This Mission of Love

It is not really in my nature to solicit financial support. That sounds a bit odd considering that when I started working for Amor that was the only way I was going to earn a paycheck. But it is true I have never been very comfortable at asking for money. It is probably the reason I am so bad at fund raising. But, that is exactly what I am going to do.

Over the years Amor has gradually changed the way I have been paid so that now I don’t have to rely on your financial gifts to maintain a steady income. Unfortunately, I have to admit that that has made me lazy in my support raising. Like I said I was never very good at it and I relied heavily on my wife to supplement my pay in order to get by. But now that my pay does not fluctuate with the gifts you supply I really have let my responsibility for fund raising slide. As a result those that support me have dwindled to a faithful few.

You see, even though I now have a fixed salary the money for that salary needs to be raised by the ministry. Amor allows us to raise support to supplement our income an additional 10% to encourage us to continue raising support to cover our salaries. It should be easier for me to do. I no longer have to try to get people to support and to partner with me. Instead I get to ask people to join the efforts of a ministry that I truly believe in.

I love this ministry. I have loved it from the time I went on that first mission trip. I loved it the day I joined the team, and I love it eight years later. Why you may ask. Well, I have a one word answer to that question, “hope”. There are many things that Amor does and many of them are never seen by our participants. We are not just a house building ministry. We are a ministry that serves a group of pastors the likes of whose faithfulness is rare to come by. It is through these men and women that God offers hope to not only the physically poor but also to those poor spiritually.

I have also had the honor of seeing so many people, who come to serve by building homes, find hope in a world that seems filled with greed and selfishness. Hope that the world can see real change when injustice is so rampant.

So if you are so inclined please join us in this mission of hope. Really that word should be love. For it is out of God’s love that we have found hope and it is out this hope that that we find the strength to love. So if you are inclined to join us in this mission of love. Please do so.

You can donate online at: http://www.amor.org/give

If you what to support me specifically you can do so online here: https://www.amor.org/SSLPage.aspx?pid=444

Graduation

1991 was the year I graduated from high school. I had dreams of becoming a famous well-paid graphic artist. And while I did eventually start a career in that field, God obviously had other plans for my life. 19 years later I watched as my son Robert received his diploma and my hopes for him are very different than hopes I had for myself at his age. His dreams are similar to the dreams I held then. He aspires to become a famous and well-paid surgeon. I would like nothing more than to see him reach his dream, but if I could I would change his focus from fame and riches to honoring God and serving others.

This year continues to test our resolve and trust in God (just so you know God is still winning our trust). As you know the past two years have brought many trials our way. This year has been no exception. Least of which has been the troubles afflicting the city of Juarez. It seems that family issues are much more difficult to bear especially when you realize you are no longer able to make the choices for your loved ones but have to watch them find their own way.

Three days ago Robert graduated from high school. Two days ago we held his graduation party. We showered him with gifts and held a feast in his honor. To the best of our ability we gave him our blessing to go into this world and be all that God has made him to be. Yesterday he left for Louisiana where he will be living with his grandparents while he attends Louisiana State University. It has been a very difficult process over the last few months, him trying hard to assert himself as an adult and us trying so hard to hold on to our child. When he told us a few weeks ago that he had decided not to return home after his student orientation I was both proud of him and sad at the same time. Time slipped away so quickly, something that when I was his age I had no understanding of, and now I feel like a spectator watching from the stands cheering on my team when I used to be the coach showing him how it was done.

We attended church yesterday before he left. Our church meets in downtown El Paso at a coffee shop, and every other week we hand out burritos to the homeless that are around the area. We had a lot of food leftover from the graduation party and only Jackie would be home for the next two weeks to eat it. I will be away working on the San Carlos Apache Reservation in Arizona. And we sent Danielle with Robert to visit her grandparents and see her brother off. So we had a lot of food left that would only go bad. So I took the left over rolls, brisket, and turkey and made sandwiches to hand out around downtown. As the others attended the service I quickly went about handing out the food. As I did this, I came across an elderly woman that appeared to be sleeping but I could not tell. I laid two sandwiches at her feet unsure if she was even alive. When I returned to church they were in the middle of a message from Matthew chapter 6:25 through 34, in a nutshell, don’t worry. As I sat there I thought about the woman on the street, I wondered how she would feel about that message. That she should not worry. I thought, “Easier said than done, God”. But then I heard the still small voice speaking to my heart. It said, “I fed her today.” And here I was thinking I had done that. As I sat and prayed I realized that this is what I want more than anything for my children that they allow themselves to be used by God.

