A little over a week ago Peluchi and I passed Verro (who we built for last march) in the street and she told us she was having some electrical problems with her lights. We stopped by her house later and found that her outdoor light wouldn’t work for a while after rain because the tin roof overhang did not sufficiently cover it. This light was above a door and Verro mentioned that in addition to the light problems, when it rained water fell close enough to the door that it would splash under it and get in the house.

So Peluchi and I said we would return the next day to fix it. I found a large PVC pipe in our tool room that was the right length to make a guttering above the door. So we cut about a quarter of the pipe out length-wise and attached it to rafters so that it would serve as a gutter to the tin.

At least that was our intention. I’ve learned with roofs here that is best to test things before you leave and so we dumped a bucket of water on the roof. It shot over our gutter at first and then started running into the PVC. Then Peluchi and I discussed if rain was going to have the force of the bucket drop’s first wave or not. Either way, we thought the light (which was under the PVC) and the doorway would be protected. But then I noticed the light had water droplets on it and I realized that as the wave lowered and it first came in contact with the PVC it ran along the outer edge and dropped on the light. Our main priority was that the light would stay dry, so we scrounged around on the corner of Verro’s family’s property (which they’ve made their own personal landfill). We found some durable plastic and cut out a square of it. Then we tied it with wire above the PVC right above the lights so water would hop that whole section. But now our gutter, which had looked decent, was pretty ugly. Also I wondered how long the wire would hold before rusting.

We brought Verro out to take a look before we left and she obviously was a little disappointed in how it looked. Later that day I started to wonder if we should have done a better job. As I thought it over I got the crazy idea of putting a car floor mat on the roof and bending it into the PVC pipe, thereby capping the flow of water. I somehow thought the floor mat would not be visible from below and thus look better. So the next day Peluchi and I went all over Pesqueria and Croc looking for someone to sell us a floor mat.  After an hour or two we finally found one, but upon arriving at Verro’s house I realized it would look just as ugly and I didn’t think it would work. We decided to go to Pesqueria and buy a larger PVC pipe. We retested the water and figured we needed a six inch wide pipe (our previous one had been three). But in Pesqueria they only had up to four inch sizes. On the way back to Croc we passed an open lot that had a lot of random junk in it. Peluchi noticed some gutters and said he knew the guy that owned them. Peluchi went and talked to the neighbors and was able to get a hold of the owner of the lot. We waited and in about fifteen minutes he came and sold us the gutter.

We put this up and it worked great. Who knew using the products made for the job could make things so much easier!

While we were working at Verro’s house her two children (Vanessa and Juanito) wanted a lot of attention. I gave them some while we worked, but figured Peluchi and I should return for a real visit later. So we returned a couple of nights later with peanut butter cookies.

It had been a while since I visited this family, but I quickly remembered how difficult of a situation it is. Vanessa, who is nine, has disease that severely limits her motor skills. Juanito, who is five, is a super high energy. Vanessa demands so much of Verro’s attention that she has little left for Juanito—who would be a handful all by himself.  Jesus, Verro’s husband, lives there but works a lot. He is somewhat passive but does help.

Anyway, the night Peluchi and I show up Jesus is still at work, but things start off pretty good. I feed Vanessa cookies while playing trucks with Juanito. Peluchi keeps a conversation going with Verro. Everyone is happy. Then I ask Juanito what he did today and it lights a powder keg. Apparently he stayed home all day because he refused to go to Kindergarten and Verro is still upset at him. Now if you are thinking to yourself that Verro should have stronger discipline with Juanito and not let him win out in that kind of situation, you’re in the same situation as I was. Except for I was dumb enough to voice my thoughts and start giving advice.

Peluchi joined in and we start talking about how it is important to make your children respect the parent’s authority. Verro strongly agrees with us and starts being very strict with Juanito as if to show us that she already knows all that. He gets upset and hits her, which starts us lecturing Juanito. Which makes Juanito more upset. Now by this time we are done with the cookies and Vanessa is playing with me with a couple of the trucks. Juanito swipes the trucks out of her hands. Verro starts trying to get the trucks back. The whole family is in an uproar.

