Saturday, July 30, 2011

Preuniversitario Paidagogos

Yesterday I got the chance to go to Concepcíon and spend some time and take some photos around Pastor Luciano's preuniversity. Before we left I had the chance to design a large sign for them to display outside the building, and I was sad to find out that since we had been gone someone had gotten up on the building and shredded the sign to pieces with a knife. Luciano asked me if I would be willing to re-do it, making a few changes that the staff wanted, and of course I was happy to help. So I was surprised when I got off the bus and saw the new sign already up and in place.

The students are on winter break right now for the preuniversity, but from the same building a number of pastors from the area also teach on Bible themes every friday. It is really neat to see the amount of people, especially youth, that come to these classes on their friday nights for 3 hours ( one class from 7-8ish pm, a small break then another class till around 10). I also found out that because Pastor Luciano was feeling a little under the weather our friend Pastor César would be taking over the teaching for the day. I got to spend some time with him and the youth pastor Fernando while they were getting ready for the nights classes. 

Pastor Fernando on the left, and Pastor César on the right in the teachers area getting ready (yes I am allowed to be back there)
Fernando has quite the music touch
We mentioned César in the post about Dichato, and it has been really awesome to get to spend more time with him, He is pouring so much of himself into the Dichato community and you can really see how connected he is with the people there. We also got the chance to have "Once" (the dinner meal down here) with him and his wife the other night which was really fun. 

Then an impromptu jam session started, then english songs started.


After that it was time to start classes, I was supposed to be photographing what was going on in the whole building, but I got trapped behind some students, and ended up staying for all of Césars class, it was quite good.

Talking about a point on the quite small whiteboard. 

He was talking about the minor prophets this day

After that we drove in Césars car back to Tomé, and I went up the stairs to check on Missy and make sure she was ok. And this is what I found the in house waiting for me...




Thankfully I was able to get a fire going pretty quick. Hope you are all enjoying your summer weather!

Blessings,
Jordan and Missy


Thursday, July 28, 2011

Our weekend...a little late

First of all, if you haven't read this post, go there now!

But if you have, wasn't it good? Jordan did a great job sharing some of the things that have been happening in Dichato these days. It's a really good reminder of how much we actually have.

I wanted to share with all of you some of our pictures from the weekend, our first real weekend back here in Chile. (Though we were already technically here the weekend before last, this one felt more "real" because J filmed the service and I taught Sunday school, as opposed to us just dragging our jet-lagged and time-zone changed bodies to church like we did the week before.)

We came home to a lovely greeting, did we mention that the night we arrived the youth had waited for the bus for 3 hours in the cold just to welcome us?? That's commitment, seriously. (We didn't have any way of communicating with them when our bus would arrive - we had left our Chilean cell phones in Tome)

Here are some pictures of our house, it's a little hard to get good ones because it is on a hill.


This is a new addition to our front yard...the owner of our house lives above us, and is building a cart system so that he doesn't have to carry things up the 90+ stairs. Hes 86, and I'd probably be doing the same thing.

 Here's Imac headed off to the beach!

 The beach isn't too busy these days, since it's winter and most students are in school.

Jordan getting used to his new glasses, we had to pray like crazy for them to get to Portland on time before we left, but they arrived safe and sound from China, with days to spare! The Chileans think they make him look like Woody Allen. 

 Saturday morning we had ourselves some french toast, a near-weekly tradition we have while in Tome - nice reminder of home.

 The girls and I went and visited an old-folks home on Saturday afternoon. We brought them little marshmallow candies. There are 2 homes in Tome (that I know of) for the elderly. Here it is a lot different, because the only people living at these homes are those who don't have families, or who can't live with their family. Most of these people were very sweet, but only a few in the home are able to communicate. The home is run by nuns, and while they are pretty strict, they let us hang out with everyone in the common room for about an hour.

 Teaching Sunday school this week was SO fun! It was really great to be back. We learned about Gedeon, and the kids loved the story. 

 I asked everyone to draw something from the story that stood out to them, this little gal was drawing the caves where the Israelites hid.

 This guy's drawing was awesome! He drew the angel appearing to Gedeon, check out how he put the (!) over Gedeon's head, so cute.

Another one drew the soldiers drinking water from the river.

All in all, super great to be back!
Many blessings to you today,
Missy

Tuesday, July 26, 2011

Crazy day in Dichato

Prelude to the post


I would ask that you read this post when you have some time not only to read about it, but also when you have some time to think about how easy to get caught up in our own world not even thinking about how great we have it in life. Missy and I have had to think hard about some of the complaining we have been doing about the cold here, and how we are missing home a bit.

We've also really had to stop to think about what a blessing it is to be serving down here, and also how comfortable we really are. We have a good roof over our head, a wood stove, food, running water in our house, and a bathroom and shower that we dont have to walk down the street to share with 50-100 of our neighbors.

I would ask that you really try to put yourself in the situation of the people of Dichato, The people of this small community have been through so much, and are still having to fight to get the most basic living conditions in a time where the winter climate is really taking its toll on everyone down here in the region.   After you are done reading the post I would ask you to prayerfully consider what you might be able to do for the residents of Dichato; whether it is daily prayer, a donation to an individual bathroom fund (a complete set of all bathroom fixtures is around US $100),  coming down here to help out  with a team from Riversgate church, or in another way.

