Dear Friends,

Just like you, Satan is able to discourage us through his unending attacks. How we have ached in the past few months over victories that he has seemingly won.

Last night as I was walking back home the Lord touched my heart and began to show me some of the great blessings that He has given to us lately. Grandbaby number three was born last week. Our two youngest children and our three grandchildren were all born here in Navojoa, Sonora. Most missionaries leave their family but the Lord has sent much of ours with us. Three of our children, their spouses and their children are here in Mexico with us.

Last night we celebrated Christmas with the kids from the orphanage and the boy’s home. A fifth grade class sent down gifts for the children. Gerardo, a fifteen year old Indian boy, began to open his gifts. A package of yellow pencils, two notebooks, a package of Kleenex, silly putty, a toothbrush, socks, a bar of soap, etc. I was amazed how excited and grateful he was over each gift. It dawned on me that Gerardo had never received a Christmas present in his life. After he had opened his presents he would pick them up again and examine each one of them. Israel left earlier today to bicycle to the other side of Navojoa to take some of his gifts to his little brother and sister so they would have a Christmas too. We feel so privileged to have a part in these kid’s lives and to know that now they have the greatest gift of all.

Wednesday night we celebrated Christmas in our Church. Sometimes special services can be a little hectic. What a wonderful time we had. The people were so attentive and we had sweet fellowship together. Three adults and a teenager prayed for salvation. After the service we all had a piece of cake and the children broke a pinata. We had a great time with 259 in attendance, mostly teens and adults.

We are so grateful to you and to the Lord, HAPPY NEW YEAR!

Dear Friends,

We have started up our Bible Institute this semester with 20 students. They are a blessing to us and have a good spirit. They work hard and are excited about winning souls. On Saturday we had a tropical storm hit. I ran into town to do some errands and about 9:30 in the morning was headed back in the driving rain. We have two young men who visit their bus route way over across town on their bicycles. As I was getting close to home I was amazed to see them headed out. They spent 5 hours pedaling and pushing their bikes in rain and mud. The next day they had a great attendance and the folks bragged about their bus captain who showed up at their door soaking wet to encourage them.

We came to this valley 23 years ago. At that time we won the foreman out on a farm to the Lord, he was faithful for a couple of years to our little village Church then backslid in a terrible way and we lost track of Miguel. Two of our men gave blood to help an elderly woman. The woman turned out to be Miguel’s mother. God touched Miguel’s heart. Miguel repented and has driven down from his village up near the mountains every Sunday with his boys for the last two months. Also 23 years ago we would go each week to an Indian village and preach out on the street. A mother would come faithfully with her 8 year old boy. A short time later the mother passed away. The little boy, Juan, became an orphan. One of our main men (we call him Coronado) turned out to be that little boy. We thank God for His goodness and His faithfulness and we thank you for your burden for these people.

Dear Friends,

The heat and humidity have been very extreme, but the Lord has turned our trial into a blessing. We have had two different groups come down in July. How it humbles us to see these folks come and work long and hard in this intense heat. Our home church, Sun and Shield Baptist, came down and installed a water line to our campus kitchen, sealed our cement roofs and made hymn books for us. Pastor Heffernan and a group from Midland Baptist came and raised the final wall to enclose our church, poured a foundation for Pastor Ismael, painted and many other things. All of these dear Brothers and Sisters were a special blessing and refreshment to our hearts.

This year we did our own teen camp for our most faithful youth who serve in the church. We took 22 kids way up into the Sierra Madre Mountains, from the heat of the valley at sea level to the cool air at 7000 ft. It was the first time that many of them had seen pine trees. We had to build a fire inside the cabin in the evening to stay warm. The youth were so excited. It was a wonderful time when through the devotions and teaching God worked in their hearts in a very special way. One evening Cathy and I stayed behind to relax by the fire. Rosario, one of the teen girls, also stayed behind. As we visited she began to tell us how in the beginning she would see our Church bus pass by her house and she would be filled with anger. She just wanted to stop the bus and yell at us. God worked in her life and to make the story short, Rosario is now the captain of that same bus route and is a teacher in Children's Church!

Because of our bus competition our Sunday School averaged 243 in July with 5 baptized and a good number that have trusted Jesus as their Lord and Savior.

May God richly bless you!

Dear Friends,

Our daughter Alicia married Justin Farmer June 13 in Morgan Hill, CA. All of us went up for the wedding and that left our church here in Mexico very shorthanded. We decided not to run the buses and vans and called it "Faithful Sunday." We encouraged people to walk, hitchhike, ride the public buses etc. Of course this left most of our Sunday School children without a way to come. Most of our people do not live near the church and I expected that we would have maybe 35 that would be able to get to Sunday School. What a blessing to call down and find out that we had 83 in attendance, almost all teens and adults.

Usually our attendance dips a little this time of the year. But in spite of that we have been seeing the Lord bless. Sunday we had two young married couples follow the Lord in Believer's Baptism. It is a rare thing for us to see both the husband and wife get saved and grow together.

Please keep us in your prayers. This is a busy time of the year for us. We will have two VBS's, our own youth camp, a graduation in our Primary School with two graduates, our annual bus route competition, two groups from the States and two building projects, all this month. Please pray that in all of this we will be able to reach new people with the Gospel.

