In short – the service went very well! Praise the Lord!

I think there were about 160 people there in all.

More details to follow.

The service in Chalco starts today at 12:00pm local time. The current time here is:

From now until then we are packing up and loading instruments to take to Chalco, and then we’ll set up and practise there.

Thanks for your prayers! I’ll let you know how it goes.

Tomorrow we’re having a special service in Chalco to thank God for His mercy during the Chalco Flood.  We’ll be providing some more clothing to those who lost so much in the flood, and also have Bibles to give them.

There will be some singing and a devotional during the service, but it’s especially a time for the people of Chalco to give testimonies and talk about everything that has happened.

Below is a (mostly) English version of the presentation we hope to show during the service (there’s still time to change a few things in it, but I think this is more or less how it will be – except in Spanish, of course!).  It gives a bit of an overview the flood and some of the clean-up and relief efforts.

There’s still LOTS to be done, of course.  The photos at the end were actually taken before the flood, so don’t be deceived by how nice it may look.

We would appreciate your prayers that the service on Sunday would be glorifying to God.

Here’s the video:

This podcast includes some exciting news – the special service in Chalco on the 14th of March, and the first service of a brand new local church on the 28th of March!  Also, news about something that happened at one of Shari’s Amigas del Alma baking classes.  But to begin – the story of the national and state anthems at Hannah’s school…

Thanks to all of you who have been praying for a new executive director for CAM International of Canada!  We’re happy to let you know that, as of the 1st of April, our new director will be Charlene de Haan.

Charlene de Haan grew up in Vancouver, BC, and now lives in Scarborough, Ontario.  She comes to us with a wealth of experience, having been the executive director of Pioneer Clubs Canada, and Manager of Human Resources with Interserve Canada.  She also has experience teaching missionary kids overseas (Guatemala), founded stepUP Transitions Consulting, does freelance writing, and is involved and has been involved in many other things.

We haven’t yet met Charlene, but Lord willing once she’s settled in she’ll be able to come visit.  Welcome to the team, Charlene!  You can send her a note here if you like.

Our current director and his wife, Larry and Jayme Hower, will be moving on with their ministry in the CAM office in Dallas.

 Larry is an administrative assistant to the president, and will be involved in bringing new missionaries to the field.  Jayme will be involved as well in this work, and they both hope to continue serving in a short term capacity in other countries as they have done in the past.

Words can’t express our appreciation for all that the Howers have done for us and for the kingdom in general over the years – both on a business level and a personal level.  We look forward to many more years of friendship (with fewer questions about what the number in D4 of this spreadsheet means, and so on!)!

Please pray for all these people as they go through this transition.

Today we brought provisions to a few dozen of the families affected by the flooding in Chalco.  We also invited them and others to the special service on the 14th.

I didn’t take a lot of video of actually handing out despensas (provisions), because I don’t want to embarrass anyone.  However, we had some good talks with some people – many people remembered us from when we served the breakfasts (and we remembered some of them).  Eventually word got around and we attracted a crowd of neighbours – there were about 20 people around us for a while.

With four vehicles and lots of helpers, we were done in about an hour.  Now, we’ll see what happens on the 14th!

Here’s the video:

On Sunday we had a potluck with everyone in our church (Iglesia Bíblical Sendero de Vida).  It was a time to say goodbye to those who will be leaving to work in the church plant in Jesús María.

Here’s a quick video of the party.  Also, check out our Photo Gallery for pictures of the event and other new photos.

A big pile of despensas, ready to go!

We wanted to try to stretch the money farther, so after getting a few pre-packaged despensas, we went out and got some things in bulk – beans, rice, tuna, toothpaste, New Testaments, milk, and so on.

With a huge assembly line, the youth put together the packages, and I think we must have ended up with about 140 despensas.

As we give these out, we’ll be inviting people to a special event on the 14th of March – a service of thanksgiving right in Chalco.

Wow, you don’t realize how out of it you are until you listen to yourself talking!  Oh well, with a little work I think this podcast is understandable.

Note, however, that I slipped in a Spanish word by mistake – my "teclado" class is actually my keyboard class.

Also, I mention information about donating to the Chalco Flood relief effort – you can find that information here.  For more on the flood, you can find the related posts easily using the Chalco Flood tag.

And now, without further confusion, here’s the podcast…

Due to some recent confusion with our (very) old donations page, I’ve recreated the donations section of this website!  (I think I created the old page in 2004 – that’s a long time in website years!)

Actually, this is a continuing trend to update the whole site and migrate it into the WordPress software that we use for this blog.

The page was also in need of updating because there are now new options for donating online that we haven’t had before.

Anyway, a few quick notes about donating.  The new pages on this site will give you information about donating to the work that we’re doing here in Mexico.  You’ll be donating to our account through our mission.

If you want to donate to a special project, there are special details.  For example, those who have been giving to the Chalco Flood Relief need to make a note that the donation is for Project #062250 (CAM’s relief fund), and a note that it’s specifically for Chalco Flood relief.  Read more details about the Chalco Flood project here.

That’s not hard, is it?  But simply donating to our account is a lot easier.

For more information about donating to our account, visit the brand new donation page (I’m not proud of it or anything)!

And for those who give so generously – thank you!  You have such a big part in the work that’s being done here in Mexico!