles first hand!

Remember how desperate they felt out on the storm tossed sea? Remember how they doubted when they were told to feed more than 5,000 people? But I think the most difficult time for them must have been when they watched the soldiers take Jesus prisoner in the Garden of Gethsemane.

Can you imagine their astonishment and disbelief as Jesus was was given a mock trial and pronounced guilty? They must have been terrified and felt helpless as they watched from afar as the soldiers scourged, mocked and tortured their beloved Leader. I’m sure that they were heartsick and full of despair as they watched Him struggle to carry the cross on His painful, bloody back through the streets of Jerusalem and up Golgotha’s hill. As they nailed our Savior to the cross, I believe they felt their hearts sink lower and lower with each resounding blow of the hammer.

Can you imagine the doubts and questions they had in their hearts? “Were we wrong?” “Have we been fools to have left everything in order follow Him?” “If He truly is Messiah, how can He accomplish anything if He is dead?”

I believe that they felt in their hearts that all He had said was true, yet… how could this happen? How could it end like this? It didn’t make sense! They were struggling!

When all the crowds and mockers were gone and all was quiet, not only was Jesus dead, but all of their hopes and dreams were dead, too. The breath had been knocked out of them when He took His last breath. Their “world”, cold and lifeless, had just been carried and laid in a dark tomb. I think that when the soldiers rolled the heavy stone in front of the tomb’s gaping hole, the disciples were wondering if they were sealing off, not only, the forthcoming decay of their slaughtered leader and teacher, but also that of all their dead and lifeless expectations.

If someone had come to them in that moment and told them “we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose”, what do you think they would have done? Laughed, scoffed? I’m not sure, but I think they would have shouted that nothing good could come from what had just happened!

You know though, the beautiful thing about our Heavenly Father is that, whether or not we believe what He says, He is always true to His word! Three days later, He proved to them that all things do work together for good!

On that third day, that resurrection morning, Jesus walked away from that tomb and death! You see, all of the previous horrible things that had happened were necessary! They had to happen because that was the only way we could be forgiven for our sins! That was the only way He could make a way for us to go to Heaven! That was the only way He could prove His love for us!

There are a couple of short daily devotional websites to which I subscribe and receive their articles on a regular basis. In addition to my personal devotion time, I also enjoy gleaning from the teachings of other Biblical teachers. So many times, it’s as if the Lord has a special message just for me - that He is using their writings to speak to my own heart and special needs.

Just recently, I read a short devotional submitted by Lamar Duke. In it, he made some pertinent observations about Romans 8:28 that bears repeating. He pointed out that:

1. It is not conjecture, but certainty. "And we know..."

2. Not some things, but ALL things. "...all things..."

3. Not separately, but together. "...all things to work together..."

4. Not inclusive, but exclusive. "...to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose."

If you read this verse in it’s context, you will see that the Lord is talking to Christians, Believers, those that are Saved.

I am so glad that we have Someone in Whom we can always depend! Someone who is always there for us, always loving us, and always looking out for our best! Even if we don’t understand what, why or how, we can trust Him! He is always true to His Word!

Just look at what He did for us on the cross!

Better yet, look at what He did for us after the cross!

HE AROSE!...

No, He didn’t promise us a rose garden. But, I ask you, who needs a rose garden when you have the Rose of Sharon?

Happy Resurrection Celebration!

I Married A Missionary, Too!

2013-03-22T19:27:00.000-05:00

Sometime back, I received an email from a young woman in Bible college that was doing some research for a thesis. I had never met her, and I really don't even know how she got my name or email address. Anyway, she wondered if I would mind answering some questions for her when the time came. I told her that I would be happy to do so. Only, when that time came, I was without access to internet and did not even read her email until several weeks after the fact.

But, be that as it may, through that contact, I began following her blog at Paper Dove Missions. Although young, (of course, at my age, everyone seems young!) she is an insightful writer and seems to have a real passion for the Lord, His service, and missions in particular.

In the beginning, she would occasionally mention a certain young man. Then I began reading about him more and more. It was quite obvious to me, as I am sure that it was to all of those who followed her blog, that young love was blossoming right before our very eyes! Finally, she announced that they had wedding plans!

Justin and Anna Toews

Well, today, I received notice of a new post on her blog. It was entitled I Married a Missionary!… . Once again, it was a short, but very well written article. In it, Anna spoke of the Holy Spirit being at their wedding and also about their plans of serving the Lord as missionaries. There was also a picture of a beautiful bride and a happy groom.

Now, at times, marriage can be difficult at best. But, if anyone in this world has a chance of making it, it is a young couple like this who has put Jesus Christ at the center of their relationship since the very beginning!

I just had to leave a comment on Anna's blog this time and thought I would share that comment with you. It contains a bit of my own testimony. Here it is:

We've never met, Anna, but I have followed your blog. I too, married a missionary… 41 years ago this June! We were in Bible college and our goal was to be missionaries in Mexico. But, God gave us a few detours on the way. We didn't always understand why, but we knew without a doubt that they were GOD'S detours and not our own, because, the WHOLE TIME, it was in OUR hearts to go to the mission field.

First, it was 6 years in Texas, our home state, with my husband working as assistant pastor and music minister, and the both of us in the capacity of youth directors, printing, cleaning and maintenance, and general flunkies. Then, when we felt the Lord was moving us, (a VERY difficult move because we LOVED the church in which we were working!) we thought we might finally be going to the mission field.

But, GOD had other plans, and He called us to Tacoma, WA, to lead a small struggling church of about 25 people who had been left with thousands of dollars of debt. Of course, by this time, we also had 2 small children, but we packed up everything we had and made the long trip from Dallas to Tacoma.

After a few years, with God's divine help, the church in Tacoma was no longer in debt and their old building had been remodeled. By the time we celebrated our 13th anniversary with the church, we had purchased more property for expansion, we had a thriving bus ministry and youth department and had started a Christian school, which also served as a training center for those churches starting new schools. We had also sent out two missionaries from our church (one to France and the other to Mexico), started a faith promise mission program and added about 20 more missionaries to our mission support program. Before we knew it, we were out of space and having two Sunday morning services and Sunday School classes in the church kitchen and in one of the church buses. We dearly loved our people and they loved us and, after years of struggling, God was blessing us greatly and we were seeing our prayers of many years being answered in that place.

After several years in Tacoma, I thought, "Well, THIS must be the mission field where God wanted us all along! And, even though the people here don't always understand my Texas accent, at least I didn't have to learn a new language!"

Finally, since we were debt free, we decided that the $60,000 in the building fund was enough with which to get started. So, we had blueprints drawn up for a new church building and began to make our plans for expansion.

But, before starting the new building, we were going to take two of our Christian school graduates to Honduras, Central America. They both wanted to work in bi-lingual Christian schools for a year. One of the graduates was our daughter, Kristy, and the other, Jason, was a young man who had surrendered to missions. My husband and I went to check things out first, and were there for only 10 days. But while there, God broke our hearts for the people of Honduras and made it clear that someone else could take our precious church through their next phase of development, and we were to leave it all and go to Honduras! Mike had been the pastor at Faith Baptist Church for 14 years! I believe resigning from our dear church was one of the hardest things we've EVER done!

NO, WAIT! I take that back! Learning a new language at 45 years old was THE hardest thing I've EVER done… BY FAR!!

Well, Anna, we have now been serving in the country Honduras since 1997, and you know what?

I CAN'T IMAGINE LIVING ANYWHERE ELSE! I LOVE IT HERE, I LOVE THESE PRECIOUS PEOPLE and I LOVE BEING A MISSIONARY!

Yep, it took us a while to get here, but…

I MARRIED A MISSIONARY, TOO! And I thank the Lord every day that I did!

Congratulations on your marriage, Anna! May our sweet Heavenly Father bless you both as you serve Him!

This is the missionary that I married
nearly 41 years ago!

January - February 2013 - Prayer Letter

2013-02-14T16:32:00.001-06:00

I have SO MUCH TO SAY AND SO LITTLE TIME!! I hope to be able to post something soon!

Below is a copy of the prayer letter Mike has sent to our supporting churches.

January-February 2013

Dear Co-labourers with God and us,

Greetings from Honduras. We arrived the first week of January after spending 4 months visiting churches and getting my annual exam. Dr. said it was a good report and he wasn’t worried. I’ll hold him to it! We had many great and long overdue visits with supporting churches in Florida and also Alaska. We picked up a new supporting church in Munford, Tennessee, where Dr. Bledsoe pastors, for which we praise the Lord and another in Las Vegas, NV, where a young man, Pastor Andy Cote, who interned with us for 9 months in Honduras has started a Hispanic work. We are Bro. Andy’s first missionary so we feel very honored to represent their church.
The works have been going well here and our ministry team members are growing and doing a great job. Hotir, who is 25 years old, has officially become my assistant pastor. It has been obvious for some time how he is growing in the Lord and everyone sees the hand of the Lord upon him. We also have 6 other faithful young adults that have taken positions in the churches as teachers, sound room tech, building supervisor, music director, treasurer, and church secretary. We have raised these young people from “pups” and it is a wonderful feeling to see them as adults taking responsibility in the church.
One week after we got back we had visitors arriving. Pastor Callen’s church from St. Cloud, Fl. arrived to visit the In Christ Baptist Church in Narajito that they had helped build in 2011. They were pleased to see the further progress of the church and had a good service with the folks there. We were also blessed with a visit from Pastor White and his wife from Surrey, B.C., Canada. He preached in the mountains on Sunday morning and in our town church on Sunday night. The road was very rough but nothing like the “thrills” we had the next two Sundays. It was horrible and there were places we thought we wouldn’t get through, but praise God we did. We got home about 4:00 P.M. exhausted. Also, two young people, Caleb and Rachel Hamman from a pastor’s home in Wasilla, Ak stayed a month with us and were a huge blessing in many ways, especially in teaching music to our young people and before they left we had a keyboard and guitar specials. Our first! We’ll take visitors like this any time!
On a sad note, one of my main men, a deacon, has just passed away from cancer. His name is Leonidas and was very instrumental in helping in the mountain work of Ojo de Agua and also in our main church in La Esperanza. A mighty oak has been removed, but please pray that in this vacancy many more will be encouraged to step up and begin to be used of God. Pray for his family, wife Silveria, four teenage sons and a small daughter and granddaughter who depended upon him. Leo couldn’t read or write, but he always encouraged and exhorted others through his spoken testimony and especially through his faithful life. Heaven and he have gained, but we will miss him.
We thank you for your faithfulness and love you all. Pray for us. There is much ground to be taken for God this year.

Yours for eternal souls,

Mike and Debbie Lane

Merry Christmas from Mike and Debbie Lane

2012-12-12T23:49:00.001-06:00

Dear Beloved Ones in the Lord,

As we enter this Christmas Season, as children of the King, we understand that the true meaning of Christmas is not Santa Clause, trees, tinsel and gifts. It is a time to honor and celebrate the birth of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. I believe there is no better place to do this than with those we love most - family!

Normally, the word “family” means our “blood relatives”, but it may also encompass others outside of that sphere with whom we feel a special kinship. For the missionary, that may also mean the people with whom God has called them to work. I know that we certainly have a special love and kinship with the precious people of Honduras and we truly count them as family! In fact, our plans had been to be at home in Honduras by Christmas. But our return to Honduras has been delayed for a couple of weeks.