One other quick disclaimer in all of this, we are not taking any sort of political stance in any of this, we are not Chilean citizens, and do not have any sort of say in who the government officials are or laws that are or are not passed. The views of what the government is or is not doing are what we have learned from newspapers, television, internet, being in Dichato, and in talking to people. We have not sat down with any government officials to get their side of the story.

Saturday, July 23, 2011

Tired of Being Tired?*

Hey Everyone,
Jordan is working on an amazing post about what is going on in Dichato these days...there have been some truly tense situations between the government and the people displaced by the tsunami, but while we wait for some videos to upload I thought I would share something on the lighter side.

I've been super tired lately, ever since we got here. And while yes, we were dealing with becoming integrated again into the busy life of full-time missionaries and Spanish-speakers, feeling tired all the time isn't fun! We went to the beach yesterday with the dog and then I was able to "double-dip" some exercise and errand running by literally running to the grocery store, I'm really off my game as far as exercising goes. That said, I thought I would share on of my go-to work-outs when I just want to do SOMETHING. I like this workout because it is super easy, you don't need anything, you can do it anywhere, and you are getting a short mix both cardio and strength training. AND it doesn't take very long, so you can do it quick before your morning shower or during one of those short quiet times you have while the kids are napping. (I always have the dog trying to workout with me so I know it's possible to do even with a bit of distraction.)


Here is the link. Like I said, doing 2 reps is only 16 mins! So put on some music, start a stopwatch, and on the top of every minute change moves! Easy easy! Also, I know that a few of the moves can be rough on the knees, so I usually switch out the lunges on the second rep with more abs or jumping jacks.


My choice music for this? Yelle or CSS, the former being a French pop artist that I LOVE and the latter having a specific song called "Move" that you can't help but tap your feet to.

So seriously, fight the tiredness! If you do nothing else active - try to start incorporating this every other day!

Imac tired after helping me exercise

Blessings, Missy

*So I know if you go to the workout website you'll see the ad with the exact same title, I just had to copy it though, because it was one of those things where I read it and was like "YES! I AM! You are describing me!" But then I saw it was an ad for some random sports drink which I'm sure I can't get here in Chile so my excitement petered off...but not enough to not copy the name.

Tuesday, July 19, 2011

Update and a short videos

Hello all,

We have quickly gotten back into the swing of things and are working at nearly full speed once again. Missy is working on getting the kid's ministry going, starting to work more on the women's ministry, and trying to get our house back in order. Jordan has been working over at Pastor Luciano's house on various projects and trying to keep the house warm.

Tomorrow we will be going to Dichato to see what we can do to get people who are still living in emergency communities bathrooms in their homes. Please be praying for these people as it is nearly freezing every night down here right now, and being that we live on the coast, it is very cold, damp, windy, and dark these days. We hope those of you in the Northern Hemisphere are enjoying summer.

We wanted to include a short video of our flight, unfortunately somewhere in our travels one of our memory cards was erased, and nearly 16 GB of photos and videos are gone. Enjoy anyway!


Just a reminder as well we dont always get around to posting all of our photos and videos on the blog, so to keep up to date with those, here is our flickr where are photos live, and here is our vimeo where the videos live. Thank you so much for checking in with us, and please let us know if you have any questions about what we are up to, or requests for any videos for us to make!

Blessings,
Jordan and Missy

Friday, July 15, 2011

Made it back

We got in to a very rainy Tomé today around 930 our time (630 west coast / portland time). Thank you for all of your prayers.


This shot was taken while we were flying over the Pacific Ocean somewhere near the coast of Peru, The Andes are visible on the horizon.

blessings,
Jordan and Missy

Sunday, July 10, 2011

My Fabulous Husband

So I've been thinking about how much I appreciate my husband, and I thought I would share with all of you in a short "Jordan Appreciation" picture post. Yes, this might be a little sappy, and yes, it has little to do with our Chile Mission, but you were warned so move along if you don't feel like reading any further!

 This is Jordan, my husband, and I can't think of anyone better to live life together with here in Portland, and down in South America. We enjoy walking, and since we have many friends with dogs here in Portland, we get extra walking companions now and then! (Jordan will even walk both dogs while I have my hands full drinking an iced tea and taking pictures)
 Here is Jordan busy reading with one of our friends' kids. We've had some free time up here to babysit and it has been so cool to see Jordan spend more time around kids - he's a natural, and super patient - he's gonna be a great dad. 
 This is Jordan instructing me in how to fix some sort of camera/computer technical difficulty. Again, his patience is incredible, especially when he has to explain something to me upteen times and I still don't get it.
 This is Jordan and our good friend Chad, one thing about Jordan is that he is a very loyal friend, and truly has a servant's heart (see picture below)
So here is the whole reason I decided I finally needed to do this post. This is Jordan chopping wood, he's been helping our friend chop up a tree that they took down in their backyard a few months ago. Its hard work, but J decided to go ahead and come over today, while our friends are out, to finish up. This is his servant heart in action. Yes, he has a bunch of wood that will need to be chopped once we go back to Chile, but does that stop him from helping out a friend? No way man! 
So Jordan, here's to you today - I love you! The Lord has made you so unique and wonderful, what a gift to be along for the ride with you for the rest of our lives!

Blessings to you and all those you love!
-Missy