Peluchi and I stay for a few more minutes, but I realize by that point our presence is making things more high stress. So we pray with the family and go.

I don’t quite know why I shared this long story about Verro’s family, a lot of other things went on this week. But this one has been on my mind. Problems aren’t easy here. Perhaps real problems aren’t easy anywhere and surely advice is not the answer to most of them.

After I made the recording yesterday morning, Jovani stopped by and informed me that he had read Mark 1 and wanted his coke. (The day before he had asked for a bible he saw on the shelf. I asked what for, are you going to read it. He said yes, so I put a bookmark in Mark and told him each time he read a chapter and came and talked to me about it I would buy him a coke). I invited him in and asked him what happened in the chapter. “Someone put someone in water” and “a guy wore clothes made out of camel hair”. As I flipped open the Bible I saw all this was in the first paragraph so I prodded somemore. With a couple of hints thrown in he was able to summarize the whole chapter and the start of the next. We went out and bought him some chips (I offered to get those instead of a coke because it seemed to early to me to drink coke). Later we walked the sheep (who has about finished off all the grass in my yard) over to Amber’s yard together and then Jovani went home after telling me he would read Mark 2 and want cokes soon.

I’m heading back to the States tomorrow (though I won’t be in blue springs till the 22nd, I’m catching a ride with Rodolfo’s family to Dallas and will stay with them a couple of nights) and always before I leave town I feel like I have a ton to wrap up. This time was no different and so today was a busy day.

Last night Peluchi and I finished up the twenty little chairs I mentioned in the last post. I asked Umberto if I could go with him to give the chairs and also to see the church there (there is no building, right now they meet outside and would like us to build them a room this spring–so today I was also trying to determine if that was a better use of one of our spring groups than doing a house). So this morning Umberto and Myrta picked Peluchi and me up at my house and we loaded up the little benches and went with them out to a tiny town about thirty minutes away from Croc. It was raining and at first not very many people were there for church. But soon bundled up people started coming out of their houses to greet us. They all seemed impressed with the little chairs. (Most of all little Lupita, who is pictured above, she warmed up to Peluchi and I right away and was ecstatic about the benches. Peluchi and I discussed latter how wonderful a blessing she had been to us.) We took about half the chairs to the adult service and then were invited to look in on the kid service (both were meeting in homes today because of rain).

The kids repeated a prayer with their teacher to start the service, during which they thanked God that we brought them the benches. I asked to speak to the kids and told them about how important kids are to Jesus because they have faith and their hearts are close to his. Then I told them Peluchi and I enjoy constructing things and when we heard kids at this church didn’t have a place to sit we were excited to get a chance to serve kids. I concluded by telling them we all should think about the things we like to do and then try to figure out a way to love people with those things.

Then we went over to the adult service. They started with testimony time and one lady shared how generous God had been with her after she had been generous with others and lots of people chimed in that they had learned that too. The pastor held out her hand and explained that when we have open hands others can receive from us and God can put things in our hands, but when we close our hands we don’t only stop giving to others but God stops giving to us. I agree with the analogy (to a point, if you carry it too far you get a formula for how to manipulate God but that’s not where they were going), but I was blown away by such poor people have such an excitement about giving and that the majority of the group seemed to understand Christian generosity.

Then they asked Umberto to preach, then we sang a song and prayed. Lastly they gave us all tacos. It was a great service. It was such a blessing to get to see my work helping these brothers and sisters in Christ who may have very high places in the Kingdom of Heaven (while there and they were all thanking us so much I thought about James 1:9-10 “The brother in humble circumstances ought to take pride in his highposition. But the one who is rich should take pride in his low position, because he will pass away like a wild flower.” and how I was the one in the low position.

And James 2: 5 “Listen, my dear brothers: Has not God chosen those who are poor in the eyes of the world to be rich in faith and to inherit the kingdom he promised those who love him?”)