We love both our children so much. And that love gives us a better understanding how our heavenly father loves us. So we will continue to follow where he leads no matter how hard the road.

Fifteen years ago

Fifteen years ago Jackie was pregnant with my beautiful little girl Danielle, Robert was a cute nearly three-year-old little boy, and I was a young, naïve about just how fragile life is, man trying to make a yellow light before it turned red. I did make the light but in my haste I failed to see the tow truck that was running the red light for the crossing traffic. We entered the intersection in our newly purchased Toyota Tercel and were struck on the driver side door with enough force to spin the car around and push us into the oncoming lanes of the crossing street. Jackie immediately began to panic. It was a hyper ventilating scream that just kept repeating and repeating. Instinct kicked in for me. I looked around and saw that no one was majorly hurt at least not to look at us. But I knew that I had to calm Jackie down. Robert was starting to panic as he listened to his mom’s screams. I had to get out of that car so I could get Robert out. I tried to calm Jackie with little success. I was able to push the mangled door open with the help of someone who stopped to see if we were OK. I pulled Robert out and tried to calm him and then went to attend to his mom and was able to calm her. By then the ambulance was there to take Jackie to the hospital to check to see if Danielle was OK. Up to that point I had not allowed myself to think that anything could possibly be wrong. And as it turned out nothing was. The greatest injury sustained was the glass that imbedded itself in my arm when the driver side door window shattered. And I did not realize that until we were all at the hospital.

So, last Friday when I got the call telling me that my son was taking Danielle to the hospital for appendicitis, instinct kicked in once again. I knew I had to keep everyone calm. Jackie and I were nine hours away in Puerto Peñasco Mexico. I knew that I had to break the news to Jackie in such a way that she would not panic. I was only somewhat successful. I knew I had to take care of some things before I left, had I known just how serious the situation was I am not sure I could have done it. I just would not allow myself the thoughts that anything really bad could happen. We would take care of what we could and get on the road, and that is what we did. It was a long drive home. We had to get updates on Danielle by phone as we drove across Arizona and New Mexico. Danielle suffered a ruptured appendix and under went surgery and we could not get there to hold her hand. I still would not allow myself to think that she would not be alright. I told myself that the doctors handle this kind of thing all the time and she would be OK but that did not help the guilt I felt for not being able to be there. When we got to the hospital the surgery was over and they said everything went well and that she would likely be in the hospital for seven days to recover. So at that point I knew I was right that everything would be OK. But on Thursday nearly a week later, the doctors started to worry. Danielle’s white blood cell count was not coming down. She was taken in for a CT scan and they found two abscesses of infection. They wanted to do what they described as a simple non-surgical invasive radiology procedure, where they would insert catheters into the abscesses to drain the infection. But as I watched and waited outside I realized this was no simple procedure. As I watched Danielle try to recover from the “non” surgery I had no one to keep calm. I had no job to make sure was getting done. And I was having a hard time keeping myself calm, and I finally allowed myself to think about what my Daughter has been going through. I finally realized that I could have easily lost my little girl, and I realized that she had not yet past that threat. She has spent the last 11 days in the hospital and things are really starting to look good. Her white blood cell count has finally started to drop and the doctors think things are looking good. Tomorrow they will take her in for a CT scan to see if all the infections have been taken care of. Then maybe we will get to bring our little girl home.

I did not realize it but I have been doing the same thing for the last year and a half with my work. Trying to keep calm and trying to keep everyone around me calm. It is probably why I have had such a hard time writing any updates to my blog. I am sure most of you know that the situation in Mexico and especially Juarez Mexico has been very bad. Every time I sat down to write anything about it seemed to get worse. I have been trying to trust God that everything will work things out the way he wants. Or at least that he will use what ever happens for good. But I have to face the fact that what God sees as good is not always what I see as good. God could have taken Danielle from me. Things like that happen every day to people all over the world. God can and does use it for good. But I would not have seen it as good. Likewise I am having trouble in seeing how God is using the drug war in Mexico for his good. And for that reason I would write but I would not post because it sounded so negative. I am going to try not to do that anymore. I know that you all have supported me for so many years, through your prayers and through your gifts. I owe it to you to allow you to support me through this as well.

