Last Wednesday I was in a church service where a visiting pastor was speaking. His sermon was a comparison of Mary and Judas in Mark 14 verses 3-11.

Mary:

• Focused on the most important–worshiping God (Christ). Luke 10:38-42
• Faithful in trials. John 11:21-40
• Forsook her greatest possession. Mark 14:3

Judas:

• Criticized intimate worship. Mark 14:4
• Complained about God’s work. Mark 14:4. 5
• Confided with wicked people. Mark 14:10, 11

What struck me is that while many look at missionaries and think that we are willing to give up many things to go live on a foreign field, most of us don’t see that as a hardship. However, we struggle with giving up some things. Maybe your struggle is the thought of giving up regular electricity, or moving away from family. We do give up those things, but personally my struggles are in giving up things of even lesser value.

I don’t think I fall into the category of a Judas, but I am not sure I am a Mary either. Sure, I am willing to give up some comforts to be a missionary, but am I willing to forsake what I see as materialistically important? I am not sure I am there yet.

Categories: Argentina, Bible, Deaf, Mexico
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I am considering adding some new content to my main website. Many of my readers would know that we are missionaries working with the Deaf. In an effort to connect with our supporters in a greater way, I am considering adding a video and/or an audio podcast**. These will be short updates that will help engage with our supporters and friends. I have no planned regularity in putting out content, but it will be at least one update a month.

The reason for doing a video version is that many of our friends are Deaf. This would allow them to get content in their language while still making it accessible for the hearing. Meaning that I would both sign and speak each one of the updates.

I don’t plan on this being a traditional podcast in that I will provide content that the general public might want to consume. Rather it will be simple, short updates about what is going on with us.

What do you think? I know that those who pray for us would like more regular content so that they know how better to pray. Is this the best way to deliver that content? I have intentionally avoided using my prayer letter mailing list as an “update” medium. I would rather those who are more connected with us go to the website and get that additional information. Do you agree?

**What is meant by “podcast”? This is a format for providing content that the “subscriber” can receive automatically via software that grabs the new information when it is available. All the content will be available at the website to view on-line, but by making it a podcast that simply means that the user could go to one piece of software to consume all the content, i.e., iTunes.

Categories: Argentina, Deaf, Podcasting, Traveling
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Here are the cookies from yesterday. These came from the same place that we got the “Oops… Wrong cookie” from last month. We don’t put much faith in the writers of such clever sayings, but these recent ones have been interesting food for thought.

My fortune: What are you waiting for? Start moving now.

I have been somewhat discouraged by my laziness in exercising and staying in shape. While I am doing much better than most, I definitely know I am not where I should be, nor where I want to be. My fortune yesterday was appropriate in that it gave me a little kick in the pants to get motivated and moving. The last 5 years I have harped on the fact that if you will simply get up and move a little bit more today than you did yesterday, you are taking a step in the right direction to get in shape and be healthier. While I still believe that, I have had trouble motivating myself to stay aggressive in my movement. Maybe this is just what I needed.

My wife’s fortune: Genius is the ability to reduce the complicated to the simple.

As an interpreter (of many things), I am constantly involved in the struggle of making sure something in one language (concept, culture, story) is completely understood in the other language with the same intent and feeling as it had originally. While I don’t know that it takes a genius to transmit information from one medium to another, it certainly is taxing on the mental capacities. When you can take something that is not understood by one person or group and interpret it in such a way that they “get it” then you are displaying an ability that many others do not have.

Categories: Deaf, Traveling, Unrelated News
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The second of our two camps for the Deaf in Mexico starts today. We are expecting 31 (or so) in attendance. This is our third year to do this camp. The first year was a day camp in which we picked up the kids and took them to a location each day. Last year we used the same camp facility that we are using this year. We had 22 campers last year, so to have 30 or more would be a big jump percentage wise.

We will be there for 3 nights. I am the guest speaker this year. Since I have been gone a year (we left a week after camp last year) then I get to be the special guest. I am still doing basically the same things I did last year except I didn’t have to do as much of the planning. Can’t get much better than that. Well, it could. I could be given special napping privileges while everyone else is outside playing in the sun. But, alas, I get to help run the games too.

So, while I have now committed to being a better blogger, I step away from the Internet for a few days. Look forward to some pictures this weekend.

Categories: Bible, Deaf, Mexico
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Yesterday was the end of the camp in Mexico that I have helped direct the last few years. This is also an end of an era. Today we said our goodbyes to the Deaf from the churches in the main part of the Mexican Republic. We are now headed to the Yucatan peninsula to spend a week of camp with them.

We started the week with about 80 campers. This grew all week with our final count up to 95. That is a good number landing right in our average range of campers. I am always amazed as to how many people come to camp based on how poorly we advertise. Out of the group of missionaries that have mostly been there the last 5 years, only 4 of the group of 10 were able to be there. We had plenty of help and teachers though since we mostly have the pastors and their wives do the teaching.

We probably had 15 people who had never been to camp before. One man from the state of Hidalgo (a new group this year) accepted the Lord as his savior. There were also 2 hearing men who surrendered to service.

Wednesday was our “battle day.” We had a dog bite, a lady step on a nail, a man get stomach cramps bad enough to justify an emergency room visit. There were three trips to the doctor for various reasons. Dissension in the camp among 2 groups grew to a head, however, as camp director I did not know anything about it until late that night. I was able to resolve it, in a way, on Thursday morning. While it seemed everything might fall apart on Wednesday, that was the day that the one man was saved. Everything worked out fine by Friday. I think we were all friends again by the time we parted ways.

Friday I was asked if I could take 3 people to the bus station. This is the first year that I have not been in a hurry to get away from camp. I got everyone off and started the trip to the bus station. My 3 had grown to 10. I took them and they said that there were still 7 more that needed a ride. I returned for the next group to find out that there were 9 more after that. On three trips to the buses I hauled 26 people in my van with only 3 seats. The back end was full of luggage. Only in Mexico can you pack 9 people at a time in 3 seats.

We took our time getting away from camp since we have no particular time schedule to get anywhere. The only town on our route that was of any size was only 1 hour away. We got into town in search of a hotel that had certain amenities. I turned down one hotel because of not having all we wanted. Every other hotel we found was full to capacity. I finally returned to the first place (almost 2 hours later) and they only had one room left, but their Internet connection was out. I have already been a week without Internet and if I am taking the next few days like they were a vacation, I really want some communication abilities.

The reason all the hotels are full has to do with this being the weekend between the 2 big summer vacation weeks in Mexico. We are also in La Huasteca region. It would be like Yellowstone NP to US citizens.

We finally found a hotel that had a room available. Our casual evening in town to relax and eat at a fancy restaurant and get some reading done ended up with us grabbing a greasy chicken from a grocery store and eating it in our room at 9:30 at night. Rarely is anything as easy as it seems it should be.

Categories: Deaf, Mexico, Traveling
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