I think I may build them some more chairs when I get back (there were still some people standing today and numbers were way down because of the rain), but I don’t know if we will build them a structure. For one they don’t own any of the land they’re on (its government owned and they are squatting so whatever is built has a good chance of being torn down in few years), but also I didn’t really see anything wrong with meeting in some of the members’ houses if the weather was bad.

Once we got back to Croc Peluchi and I took the two chairs Jason, Peluchi, and I had started last August. (They had sat in the corner of the tool room as

I waited for a tool I ordered so I could firm them up a bit. Then I got the tool when Jon Stephanoff arrived, but things have been busy enough to keep me from the chair until this week when I decided I had to get them done by Christmas. I added some support both under the seat and a cross at each leg. With these additions the chair really firmed up. Then I sanded the seat and back

and they were ready to go.) So Peluchi and I went out to Vayas–a town next to Croc–and gave the chairs to Tomas and Lorena (you may remember their baby Krystal had the brain blood vessel problems and has had to have a lot of doctor attention). The family never had real chairs when Peluchi and I would visit and so I chose them to give the chairs to. It had unfortunately been at least two months since we had last visited them, but they were happy to see us and were really impressed with the chairs. Lorena talked about how pretty they were (I found this amusing as I thought about how I think Jason feels them to be pretty ugly) and Tomas wants to come over some time and learn how to work with wood better. We also found out Krystal is doing pretty well. She is growing well and is getting stronger in her feet (though her leg coordination is behind).

Then I parted ways with Peluchi for a bit and fulfilled my promise to Jovani to make banana bread with him before I left. We played Uno and Double Trouble while the bread baked. Jovani tried to cheat quite a bit on Double Trouble. Once for the win he tried to lie about where his piece started and I had to call him out on it and really be hard on him to get him to admit he lied. He won that game in the end anyways, which I think now was for the best for him to see it was better to win without cheating (to be honest at the time though I wasn’t letting him win, I was a little frustrated by the cheating).

We made two loafs; Jovani took one to his family and I took the other with me to go visit Idolina and Julio. I picked up Peluchi on the way and we stopped in and had a long talk with Idolina (Saturday is Julio’s only day off, but he and their daughter were both taking naps). We talked about doing a Bible study when I get back into town. Julio woke up just as we were about to leave and we chatted with him for a few minutes.

Finally I made arrangements with Peluchi to care for the sheep while Rodolfo and I are gone. Now all I have to do is a little packing for the trip.

I will be taking a break from the blog while I am gone from Croc (in KC Dec 22-25, Springfield MO Dec 26-Jan 2ish, back in KC till Jan 7ish).

Merry Christmas everyone!

[Top]Angeles cooking a hotdog when here family came over for a visit. (She borrowed my sweatshirt as the night got colder.

[Left]After taking a picture of Angeles, Norma insited on getting in one too.

I only alluded to the carpentry project I am working on but here is a picture:

There are a couple of missionaries that Umberto knows who have started a church in a small town near us. Right now though at their church service is outside and the children don’t have anywhere to sit. I had originally planned to make full benches, but Umberto came up with this basic design because the missionaries don’t have anywhere to store the chairs onsite. They want them to be small and light. I’m shooting for making about twenty simple chairs by this Saturday when I am going out there with Umberto to see the ministry first hand.

It has been an exciting week here in Croc. As I think I mentioned last week my roommate Rodolfo and I decided to get a sheep so we could stop cutting our grass with a machete. In preparation, the two of us and Peluchi worked on fencing in the front of our yard and got things finished on tuesday. On Wednesday we went down to Jesus and Angelica’s house to buy their sheep (a little black female, one year old). Jesus (Jr), who is two or three, started wailing once he realized Rodolfo and I were going to take the sheep with us; it made me feel super sad.

But the sheep has been an awesome addition to the house. She mostly just eats, but she has some hilarious mannerisms and although she seems fairly indifferent to your presence while you are next to her, she will run and wail for you if you walk away from her–she hates being left alone.

