The Friends and Family plan

Day at the beach with Greg, Abby, Jeff, Rachel, Fred, Lauren and the littles

Once again we have been so blessed with family visiting us here, and this time it was our four older children and a couple of their spouses, all at the same time. We had a great time with them and as I write this, Rachel is still with us for another week. We rode some motos, went to some of the waterfalls, went to the beach one day, worshiped together, shared many meals together, played some games, watched some movies, and just had a lot of fun. This is the third time for most of them to come down and visit. Elliot, Rachel's husband was not able to come this year as he had started a new job and did not have any vacation time coming yet. 

Family photo at our home in Jarabacoa

Family Photo taken at the SI Base

          Rachel will be going back on June 27th and Janae will be going back with her. Janae will spend a week in Shipshewana and then meet Karen in Atlanta for a week at WellSpring Camp, a camp for special needs kids. Janae will be a counselor there for the week and Karen will spend a couple of days planning for when WellSpring comes to Jarabacoa and does day-camp for Genesis. Janae will then fly back home when WellSpring comes down on July 15th. WellSpring will then be here for a week of day-camps. It will be good for Janae to have the opportunity to go back for a week but also a but scary to have her flying alone. But I am sure she will be fine.

     We also have a praise that we have spoken to a lady that her husband is coming on staff with SI in August, and she will be tutoring Marcy this coming school year. We have met them before as they have been here on outreaches other times and have actually lived in the Dominican Republic for a couple of years in Santiago in the past. They will be arriving on August 3rd and we are all looking forward to having Dave Adams join our men's sports site and then to have Megan tutor Marcy. It will be a bit of a different schedule but should work out great. 

A laptop charger that was  fried through the wiring.

The corner with all the supplies that got he worst of it.

 Another point of news here at SI is that on Sunday night at about 8:30, I received a call that our Physical Therapy site was on fire. When I got there, the one fire truck in town was on the scene and had the fire "mostly out" enough that we could start to go in and get things out and put them in our Dentistry site, right next door. It had started by a transformer blowing out on a pole outside the clinic. The electrical fire followed the wires inside and sparked the inverter we had inside and then followed all the wires inside the walls in the building. There is not a lot of protection again these kind of surges so it is something that we live with. We could put a disconnect switch and turn it off each night but, that is when the electric is on and it charges the batteries for the day, when the electric is off. It is so foreign as to anything we would experience in the states but, WE ARE NOT IN THE STATES. We spent most of Monday cleaning up the mess then on Tuesday started the "final cleanup" of scrubbing walls, pressure spraying, rebuilding one wooden wall, (everything else was concrete), and getting ready for painting. Hopefully by Monday we can start to paint and be ready for our next outreach there on June 30th.

The place where the fire started

      Pray that we can use this incident to praise God that it was not worse than it was and that no-one was hurt. 

The hardest part, is waiting.

        As the summer teams start to arrive again, it is nice to see all the staff again at meal times. We eat most of our meals together when teams are here and then when teams are not here, we eat at home. We were reminded with the teams starting up again that the main reason that we eat together is not to save us money on our grocery bill but rather to have the interaction with the groups that are here. So it is a hard act to balance. Spending all day in the sites with the teams and then wanting to spend time with the other staff and your family, but yet, why are we here? Is it to be comfortable? Be around people that have a common interest and we know? Or is it to witness to the groups that come down? Which ever we choose, it is a good thing to think about.
    Sunday in church, we had a guest speaker that spoke on Matthew 26:58. As Peter was following the men taking Christ to Caiaphas, "Peter followed at a distance" and then stopped at the courtyard. What makes us "follow at a distance"? Why do we sometimes stay just far enough away from Jesus that maybe he won't notice the sin we are committing. Or maybe we are embarrassed of the way we have been acting towards others or a situation. There could be a multitude of reasons. Our Pastor in Shipshewana has a plaque on his wall that reads "If it seems like you are far from God, guess who moved" How true that is. I have also heard it said that we are all just as close to God as we truly want to be. If we say that "I just want to be close to God," there are many ways to do that but they all have to be intentional. Reading the bible, engaging in a Bible study, praying, spending time around other believers, etc. But it is all up to us individually as to how close of a relationship we have.

      I was reminded today of our new staff who are in the process of fundraising, attending Missionary Training, or Language School. As we anticipate them arriving, I am reminded of our time "in the waiting". There was a song out by Greg Long many years ago and some of the lyrics are: I want a peace beyond my understanding......It seems the hardest part is waiting on You, when all I really want is just to see Your hand move........And I would add MOVE NOW!! It is hard to wait though. Waiting to sell a house, waiting for the right person to marry, waiting for the right job and needing to work at your present location for now, waiting for a car to get repaired in a garage, waiting for the results to come back from a medical test, waiting on a red light when everyone else around you is driving right on through, waiting on an adult child that is not walking in the Lords way, waiting on that little stupid circle thing on our computers, while it sits there and spins, or as in the case of many of us in the mission field, waiting for the donations to come in and hit our account so we can move to the mission field and begin the work that God has called us to do there. His timing is ALWAYS best. ALWAYS!! (Dave and Megan, April, we are all praying for you in this waiting period of your life).
        I close this post praying for all of those "in the waiting". May you receive the Peace of God in the waiting. Mike.