By God's Grace Celebrating 25 Years

Yesterday Iglesia Bautista Vida Nueva celebrated its 25th anniversary.  More than 2000 people attended the service held in the ballroom of the Crowne Plaza Hotel.  It was so croweded, that they asked the kids between 13-18 to sit on the floor so there would be chairs available for the adults.  

There was special music, including the hymn, "Sembraré," which was sung at Vida Nueva's first service 25 years ago.  

Although, there were videos and pictures from the early days of the church, the most impactful part of the service was when four children told their story 25 years into the future.  

Pastor Steve and Julio challenged the church to continue moving forward to change the future of El Salvador for their children.  

Of course, there was a birthday cake and the happy birthday song.  The pastor's blew out the candles!

Merry Christmas and goodbye until 2016

Thursday night was our last worship service at Vida Nueva until 2016.  The church was beautifully decorated for Christmas and we sang some Christmas carols,  By the way, "Joy to the World" really sounds different in Spanish; in fact, the word "joy" isn't even in the song.  It's called "Al Mundo Paz," which is translated peace to the world.  It probably has to do with the fact that in English the words "joy" and "world" are one syllable words, while in Spanish the words for "joy" (gozo) and the word for "world" (mundo) both have two syllables, therefore, they aren't a perfect substitute in the song.  Hence, "peace" to the world, instead of "joy" to the world.    

The pictures make it look like no one was there.  Really, there was a pretty big crowd, they were all sitting behind me.

We were able to say "adios" to almost everyone on Thursday night:  Pastor Steve and Pam, Pastor Julio and Patty, David and Maritza, Guillermo and many more. 

We fly to California this afternoon and should be getting grandkid hugs before they go to bed.  

Back on our Normal Schedule

After two days of unpacking, doing laundry, delivering packages, paying bills and buying groceries, we're settling back into our regular schedule.  Tonight's regular schedule meant being in the Thursday night service at Iglesia Bautista Vida Nueva.  

It was great to see everyone and catch up a little bit.  The worship music was awesome, with some of my favorite songs.  Best of all, Pastor Steve is back and is continuing his verse-by-verse series study of Revelation.  Tonight he preached from Chapter 10, and although he covered Chapter 8 and 9 while we were in the states, the sermons are available on the church website.  I'm looking forward to listening to them when I walk this week.

Happy 24th Birthday, Vida Nueva

I've probably written about the church's birthday celebrations before, but decided it was time to highlight another year.  Here in El Salvador it is common practice for churches to have an annual birthday celebration.  Just like in the life of every individual, a birthday celebration seems to be a good way for the church to look back and see God's faithfulness over the years. 

This year's celebration spanned the entire month, with interviews of individuals, couples and families who have been part of the church.  Today, David Aguilar, hotel campus pastor, interviewed Pastor Julio and Pastor Steve.  If you've ever seen these two together, you know just how much fun it was too watch the interview.  Believe it or not, they started the church when they were 26 and 28 years old, respectively.  As I said, a look back over the 24 years reveals God's plans and His faithfulness.  Because no respectable birthday celebration would be without them, there were balloons, confetti, cake and also a great message from 2 Corinthians.  

We are Vida Nueva!

  

FIVE YEARS TODAY

It's been exactly five years today!  On June 8, 2010, about 10:00 in the morning, our son, Jon, took us to KCI to catch our flight to El Salvador.  We checked four large duffle bags, each weighing 50 pounds, and each of us carried on a medium size duffle weighing 30 pounds.  Jeff and Paula Rhoades picked us up at Comalapa Airport and, thus, began our journey!

We're not the same people who arrived five years ago today.  Now we speak Spanish and are able to communicate with the people around us and we consider El Salvador "home." 
  
However, the most exciting things that have happened over these five years have not come as a result of what we have done, but what God has done in and through us.  Here's just a few highlights:

• We've been blessed to meet thousands of people from churches all over the US who have come to share the gospel on a mission trip 
• We've shared our testimony and listened to other's testimonies in hundreds of school classrooms.
• We've seen the gospel shared door-to-door and in the evening family festivals during more than 60 mission trips.
• We've seen hands raised in response to the sinner's prayer thousands and thousands of times. 
• We've been part of a great church that preaches the gospel and focuses on discipling new believers.
• We've made life-long friends as we've loved and been loved by our church family in all of the VidaNueva churches.  
• We've relied on God to lead and direct us in the work of the ministry here.
• We've witnessed what God can do with believers who are faithful to share the good news.  

We still have much to learn . . . and are still very much in the process of growing into the people God intends for us to be.  It's only fitting that we have an appointment at immigration today to renew our residency visa for another year.  We don't know what the future holds or how much longer we will be here, but we trust God to let us know when it's time to move on.  Thank you for being part of our journey; please continue to pray for us as we work here.

Here's to another five years.

One more Friendship Event

On the last day of February, we celebrated the final friendship event for the month--a women's ministry breakfast.  This active ministry holds three breakfasts and one retreat each year and we always celebrate friendship in February.