I also had a desire to be with my mother and sisters since it would the first Christmas without Dad. (He passed away last year, 5 days after Christmas.) Although this, too, did not work out, it just seemed right to be there with my family. I know this first Christmas since Dad’s home going will be an especially difficult one.

I love that phrase, “...home going”! “Home” is another word that we associate with family! They even have a song about it that says, “I’ll be home for Christmas...”. It’s a great comfort to me to know that Dad will also be celebrating in his Heavenly Home with family, many of whom he has not seen for some time - his parents, several of his brothers and sisters, and other relatives. But the greatest thrill, I would think, is that he will be in the presence of the One who lay in that manger so long ago! He will hear the same Heavenly Hosts singing, “Glory to God in the highest”, just as they did so long ago! I would not have Dad miss that for anything!

But, this Christmas will be very special for Mike and I, too! God has worked things out for our son and his family to travel from Washington to Nevada where they will spend Christmas with our daughter and her family! Other than Dad’s funeral last year, we have not all been together for at least seven years! Understandably, Dad’s funeral was not a fun time, nor one that any of us remember much about. Anyway, Mike and I will have the rare blessing of being with all our children and grandchildren this Christmas! Only our Heavenly Father knows when we might all get to be together again! It is for this reason alone, that we have delayed going home for a couple of weeks. We will spend Christmas together with our family!

You know, when you think about it, that very first Christmas was about family, too! That was why God’s precious Son confined His infinite self to finite human form! Because He wanted His children to come “home” for Christmas... and stay for eternity! He, too, wanted to be surrounded by family! But, for that to happen, He had to be born of a virgin, live a sinless life, be crucified on a cross as He bore our sins, and rise again - victorious over sin and the grave!
What wonderful, awesome, inconceivable, unfathomable love! But, only those who accept His wonderful gift of salvation are accepted into His family! That is the only reason He was born!

He was born...

...to die...

...so that we could become part of His family!

“But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name” ~ John 1:12

Our prayer is that you will make the Child and Saviour of Christmas the center of, not only your celebration this year, but also the center of your life!

Have a Wonderful Christmas and a

Blessed New Year!

Mike and Debbie Lane

Missionaries to Honduras

My Thanksgiving Wish For You

2012-11-19T19:17:00.000-06:00

A young man named John received a parrot as a gift. The parrot had a bad attitude and an even worse vocabulary. Every word out of the bird's mouth was rude, obnoxious and laced with profanity.

John tried and tried to change the bird's attitude by consistently saying only polite words, playing soft music and anything else he could think of to clean up' the bird's vocabulary.

Finally, John was fed up and he yelled at the parrot. The parrot yelled back. John shook the parrot and the parrot got angrier and even more rude. John, in desperation, threw up his hands! Then he grabbed the bird and put him in the freezer. For a few minutes the parrot squawked and kicked and screamed. Then suddenly there was total quiet. Not a peep was heard for over a minute.

Feeling guilty about his actions and fearing that he'd hurt the parrot, John quickly opened the door to the freezer. The parrot calmly stepped out onto John's outstretched arms and said "I believe I may have offended you with my rude language and actions. I'm sincerely remorseful for my inappropriate transgressions and I fully intend to do everything I can to correct my rude and unforgivable behavior."

John was stunned at the immediate change in the bird's attitude. As he was about to ask the parrot what had made such a dramatic change in his behavior, the bird spoke-up, very softly,

"May I ask what the turkey did?"

* * * * * * *

The above story is a copy of an email that I received last week! I thought it was SO funny and just had to share it with you all!! All it took was one look at that frozen turkey to completely change that parrot’s attitude in a hurry!

Have you ever called anyone a turkey? Or, for that matter, has anyone ever called YOU a turkey? I’ve been called a turkey before - by my mom! Can you believe it! My MOM!

I can’t say that I’m exactly sure of the connotation of being called by that name, but I would imagine that it is similar to calling someone “silly” or a “goofball”. But my husband, wise man that he is, said that he thought that it was possibly just a nice way of telling someone that you think they have an ugly neck! Either way, I don’t think I want to be called a turkey.

Now, back to that story. At first, I have to admit that, I felt a bit sorry for that poor, ol' frozen turkey. But you know, the more I thought about it, the more I am of the opinion that I would rather be the turkey than the parrot!

Here is my reasoning:

The parrot was rude, obnoxious, profane and abusive! And John did NOT enjoy being around it. In fact, rather than bringing him comfort and pleasure, the parrot was frustrating, was causing him embarrassment and stress, and it brought the worst out in John! Even if it had not been so rude, all it would EVER do is just repeat whatever it heard others saying! Talk about the ultimate gossip!

But, you might be thinking, 'Well, at least the parrot was alive! That poor turkey was as dead as a door knob and frozen as hard as a rock!'

And, you are right!

But, think about it! Even if that turkey had spent it’s entire life just walking around pecking at grains and insects and then finally dying of old age, what use would it have been to anyone? What purpose would it have served? NONE! Whereas, by giving it’s life and being prepared for someone’s Thanksgiving dinner, it would be a blessing and benefit to many!

Yes, it’s true, it would have to die, but at least, it would be giving it’s life for a good cause! AND, I venture to say that John received much more pleasure from that turkey than he ever did from the parrot!!

Just think about it!! I could be wrong but, I believe there must be some deep, theological lesson in this story - some spiritual insight from which we should glean!!

Yep! I’m sure of it! After much thought and meditation on the subject, I’m sure that I’d MUCH rather be the turkey than the parrot!

* * * * * * * *

Mike and I would like to thank all of you who support and pray for us! Only our Heavenly Father knows how much we love and appreciate you all! Our prayer is that God will richly bless you, that you will have a wonderful Thanksgiving and...

May You Be A Turkey!

Americans Need to See this Video Before the Election

2012-11-02T14:07:00.002-05:00

If you have not yet seen the movie, "Agenda -Grinding Down America," please take advantage of this offer from the producer to watch it online without cost in the coming week before the national elections in the United States of America. It is highly informative, well researched, full of 'heart' for the best principles of truth and honesty, and full of competent commentary contributions by highly respected and God-fearing leaders. Every American parent with one iota of concern for their children and grandchildren and the life they will live in the future should watch this. If they are listening closely they will inevitably have their eyes opened to the reality of the agenda being carried out by the sworn enemies of the vision for America held by those who sacrificed their lives for the liberty we should cherish.

Encourage everyone to share it immediately... especially pastors, teachers, and those who are unashamed to influence others for the sake of shedding light on the thinking of those who have been compromised by the darkness of wholesale deception.

CLICK THE LINK BELOW TO WATCH 'AGENDA':

http://vimeo.com/user2695043/agenda

Below is a personal note from Curtis Bowers, the producer of the movie, 'Agenda'

Friends,

AGENDA is now on Vimeo to watch for FREE until the election. We would appreciate if you would help this go viral.

Please forward and share this everywhere, and encourage your contacts to do the same.

Americans need to see this film before the election.

We praise the Lord daily for the amazing response to AGENDA, and we pray this final push until Nov. 6th will make a difference.

God bless,

Curtis

Copybook Heading Productions LLC shared this with you:http://vimeo.com/user2695043/agenda AGENDA: Grinding America Down (Full Movie)

http://vimeo.com/user2695043/agenda

Unexpected, Unbelievable, Overwhelming Blessings!

2012-09-20T03:33:00.000-05:00

Sometimes it seems that the faster I go, the behinder I get!! (Is “behinder” even a word?) Oh well, you get the idea! I’m behind in posting my weblog updates, answering email, thank you notes, and sleep! But, you know what, no matter how busy we get in the Lord’s work, God always makes it worth your while by throwing in unexpected, unbelievable, overwhelming blessings!

For a general summary of what has happened since my last post, we (Mike and I, and Kara) finally made it back to the States, Mike has had his cancer checkup, we had a quick visit with parents, found and packed our “cold weather” clothes, flew to Washington and had a “too short” visit with our son, his wife and three of our grandchildren, put together a new and updated video presentation, and we are now in Alaska visiting some of our supporting churches.

The general summary above is for those who want to know what is going on with us, but just want a “quick read” and really don’t want to have to sift through my “long winded ramblings”!

But, for those of you who like to “ramble” with me, here a few more details:

1. Kara loved the Honduran people (and they loved her!) and she is already saving money for a return trip. When she returns, she is hoping to stay with us a year! (WOO-HOO!)

She was a tremendous blessing to all of us!! You may read the testimony of her time there under the tab marked “Mission Internships”.

2. We praise the Lord that Mike got a “good” report on his prostate cancer. Scans showed that, of the two small tumors left, one showed no change, although the other was a bit smaller in size. BUT, even though very small, there was a new spot that showed up on the scan. He is to continue his current mode of treatment and return for another scan in a year.

~BRAYDEN~
GrandSON #3
GrandCHILD #7!

~MAKAYLA~
Brayden’s big sister
& Dakota’s little sister.

3. On our recent trip to Tacoma, Mike finally got to meet our newest grandson, Brayden. At five months old, he is really beginning to show his personality. He adores his big brother (who turned 10 yrs. old while we were there!) and sister ...and, the feeling is mutual.

~DAKOTA~
Our first and oldest grandSON
celebrated his 10th birthday while we were there.

We did get to spend a little “down time” with our son and daughter-in-law, but the fact that we had to have the new video ready in less than two weeks really hung like a heavy, black cloud over my head.

Before leaving Washington, Kara met with me at our son’s home to show me what she had figured out about the video program that I was going to use. (I had asked her to to really pray for me since I understood nothing about the program!)

4. I was able to get an updated video done and finished the day before we needed it. It’s a little longer than we really wanted (14 minutes) but, so far, everyone seems to be receiving it very well, THANK THE LORD!! If you would like to check it out, just click on the Ministry Video, close to the top of the page on the right.

5. We receive several calls a week from different ones in Honduras. The majority are from those heading up our ministry team there, calling to give Mike reports and updates on the works or ask questions and advice. We thank God for each one of those Godly young men and women (and teens!) who continue the work at home while we are here and for the good reports we are receiving! Occasionally, we also receive calls from some of our ladies or some of our teens and children, who just want to talk and tell us they miss us. They will NEVER know just how much we love and miss them!!

So far, our time in Alaska has been amazing! God has SO BLESSED! It has been so good to see the pastors and precious people that have been such dear friends and prayer warriors through the years, as well as the many new friends we have made. Some of our most faithful supporting churches are here in Alaska and we feel so very blessed to represent such wonderful servants of God in Honduras! It has been a thrill to show them what their prayers and mission dollars have enabled God to do on the mission field. There is no way we could do what we do without them!

This is the bear that I shot!(with a camera, that is!)

Alaska is such a vast and beautiful state and, as we travel from church to church, we have seen such unbelievably gorgeous scenery, as well as several glaciers and a myriad of wildlife, including sea otters, beluga whales, bald eagles and a bear! We are hoping the Lord allows us to see caribou and moose while we are here. That would just top things off and …OH, WOW! YOU’RE NOT GONNA BELIEVE THIS!! I had to leave off typing to run upstairs to get my camera! I am working on this while sitting in the dining room at a friends home in Anchorage ...AND while writing about hoping to see caribou and moose, a moose just walked past the picture window! That is something that you don’t see everyday!!! That is, I guess, unless you live in Alaska! I’m glad that we have two more weeks here before heading back to the “lower 48”.

