Bogota

Wednesday p.m.

Well, today we spent the entire day painting. We are painting all the rooms for the girls in the Genesis house. Most of us have been painting the bedrooms while Chris has been spray panting the beds. They just found out today they are getting a newly remodeled area...they were pumped. It was pretty neat seeing how excited they were. Hopefully, we will complete all the painting and begin laying carpet tomorrow. It would be nice to get all of that done tomorrow since Friday will be our last official day to work. We fly home Saturday morning. I'll be sure and snap some shots of the completed rooms. Tonight, we had supper at the Exodus house which is where the older boys live. We provided a pizza party for all the children. It was awesome. Some of the kids would hide some of the pizza so they would have some for later...that was sad. The good thing is these kids would be on the streets with nothing to eat if not for Richard and Jeanene...the leaders of Children's Vision. Let me tell you, they are doing a great job here in Bogota...very inspiring. One cool thing tonight was the addition of two new children. Two sisters, 16 months old and 2 months old were brought into the home tonight. Marinda and one of the ladies staying with us at Bethel were asked by Jeanene to come to her room and help bathe them and clean them up. After supper they presented them to the children as their sisters. The mother of these two babies came to Jeanene for help. She was feeding the baby sugar water in a bottle. That was a neat experience for Marinda to get to help clean up a brand new addition to Children's Vision. After that we went to a park and played basketball. Here in Colombia it's all about soccer, but we convinced them to go play some basketball. It was a lot of fun. We are beat so I'm going to bed...we have a lot of work to do tomorrow.

Compassion visit

Monday p.m.

Today we had our visit with Kelly Johanna Caranza Ceballos. She's 8 yrs old and we've been sponsoring her thru compassion for about 2 yrs. We were shuttled to the Compassion office in Bogota and were given a tour of the facility. We got to see the room where our letters are translated. It was really neat seeing all of it firsthand. After that, our translator took us in a cab to Kelly's project in Monterrey. Very cool guy, i'll share more about him when we get back. I cannot imagine how this whole day could've gone any better. We were taken to the village church and we met Kelly and her family. Kelly and some of her classmates performed some authentic Colombian dances for us. We took a tour of her school. We went to her house and gave her and her family some gifts. She lives in a very poor area and her house is on a dirt floor. It was very sad to see the conditions they live in but compassion is doing a great job with this ministry. We took Kelly and her mother to the mall and Kelly experienced some things for the very 1st time. She had never been to the mall. She had never eaten a hamburger at a restaurant. She had never been on an esclator or elevator. We got her some sunglasses, ice cream and took her for a ride in the bumper cars...it was awesome. After that, we spent the rest of the afternoon at the park. Let me say, this was the most amazing day we have ever had as a family...at least to my knowledge. I'll share more about it when we get home, but it was just unbelievable. We were very impressed with compassion and the way they handled the visitation. Thanks for all the prayers. As for the Moix's, they spent the day scraping and painting in the Genesis house. That's what we will probably be doing for most of the week. There's a little Christian bakery down the street from where we stay. We walked down there after we had supper with the boys in the Exodus house. They serve different kinds of breads, hot chocolate, snacks etc. Oh yeah, we had a new girl move in the Bethel house with us today. She is from Peoria, Illinois and has been in Bogota for a little while and now she is doing some work at Children's Vision. It's been a great day! Hope everyone is doing well back home and thanks again for the prayers...see you soon!

More Bogota

Sunday a.m.

We don't have an internet connection at the place we are staying. One of the schools (the Genesis House) has an internet connection upstairs but it's around the corner from where we are. So, i'll try to type down some thoughts when I can and copy and paste them to my blog when we are at the Genesis House. The schools are spread out around the neighborhood. I always thought in my mind they were all together but that's not the case. I guess they just buy property when the opportunity arises and the funds are available. The neighborhood has a lot of thieves/crime so, we have been told not to go out after 8:30 p.m. Moix has his boyscout knife so, he has been given the role of security :-) We are getting ready for church...we will go with Jeanine and the children. I'm not real sure what is on the agenda for the rest of the day but I think we may go to the Exito (like our wal-mart) for supplies. There's not much too eat for breakfast. Let me tell you, these kids are starving for love and attention. It's amazing how we met them for the 1st time and their fingers had to be literally pried from our arms. We don't speak spanish and they don't seem to care one bit. They just want somebody to play with them. I probably need to mention the pictures on the last post are shots from the Bethel Station, where we are staying. I'll try to post some photos when possible. That's all for now.