Today I worked at the registration table with two other women.  We helped check in the more than 100 women who attended.  I was really surprised at how many of the women I knew--I guess that should be expected as we are closing in on five years at Vida Nueva.  I think I was the only "gringa" in the room today, as neither Rachelle nor Tiffany were able to attend.

A few pictures:

Final Missions Conference Service

We wrapped up the mission conference, Export Life, on Sunday morning with a combined Koinonia service at Crown Plaza Hotel.  Hopefully, the impact of the conference will bring fruit for years to come.  Here is a wrap up of the last 3 days from Pastor Julio:

If you were at the missions conference Export Life 2013, Rudy Garrido, guest pastor from Colombia, preached three compelling messages about missions.  In the first, "Why Missions?" (Thursday at Lourdes) he clearly outlined the daunting task that God has given us as a church to bring the world the knowledge of the love of Christ's sacrifice on the cross. On Friday in Miravalle, God showed us, in an unforgettable way from the book of Ephesians, the responsibility we have to grow individually as believers so we can be ready to fulfill the mission God has given us. Personally, not for many years had I heard so strong, so solid and so Biblical an argument in favor of the local church or heard a sermon so strong against  the current tendency for some immature believers to be nothing more than "spiritual tourists."  These "spiritual tourists," move from church to church without committing or without relating and, thus, cause damage to the church because they are not doing their part to edify the body. On Sunday at the hotel, the challenge to our church and to individual members was to start contributing to missions through Faith Promise.   It was an an appeal to rededicate our lives and finances to the missions ministry. The challenge was to commit to seek God's guidance to understand how we can push the kingdom in this area through the local church and the answer to this challenge will happen in the coming days.  This conference has been excellent . . . . now we wait for God to confirm in the heart of each member the way to risk more for missions through MetroAmérica 0-20.

I end with a few pictures of the day . . . . thanks for praying for us!

 Praise team leading us in our them song, "Cuenta Conmigo"

 View of the congregation during Pastor Rudy's preaching.

Guest Pastor Rudy and his wife, Rocio, Pastor Julio and Patty, and Pastor Steve and Pam

Winding Up

Today is our 22 day in the Kansas City area--already 8 days longer than we expected to be here.  We rebooked our plane tickets for next Wednesday, July 17.  It's been great to spend time with our families and friends.  We're planning one more homemade ice cream bash at my brother's home before we leave.  This is the perfect bookend to the initial bash before Elizabeth's surgery. 

From all accounts we've read and the Facebook pictures, the mission trip and VBS at Vida Nueva this week was awesome.  The super fiesta is Sunday and we are praying that many of the parents bring their children and, as a result, get to hear the gospel in person. 

Happy Anniversary Vida Nueva

Here in Central America, church anniversaries are celebrated every year.  I really like this idea!  It gives the pastors and congregation a time to reflect on what God has done in and through the church in the last 5, 10, 15 (fill in the blank) years and to dream about the future!

Yesterday, we celebrated the 22nd anniversary of Iglesia Bautista Vida Nueva.  Pastor Steve Kern took a minute to explain that we pattern our annual celebration on Jehova's message to the nation of Israel to celebrate their rescue from Egypt every year during the passover season.  As Christians, we no longer celebrate passover, instead we celebrate Christ's resurrection.  But, the idea of remembering what God has done for the church (from one year to the next) is one that serves the church well.

These days, the church meets at four different sites and has six distinct services.  This Sunday we were 1000+ strong at the Crown Plaza Hotel.  Wow!  The music, the historical video, the message and the fellowship were awesome.  I've included a couple of pictures from the celebration!

When you read this, take a moment to reflect on the history of the church you attend.  When was the last time you looked back to the rich history of your church and clearly saw the hand of God moving.  If you haven't done that lately, I encourage you to try it--it's a great way to build your faith!

"Better is one day in Your house than 1000 elsewhere!

 Praying for our newest missionaries who are going on a 2-week survey trip to Bogota, Colombia.

 A view of part of the crowd.

 Pastor Julio bringing the message from the book of Esra.

 Birthday cake and the Salvadoran birthday song!  

Five pastors blowing out the 22 candles!

Cake for everyone!  Happy birthday to Vida Nueva!  

Back at Church

It was great to be back at church today.  The music was especially great today and Stephen didn't even play.  In addition to the regular worship band, we had the pleasure of hearing Kike Pavon, a 26-year old contemporary Christian musician from Spain.  He was in town for a concert last night so he sang in each of our four services. The three songs he did were excellent; I really enjoyed his song called, Dame Un Nuevo Corazon," which translates as "Give Me a New Heart."  If you're really adventurous and would like to listen to the song (in Spanish), click here.

Also, although it is not as easy to listen to a sermon in Spanish, I do love Pastor Julio's messages.  He is doing a series on the names of God.  The first message in the series was on Jehovah; today's message was on Adonai from Daniel 9.