{"id":767,"date":"2012-05-24T23:54:34","date_gmt":"2012-05-25T04:54:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.vitwministries.com\/wordpress\/?p=767"},"modified":"2012-05-24T23:54:34","modified_gmt":"2012-05-25T04:54:34","slug":"safe-in-cd-valles-mexico-again","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.vitwministries.com\/wordpress\/2012\/05\/safe-in-cd-valles-mexico-again\/","title":{"rendered":"Safe in Cd. Valles, Mexico Again"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Elephant Ears in our patio garden<\/p><\/div>\n

Well, I knew that it was bad, but I had no idea how bad it really was! It has been more than two months since I have last posted a blog. I could do a song and dance and try to get some pity, but I know that would be as good as useless. So, without belaboring the issue, I will begin tout suite.<\/p>\n

Theresa and I are back in Cd. Valles, having arrived back on Sunday evening after a wonderfully uneventful crossing into Mexico, and an equally quiet trip from the border to our place yet once again.<\/p>\n

But let me first bring you up to date on events that happened back in Canada while we were there. As I reread my last blog again, I realize that I left everyone very much in the dark during the past two months. I apologize.<\/p>\n

As you will remember, we returned to Canada for an unexpected visit due to my father\u2019s deteriorated health. At the time it looked like he was unlikely to live too much longer, and we did not wish to return simply for a funeral. When we arrived back in Manitoba on the 23rd<\/sup> of March he was not doing well at all. He had recently been discharged from the hospital, and was surrounded by caring family and friends.<\/p>\n

Theresa and I were able to spend almost every day with my parents while we were in Manitoba, and we were overjoyed to watch my father make a slow, but very steady return to health. He is single-handedly keeping the pharmaceutical companies in business, but he is doing very well.<\/p>\n

During his very near brush with death and his subsequent recovery, my dad has had a rekindling of fire in his spiritual bones. He is actively declaring, praying for, proclaiming, and believing for revival in God\u2019s Body – particularly across the north of Canada. He has always been a good communicator and letter writer. Now, however, this is his burning passion. He is in communication with friends, church leaders, acquaintances from over the years, as well as First Nations Chiefs and community leaders, calling for unity and revival amongst Christ\u2019s Body, the Church. As I watched him write his letters I often thought of him as the Apostle Paul who also spent many hours in his later years writing letters. We can be extremely thankful for these letters as well since they make up a large portion of the New Testament in the Bible.<\/p>\n

By the time that the end of April came around we felt that both of my folks were doing well, and we had their blessing to leave and return to our work in Mexico. We made several stops on the southward journey promoting the work of the ministry, and arrived back at the border of Mexico on the 17th<\/sup> of May.<\/p>\n

We arrived back to a very, very warm welcome \u2013 both figuratively and literally. Before I sat down to the computer I checked today\u2019s stats on my little weather station \u2013 it read as follows for today:<\/p>\n

Outside temperature<\/p>\n

Maximum:\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 106.5\u00b0\u00a0 (41.4\u00b0 C)<\/p>\n

Minimum:\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0 81.3\u00b0\u00a0 (27.4\u00b0 C)<\/p>\n

Inside Temperature (ie., our living room)<\/p>\n

Maximum:\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0 99.5\u00b0\u00a0 (37.5\u00b0C)<\/p>\n

Minimum:\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0 85.2\u00b0\u00a0 (29.6\u00b0C)<\/p>\n

And it is not nearly hitting the top yet.<\/p>\n

It is \u201clovingly\u201d claimed that it reaches 45\u00b0 – 55\u00b0 Celsius or more (113\u00b0 – 131\u00b0 Fahrenheit) in Valles at the peaks. Honestly, I don\u2019t doubt it, but sometimes I do think that the temperatures are taken in a cheating fashion. In all reality, temperatures need to be taken in the shade (as are mine), and not in the sun as this will skew the temperatures due to the direct rays. Nonetheless, when one cannot possibly step onto concrete or soil barefooted without badly burning your feet, and when it feels like one is breathing hot air out of an oven, except that it is dripping with humidity, is it hot however you cut it. Thank God for a little window air conditioner unit in our bedroom. This makes nights tolerable, even if not cool. In my years here before I had air conditioning it was almost insufferably hot, making it difficult to get any sort of a good sleep at all. Now it is much better at night. The days still do take some getting used to, especially when there is no escape.<\/p>\n

The sugarcane looks wonderful! God has blessed us with good moisture after our initial desperate pleas last year. He has answered our prayers, and things are looking good now. If he continues to bring us the much-needed rains, this will be a good harvest year indeed. Praise the Lord!<\/p>\n

We are gearing up for village outreach again. We brought our little trailer down from Texas this time. Tomorrow I hope to buy 30 chairs that we will use with the video ministry in the villages. The trailer will be used to haul the chairs and ministry equipment. We are putting a team together of like-minded people from various denominational backgrounds, and with various giftings. On Monday we hope to begin ministering directly into the surrounding villages of the Huasteca region \u2013 especially among the Tenek indigenous groups.<\/p>\n

Theresa is again getting prepared to begin ministering to the women with sewing classes. Already there is a steady stream of women arriving at the door to find out when classes begin. Theresa\u2019s fingers will not be still for long, and there will be many women ministered to through her talents. She is also already booked to help prepare puppets and other props for the extensive Summer Bible School programs for the children. Once again, she will be kept very busy there.<\/p>\n

It seems like we have not yet had time to breath since we arrived back. There is always mission \u201dbusiness\u201d to take care of, meetings to hold, bank accounts to take care of, things to arrange, etc. But then, how is this different to your life? I guess it isn\u2019t. Maybe the one exception is that I am now struggling with an overgrowth of weeds on the land again in 106\u00b0 heat. That may be one difference that we have. However, I hope to get the tractor fired up very soon, and utilize some \u201cmodern technology\u201d rather than that of a machete and gasoline \u201cWeed Eater\u201d to cut down a field of two-foot tall grass and weeds.<\/p>\n

But, it is to bed with me for tonight. It has been a long and strenuous day. Tomorrow is another day, and there will be more blogs to follow (hopefully without such a long wait in between).<\/p>\n

Blessings,<\/p>\n

Steven and Theresa<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Well, I knew that it was bad, but I had no idea how bad it really was! It has been more than two months since I have last posted a blog. I could do a song and dance and try to get some pity, but I know that would be as good as useless. So, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vitwministries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/767"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vitwministries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vitwministries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vitwministries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vitwministries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=767"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.vitwministries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/767\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":770,"href":"https:\/\/www.vitwministries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/767\/revisions\/770"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vitwministries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=767"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vitwministries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=767"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vitwministries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=767"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}