Cultural Day

The top picture is of my university Spanish class that went for a cultural field trip this past Wednesday. We were joined by Ingrid's class and a class of Mexicans studying the native Hamiti (ah-MEE-tee) language. There were about 30 of us in total. We drove north past the city of Pachuca and visited an old benedictine monastery for about an hour. It had some very beautiful and unique art forms (see bottom picture). From there, we were off to the town of Actopan in the state of Hidalgo. We went to the home of a native family whose primary language is not Spanish but Hamiti. We ate all sorts of foods that were more or less indigenous. We had lamb cooked in a earthen pit (see second picture), nopal (a type of cactus), various kinds of fruit you can't get north of the border, hand made tortillas, and many other foods. It was all very delicious. We then went to a town called Ixmiquilpan where we visited a craft shop (bottom picture) and the Convent of Arch Angel Michael. We did not get home until quite late at night yet had to be up early to take the kids to school and go to a church planting strategy meeting with the Ruizes and the Williams (from CAM International).

The more we plan, the more we get excited at the prospects for here! Everyday we are meeting new people that are potential new contacts to begin a church with. At the meeting, someone said "We have to be deliberate in getting into the community to meet contacts; they're not just going to arrive at our door." Oddly enough, a few hours later, we had a mom and teenage son whom we had not met before ring our doorbell to announce their arrival at our house! He has a school project in which he has to interview a native English speaker about a variety of things. God has a sense of humor.

Also, we ask for all of you to keep praying for us. We were pulled over by the police yet again today ( four of them) and they clearly were planning to do us wrong until I asked Ingrid to call our lawyer. I must say, these police really are wearing on me and this incident was particularly frightening for Ingrid. Pray for courage when under fire from the Evil One, integrity in all that we do, and a holy boldness to proclaim the truth of God's word.