Also I got the chance to visit with several families this week. One of them even asked Peluchi and I to start a Bible Study with them, which I think is going to be great!

As well Jovani (the 8 year old who lives up the street from me) and I have had a lot of chances to hang out. He has recently got into a checkers so we have been playing that a lot. A few days ago he brought over his slingshot (which today when I was at his house I notice had been cut in two–he explained he shot a rock at a car and his mom destroyed it) and Peluchi, he and I had a target contest that ended with us on my roof shooting across my yard at the target. Yesterday he saw me in the street carrying several books and stopped playing marbles with friends to help me carry my load to my house. Rodolfo was sitting out on our patio and I wanted a snack so I brought some tostados and salsa out. The three of us had a little feast and as I was talking to Jovani I asked him what was his favorite part of his day, what was the coolest thing that had happened. He paused for a moment and then said, “This”. Then after a few more minutes of conversation he went back to catch up on his marble game.

Today He and another boy, Chewito stopped by and we started taking turns at checkers. After a while I offered that we could all go to the church and make cookies. Almost as soon as we got to the staff quaters (I still cook there because Rodolfo and I’s oven doesn’t really work) I turned my back for a moment as I was putting some dishes away and as I turned around I noticed Jovani had slipped something into his pocket. I asked him what he had as Chewito is yelling, “it’s tickets” sure enough he had stolen a wad of our after school program tickets (which can be used in a prize store we have). And so I had to chew him out a little and send him home. Later today he came back by my house and we had another little talk about what he had done and then I let him go with me around town as I did some errands.

There are ups and downs with Jovani, and I try to be very firm and immediate with him when he steps out of line, but then also to be welcoming to him when I can. He gets into a lot of trouble at school and I think just about everywhere and he doesn’t have a good family situation.

Tomorrow I will be heading back to the States for about a week for ThanksGiving. And while I’m there I will be able to get ahold of a usb cord for my camera and put up some photos of the sheep!

Please be in prayer for Pepe (who we built for last spring). He has several tumors and the doctors say he won’t make it long. His family is with him now and Rodolfo has been spending a lot of time with him too.

 

The passage I refer to in the audio blog as being in Leviticus is actually:

Deuteronomy 22:1-4

 ¹ If you see your brother’s ox or sheep straying, do not ignore it but be sure to take it back to him. ² If the brother does not live near you or if you do not know who he is, take it home with you and keep it until he comes looking for it. Then give it back to him. ³ Do the same if you find your brother’s donkey or his cloak or anything he loses. Do not ignore it.

 ⁴ If you see your brother’s donkey or his ox fallen on the road, do not ignore it. Help him get it to its feet.

I know it has been a little too long since my last post. A lot has been going on: Jon shadowed me in work for about a week in Croc, then most of the YouthFront Mexico staff (including myself) went back to KC for meetings at our main office and then to Cincinnati for this year’s CCDA (Christian Community Development Association) conference, and now I am spending a few days with my family in Blue Springs. I will be heading back to Croc with the rest of the staff on Halloween.

I can’t cover all of even the big details of the past two or three weeks, but I do want to share a couple of stories:

First Jon, Peluchi, and I went to visit Julio and Idolina’s house a couple of nights before I left Croc. Idolina cooked eggs and chicaron (a spicy sausage which was one of Jon’s favorite new foods in Mexico) with flour tortillas. It was delicious. I made some chocolate chip and also some chocolate-chocolate chip cookies (I was finishing up the dough of the latter) for desert. All that great food helped set the stage for great conversation (this might be a maxim to live by). In previous conversations we had talked, particularly with Idolina, about spiritual things, but this night we got into deep discussions that included Julio. I think the connection with and opening up of Julio started when I shared that Peluchi and I understood we couldn’t change anyone (Peluchi had been talking about how we are open to having spiritual conversations but don’t want to force that to be the only topic). I went on to say that we didn’t need to force conversation because God had given each person a free will to decide what they thought about God and that only Christ and the individual had the power to change that individual. I could see in Juilo’s eyes he really bought into that idea. As the night went on we talked about all sorts of things, from sports to movies to thoughts on praying to saints. Typically towards the end of a visit Peluchi and I pray for the family, but Nathan’s cancer (which I mentioned a post or two ago) was on my mind and so I asked if we could all pray together for Nathan and for their requests. Both Idolina and Julio didn’t want to pray, but I think that I had asked for their help praying for Nathan was impactful and Idolina soon agreed to pray (before we left Peluchi made Julio promise to pray next time we came; Peluchi is definately more forward than I would be, but perhaps God has us together for our tandem of approaches). As we were about to go both of the couple excitedly wanted to know when we could come back, I told them we could come in a couple of weeks, as soon as I got back from the States.