Sunday p.m.

We are currently at the Genesis house watching a movie with the children. Maddie and Marinda stayed at the Bethel house since maddie wasn't feeling well...pray for her. The Archer's will be leaving at 8 am to meet our compassion sponsored child. We have a suitcase full of gifts for her...that's gonna be awesome. We will give the kids at children's vision the gifts from crossroads on Tuesday. The moix's along with a mother and daughter from Indiana will begin painting in the Genesis tomorrow. The mother and daughter are here as missionaries as well and are staying in the bethel house. We went to church this morning with some of the kids and it was an experience. Hearing some of the songs we do in spanish was interesting and they like to dance...it was cool. Moix and myself got to say a couple words with a translator. We had the afternoon off so we checked out the mall which is about 1 mile from bethel. It's the largest mall in south america. They have a store called Exito (like walmart) and we were able to get some supplies. Keep us in prayer, having a great time.

We made it!

We got to Bogota on time but it took a little while to get through customs. We just crashed when we got to the Bethel House...it was a long day of traveling. Today we spent most of our time as tourists, seeing some of the sights. We are at the Genesis House right now and we just had supper with some of the children. Everyone is doing great. It's been a bit of a culture shock. We are going to church in the morning with the children and probably shopping for groceries after that. Keep us in prayer as the area we are in can be pretty dangerous. God bless!

Paragould Campus

The Paragould Campus is progressing...we have a wall baby! I know the picture is not great but it was sent to me on my phone. We have a wall people...awesome!

Launch Meeting

We had a great launch meeting tonight at the Paragould Campus. A big group showed up and there's excitement brewing in the air. The big thing right now is the wall that needs to be built that separates the worship area from the children's area. We are hoping to see that wall go up this week. Once that happens we will be able to begin work on all the different areas of the church. It's gonna be a busy time around Crossroads for the next few months...but very exciting! After I got home tonight from the meeting I led a guy from Paragould to Christ on Facebook. Pretty crazy, huh? We are planning to baptize him at the Launch service. Get involved...don't miss out on all that God is doing.

Billboard is up!

I just wanted to let everyone know the Launch Billboard is up. It's located on Hwy. 49 in the Brookland area right across the highway from Jordan's Quik Stop and just north of La Cascada. When you're headed to Paragould look to your left when you approach Jordan's. When you're headed to Jonesboro have the person riding shotgun look behind you to the right. Are you driving solo? No tips, I won't be responsible for you running off the road. Be safe!

TobyMac & Tomlin

We went to the Hello Tonight Concert last night in Memphis. The concert was at Hope Church and it was sold out. We bought our tickets about 3 months ago. I must say, it was awesome. I'm a big fan of both Tomlin and Toby...however, they are both very different. Tomlin is more of a worship leader type and Toby is the rapper/singer, tons of action going on on-stage during his time. I guess you could say it was the best of both worlds...Hannah Montana plug not intended. Go see either one of them if you get the chance and tell them Mike sent you. Yeah, do that...tell them I sent you.

Paragould Campus

We have signed the lease and the building in Paragould is officially ours...at least for the next 12 months. The building is located in the Paragould Plaza just south of Sears. We will find out about city codes and have the utilities switched over this week. Once we get that stuff out of the way we can go to work on preparing the building for Church. The launch date is set for 10-10-10 and the service will be at 9:00 a.m. This is gonna be a really cool day for Crossroads Church as we are stepping out on faith and trusting God during this journey. I'll try and keep everyone updated on the progress of the building.