Please pray for little Juan Carlos, an eight year old boy that was just left with us an hour ago. He had no place in this world. Thank you for helping us so that we can take him in. I just looked out my window and he is on a bicycle contentedly riding across the property with the wind in his face.

Thank you!!

Dear Friends,

Summer is upon us. Every night we can see the thunder clouds and lightning over the Sierra Madre Mountains which means that the monsoon rains will son be here. It will be a blessing to settle the dust. Last week we finished our spring semester in the Bible Institute and graduated three. Our primary and middle schools will go through the end of June because of the time-out for the swine flu. We have shifted into our summer schedule which allows us to focus on some of the details that we have been neglecting during the school year.

It is always exciting to see how the Lord works. Missionary L.H. Ashcraft used to tell me, "Plan your direction and enjoy the adventure of the unexpected turns that God puts in your path." We never planned or intended to start a boy's home. Our plan for the orphanage has been to take in younger children. It would not be wise to take in older boys and have them near the children, or so we reasoned. Nevertheless, one by one the Lord began to bring us boys. The youngest are 12 and the oldest is 17. There are now seven of them. More would like to come.

What a great blessing they have become to us. We are getting them before they get into drugs. They are becoming soul winners and are excited to serve the Lord. All of them have surrendered to preach. They have a place here and an identity. They are still boys and get into mischief, but they have good attitudes, work very hard, expect very little and we love them. I have them in the boy's dorm and when the Institute is in session there is not enough room. Please pray with us that we might be able to build.

I want to give a special thanks to some West Texas Pastors and their Churches: John Lyons, Jack Berg, JJ Leach and Richard Martin, who last month, "delivered us out of the mouth of the lion."

Thank you!!!

Dear Friends,

These last two months have been a time for us to experience God’s mercy and grace in a very constant way. Mike drove our family and Liz, one of our American students, up to the States the 17th of Dec. They headed out after an evening service. At 2:30 in the morning I got a call from Mike telling me that they had an accident. As they were passing a semi they came up on a donkey in their lane. The suburban dropped off the edge of the pavement, lost control and turned on to its side. Cathy flew from the front seat to the back where Liz had been sitting. Liz went out the back window and ended up on the ground. By God’s grace nobody was badly hurt. How the suburban didn’t flip all the way over is a mystery to me. Christy had just strapped our grandson Nick into his car seat. You may have noticed that your last Prayer Letter was in rough shape. It also went through the accident. We praise God for His protection.

All of a sudden God has opened the door for us to begin a Christian School. It is different here in Mexico. The teachers and the school have to be approved by the local Education Office. God sent us Jennifer, a young lady who has helped start 10 schools in the state capital of Hermosillo. With her help our teachers and school have been approved. We have 9 elementary and middle school students from the orphanage and boys dorm who, Lord willing, will start classes next week.

We have had many extra demands on our time and money in the past couple of months. During the week we feed up to 40 children, institute students and workers. God has been faithful to always supply exactly what we need. It has been amazing to see His goodness. Because of the economy we have lost some support, but through all of this we have been able to continue building Bernardino and Fernanda’s little home. If we tried to make it work with a budget, we should not even be able to pay all the bills, much less build. Bernardino is a hard worker and has many responsibilities in the Church and Institute. Fernanda is coming from Guaymas and will help lift some of Cathy’s workload. They will be married the 28th.

We are having a great semester in the Institute with 27 students. Seventeen are full-time. We have averaged 144 in Sunday School so far this year and baptized 4 last month.

We Praise God for you and want to thank you for your sacrifice to help our people!

Dear Friends,

We ran out of coffee! I walked over to the dining hall a few minutes ago, a little before 7:00 am, to borrow some. The fog from all the irrigation around us is lifting and the wood smoke from the neighbors around us cooking breakfast is mixing with the mist. It is a cold morning for us, 48 degrees. The students are gathering in the dining hall for morning devotions where it is about the same temperature as outside (only 3 walls). They, as always, are in good spirits, joking and laughing. Most of them are new Christians. Christy is in the kitchen frying scrambled eggs and hot dogs, on of the favorite breakfasts. Liz, an American student, just ran down to the village store for fresh tortillas. We are all a little extra excited because tomorrow is the last day of classes. The students have 5 finals today and we will have the Christmas party tonight at 8:00. Some of the boys did not have the $4.00 to buy a gift to exchange so I loaned it to them. They will work it off tomorrow. This is good for me because I have a mountain of fill dirt that needs to be shoveled into the tiny new house that we are building (by faith) for Bernardino and his new bride-to-be Fernanda who will be married the end of February. Some of the church ladies were here yesterday all day to make tamales for our Christmas Service the 24th. We were caught off guard two weeks ago when we celebrated our 3rd anniversary as a Church. We prepared for 200and had 338 in Sunday School. We were able to add water to the pozole and nobody knew the difference but this time we plan to be prepared. We are grateful to Pastor Lyons from Odessa, Texas for coming and preaching. He was a GREAT blessing! Well, Micah just drove in to start his class "The History of Israel". I had better close this letter and get around.

We love you and thank you and wish you a very merry Christmas!