Mission work

This is one of those lonesome roads that we would take to a countryside village. The beauty of God's creation never fails to stir my heart.

Always be ready to answer God's call, Acts 9:6 Lord, what will thou have me to do?

For the past several months I had been putting off making a trip to Sierra Vista, Az. and then on to Nogales, Mexico. This past week I convinced myself that I should get this trip out of the way.

On Tuesday morning the 9th I left Albuquerque Sunport on Southwest Airlines and flew to Los Angeles and then back to Tucson. (Strange flight pattern - no, when you fly free you take whatever gets you there.) In Tucson I rented a car and drove to Sierra Vista, AZ. There I spent the night and the next morning with the help of a friend we made the trip to Nogales, Mexico to deliver a van to one of our Mexican pastors who had ridden the bus up from Alamos, Mexico where Ginger and I had served as missonaries for 11 years. This aged van (1996) was donated to our work in Mx and it had been a faithful friend for all those Mexico years. It allowed us to ferry special education students to school each day and provide transportation to folks wanting to attend church as well as delivering food boxes for 11 years to our needy families in Alamos.

A Mexican pastor Matias is a very dear friend of ours and one of the most dedicated workers for the Lord that I have ever known. This man is one of the men whom you may remember us referring to as the "Lazarus Brothers" He is one of those workers who has truly denied himself, taken up his cross and followed Jesus wherever he leads. The van was truly needed for his ministry work there in Mexico. Many small mountain villages which have no church receive the message of Jesus Christ from this dedicated man of God. It was truly a blessing to get to see him and enjoy fellowship with him although it was only for a short time. When I think of this man who has forsaken all the comforts of life as we know them and totally dedicates his life, body, soul and Spirit to serving the Lord it makes me wonder how many of us would be willing to do the same for our Lord and Savior. Let's pray that the van continues to serve our Lord for many more years.

There are many pastors in Mexico who love and serve our Lord in just the same way as Hermano (brother) Matias and everyone of them should be very precious to us. I would ask all of you to please lift them up in prayer each and every day.

The Stanley Union Church is very generous in their financial support of our Mexico mission work. I would like to say a big thank you to the church for allowing Ginger and I the time to visit with our Mexican pastors two or three times a year as it is wonderful to visit with them and see first hand the work that God is doing through these wonderful God fearing men.

Please remember them in your prayers.

Stanley Singers

This is a snapshot of our new singing group. This was a practice session Sunday before last. Yesterday (Sunday 7th) was their debut for the congregation. They sang Amazing Grace. I'm not a singer so I can't render a professional judgement but it sounded good to this old southern gospel ear. Channah Edwards is the director and pianist for the group.


Nancy Shiver gave a short history of Amazing Grace and John Newton who wrote it. I knew he was a slave ship captain before being saved. Newton later became a curate in the Church of England. God surely knew what he was doing when he gave inspiration to its writing and for it being passed down through history over for over two hundred years. It has and will continue to bless and move us all. Praise God.


We have a wonderful video entitled, Amazing Grace. It was a PBS documentary by Bill Moyers. It aired back in the late '80s. I was able to order from the PBS store. Recently I tried to order it on DVD but learned it was no longer available. I have asked a friend to copy the video to DVD format. Hopefully he will do so soon.

Glorifying God

As I was talkng to the Lord in prayer this morning I felt lead to post this note. There are times when we get so busy with our own daily schedules that we forget to give sufficient time to worshiping God.

We all need to remember that Isaiah 43:7 reminds us that we were created for God's glory. Psalms 86:12 says that we are to glorify his name forevermore.

In Matt 5:14 God says, that we as individuals and the church, are the light of the world. A city that is set on an hill cannot be hidden. Matt 5:16 says, we are to let our light so shine before men, that they may see our good works, and glorify our father, who is in heaven.

In 1 Thes 5:19 we are commanded by God to not quench the Spirit. If we go through our life quenching the Holy Spirit we will never be lead to glorify God in the way that he desires. Since we were created for God's glory and to be used for his will, the bible tells us in 1st Cor 6: 20, we are to glorify God in our body and in our spirit which belong to God. We were bought with a price, the precious blood of Jesus Christ that flowed from the Cross at Calvary. We are not our own, we belong to God. So let us all forget about ourselves, put Jesus first, and glorify God in everything we do.