Second, while at CCDA in Cincinnati a couple of the YouthFront Kansas City staff and I were sitting at a table near an open square downtown. An African-American man in his fifties named Jerry asked us for a light and then accepted an invitation to join us. We talked for a couple of hours with him. We asked a lot of questions and got to hear a little of his story: his apartment had been foreclosed last Wednesday and he had chosen to live on the street rather than move in with his sister (her talking was worse than the cold according to Jerry, though he remarked that if the current cold streak continued he might not still be saying that the following night). He had lived on the streets before–six months being the longest single stent. Jerry currently had a job at a Catholic ministry to the homeless. He grew up in Cincinnati, then moved to Atlanta for a while but hadn’t liked it so he moved back. He had been in jail once. He wants to get married and recently met a lady he likes. He grew up in the 60’s and said he was pretty radical. He regrets that in his youth he hated white people. He has since changed, but he thinks there are a lot of powerful forces working in society to hurt the black community. He was very passionate about the Willy Lynch letters ( http://www.finalcall.com/artman/publish/Perspectives_1/Willie_Lynch_letter_The_Making_of_a_Slave.shtml )and how insane the systematic evil found in them was (they cover a speech during the early American colonies about how to control slaves by breaking down family structure, breeding mistrust/division amongst blacks, and viewing them like horses to be broken). Jerry convinced us to go and read them and they were disturbing. We also talked about drugs and he shared how problems had improved in Cincinnati over the last 20-30 years. He believes this is the case all over the country because drugs have become more scarce and thus prices have gone up and quality has gone down. In response, according to Jerry, many people have gotten off drugs. And he attributes all this to the war on drugs. I was surprised to be hearing all these positive views on the war on drugs–because typically all I hear is that drug problems are awful and getting worse and the war on drugs isn’t working. I’m not saying Jerry single-handedly convinced me that all my previous notions on drugs in the States are wrong, but it got me thinking about a similar scenario I have experienced in the past several years: with the war in Iraq I also have no first-hand experience and I hear a lot of negative reports in the media. And a few times I have had the chance to hear firsthand reports on Iraq from returning soldiers. On a couple of occasions these reports were by far more positive than any media report I had heard and covered details I had not considered. Again, it didn’t totally change my idea of what was happening in Iraq, but I began to realize the need to add to my knowledge all firsthand reports I could because they were very valid and a critical piece of the truth. Talking to Jerry I realized that I need to seek out hearing people’s personal stories and experiences in regards to race with just as much fervor. Because just like Iraq, I have read a lot about race struggles in the States, but I haven’t heard many nonwhite firsthand accounts–and they are powerful, critical pieces of the truth.

There was more at CCDA that helped open my eyes to my need to hear and listen to different peoples’ experiences, but I can’t go into it all here. But Jerry, more than anyone else, helped me learn this lesson.

Please be in prayer for Jerry and that he will be able to get off the cold streets, for our staff’s trip back to Mexico this weekend, and for Peluchi and I’s visit with Idolina and Julio this week. Thanks.

Listen to Jon and I share about the rest of our trip:

A couple of weeks ago in an audio post I said I would put up a link to Jon and I’s first traveling adventure (Hitch Hiking to Corpus Christi, TX) but I forgot to put it in the post. Here you go:  http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2085444&id=34314336&l=9447bf48d7