As you can see, God has been incredibly good to us in so many ways!! Now you see why I entitled this entry "Unexpected, Unbelievable, Overwhelming Blessings!”.

What else would YOU have called it?

Please, keep us in your prayers as we travel from church to church and report on the work in Honduras. Pray for our safety, but most of all, pray that God will use us to be a witness, testimony and blessing everywhere we go.

Also, please pray that there will be those that will love Him and trust Him enough to answer His call and give their lives to serve Him in whatever capacity He wants! It is only when we are willing to “pour out” our life for cause of Christ, that He can begin to "pour out” His unexpected, unbelievable, overwhelming blessings on our life!

May God bless each of you that are faithful prayer warriors and witnesses for the advancement of the cause of Christ!

Maranatha!

Debbie

Below Are More Photos Of Alaska

We stayed in Palmer for a while with some long time friends.
This was the scene we saw every time we left their home.

EVERYWHERE you look, there is unbelievable beauty!

This was just ONE of the gorgeous scenes we saw on
our way to an appointment with one of our supporting churches!

As beautiful as the majestic mountains and lakes are,
there is just as much wonder and beauty
in the smallest flower and plant!

I was able to shoot this picture of the Matanuska Glacier.

Sometimes the beauty is nearly overwhelming!

Could I Buy Some Time .....PLEEEZE!!!

2012-07-24T20:36:00.000-05:00

I TRY to take one day at a time…
but lately, several days have attacked me at once!!

Since my last post, nearly 2 1/2 weeks ago, so much has happened! I have wanted to write it all down and share with everyone, but there never seems to be enough hours in a day to get everything done!

Maybe some of you remember the commercial with Ben Stein some years ago where he pulls up to a drive through and, with a weary look and a dead pan voice, he asks, “Could I buy some time, please?” Well, that has certainly been my sentiments of late. However, along with the time, I would also like to buy some much needed energy!

Nevertheless, I will try to condense and summarize some of God’s latest blessings that He has sent our way and I will try to do so without minimizing how AWESOMELY He has been working!

Sunday, July 8th: In my last post, I told how our drive to church most probably differs from yours. If you thought THAT was interesting, you will certainly enjoy hearing about our baptism service on this particular Sunday.

New Hope Baptist Church of La Esperanza and Calvary Baptist Church of Ojo de Agua both have a baptismal in their church buildings. However, in some of our other works, we still have to make a trip to the river to baptize believers. That is the case at the In Christ Baptist Church in Naranjitos, our farthest work.

On this particular Sunday we had three ladies to baptize. Across the road from the church is a river with a good sized waterfall that flows into a small pool that is just deep enough for baptizing. That is where we normally baptize. However, there had been a heavy rainstorm the evening before that had left the pool very muddy. When we arrived, were informed by the people there that, because of that fact, it would be better to go to another location.

So, we loaded everyone in the back of the flatbed 450 and drove another 10 minutes up into the mountains.

When we arrived at the designated spot, I could see no river at all. That was when we were told that we had at least a ten minute walk to get to our destination.

Now, I love to walk, especially when there is beautiful scenery around me. But this was NOT a “stroll in the park”!!

It was DOWN a steep, muddy, mountain path, something for which I was NOT prepared! Trust me when I say that slip-on sandals with a low wedge heel are NOT the best shoes to be wearing in this situation! But I’m game, and so, walking behind Mike, with both my hands on his shoulders, we started our downward hike to the river for our baptism service.

The Lenca Indians are used to walking these muddy mountain trails and seem to be as sure-footed as mountain goats. However, it’s a different story for us city-bred gringos! Believe it or not, although Mike did slip down in the mud a couple of times, I didn’t fall even one single time! That fact alone is just more proof that we serve a God of miracles!

Sure enough, about ten minutes later, we finally made it to the bottom of the trail and to the river!

While standing in the cold, mountain river, Mike once again explained to the people about scriptural, deep water baptism and it’s significance to a believer’s identification with Christ and their new life in Him.

Then, with young and old alike watching, these three new believers took a great step of obedience and went down into that cold, muddy river to be baptized.

It was not only a picture of our loving Savior’s death, burial and resurrection, but also a picture of the death of these ladies’ old lives, lives that had been buried under the cleansing blood of the Lamb, and the resurrection of their new lives in Christ Jesus. It was a sweet, sweet service!

If you look very closely, you can see the people
who made it to the top of the hill
long before I did!

Afterward, we faced the long climb back up the hill to the truck. Somehow, it seemed much harder going up than going down and I had to stop a couple of times to catch my breath and rest a bit. At one point, I thought I was going to pass out! You may ask, “Was it worth it??

"You bet your sweet life it was!!!!

That evening, back in La Esperanza at the New Hope Baptist Church, two more were baptized and, although it was not as exciting a trip to get to the water, it was just as significant and a tremendous testimony to their new life in Jesus Christ.

Monday, July 9th: The next morning, we left cool La Esperanza for HOT San Pedro Sula. We had 3 things on our “To Do” list that made it necessary to make this 3 hour trip, once again in our small, unairconditioned, 21 passenger bus: 1. There were some things that we needed to look for that we cannot get in La Esperanza (like canned green beans and stewed tomatoes). Not necessities, but more like luxury items for us. 2. We had to take a transmission back to where it had been bought to exchange it for another in hope that it might work this time. This would be the third one, and you know what they say ...”Three’s a charm”! and... 3. We were going to the airport to pick up Kara, who was going to stay with us for a month!!!

Kara is a young woman from Faith Baptist in Tacoma, WA. (This is the church where Mike was pastor for 14 years.) We have known her parents since “forever” and count them as dear and precious friends. We remember well when Kara was born. She has grown up with loving and dedicated Christian parents, attended and received her diploma from the Christian school that we started years ago and, all her life, has been in that wonderful church being saturated with good Biblical teaching. Although she was just three years old when we left the pastorate to become missionaries, we always saw her when we would go to Tacoma and visit our son and the church there. It has been such a joy to watch her grow through the years, not only physically, but spiritually, as well. Kara is now a beautiful, godly, 21 year old woman.

This is her first time out of the United States, as well as her first mission trip. I think that, so far, it has been a real eye opener. She has already been such a joy and blessing to have around. (I have felt badly that we have been so busy, though!)

While she is here, Kara is keeping an online blog of her experiences and thoughts. If you would like to check out what she has to say, you can go to www.karaplein.blogspot.com where her blog is called Honduras Adventures.

Saturday, July 14th: Unfortunately, during Kara’s first week with us, I had to spend nearly all my time writing, and then translating, several lessons and student study sheets, preparing for a meeting that was scheduled on her first Saturday with us.

Arlen with some of the children
in San Lorenzo.

I have been praying for some time that God would give us more Sunday School teachers to help in the many works that we have. I can no longer teach everywhere, every Sunday, indefinitely. (This ol’ gal just ain’t as young as she used to be!)

That schedule even took it’s toll on Arlen Stevens, the young missionary wife who took care of all my classes while I was in the States ... and she is in her early thirties!

I had 7 prospective teachers show up at my house for teacher training. Their ages ranged from 13 to 21 years. Thirteen is awfully young, but they can always start out as helpers and work their way into more responsibility as they prove themselves. Also, if they so desire, they can occasionally teach the children in San Lorenzo where we normally have a smaller group of children who, no matter what their age, are at the beginner level.

Since the training, which included lessons such as “Requirements for Being a Sunday School Teacher”, “The Importance of Teaching Children”, “The Five Methods of Learning”, “How to Maintain Order”, “How To Be An Interesting and Effective Teacher” and “How to Make the Bible Come Alive!”, I have had two more tell me they are interested. It would be wonderful if we could have a “teaching team” that could rotate going to the mountains on Sunday! Please pray for God’s perfect will in this matter.

Sunday, July 15: This was Kara’s first Sunday with us, and it really turned out to be a “doozy” of a Sunday!

After being bumped and jostled for two hours, we finally arrived in San Lorenzo for our first service. I think it was Kara’s first time to attend a Sunday School class where children had to sit on sacks stacked against the wall.

Then it was on to the church in Ojo de Agua where there were 34 children in my Sunday School class! At the end of the service, the children joined the adults to watch a couple of young people get baptized. For some of the children, this was their first time to see Biblical “deep water” baptism, rather than sprinkling.

The first one baptized was Marlene, one of my prospective teachers who has been living in La Esperanza with missionaries Jason and Arlen Stevens this past year so that she might further her education. (Lenca schools in the mountains only go through the 6th grade). Every weekend she travels back to Ojo de Agua to visit her family and attend services in the church where she grew up. (For years, we met and had services in her grandmother’s house where Marlene lived.) Actually, she has already been a helper to Arlen with the classes there during this past year. Many who have visited Honduras and Ojo de Agua will recognize her face and sweet smile. Marlene, who just turned 14 last Friday, has been faithfully attending my Sunday School class since she was only 5 years old. It was so good to see her finally follow the Lord in baptism!

The other one baptized was Kenia, who has become Marlene’s best friend since moving to La Esperanza! She is such a little sweetheart! Even though she is the only one in her family that attends services, her mother gave her permission to follow the Lord in believer’s baptism. She has also been traveling to the mountains every weekend and helping some with the little ones in the classes. Just look at those smiles! You can see the joy of the Lord on both of their faces!!

That is Marlene and Kenia
standing on the tool box.

After the services, we all loaded up in the truck and started the two hour trip back to La Esperanza where Mike was to baptize two more in the evening service at New Hope Baptist.

When we were about 30 minutes away from La Esperanza, we came upon a bus stalled in the middle of the narrow road. We had to restrict our already slow pace even more to get around it. We had barely passed the disabled bus when we began to hear the people in the back of the truck banging on the top of the cab and screaming for us to stop because someone had fallen out of the truck!

Kenia, had apparently been standing pretty much in the same spot as in the above picture, but she was trying to grasp some leaves of a tree branch as we went under it, lost her balance and fell, breaking her wrist and some of her teeth. Instead of going home, Kenia, Kara, Silveria (one of the ladies from our church) and I were dropped off at the local “hospital”. (I put that word in quotation marks because I have my doubts about the validity of calling it a hospital!)

Several hours later, she was released with a cast on her arm. We made it back to the house with just enough time to change clothes and make it to the service at New Hope Baptist where we had two other baptisms and then celebrated the Lord’s Supper.

All of this made for a very long, but very exciting day! I am sure that it was a Sunday unlike any that Kara had ever experienced before, and one she will never forget! The next day, she was still feeling the effects of her first Sunday with us here in Honduras!

In the near future, we will also be taking Kenia to see a dentist. Even though the accident was not our fault, we feel that it is only right for us to take care of the medical and dental needs of the little girl of this poor family. Her parents have been very understanding during this whole situation. Our prayer is that, through all of this, God will bring them to accept Him as their Savior.

You know, Satan is never happy when people come to Christ, accept His salvation, and begin to really fall in love with Him and serve Him. He tries one thing after another to knock them off track. But, we serve an awesome, all powerful, all knowing God! How we thank the Lord for His protection in this accident that could have very easily been a potentially serious or fatal one.

Hotir passes around the cup of grape juice
that is to remind us of the blood
that Jesus shed to cover our sin debt.