Many things have happened over the past year and a half. Many of you know about them but not all of you. In October 2008 I had to let a friend go that I had worked with for more then six years. Not long before, the violence from the drug war had really started to intensify. In December of 2008 he was dead, a victim of a shooting at a Juarez Gas station. I really struggled with it for quite a long time. In March 2009 the U.S. consulate released a warning that we had no information on and we made the decision to cancel all of the youth mission trips to our Chihuahua field that spring. We did a lot of investigating before we felt comfortable enough to allow groups to start coming back. Then we had the swine flew scare and what groups we did have started to cancel. In the summer of 2009 I drove by a shooting in the Juarez area. I was scared. It only took a few seconds, but I never drove the same way again. My eyes are constantly scanning the road for anything that looks suspicious. By the end of 2009 we had only built ten houses in the Chihuahua field. On a normal year we were building close to two hundred. 2010 started to look up some groups were starting to sign up for spring I was thinking that we might double or even triple the number of houses of 2009. However on the second day of our spring season in Chihuahua there was a shooting not far from our camp. Around the same time there was a shooting in Juarez claiming the lives of people with close ties to the U.S. consulate. The consulate evacuated all U.S. personnel. While our groups were not in danger we felt it was best to do the same. So four houses were left unfinished, and my thoughts of doing more houses this year left with the groups.

There is a good side to all this negative news. There was a donation made enabling our pastors to build seven homes for families that would not be receiving a home due to all of the violence. In light of the work that the pastors were already doing, the groups that were evacuated donated their funds so that the houses could be finished. So, ten houses will be built this year as well and the year is not over yet. Let’s hope God wants to do more. But if that is not what He wants. Let’s hope I am OK with it.

Nobody Gets a Smooth Ride

Nobody gets a smooth ride.
Every child will learn how the asphalt burns
when he takes sharp turn too wide.
Nobody gets a smooth ride.
I'm really sorry the way things are going these days,
try to be careful, that's all I can say

“Nobody Gets a Smooth Ride” The Choir

As it is evident from some of my past post, I find much of my inspiration for these posts from music. I have been listening to the song above for a while now and when I hear it I can’t help but think of the situation that has enslaved Mexico over the past year. What can really be said but that this is a dangerous world and please try to be careful? It has had a major impact on the city of Juarez and the surrounding areas of Chihuahua. This is the place God has put me; it is the people of this area that I have fallen in love with. It pains me to know that because of fear we are unable to pour out Gods blessing on these people.

For some reason in 2007 we were unable to build a home for the Davalos Olague family. In 2008 we saw a large drop in the number of groups due to several factors one of which was the fear that has affected every ministry along the border. So, once again this family of six waited. Our pastors and field reps had to talk to them several times and ask them to be patient and wait on God. Needless to say, that this family as well as a few others became a high priority for us to build for in 2009. Unfortunately, the beginning of 2009 saw the violence in Juarez rise to an all time high. On top of that the swine flu made itself know to the world and Mexico became feared all the more. It was looking as though this family would have to wait even longer. The family told Alfredo Chavez, one of our operations coordinators, that they gave up hope. No one was coming to help. A few years ago our logo consisted of the phrase “Come build hope” and now so few are coming that this family lost all hope. They had made their home in an old eighteen-wheel trailer that must have felt like an oven in the summer and an ice box in the winter.

When we found out that First Baptist Church, Wichita was not going to cancel their trip I wasted no time in assigning them to the Davalos Olague family. This group came to offer hope and they were not going to let anything stop them. Just before their trip their numbers started to decline and they did not know if they could complete the size project that the Davalos Olague family needed. I kept telling them that their numbers were fine for a double even as I watched the numbers slip into what I would normally assign to a single. I just could not tell this family to wait again.

They came and they built that double with a little help from myself and Alfredo. The community leaders were so grateful that they offered to help by escorting the group to and from the worksite every day and by checking in on them through out the day to see that everyone was OK. They understand the fear and want to do all they can to ease that fear. It was one of the most trouble free weeks I have experienced in all my time working for Amor. And best of all after waiting two and half years, A hope lost became a hope restored.

At one of the nightly devotionals this group held we spoke about the situation in Mexico and how it was affecting the blessings that God wants to bestow on people. They were shocked at just how profound it has been. One of the members shared a story of one of his teachers that I will leave you with. He lived in Houston, TX and I believe it was hurricane Rita that was headed straight for them the streets were flooded and all his teachers canceled classes. When he asked his EMT teacher if classes were canceled, the teacher replied “We are EMT’s this is when we go to work”.

The world is a dangerous place. Please try to be careful, but if we follow Jesus;

This is when we go to work.