Merry Christmas!!

Oregon

I'm now in Oregon, for those of you who may not have known. I'll be in the States until probably some time in March, raising a little more financial support, and visiting with friends, family, and donors!

And missing Jean Paul!

Nativity Set

Once again, here are some pictures of the nativity set in the Centro of Querétaro. I LOVE looking at this – every time I pass through the Centro during Christmas time, I look at it!

Here’s the angel announcing to Mary that she will become pregnant and give birth to the Savior.

Here’s an interesting Mexican version of this… They say that the angels that appeared to the shepherds to announce Jesus’ birth also appeared to guys in charge of watering animals. Here are the guys with their water jugs (it’s interesting to me that all the figures in the nativity set except angels, Mary, and Joseph look like Mexicans! But I know we do that too – the people in the nativity weren’t white either!)

Here’s the traditional nativity scene – sorry it was REALLY sunny out, so the light turned out weird.

And another latinamerican take on the nativity – the three wise men. They have names – Melchor, Balchazar, and Gaspar. One comes on a horse, another on a camel, and another on an elephant. They come from India, China, and Africa. (I probably didn’t get all these facts 100% correct, I’m doing it from memory of what people have told me).

Here’s the actual Mexican Christmas scene – families participating in a traditional posada. At a posada, people sing a song remembering the journey that Mary and Joseph made to Bethlehem. I think the song also talks about the shepherds and the wise men. Then there’s a candle-lighting, and a piñata for the kids. Yummy food is served (in QRO it’s generally small sandwiches of shredded chicken in mole – my mouth waters just thinking about it!!)

Here's the creation scene:

And the hell scene:

Guadalupe

Here in México, December 12th is a national holiday. This is the day of Guadalupe, who is the patron saint of México. I was in the Centro the night of the 11th, and there was a procession going to the cathedral that sponsors Guadalupe. There were a TON of people waiting for the truck with the Guadalupe statue on it to pass by. When it passed by people were crossing themselves, and kids were bringing gifts up to the truck to give to the statue.
Here’s a picture (sorry about the quality) of the truck passing by.

It was very sad to me, because it was like the people were waiting to be saved or redeemed by Guadalupe. It’s so sad to me that many people in México (and around the world) read the same Bible (ok, with a few extra books added in) as I do, yet have such a different concept of salvation and forgiveness of sins. The Bible says that Jesus forgives sins, and that there is no other way to be saved except through Him.

Pray for the people of Querétaro, that somehow, someday, eyes will be opened to true salvation in Christ.

The Pepes

There are two guys at Horizonte church who are both named Pepe.

Pepe 1 (or the first Pepe to start coming to Horizonte) began attending in the following way...
Lalo (a Christian guy at Horizonte) randomly saw Pepe one day by his house. Lalo and Pepe had been best friends in their childhood. Pepe was unemployed, and frequently high or drunk or both. He started talking to Lalo about how messed up his life was, and Lalo was on his way to church to help out on a saturday. Pepe ended up coming to church with Lalo the next day.

Over the course of a few weeks, Pepe found that people actually liked him and cared about him at Horizonte! He began working part time with Lalo in the electrical business, and began coming early on sundays to help set up the audio and video equipment.

Horizonte contracted Lalo to install the new electical system in the auditorium (we previously had 3 fuses and 4 electrical outlets for the entire auditorium, and were running 4 speakers, 3 guitars, 5 microphones, a video projector, two computers, a sound board, a video camera, and all the lights, snd sometimes 4 fans, off those 3 fuses! Talk about NOT OSHA approved!! We now have 17 fuses, and like 25 outlets. Lalo installed 3/4 of a MILE of wiring in the auditorium!!) Anyhow, Pepe began to come during the week to help Lalo. One morning he came in really drunk. He had been sober for several weeks, then one day not. He didn't want to come work at the church because he thought that Lalo and Martin (the pastor) would kick him out. But he came, and instead of working on the wiring, Martin and Lalo took some time with Pepe to let him know that God forgives, and that they forgive too. Martin and Lalo offered to help Pepe with accountability with alcohol, and life went on with a sober Pepe, who now comes to church on saturdays to read the Bible with Juan, another guy at Horizonte.