Sunday, July 22: Yesterday was another day filled with God’s blessings! It was our Sunday to go back to Naranjitos (we go there every other Sunday). Yesterday, that church celebrated the Lord’s Supper for the first time! The attendance was down, but the fellowship was sweet!

In Ojo de Agua, the service was well attended and that church, as well, celebrated the Lord’s Supper for the very first time. Also, I was able to lead five children to the Lord while, at the same time, Mike was leading a lady to the Lord!

Then, before we left, the male companion of Dora Belinda, one of the ladies that I led to the Lord three weeks ago, wanted to talk to Mike. Cecilio and Belinda had decided it was time to get married so that they could get baptized and become members of the church.

You must understand that the majority of the people we work with are not married! In rural Honduras and among the Lenca Indians, it is an accepted practice for a couple to live together, for a man to have several different “families” and father dozens of children, or for each child in a family to have a different father. It is an accepted practice because the Catholic church has never taught them that the Bible says it is sin, nor have they taught them about the importance of marriage.

For this couple to make this decision, it is a great sign of spiritual growth and a love for God and His Word. This is a fine couple, and they have much potential to affect other new believers in this Lenca community. We are so thrilled about this step of obedience and growth on their part. Please pray for them.

At the service at New Hope Baptist in La Esperanza, we were thrilled to see slightly over 100 in attendance, one of those being little Kenia who had fallen off the truck the week before! Before the preaching, Kara gave a wonderful testimony with Mike translating for her. It was such a blessing to our people. The Hondurans, and especially the children, have fallen in love with her (which is easy to do)!

Mike interprets as Kara gives
her testimony.

The children (as well as some of the young men)
are enamored with Kara!

Then, as another special blessing from the Lord, 16 year old Hector, one of the finest young men I know, expressed his desire to teach children about Jesus Christ! He will be coming to my house this Saturday for “basic training”.

Well, there you have it! And that’s really just skimming the highlights on what has happened in the last 2 1/2 weeks! God has been tremendously good and He is blessing our efforts here!

That is NOT Mike on the radio tower,
but rather the man that was hired
to do the work!

In the midst of all of these happenings, Mike has been calling churches and setting up appointments for our time in the States at the end of this year, as well as trying to stay on top of vehicle repairs, buying the needed building supplies, trying to adjust the Bible Institute schedule, studying and preparing messages and, with the financial help of others and under the direction of former Honduran missionary, Jim Foster) helping to facilitate the extension of the radio tower at Voice of the Good Shepherd (a ministry started years ago by Jim.)

As for me, in addition to my “wifely duties”, such as cooking, cleaning, laundry, and so forth, I have also been busy preparing the weekly lessons and illustrations, etc, for the new teachers, as well as working with them in the classes on Sundays. Moreover, I have been engaged in trying to finalize our travel plans, car rentals, Mike’s doctor appointments, etc, for when we are in the States. Furthermore, we are also preparing to receive a Mission Team from the Pleasantview Baptist Church in Arlington, TX, who will be coming on the 31st of this month for a week of ministry in Honduras! (We are so looking forward to their visit!!)

As you can see, our lives as missionaries in Honduras are full and active, with never a dull moment. (Even now, I’m finishing this article in the dark because we lost electricity about an hour ago!)

In fact, our lives are so full that I could really use a little bit of “down time” every now and then. Like Ben Stein, I would really like to know

...”Could I buy some time, …PLEASE?”

THIS Is What OUR Drive to Church Is Like!!!

2012-07-05T08:16:00.002-05:00

Last Sunday, Mike and I were talking about the BIG difference between going to church in the United States and OUR regular Sunday morning drive to get to church here in Honduras.

“Most people just wouldn’t believe it,” Mike said ...and I agreed!

Therefore, I decided to snap some pictures along the way so I could “take you along” with us and just give you an idea what we see EVERY Sunday morning and why it is SO different. All of the photos in this article (and there are quite a few) were taken on one Sunday on the way to and from church.

First of all, we must be ready to leave the house by 7 a.m. This particular Sunday, we are going in the old ’78 Toyota Land Cruiser that we bought from Jim Foster when he left Honduras. It’s a bit rough riding, but it is the only vehicle available on this particular morning. Our first destination is our church in Naranjitos, 30 miles away. Part of our team will be holding services at San Lorenzo simultaneously. After the services in Naranjitos, we will pick up the team in San Lorenzo and head back toward La Esperanza, stopping along the way in Ojo de Agua to hold services there. Then we’ll head for home, eat lunch and rest a bit before the 6 o’clock service in our main church in La Esperanza. Are you ready? Here we go!

There are not many out and about in town this early in the morning and, except for a couple of cars and a few people on foot, the streets of downtown La Esperanza are pretty empty.

After we leave town and get into the out skirts, we begin to see more people. They are the Lenca Indians on their way to town to either buy supplies or sell their wares (fruits, vegetables, tortillas, etc.). Their mode of transportation is usually either by mountain taxi (pickup truck) or by foot.

The road is rough (MUCH rougher than it looks in these pictures!). The going is slow, and every time we hit a bump (which is every few seconds) a metal bar at the back of my seat slams against my tail bone. After just a few miles, I know the ice packs will be in use when I get home.

But, in spite of it all, I LOVE THIS PLACE!!! The wonderful, beautiful, hardworking people and the gorgeous scenery and interesting sites make this rough trip worth it EVERY TIME!

This particular home is lucky enough to have a nice large mud oven for baking!

Honduras is full of breathtaking scenes.

These are just a few that we get to see every Sunday.

When I see a group of people walking up the road, and there is nothing but a few homes scattered along the mountain sides, I often try to imagine where they must be going. It’s a real puzzle sometimes!

This woman struggles with a stubborn cow while her children watch.

Sometimes, during the rainy season, the roads are like this for the whole 30 miles. At times, they are impassable and all we can do is turn around and just head back home.

The children are the real beauty of this county! They also hold the key to the Spiritual future of Honduras.

Win the children to Christ, and you win the future of Honduras for Christ!

A barefoot Lenca woman with her dog.

Do you remember the old song,

“She’ll be comin’ round the mountain when she comes, when she comes….”

Well, that’s ME!

About 2 hours later, at a little after 9 a.m., we finally arrive at our destination: The In Christ Baptist Church of Naranjitos. The people of this community are so proud of their new building which a team from the Eastern Avenue Baptist Church from St. Cloud, Florida, built for them last year.

Mike walks up the hill to the church while I bring up the rear, snapping pictures.

It took a bit of getting used to, but the truth is that, in Honduras, no one really seems to notice if a dog wanders through the door and stretches out on the cool tile during the service.

When services are over, we once again load up and head back the way we came, stopping in San Lorenzo to pick up those who have held the services in that community. At this time, even though my spirit is willing, and even excited, my tail bone is throbbing and numb! But, hey! It could be worse! At least we have a car in which to get there!

The next stop is the Calvary Baptist Church of Ojo de Agua. And we still have a lot to see on the way!

As you can see from these pictures, door to door visitation is much more difficult in these areas. But the “fruit” is worth the hike!

At the Calvary Bapist Church in Ojo de Agua, the adults attend the preaching service while the children have Sunday School in their new classrooms.

Even though the congregation is down because it is time for the people to harvest their coffee crops, Mike preaches and encourages the people to stand strong and go forward in their faith.

Once more, we crawl into the old blue Land Cruiser and head for home, enjoying more sights along the way!

Everyone works in the home in Honduras - even the children. These children are carrying wood home for mama so she can cook their beans, rice and tortillas on their mud stove. It’s a little difficult to see, but the wood has a strap around it which is also stretched across their foreheads. That way, they are able to carry more weight than would be possible to carry in their arms. It’s hard work! However, we did get a smile from them when we stopped and gave each of them a piece of candy!

This little guy plays in front of his home.

I can’t help but wonder how far this woman must walk before she arrives at her destination.

It is nearly 3:00 when we arrive home hot, dusty, tired, hungry and bedraggled. My backside feels bruised to the bone. We have 3 hours to eat, rest and clean up before our 6:00 service in our main church in La Esperanza. The smell of hot, homemade soup in the crockpot welcomes us when we walk through the door, but I’m not sure if I had rather eat or lay down with an ice pack! Decisions, decisions!! This old gal just ain’t as young as she used to be!! How about you? Did you enjoy the trip?

Most of you probably have two questions running through your head right now:

1. Why do we do it? Why put ourselves through this every Sunday? The answer is one word: LOVE! And you may be thinking that I am talking about our love for Christ, or our love for the people here. While it is true that we DO love the Lord Jesus Christ and we DO love the people here SO VERY MUCH, that is not the love that I am talking about! We do not do it because of OUR love. We do it because of HIS love!! How could we be so selfish as to accept His priceless “love gift” of salvation, a gift that He died to provide for us, and not be willing to share it with those who need it so badly? How self-centered and ungrateful would that be of us! HIS love needs to be shared ...MUST be shared - because we live in a broken-hearted world! Yet, who among us has a broken heart?

2. Is it worth it? Well, I will tell you this. The last two Sundays, I have had the privilege of leading four ladies to the Lord, one in each of the four communities that we usually go to each Sunday. I showed them from God’s Word what He had to say about what we needed to do to go to Heaven. When I read to them from Romans 5:8, “But God commended His love toward us in that, while we were yet sinners, CHRIST DIED FOR US”, I saw the tears form in their eyes. It was the realization of His great love for each of us that touched them so deeply! The fact that He loved us so much that He willingly died in our place! Later, when they had prayed and asked for His forgiveness and accepted Jesus’ unconditional love gift of salvation, I saw such joy and peace shinning from those same eyes! Is it worth it?? YES! A THOUSAND TIMES YES!

No matter what your drive to church on Sunday morning is like, no matter how long it takes you or what you see along the way, as recipients of His Great Love, our job is to share that Love and lead others to it!

No matter where you live, you DO make that drive to church on Sunday, don’t you? If you DON’T, the answer for why you DON’T do it is the same as the answer for why we DO!! That’s right, if you are honest, you don’t go for the same reason:

LOVE!

But unfortunately, you have

A LACK OF IT!!

I pray that you will fall in love with your Savior!

And, if He is not your Savior, I pray that you accept His love gift of eternal life!

Click here to find out how to receive God’s love gift to you.

Debbie Lane, Missionary to Honduras

Expect the Unexpected in Honduras!

2012-06-30T23:55:00.000-05:00

I think most people have heard of Murphy’s Law. That’s the “law” that says, if anything can go wrong ...IT WILL! The one thing I didn’t know was that Murphy’s entire name was Antonio Jose’ Gonzales Murphy and he got all his laws from living in Honduras!!! (I’m just kidding of course!) But it could have been true!!

I’m not sure if it’s true for missionaries living in other countries, but the key word for living in Honduras is “FLEXIBILITY”! You have to be flexible! I’m not talking about being physically flexible although, with the roads that we travel, that would not be a bad trait to have either! However, what I am talking about is expecting the unexpected in your simple, every day life. I’ll give you a few examples taken from just our first two weeks back in the country.

It all started when we arrived at the airport. Hotir, our neighbor and co-worker in the ministry, was to use our truck to make the 3 hour trip to San Pedro Sula and meet us at the airport. He has been our “airport transportation” for the last few years and is always right there waiting when we walk through the doors with our luggage.

