Prayers and praises!

The prayers:

Please pray for Francisco and his family. He's one of the folks from Tayoltita, he's married, but his wife has left and he's working and caring for their two children, a boy 8 and a girl 10. Francisco has been quite sick in recent weeks and quite swollen. Darwin and Mary Ann took him back to Mazatlan with them two weeks ago to see a doctor there and the doc did a basic check up and gave him some tests and some meds to reduce his swelling.

This week he went back to Mazatlan with Darwin and apparently he's got some serious health issues concerning his heart and kidneys and he must return to Mazatlan this coming Tuesday for more testing with a specialist on Wednesday morning. The outcome doesn't look too good from a human perspective, as the specialist said that left untreated as he was he would have died within six months. The issues are not only his health but his kids and his wife too. Appreciate your prayers.

Prayers also for our landlord's wife, Maria Luisa. She has diabetes, and has been having vision problems for some time now. Jacobo has been taking her to various doctors and they have been doing various treatments without much improvement. Additionally, she seems much more frail recently, though she will tell you that she's actually feeling better. She's lost more weight, and was thin when we first met her in January. Jacobo recently got a referral to an eye specialist in Los Angeles, and another in Yuma, AZ. They are preparing to take a trip to see them both in hopes of having her failing vision restored. Please keep them in prayer not only for all the health professionals that they will see but also for travel mercies as they drive up for these appointments.

Prayers also for two friends at home in Washington having surgeries coming up soon. For Ted, our neighbor from around the corner in Olympia, who has knee surgery scheduled for May 5 and Carolyn, from our small group at church, who has her surgery scheduled for May 17. Both have been in a lot of pain, and it is our prayer that the Lord will guide the surgeons and get them on the road to recovery, free from the pain that has plagued them.

Prayers also for our newly reformatted team meetings, the first of which is tomorrow. We'll be meeting at a beach, worshiping, communing, sharing and eating comida together. The beach, worship and communion are new additions to the meeting, coming out of our visit from our personnel guy. And we'll only be meeting once a month now, rather than every other week. May 1 is also a national holiday in Mexico, the day of the worker, Dia de Trabajo.

Prayers for our visa process. We've just discovered that Pastor Lupe in Mazatlan must write letters for the three of us (me, Ralph and Tom) and send them off to Mexico City, and then we have to wait for a letter back from them before we can apply for our visas. We all need to at least apply for our visas before the end of June or we'll have to drive to Nogales and enter the country again on a tourist visa! Please pray that Lupe gets the letters out this week, and that the officials in Mexico City also act quickly on the requests and return them promptly so that we can get the process going officially and avoid a trip north! Lidia, Cristina and Gracia are Mexican citizens and don't need visas!!

Prayers for Darwin, Mary Ann and Gracie as they prepare for a couple of months of travel to visit and encourage the churches in Puebla and Nogales before they head out to San Diego for their vacation. They expect to leave sometime in mid-June when Gracie gets out of school and return in early September. Travel mercies, good relationships with the church leaders and good rest and relaxation with family in the states.

Prayers that Presidente Fox WOULD NOT sign a bill before him from the Mexican congress, which would eliminate penalties for those caught with small amounts of some drugs. Sales of drugs in any quantity would still be illegal, but certain possessions by "consumers" would not. Here's a list of the drugs and the "okay" amounts for personal use:

opium (raw, to be smoked) 5 grams
heroin, 25 mg
marijuana 5 grams
cocaine 500 mg
LSD .015 mg
MDA 200 mg
MDMA (Ecstasy) 200 mg
mescaline 1 g
peyote 1 KG (2.2 pounds)
psilocybin (concentrate, pure, active ingredient) 100 mg
hallucinogenic mushrooms (raw, off the farm) 250 mg
amphetamines 100 mg
dexamphetamines 40 mg
Phencyclidine (PCP, or Angel Dust) 7 mg
methamphetamines 200 mg
Nalbuphine (synthetic opiate) 10 mg

The praises!!

Praise as this week and last I was able to read the scripture in church when Pastor called on me!! I was surprised, as he's never called on me before and now he's done it two Sundays in a row. I'm thankful that my Spanish has improved enough that I can be understood when I speak and also when I read aloud, so I didn't embarrass myself. Our learning is not just speaking, but reading and writing as well. I also was thankful this week as my bookcase Genaro made arrived and it is a thing of beauty! He did such a nice job with it, even put it on casters so I can move it easily to dust under it! I was able to write a thank you note to him and Carmen in Spanish. Carmen would accept nothing less of course!! We were so blessed to have these two as our hosts for our first month in Mexico.

Praise also for an early morning visit from Pastor Jose on Thursday. He arrived at 7:45, I was cleaning the patio and he was cleaning the church and he came by with more tamales de Elota for us, which was very nice. He stayed and chatted for more than an hour and then asked if he could accompany Darwin and Ralph to Campo Santa Lucia that evening!!! What a tremendous blessing! We had been praying that he would take an interest in the work in the camps so we were thrilled that he asked to come along. He had a blast and asked if he could go again next week!! We weren't sure if he would or not, but this morning in church he prayed for the people in the camps, and after service he reiterated to us that he wanted to go again on Thursday!! Praise the Lord!!

Praise also for communion today in church. This is the first time we've had communion since January 8 at our home church in Olympia!!! The churches and pastors here have been trained, but they "just don't do it". But this morning when we arrived for church Mimi (Pastor's daughter) was preparing the wine and wafers! Hopefully La Cena del Senor (The Lord's Supper) will become a regular part of our worship times. That's our prayer!

Thanks for praying and praising along with us. We love and appreciate you all so much.