Pepe 2
This Pepe had been to an evangelical church before, and didn't particularly like it. His wife, Ana, was very interested in attending an Evangelical church, and one day, after inviting Pepe many times to various churches, they came to Horizonte. Pepe actually liked it and felt welcomed, and they even started going to a beginners Bible study that day!
Pepe is a welder. Just use your imagination here as to what the lifestyle of a lot of welders are like in Mexico. Yeah, he went out to drink every night with his other welder friends, and if anyone messed with them, they'd pull out their guns. (imagine hick people getting mad in the States)
Anyhow, Horizonte needed bars put on the windows and doors for security, to be able to leave all that electronic equipment set up over night. Juan (full time maintenance at Horizonte) is a welder, so he began the huge project of making bars for 6 large windows and 3 sliding glass doors. Pepe heard about this, and decided to actually take time away from his welding shop to spend three weeks working with Juan on the window bars. This was without pay!! During this time, Pepe and Juan had a LOT of time (like 12 hours some days!) to work and talk together. Pepe had accepted Christ, but still had (has) a lot of questions, some of which were answered simply by watching Juan's lifestyle, others through asking questions.
One day, just like the other Pepe, Pepe 2 came one morning really drunk. He too was afraid that he'd be rejected by Juan and Martin. Again, they sat down to talk with him about God's grace and forgiveness, and helped him get into a recovery program for alcoholics.

Both Pepes are regular attenders at Horizonte, are enthusiastic about knowing God more, and readinig the Bible, and also use some of their free time to help out in various tasks at church. BOTH Pepes have invited other non-Christian friends to Horizonte!
Lots of good stuff going on that God is doing!!

Below: Martin, Pepe 2, Pepe 1, Ricardo, and Kurt (from NPCC) hoisting a set of bars for a sliding glass door.

Pepe 1 and Lalo working on the electrical system:

Differences of Death

Everytime I encounter things that have to do with death in Latin America, I realize how latina I'm NOT.

I never saw a dead person in my life (nope, not even at an open casket funeral!) until the summer of 2003. I was in the shower at my house in Honduras when I heard a HUGE loud crash sound that lasted for like 20 seconds. Upon gettinig dressed, I went to the front room and Suyapa was calling the Red Cross. There had been an accident RIGHT in front of our house (which is on the main highway through Honduras) between a Mack truck and a littly bitty pickup. The neighbors began trying to get the three guys in the pickup out with garden tools. When the ambulance arrived, they removed on man alive, and one dead. The third guy had died instantly. I unfortunatly got a really good view of that guy's head, which is in terrible shape after having passed through the accident. One of the other gringas was watching the whole thing from her front porch, in tears. What really surprised me was that my little cousins (8 and 11 years old at that time) and some other little children were walking up to the accident and looking in the truck, and no one even thought anything of it.

In early 2006, I went to the Mummy Museum in Guanajuato Mexico. I don't really consider the mummies to be anything super terrible, even though they are real dead people. But what surprised me there was that parents were posing their small children by the mummies to take pictures of them. One family even posed their baby by a baby mummy! I'm pretty sure that if this museum were in the States, there would be an age limit to be able to enter...

Earlier this year, I received a MySpace comment (NEVER do this) from my Honduran brother telling me that our aunt Amalia had died. I had just seen her laughing with grandma and another of thier sisters like a month before. I even remember telling her that she and her sisters were a bunch of troublemakers. She laughed and agreed! Then I get a MySpace comment telling me that she died. It's like people are sad for two days, then life goes back to normal.

This past monday night, a friend of mine, Chelo, was in a bad car accident and died. She wan't a close friend of mine, but I had hung out with her a few times, and she was only 25 years old! It was so sudden, it took all of us by shock. I've never been to a funeral in Mexico, nor in any other latin american country. The funerals happen within hours of the death. I didn't find out about Chelo until about 4pm the day after the accident, and the family had been at the funeral home all day by that time. They buried her today (wednesday) in the morning.

My friend Rebecca, who is from the States and has been here since August, was a good friend of Chelo, and Chelo's best friend Sarahi. Rebecca stayed all day tuesday and most of the day wednesday at the funeral place with Sarahi and family.

The thing that really really tore at my heart, and I can't even imagine, is that Sarahi and Rebecca dressed Chelo's body to be buried. I wanted to ask what she looked like after having been in a car wreck, but am not about to ask something like that so a good friend of hers who dressed her body! I would have thought that one person would identify the body, then she would be put in a closed casket and buried. But apparently, they had her in an open casket for a long time - for funerals here family and friends go sit with the immediate family and the body for long periods of time. I didn't go. I couldn't make myself go. I don't know how Rebecca did it, or especially Sarahi, who was Chelo's best friend.

I don't know if I will ever get used to the different customs of death here. And I know that I haven't experienced the half of the differences yet. I know it shouldn't be a sad thing when someone who is a child of God dies, and I know that Chelo is in a better place now, but the physical part of death still makes me not know how to react or what to do. And some day I'll have to go to a funeral here and actually know what it's like...

Amalia (in the purple) and two of her sisters on the day that I said they were a bunch of troublemakers

Chelo