Mike had talked to Hotir the eventing before we left the U.S. and made sure he had our flight number and arrival time. When our plane landed, we halfway expected delays and problems, either with the arrival of our luggage, hassles with customs, or both! Those things have happened with us on more than one occasion. However, other than the fact that, while going through customs, Mike discovered that, somehow, he had left his residency card in another bag back in the States, we were pleasantly surprised at how smoothly and quickly things went! We came through customs thanking the Lord for such an easy entry into the country, and happy that Hotir would not have to wait long for us.

The airport in San Pedro Sula

As we walked through the glass doors from customs and into the airport lobby, we expected to see Hotir’s smiling face waiting for us there - but he was nowhere to be seen. “Oh well, he probably got hung up in traffic,” we surmised. So, with all our luggage stacked on a rolling cart, we waited at the door for his arrival. After an hour, we were beginning to get a bit concerned, and twenty minuted later, I was praying earnestly for his safety. Finally, about an hour and a half after our arrival, we saw Hotir, smiling and in one piece, walking across the parking lot towards the doors to the airport (the entire airport only has two sets of doors so it was not hard to spot one another!).

After greetings, handshakes, and hugs, Hotir went to get the the car - but the vehicle he pulled up in was not ours - it was his parents car. He explained to us that he had started from La Esperanza that morning driving Mike’s big “Ford-Tough” truck but, before he even got out of town, one of the tires blew out. He quickly got that fixed and started out again, but immediately noticed another problem ...the transmission was acting up and the truck would not shift into gear. Thank the Lord, all of this happened before leaving town and he was able to turn around, limp back to the house, and borrow his parents vehicle.

Happy that there had been no serious mishaps and thankful that his parents had been so generous as to allow him to use their car for such a long trip, we loaded our belongings, piled into the car with Hotir, and headed for home. About three hours later, we pulled into our driveway without incident.

The next day, we were busily unpacking and trying to get settled. After working diligently for a few hours, we were both a bit hot and sweaty and I went to fix us a glass of ice water. However, when I opened the freezer to get the ice trays, instead of finding ice in the trays, all I found was cool water! Our refrigerator, a gift from our church in Tacoma, Washington some 19 years earlier, was dying! Some things were still frozen or were at least icy, so we really hand’t lost any food yet. Fortunately, a couple of years back, we had bought another refrigerator from some missionaries that were leaving the country. We bought to use in the church kitchen when it is finished, but in the mean time, we had let the children’s home use it. They no longer needed it and it had been returned to us and it was sitting in the unfinished addition of our house. So, after a couple of hours of cleaning it up, we were able to plug it in and transfer everything into the working refrigerator. Our first thought was, “Wow! This is great! When we get the broken ‘fridge out of the kitchen, we’ve got a nice new one that we can just put in it’s place!” But, unfortunately, the “new” refrigerator was two inches wider than the space between the cabinets. The old one HAD to be fixed! There was no way that we could afford to buy a new refrigerator! If it could not be fixed, I would just have to live with going outside to the addition any time I needed anything from the refrigerator!

We put in a call to Luis, who works on appliances and makes “house calls”. Luis is a wonderful Christian young man whom we have known for many years. He immediately came out and made a diagnosis - he felt that the 15 years of electricity fluctuations had taken its toll and the refrigerator’s compressor was dead or dying. But, to know for sure, it had to be loaded up on our flatbed truck and taken to the refrigerator “hospital” to be checked out.

The next day, Luis called with the verdict. It was not the compressor! It was a damaged tube that was leaking freon! Our little fridge would live!! We just had to leave it for a few days with “Doctor” Luis so he could replace the tube and fill it with freon. I’m happy to say that, four days later, our refrigerator was back home with us, healthy and freezing water just as good as new!

One of the most pressing needs upon our return was that we were going to have to go to Tegucigalpa, the capital city, and renew our residency cards. Both of our cards had expired while we were in the States. Because all of our ministry vehicles, except two, have some major issues going on, we would be making the trip in the only logical vehicle that we were sure could make the journey - our small, yellow, reliable 21 passenger school bus. (The other running vehicle was a 40 passenger bus!)

We were packed and ready to go on Monday morning, less than a week after our arrival in Honduras. We loaded our stuff and Mike tried to start the little bus, but “old reliable’s” battery was dead. For several days, Mike and Hotir worked to get it up and running, and all the while, because we were thinking we would be leaving the following morning, we were lived out of our suitcases. Thursday morning, after finally installing a new battery on Wednesday, we loaded our bags for the third time and took off for the big city.

“Tegus” (as the country’s capital is “affectionately” called for short) is a dirty, crowded city where we try to get in, take care of our business, and get out as quickly as possible. However, we always have to stay the night when we go because it is a 3 hour drive one way. By the time you get where you are going and take care of your business, it is usually getting late, and we really don’t like to drive Honduran roads at night. (You just never know when you may run up on a cow, mule, horse or drunk in the middle of the road!) We usually stay at the cheapest place we know, but this time, to celebrate our 40th wedding anniversary, we decided to stay at the Hotel Maya.

After checking into the hotel, we left for the immigration office. As we pulled out of the hotel parking lot in our little yellow school bus, we began praying that they had not moved their office again. (It makes it really difficult and frustrating to show up at what was a government office only to find that they have moved it again without informing you. That means that you must then go looking for their new location. This is in a city where many of the streets don’t even have names!) But God was merciful, and the location had not been changed.

The first order of business was to pay the fines for allowing the cards to expire. Mike’s card had expired just a week earlier but, because I was in the States all of last year taking care of my parents, my card was more than a year over due! We thought this might cause a problem but, it seems that they are always more than happy to take money from Gringos, so, that problem was taken care of rather quickly. Nevertheless, the hitch came a few minutes later when they discovered that Mike had left his old card in the States.

Now, even though they have all the information in their computers and files and we had Xerox copies of his card with us, they said that he would first have to go to the Police Station on the other side of town and get a “denuncio” or paper of disclaimer. Next, we would have to go to the bank and get a “constancia” which is a paper saying that we have exchanged a certain amount of American dollars during the last year.

So, we crawl back into the hot, unairconditioned bus. Several hours later, after we ran all over Tegus fighting bumper to bumper traffic, locating parking spaces big enough for a small bus, waiting in lines and hassling with officials, we finally had all the papers required and were ready to take them back to Immigration. But inevitably, they had already closed! Oh, well. No problem. We would have a nice anniversary dinner, get a good night’s rest and be there first thing the the next morning!

The following morning, which was Friday, after checking out of the Maya, we headed straight to the Immigration office. After a short wait, we saw the same girl we had dealt with the day before. She was satisfied with the paperwork and proceeded to type all the necessary info for our new cards into her computer. Next, she snapped our ID pictures for the cards.

And then, she sweetly smiled and said, “I’m sorry, but you can’t get your cards today. You’ll have to come back on Monday. The girl who makes the cards did not come in today.”

Well, it turns out that, in the entire country of Honduras, there is apparently only one person authorized to make the residency cards ...and she decided not to go to work last Friday!!

After a few stunned moments of disbelief, we told her that we needed to go home and would just have to try to come back sometime the following week. So, we boarded our little bus and headed home.

Well, today is Tuesday. So far, we have not been able to return to Tegus. We are just praying that they will hang onto our cards until we can make the trip again - hopefully next week. BUT ...we don’t expect anything - except the UNexpected!

The good thing in all of this is that, with God, nothing is unexpected or takes Him by surprise! He knows all about it, and He makes all things work together for good to them that love the God and are called, according to HIS purpose!

Just think about how about God was working during all our unexpected happenings in the last two weeks:

1. When Hotir was coming to get us, the truck had all it’s problems before he even left town rather than two hours down the highway!

2. The refrigerator waited until we came home before breaking down, we had an extra one that we could use, we didn’t lose any food during the problem, and our little refrigerator was fixable!

3. For our trip to Tegus, at least we had one working vehicle that was travel worthy (even if it was a bus), we had a nice anniversary celebration and, now, all the paper work is done and we just have to make the trip to pick up our new residency cards!

You know what? When you know that God is in control, you can just sit back and relax. You can just expect Him to take over and handle things when the unexpected happens!

Now, I wonder what Murphy would say to that!

P.S. Before I could post this, we had an ANOTHER UNEXPECTED event! Our internet, which had only been working for 2 days, QUIT working.

Now, here it is, two and a half weeks later, and at last we have internet up and running again! That is why you are FINALLY reading this!!

Home Invasion!

2012-06-11T19:18:00.000-05:00

One May 29th, we returned home to Honduras, only to find that our home had been invaded ...TWICE!! This is just one of the things that we, as missionaries, must deal with sometimes.

It seems that the first home invasion was from mice and spiders! Whenever there is no activity in our home, the mice either burrow through the adobe or chew off a corner of our wooden doors to gain entrance! In addition, the spiders leave their delicate, but annoying, webs in every corner, in every cabinet, and hanging from every picture and light fixture!

Then, they all get together and party and leave the biggest mess for us to find when we come home! Unfortunately, we have come to expect this and we know that, upon our return, every cabinet and every drawer, as well as every dish, utensil and cooking pot in our kitchen will have to be cleaned and washed with bleach water!

The second invasion was by our neighbors, with Jason and Arlen Stevens (our dear friends and fellow missionaries) as accomplices, supplying them with a key to our home!! Can you believe it????

You have heard us mention Hotir, the young man who grew up in my Sunday School class and who is now my husbands’ right arm in the ministry. Well, Hotir’s entire family is just as special as he! For several years Alex, his brother, faithfully helped me in all my children’s classes, followed by Victoria, their sister. Lincy and Victor, two more brothers, are also vital to the ministry, doing anything that is necessary, whether it is driving a bus, construction projects, handling the audio equipment, or whatever!

Well, it seems that for a solid week, these “kids” (and I understand their mother for a short time, too) came into our home and cleaned, and scrubbed, and swept, and washed everything, getting our home ready for our return! No one asked them to do it - and there was no pay involved. They just did it out of the kindness of their hearts!! This is just one example of why I love these people so much!

Wednesday night service at New Hope Baptist,
the day after our return.

How good it is to be home!! It has been so wonderful to see everyone! My “kiddos” had all grown so much that I hardly recognized some of them!

I finally got to see the work that had been done on side additions on our main church, New Hope Baptist, in La Esperanza (I will try to post pictures of this soon!). There is still much to be done as soon as funds are available, but it was wonderful to see the progress!

Calvary Baptist Church of Ojo de Agua
with their new Sunday School addition.

I also finally got to see the new Sunday School addition to the Calvary Baptist Church of Ojo de Agua. What a tremendous blessing! And I know that Hermana Enrique is glad, after several years of meeting in her home, for the children to have somewhere else to meet!

Next month, the people we have transported from Quebrada de Lajas for the last few years to our services at New Hope Baptist in La Esperanza, will finally begin meeting in their very own church building in their own community!

The new church at Quebrada de Lajas

A church construction team from Tennessee came a month or so ago and built their new church on some property we had purchased a year ago just for that purpose. We have given that work over to the very capable hands of our fellow missionaries and co-workers, Jason and Arlen Stevens. We have no doubt that God will bless them and that this church will continue to grow and be a real lighthouse in that community!

Because Mike and I were not able to go with the team to the mountains last Sunday, I have yet to see the new building at our work in Narranjitos that was built last year by a church from Florida. The reason we could not go was because, for the last couple of months, Hotir has been taking our teens up to our mountain works among the Lenca Indians on Saturday afternoons and they go soul winning and visiting. Then, because it is such a long trip back, they sleep on the cement floor of one of our churches in whatever community they are working that particular Saturday. The following morning, with Hotir and Salvador preaching, they hold Sunday morning services in each of the works before arriving back in La Esperanza about 2:30 on Sunday afternoon. Mike and I, with our backs, are not quite up to doing that. But, it seems that they really don’t need us there anyway! They led 9 people to Christ this last Saturday!! If you add that to the 4 that accepted Jesus in San Lorenzo the Sunday before, that is 13 people that have accepted Jesus Christ as their personal Savior in the last 2 weeks!!!

People, that’s what it’s all about!!!!

As I said in the beginning, our home was invaded by mice and spiders, then by our precious neighbors. However, it is our prayer that we may “invade” as many Honduran homes as possible with the Gospel of Jesus Christ and His message of love and salvation!! Please pray with us to that end!!!

FOCUS! FOCUS! FOCUS! by Mike Lane

2012-05-23T14:35:00.000-05:00

The following is a reprint of my husband’s prayer letter that was sent to our supporting churches:

Several years ago, our daughter had directed her three year old daughter Hannah, to pick up her toys and things in her room. Hannah,as a young child, was easily distracted from the task at hand and would begin to play with her toys rather than putting them away. Kristy went to Hannah's room to check on the progress and found her daughter had begun to play rather than completing her job. She exclaimed, "Hannah!"...at which point her daughter replied, and began to gesture with her hands, making a forward and backwards motion, "I know Mom...FOCUS...FOCUS...FOCUS!!!”

I use that incident to illustrate the danger that we as Christians and churches encounter in our lives and ministries. I see some churches changing directions and allowing less opportunities for missionaries to present the needs and challenges of their fields of service. This usually results in less resources being available to the foreign fields of evangelism. Personal experience and that of other Pastors has shown that maintaining the balance between home needs and "regions beyond" needs enables God to supply "all our need according to His riches in glory by Christ Jesus" (Phil.4:19). It is ALWAYS A WALK BY FAITH for individuals and the corporate body of the church. I have seen God bless myself, others, AND the church as it made decisions to step out and be a blessing to their Pastors, Missionaries, and others. Remember...we must always try to FOCUS on what our Master has commanded us to do, be witnesses BOTH in Jerusalem AND unto the uttermost part of the earth! (Acts 1:8)

The ministry continues to go well in Honduras. A new church building just went up in Quebrada de Lajas, our closest work to La Esperanza. God enabled us to finally purchase land last year after years of trying and God directed the Liberty Baptist Church, Kingston, Tenn., to help their missionaries and our co-laborers, Jason and Arlen Stevens in putting up the building. This was Jason's first building project and I know he learned a lot about costs and dealing with the people and all the issues of building...invaluable experience. They are a great blessing to us, along with our faithful people serving along side of us all. They are winning souls and faithfully going to different communities to witness. The old vehicles keep carrying them and the gospel to remote corners of our area, if we can maintain the repairs on them. THANK YOU for all you do to help us. Each of YOU ARE IMPORTANT to a continued and active ministry!

PRAY FOR US AND PRAY FOR REVIVAL IN AMERICA AND THAT CHRISTIANS WILL EXERCISE DISCERNMENT AND HEAVENLY WISDOM IN THE UPCOMING DECISIONS IN AMERICA!

THERE’S NO PLACE LIKE HOME!!!

2012-05-18T00:37:00.000-05:00

After all the incredible adventures, the wonderful new friends, and the victory over the Wicked Witch of the West, the whole point of the story of “The Wizard Of Oz” boils down to five little words. With high hopes, Dorothy clicks the heels of her ruby slippers together as she chants those five words over and over, “There’s no place like home! There’s no place like home!”, thus intimating that, no matter how wonderful a time a person has had, home is still the best place to be. I can certainly identify with Dorothy!

As a woman, can you imagine leaving your home (your “nest”) to go on a trip ...and not returning home for nearly TWO YEARS??? Well, that has been my recent experience! It was certainly not because I did not want to go home. It was because I couldn’t go home.

Back in July of 2010, we came back for Mike to get his cancer check up. Unfortunately, his check up did not go well. Rather than six months, the doctor wanted to see him again in three. That’s when we decided to stay in the States and use those three month to visit some of our supporting churches. Consequently, we made a trip of over 12,000 miles in three months visiting most of our supporting churches on the west coast and along the Canadian border!

At the end of three months, Mike’s health was much improved, so we began to make plans to return home. However, another month or so was spent trying to figure out the best and most economical way to get a small bus to Honduras. But finally, tickets were bought and plans were made to go home in January 2011. Unfortunately, the evening before our flight was to leave, my Dad had a heart attack. I cancelled my flight and Mike went home without me. Therefore, for the entire year of 2011, I was in the States, helping out with the care of my Dad (and Mom). Although Mike made a couple of visits back to the States, he spent several months in Honduras alone, carrying on the work there.

Dad spent the majority of last year in hospitals, rehabs and nursing facilities and, at one point, Dad and Mom were in different hospitals at the same time, finally ending with them spending a month together in a rehab facility before going home. Dad finally lost his battle for life on December 30, 2011, and we buried him on January 4, a few days short of a year since his heart attack. I will forever be thankful that I was able to be with him during his last year of life (such as it was)!

MaKayla and Dakota admire their
new baby brother, Brayden.

After Dad’s passing, we had a few appointments in Florida to keep and, in addition, I had promised to be with my daughter-in-law and help out during the birth of our newest grand baby. On March 24th, Brayden Bobbie Lane was born to our son, Brandon, and his sweet wife, Kathy, much to the joy and delight of his older siblings, Dakota and MaKayla!

My dear friend, Ruthie, and I

For nearly two years now, I have been living in the homes and under the hospitality of others. During my extensive time in Grand Prairie, while helping to care for Dad and Mom, I have stayed with my dear friend, Ruthie. She has, for over a year now, given me a bedroom and a bathroom in her home, as well as complete kitchen and laundry privileges. She has been a prayer partner, encourager in the Lord, and also a shoulder to cry on when needed. She has been and is the kind of friend that most people dream of having, and I shall be forever grateful to the Lord for bringing her into my life.

There is a quote that best describes the kind of friend that she has been to me: “Friends are angels who lift our feet when our own wings have trouble remembering how to fly.” ~ Anonymous

Well, I am thrilled to announce that we are going home on May 29th!! For me, it will have been nearly two years since I have seen my precious little black-eyed Honduran children and the rest of our dear people. We have been blessed with a team of godly workers who have been under the direction of fellow missionary, Jason Stevens. God has been so good and He has continued to bless and bring souls to Him, in spite of our absence. There has been continuous spiritual growth among the people, as well the different works and missions in the mountains. To us, this has been a confirmation that it truly is GOD’S ministry, not ours ...and we would not have it any other way!

The last two years have been full of numerous blessings, difficulties, highs and lows. I would not have chosen to be away from my home and our work for such an extended length of time, yet I will forever be grateful to the Lord for directing it so. He ALWAYS knows best! But now, as the time draws near, my excitement can barely be contained ...and I catch myself chanting Dorothy’s words,

“THERE’S NO PLACE LIKE HOME!

THERE IS NO PLACE LIKE HOME!”

No Greater Joy!

2012-04-25T00:31:00.000-05:00

We are continually receiving weekly reports from home (Honduras) of spiritual growth among the believers as well as growing attendance in several of the works. Construction of the mission church in Quebrada de Lajas, under the direction of our co-worker and fellow missionary, Jason Stevens, is going very well and the people in that community are excited about having their own church building. Last month, our evangelistic teams from our main church, Iglesia Bautista Nueva Esperanza (New Hope Baptist Church), saw 25 people in the outlying Lenca communities come to know Christ as their personal Savior!

Only a pastor, missionary or Sunday School teacher can truly understand the unspeakable joy you feel when you see those whom God has placed under your spiritual care (your “children”, so to speak), walking in the truth of God’s Word and having a burden to share the Good News of the Gospel with a lost and dying world!

God willing, we will be on our way home next month! Mike is waiting for me to be free to go home with him. (He says he is NOT going back until I can go back with him!) Just the thought of finally being home with our dear people once again fills me with “joy unspeakable and full of glory”, as the old hymn goes!!

But as always, in the life of a foreign missionary, it is a bitter-sweet joy. It seems that, no matter where I am, I am missing someone and my heart is longing after loved ones. When I am here in the States, my thoughts are consumed with our precious people in Honduras. When I am in Honduras, I ache to see my family, my children and grandchildren! (How sweet Heaven will be when there will be no more “goodbyes” and no more tears!)

As I leave the States this time, two things will make going home especially difficult. I will leave my mother living alone as a widow. Always before, I knew she and Dad had each other on which to lean. But, Dad is now in Heaven. Also, I will leave an additional grandchild behind.

Brayden Lane, Born March 24, 2012

Our newest blessing!

For the last six weeks, I have been in Tacoma, WA, helping out after the birth of our newest grand baby. On March 24, Brayden Bobby Lane was born to our son, Brandon, and his precious wife, Kathy. His older brother and sister, Dakota and MaKayla, could not be any prouder of their new baby brother. And rightly so! For he is truly a little sweetheart (as are ALL seven of our grandchildren!) Yes, I am proud of them all!!

However, as much as I love my “grandies”, you will never hear me say, “Had I known how great having grandkids would be, I would have skipped having kids and had the grandkids first!” I LOVED having kids!! Besides my salvation, our two children were, and continue to be, the greatest gifts and the greatest blessings that God has ever bestowed upon Mike and I! When they married, their spouses just increased our blessings and happiness by two-fold! And our seven grandchildren are just the “icing on the cake” and the “cherries on top”!

On Monday, April 30, I will be leaving my son and his family, my newest grandchild and his two older siblings. The time of my departure is approaching much too quickly! Instead of focusing upon leaving my loved ones, I am trying to focus on the positive side and looking ahead to seeing my dear loved ones in Honduras. At times, I succeed in this endeavor and, at times, I do not.

Something else that is fast approaching is Mother’s Day. Always, at first I think of my own precious mother and her example to me of unconditional love. She and Dad did not send us, but instead, faithfully took us to church. I remember her singing hymns as she worked around the house and many times, even after I was grown and married and would come to visit, I would find her worn, red Bible open on the kitchen table where she had been sitting and reading. Whatever I may be, I owe to my own dear mother and her example to me.

Secondly, I think of what a blessing, responsibility, and privilege it is to be called by that name: Mother. God entrusts these precious little gifts to us and He expects us to, not only instruct them in the things of God, but to be an example of the believer. In addition, if we lead them to accept Jesus Christ as their Savior, our children are the ONLY things we have on this earth that we can take to Heaven with us when we die!

As a mother of two and grandmother of seven, I have been TREMENDOUSLY blessed of God!!! I want to share my blessings as a mother with you. Now mind you, I am NOT bragging!! Just sharing my blessings and my great joy!! What a joy it is to see my children and their spouses, and my grandchildren, faithfully serving the Lord!

Since 2000, our son and his wife, Kathy, have been on staff at the church where Mike was the pastor for fourteen years. Brandon is the Minister of Music and Kathy is one of the secretaries. During my visit here, I have had the privilege of, not only hearing my son sing and play the piano in church, but also, I have been able to hear him teach his Family Foundations Class and preach in the pastor’s absence! What a joy and what a blessing!

Last month, our daughter and her family left Idaho and a church in which they had been serving the last few years and dearly loved. Their hearts were broken to think of leaving such precious friends - friends in the Lord who had become more like extended family. Her husband’s work had moved them to Elko, NV. However, as much as they missed their “family” in Idaho, they immediately found a church home, began to meet new “family” members, and find ways to serve the Lord in the new place to which He had brought them. I received a text message from her just this morning asking for prayer. They have asked her to be the speaker at the Mother/Daughter Luncheon at their new church!

Another joy and blessing that I would like to share with you is the fact that, as of last November, ALL OF MY GRANDCHILDREN (except for the newborn, of course) HAVE ACCEPTED JESUS CHRIST AS THEIR SAVIOR!! They are ALL being raised to know and love God’s Word! They are ALL being raised to love and appreciate the sacrifice that a Holy God made for a lost and dying world so that they might be able to spend eternity with Him in Heaven.

I have attached, for your viewing pleasure (or not), videos of my greatest blessings and continual joy!! Yes, I’m a proud Grams! And if you take a moment and watch my six older grandchildren as they share their praises to the Lord, you will know why “I have no greater joy than to hear that my children walk in truth.”

Our son’s daughter, 7 year old MaKayla, tells her favorite Bible story… with illustrations!

Her 9 year old brother, Dakota, recites Ephesians 6:10-20.

Our daughter’s 6 year old, Josiah, also quotes scripture…

…and has been doing so since he was 4!

7 year old Abigail, his older sister, tells her favorite Bible story - Noah’s Ark.

(She likes horses!)

Esther (age 13) on the piano and Hannah (age 12) with the violin play the song

“One Small Child”. They are my daughter’s oldest children.

Finding Encouragement Even in Tragedy

2012-04-04T19:44:00.001-05:00

In my recent article entitled “Twelve Years After Columbine”, I posted the testimony and prayer of Darrel Scott, the father of Rachel Scott who was killed in the Columbine School Massacre. Twelve years later, Rachel’s testimony is still making an impact and touching hearts.

I think that too many times, Christians fail to stand up for Christ as we should. Why it should be thus could be for a myriad of reasons: fear, apathy, lack of interest or knowledge, etc. But when a man, woman or even a child stands tall and names the name of Christ, giving no importance as to the consequences of doing so, they are not soon forgotten. They leave a legacy and an example for many, many years to come!

I shall never be famous nor well known. Moreover, that is just fine with me, for fame, world renown and riches have never been a desire of mine. But, I do want to make a difference in this world… or at least in somebody’s world… even if it is only in the lives of my children and grandchildren! Even if they never receive an inheritance, I pray they receive a legacy from me… a legacy of faith in God and a love for lost souls.

Today I received an email from my precious daughter, Kristy. It was about another true story, a testimony that has lasted through the years - 100 years to be exact!

This is by Vision Forum Ministries:

To Be a Titanic Widow:

Finding Encouragement Even in Tragedy

If you are like me, then it never hurts to get a healthy dose of encouragement. Sometimes encouragement comes from understanding the sacrifices of those Christians who came before us. In less than two weeks, the world will observe the 100th anniversary of the sinking of the Titanic, an event which shook the world and presented to the modern era a living parable of God’s sovereignty over man’s hubris, but also of tremendous hope in the midst of judgment. But the story of the Titanic cannot be reduced to the legacy of icebergs and supposedly unsinkable vessels. It is the story of real people who experienced both real loss and real physical redemption because of the Christian ideal that men sacrifice for women. The story of Charlotte Collyer is just one of thousands, but it is a precious insight into the way one Christian woman loved, lost, and shared her experience with those closest to her. Read it and be encouraged that you serve a sovereign, just, but merciful God.

Women and Children First,
Doug Phillips
President of Vision Forum Ministries
Founder of the Christian Boys’ and Men’s Titanic Society

Brooklyn, New York

Sun April 21st, 1912

My Dear Mother and All,

I don’t know how to write to you or what to say, I feel I shall go mad sometimes but dear as much as my heart aches it aches for you too for he is your son and the best that ever lived. I had not given up hope till today that he might be found but I'm told all boats are accounted for. Oh mother how can I live without him.

I wish I’d gone with him if they had not wrenched Madge from me I should have stayed and gone with him. But they threw her into the boat and pulled me in too but he was so calm and I know he would rather I lived for her little sake otherwise she would have been an orphan.

The agony of that night can never be told. Poor mite was frozen. I have been ill but have been taken care of by a rich New York doctor and feel better now. They are giving us every comfort and have collected quite a few pounds for us and loaded us with clothes and a gentleman on monday is taking us to the White Star office and also to another office to get us some money from the funds that is being raised here. Oh mother there are some good hearts in New York, some want me to go back to England but I can’t, I could never at least not yet go over the ground where my all is sleeping.

Sometimes I feel we lived too much for each other that is why I’ve lost him. But mother we shall meet him in heaven. When that band played ‘Nearer My God to Thee’ I know he thought of you and me for we both loved that hymn and I feel that if I go to Payette I’m doing what he would wish me to, so I hope to do this at the end of next week where I shall have friends and work and I will work for his darling as long as she needs me. Oh she is a comfort but she don't realize yet that her daddy is in heaven.

There are some dear children here who have loaded her with lovely toys but it’s when I’m alone with her she will miss him. Oh mother I haven’t a thing in the world that was his only his rings. Everything we had went down. Will you, dear mother, send me on a last photo of us, get it copied I will pay you later on.

Mrs Hallet’s brother from Chicago is doing all he can for us in fact the night we landed in New York (in our nightgowns) he had engaged a room at a big hotel with food and every comfort waiting for us. He has been a father to us. I will send his address on a card (My Horder) perhaps you might like to write to him some time.

God Bless you dear mother and help and comfort you in this awful sorrow.

Your loving child Lot.

“...Where, then, does this rule which prevailed in the sinking Titanic come from? It comes from God, through the faith of Jesus of Nazareth.

It is the ideal of self-sacrifice. It is the rule that “the strong ought to bear the infirmities of those that are weak.” It is the divine revelation which is summed up in the words:“Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.”

The ideal that the strength of the strong is given them to protect and save the weak, the ideal which animates the rule of “Women and children first,” is in essential harmony with the spirit of Christ.

If what He said about our Father in Heaven is true, this ideal is supremely reasonable....Think about it. Is this ideal to survive and prevail in our civilization or not?Without it, no doubt, we may have riches and power and dominion. But what a world to live in!

Only through the belief that the strong are bound to protect and save the weak because God wills it so, can we hope to keep self-sacrifice, and love, and heroism, and all the things that make us glad to live and not afraid to die.”

Sermon preached by Henry van Dyke
Princeton,N.J., April 18,1912.

Titanic 100: An International Centennial Event
The story of Charlotte Collyer is just one of the many true stories that will be told through reenactors, in story, song, and message at Titanic 100: An International Centennial Event. To learn more about this event, or to register, click here.

Download a Free Copy of Our Commemorative Brochure and Souvenir Book
Please enjoy a free copy of our commemorative brochure and souvenir book by downloading it here.

To Help Us, Share This Message With The World
Help Vision Forum Ministries share the Gospel message of hope embodied in the principle, “Greater love hath no man than this, that he lay down his life for his friend.”

??? The BIG Question ???

2012-04-01T13:17:00.000-05:00

In the strongly Catholic mountain villages where the more than 100,000 Lenca live and work, Satan has had free reign for centuries. These people have never been taught God's Word. Their hearts and minds are filled with superstitions, traditions, and the lies of a false doctrine. They are unbelievably poor, the vast majority of them living in mud houses with dirt floors and without running water or electricity. They have no hope of ever being able to better their lives and, because of what they have been taught, they have very little hope and no assurance of a better after-life. They are not really recognized by their government, nor accepted by mainstream society. Even most missionaries are not interested in working with them because it's a very slow, very difficult ministry with seemingly very little return for your months and years of work. They are, basically, a forgotten and an unreached people.

But, God loves them and He has not forgotten them! He died on the cross because He loves the Lencas as much as He loves you and me! They have a right to hear, and we have the responsibility to tell them the truth of God's Word! In fact, as Christians, we are commanded to go and tell them about God's plan of salvation.

These are the people to whom God has called Mike and I to minister and we dearly love them! We have claimed for Christ those mountain villages and the precious people who live and work there! We will continue to go and preach the Gospel and teach them God's Word as long as we are physically able. And when we can no longer go, our prayer is that others will have caught the vision and continue to seek them out and tell them of God's love. PLEASE pray with us, that more will answer the call of God in their life!

You see, the big question is not, “Why won’t God call more people into missions?” If you are a born-again Christian, He has already called you! The big question is,

"WHY WON'T YOU ANSWER HIS CALL?”

Twelve Years After Columbine

2012-03-16T18:58:00.003-05:00

"I am not going to apologize for speaking the name of Jesus . . . If I have to sacrifice everything . . . I will." –Rachel Scott

On Thursday, Darrell Scott, the father of Rachel Scott, a victim of the Columbine High School shootings in Littleton , Colorado , was invited to address the House Judiciary Committee's subcommittee. What he said to our national leaders during this special session of Congress was painfully truthful.

They were not prepared for what he was to say, nor was it received well. It needs to be heard by every parent, every teacher, every politician, every sociologist, every psychologist, and every so-called expert! These courageous words spoken by Darrell Scott are powerful, penetrating, and deeply personal. There is no doubt that God sent this man as a voice crying in the wilderness…

The following is a portion of the transcript:

"Since the dawn of creation there has been both good & evil in the hearts of men and women. We all contain the seeds of kindness or the seeds of violence. The death of my wonderful daughter, Rachel Joy Scott, and the deaths of that heroic teacher, and the other eleven children who died must not be in vain. Their blood cries out for answers.

The first recorded act of violence was when Cain slew his brother Abel out in the field. The villain was not the club he used.. Neither was it the NCA, the National Club Association. The true killer was Cain, and the reason for the murder could only be found in Cain's heart.

In the days that followed the Columbine tragedy, I was amazed at how quickly fingers began to be pointed at groups such as the NRA. I am not a member of the NRA. I am not a hunter. I do not even own a gun. I am not here to represent or defend the NRA - because I don't believe that they are responsible for my daughter's death. Therefore I do not believe that they need to be defended. If I believed they had anything to do with Rachel's murder I would be their strongest opponent. I am here today to declare that Columbine was not just a tragedy -- it was a spiritual event that should be forcing us to look at where the real blame lies! Much of the blame lies here in this room. Much of the blame lies behind the pointing fingers of the accusers themselves. I wrote a poem just four nights ago that expresses my feelings best.

Your laws ignore our deepest needs,

Your words are empty air.

You've stripped away our heritage,

You've outlawed simple prayer.

Now gunshots fill our classrooms,

And precious children die

You seek for answers everywhere,

And ask the question "Why?"

You regulate restrictive laws,

Through legislative creed..

And yet you fail to understand,

That God is what we need!

Men and women are three-part beings. We all consist of body, mind, and spirit. When we refuse to acknowledge a third part of our make-up, we create a void that allows evil, prejudice, and hatred to rush in and wreak havoc. Spiritual presences were present within our educational systems for most of our nation's history. Many of our major colleges began as theological seminaries. This is a historical fact. What has happened to us as a nation? We have refused to honor God, and in so doing, we open the doors to hatred and violence. And when something as terrible as Columbine's tragedy occurs -- politicians immediately look for a scapegoat such as the NRA. They immediately seek to pass more restrictive laws that contribute to erode away our personal and private liberties… We do not need more restrictive laws. Eric and Dylan would not have been stopped by metal detectors. No amount of gun laws can stop someone who spends months planning this type of massacre. The real villain lies within our own hearts.

As my son Craig lay under that table in the school library and saw his two friends murdered before his very eyes, he did not hesitate to pray in school. I defy any law or politician to deny him that right! I challenge every young person in America , and around the world, to realize that on April 20, 1999, at Columbine High School prayer was brought back to our schools. Do not let the many prayers offered by those students be in vain. Dare to move into the new millennium with a sacred disregard for legislation that violates your God-given right to communicate with Him. To those of you who would point your finger at the NRA -- I give to you a sincere challenge...Dare to examine your own heart before casting the first stone!”

Rachel Joy Scott
August 5, 1981 - April 20, 1999

My daughter's death will not be in vain! The young people of this country will not allow that to happen again.”

Darrell Scott

Rachel’s Tears:

10 Years After Columbine...Rachel Scott Lives On

By Beth Nimmo and Darrell Scott with Steve Rabey
Forward by Chuck Norris New!

Please click below for more information, books and videos on Rachel Scott and the difference that one person sold out to God can make in our world.

http://www.racheljoyscott.com/index.htm

Prayer Letter for January-February 2012

2012-03-08T16:00:00.000-06:00

January-February 2012

Dear Co-labourers,

Thank you all for your faithful support and prayers. They have all been very needed as the family has gone through the sorrow of the loss of Debbie's father the end of December. My wife, her mother, and the family are doing well and moving on as God's grace sustains all in the grief process.

I will be going home to Honduras within a couple of weeks and Debbie will be going to Tacoma, Washington to help our son. Brandon, and his wife, Kathy, during the birth of their third child. Afterward, she will be joining me in Honduras.

In February, it was a blessing to visit some of our faithful churches in Florida. Later, in the Fall, we hope to finish reporting to the rest of our Florida churches because it has been about 10 years since we last visited.

In addition to visiting our supporting churches, it was a blessing to be with Eastern Ave. Baptist Church, St. Cloud, Fl. who sent a group to help us build a new church building in Naranjitos, a community where we have worked for about 6-7 years and is located about 30 miles from where we live in La Esperanza. Those guys worked hard and finished the roof just in time to have a celebration service. It was a happy reunion for me to be with them in their church and see their "mission field". This church supports our friend and fellow missionary Duane Chase and missionaries Jason and Arlen Stevens.
Jason and Arlen are doing a good job among the community Quebrada de Lajas and have obtained the help of a church in Tennessee to come and help with a church building in April. The foundation is being laid in preparation of their arrival. Fortunately, this building will be many times easier logistically to build as it is our closest work to La Esperanza.

On the way to meetings in Florida, I dropped off at Glory Land Baptist Church in Birmingham, Ala, a good used transmission and a rebuild kit for our Ford trucks to be shipped to Honduras in March. It will be a blessing to get the parts for repairing our vehicles. God knows how difficult it is to keep our "Ford tough" trucks and vans running in Honduras. Repairs and operation of the vehicles are a major expense of the ministry. We appreciate your prayers.

Thank you for your prayers for our faithful workers. Please uphold preachers Hotir, Salvador, Santos, and Clemente in prayers. Also pray for Leonidas who is recovering from an injury he received while lifting heavy rocks during our building program. In addition, please continue to pray for Jason and Arlen and their two sons.

We are so grateful for your faithfulness and love for missions. How GREAT is your reward in Heaven. Our prayers are for God's blessings upon each of you. Pray for America's revival and survival. It is a critical hour in our history. If God is forced to continue to judge America it WILL affect missions!

In our Lord's willing and joyful service,

Bro. Mike and Debbie Lane

When Words Are Not Enough

2012-03-04T16:22:00.000-06:00

It has been a little over a month and a half since my dad went to be with the Lord. In spite of that, life just seems to go on, without hardly missing a beat. Being the wife of a pastor/missionary/full time Christian worker for 38 years, I can tell you that I have been to many a funeral and I have lost many relatives, dear friends and co-workers. I have never said to someone grieving the loss of a close loved one, “I know how you feel” ...because, even though I have felt the loss of people that I dearly loved, I had not lost anyone in my immediate family! I could only imagine how they might feel, but I had never walked in their shoes.

So, how does it feel, when someone who has been such an essential, vital, and significant part of your life - all your life - is no longer in your life?? Well, it feels like a gaping hole has been left in your heart - your universe!

It seems to me, that the passing of a life, should cause a “hiccup” in the world’s activities, or at least, cause a small ripple in time. I must confess to you, that it somewhat puzzles me that your personal world can be shaken to the core and yet the rest of the world in general just keeps going on, taking no notice. Sometimes, it may be that even those closest to you can be unaware of the depth of pain that you feel. They just don’t get it. And even though there are others who are sincerely sympathetic and hurting with you, you feel as if you are all alone in a place you have never before been.

That is ...you are all alone, except for God and His Holy Comforter! If He is there with you, then it is a place full of sweet sadness and there is a solace that only He can give. It is certainly not a place that I would ever want to walk through without Him by my side!

However, through the death of my Dad, I have also learned that, although there is an aloneness in grief, there is so much comfort in the prayers of others and those who seek bring comfort to you by their kind expressions of sympathy! It is that love and support of others that is helping us to get from point A (the point of grief) to point B (the place of healing). It makes me think of Christmas Day with Dad, five days before he died.

Dad’s brother and his wife have, for many years, hosted a family reunion on Christmas afternoon. After talking with the staff at the skilled nursing facility and my aunt and uncle, it was determined that, as long as certain precautions were taken, we could take Dad to the reunion for a few hours. So, on Christmas afternoon, Mother, Mike and I went to pick up Dad. I signed the appropriate paperwork saying that I would be responsible and make sure that Dad was well taken care of and safe. That meant that we would make sure he was safely transferred between the van and his wheelchair and did not run out of oxygen. Be that as it may, when we got to my uncle’s, Dad refused to use the wheelchair or the oxygen!

Even though I understood that it was a matter of manly pride on Dad’s part, I was terrified! I was responsible ...and I knew he was not able walk that far! However, Dad went into the house with the help of someone on either side of him. With their strong support and help with balance, Dad pretty much walked in and sat down. Nevertheless, a few hours later when it was time to return to the van, Daddy was so tired that he could not pick up his feet and hold his own weight. I know that those who helped him back to the van were heartbroken for Dad and would have gladly willed their own strength to him ...but they could not. If he had not had those strong arms on either side to hold him up and propel him to the van, he would never have been able to get from point A to point B.

That is what every card, note and phone call has been for me ...for my mom and sisters! At first, I tried to respond to each one. But later, when I I had time to get online, there were scores of people who, through email and Facebook, had sent messages of sympathy and encouragement and assured us of their prayers. I would have loved to send a personal message of appreciation to each one, but it was just impossible to do so! I just could not keep up!

I would like to use this public format to thank you ALL for every phone call, every sympathy card, every email and every note on Facebook that we received expressing your sympathy and prayers on our behalf. Some of you I have never even met face to face, yet you took the time to reach out to someone who was hurting. You have taken the time to walk beside us and hold us up when we have needed it the most. You are helping us to get from point A to point B. The words “thank you” just do not seem enough to convey what is in our hearts. However, I know no other words!

May our Heavenly Father bless each of you abundantly for reaching out to us and being such a blessing!

And once again, I would like to say

IN LOVING MEMORY - Confident and Comforted

2012-01-06T00:45:00.001-06:00

ERNEST TED HASTINGS

1927 - 2011

Christmas Day - 2011
The last picture I took of Daddy, 5 days before he went to Heaven.

Yesterday, January 4th, we put my daddy’s body in the ground. Note that I said it was his body or, as my husband put it, his “earth suit" that we buried. After a long illness, my Dad is finally through with hospitals, rehab and dialysis. For the last three years, his one kidney had done it’s best to keep up, but even dialysis could no longer do the job. The cancer in his prostate, although "under control", had also, I’m sure, taken its toll. His tired old heart, after three stents, congestive heart failure and a triple by-pass, could no longer take the strain. Consequently, on December 30, around 8:30 p.m., he took his last labored breath, his heart stopped and Daddy left that poor, old, worn-out “earth suit” behind. No more pain. No more suffering. No more fighting to get better.

His “earth suit” is in the ground but, rest assured, my Daddy is not!

Corinthians 5:8 (KJV)

We are confident, I say, and willing rather to be absent from the body, and to be present with the Lord.

How precious are the promises of our Heavenly Father! He told us that we can be “confident” that, if we have accepted his forgiveness, his sacrifice for our sins and His gift of salvation then, when we leave our body in death, we are immediately ushered into the Lord’s presence! According to Dad, he accepted Jesus as his Savior in a little Baptist church in Louisiana at around the age of 7 or 8 years old! So, what does that mean?

That means that, even as I write this, my two sisters and I have two daddies watching over us, and my earthly daddy and my Heavenly Daddy are enjoying each other’s company! As I write this, He is already enjoying a family reunion with his parents, two brothers and a sister that went before him! He has met, and is probably spoiling his great-grandbabies, my grandchildren, the three babies our daughter miscarried. As I write this, I am happy to know that Daddy is no longer so tired and so sick and full of pain!

I will miss his “daddy hugs and kisses”, his silly jokes and funny sayings, and his stubborn ways. As with most families, Dad and I occasionally had our disagreements and didn’t always see eye to eye. But, no matter what, I never doubted my daddy’s unconditional love, a sure love that always gave me a feeling of belonging and security. Yes, there is a lot I will miss, but I would never want to bring him back and take him from the peace and the wondrous splendor he is now enjoying.

I ask for your prayers, not just for me, but also for my mother, my two younger sisters, his grandchildren and his remaining brother and sister. We sorrow for our loss, but we rejoice in Dad’s gain! We rejoice in the blessed hope of our Wonderful Redeemer and, in the difficult days ahead, we will rely upon the Holy Comforter to hold us close and whisper to our aching hearts His Words of love, consolation and reassurance. We will find our confidence and comfort in Him! Of that, I am sure!

1 Thessalonians 4:13-14 (KJV)

(13) But I would not have you to be ignorant, brethren, concerning them which are asleep, that ye sorrow not, even as others which have no hope. (14) For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so them also which sleep in Jesus will God bring with him.

This picture was taken on October 6th,
Mom and Dad’s 61st Anniversary.
The next day he went into the hospital.
He never made it home.

We love you, Daddy, and we will miss you so much. But we will see you again, and never ever have to say goodbye!

Revelation 21:4 (KJV)

And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes; and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain: for the former things are passed away.

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