Archive for February, 2009

God is faithful

Monday, February 9th, 2009

Chimane, Trinitario and Yura believers are hearing Bible lessons on the radio.

God had been impressing on me the fact of His faithfulness since we headed to Indonesia. While there, He opened my eyes anew to see Him at work in the little things of life, as well as the big. Then God reminded me of this fact again when I read this update.

“You wouldn’t believe … how the work is going! One of the radio Bible teachers led a man to the Lord [where] the people hated the Gospel. For 20 some years they wanted nothing to do with the teaching. One day Rosauro met this drunk guy on the road and he questioned Rosauro for more than 3 hours on why the Rosauro does what he does with no gringos around. Rosauro led that man to the Lord and that man, his name is Marcelino, has gone to every house in the village asking forgiveness! Chimanes don’t do that!

Now there is about 9 believers there and Rosauro teaches the Word of God in Marcelino’s house! Marcelino called me to say thanks for my part! Wow, I do so little too but he was thankful and he asked a ‘favor’… guess what it was? Bibles and study material! Praise the Lord for Wayne’s many, many faithful years and now we have materials to send! Rosauro told me that when Wayne was writing there was NO interest but Wayne was faithful and now there is interest and we have lots of materials! Isn’t that neat!”

I am struck with a sense of awe when I consider how God works. Years before they were wanted, God saw fit to have some faithful workers painstakenly translate His Holy Scriptures into yet another language. He knew what He was doing. He knew that Marcelino would one day be ready to see his need of a Saviour, the Saviour, Jesus Christ.

Cooking for 50+ at Snow Camp at the Last Minute

Saturday, February 7th, 2009

Serving dinner to 50 teens at Snow Camp.

Last weekend (Jan. 30th-Feb 1st) Angie and I had the unexpected blessing of cooking at a Camp. All said and done, we cooked for a youth group of around 50 teens at their Snow Camp.

We had no idea God had this in mind. At 10am on Friday morning, a friend of our called me at work. When I got him to repeat what he had said a lot slower, I realized he was asking us to cook at Snow Camp for the weekend. The scheduled head-cook was ill, and they had exhausted their list of replacements. Camp was to start in a matter of hours, and they still needed someone.

Our friend (who is on the board of directors for the camp) thought of Angie. Not only were we familiar with this camp kitchen, but Angie has helped in the kitchen for “Pitch & Praise” the last couple springs, cooking for 2000 teens. Surely she was capable of heading up the kitchen efforts for 50+ teens.

My wonderful helpers!We decided we could help, and after finding others to fill in for us at church that weekend, we headed up to the Stayner Bible Conference Grounds. An amazing team of helpers was waiting for us. They had already taken stock of what we had, and were eager to go shopping for what we didn’t.

Our decorated cheesecakes. If you look at the back, you can see the chocolate ones too.The menu had already been worked out—that was a relief. For the most part, Angie’s serving suggestions were right on! And her scratch mac-and-cheese—it was a hit! One leader came up wanting the recipe because his wife has been trying to make home-made mac-and-cheese, but it didn’t hold a candle to Angie’s!

Delena found mommy`s mittens in her coat pocket and decided to keep her feet warm while she slept.While the days were really long for Angie in the kitchen, she thoroughly enjoyed it. I helped out in the kitchen when needed, but was keeping Delena busy most of the time. Once I put her down for a nap without socks on. She must have gotten cold, because when we went in to check on her, she had somehow gotten Angie’s gloves, and put them on her toes!

To see some more photos of our weekend serving, click here: http://www.ntm.org/jason_bechtel/photos.php?img_id=52711&category=Cooking+for+HMC+Snow+Camp+2009

Trip to Missouri

Wednesday, February 4th, 2009

<img class=”alignleft size-medium wp-image-104″ style=”margin-right: 10px;margin-bottom: 5px” src=”http://www.ntm.org/wp/jason_bechtel/files/2009/02/2568_52488.jpg” alt=”And Jason thought MY earmuffs were embarrassing…how about some Shrek ones! :)
(At Bronner`s–the world`s largest Christmas store)” width=”300″ />

Two weekends ago, I had the opportunity to visit our sister campus in Missouri.  Two friends and I went to visit our co-worker and friend, who is now working at the USA training centre.

The Natural Bridge at Ha Ha Tonka Park...Can you see Eleanor? We blazed the 17 hours there, and with the time change in our favour, made it there by 9:30 Friday night.  It was a whirlwind weekend which included a campus tour and visit to their amazing bookstore, outlet shopping, a home spa night, hiking and lots of great times of talking!

"Gateway to the West" Arch in St. LouisOn the way home, we decided to take things a little slower and broke it into 2 days.  We left early Monday morning to visit the St. Louis arch.  It’s a lot bigger in person!!!  We made it to Lansing, MI by 9:30 Monday night where we crashed at a hotel.

The 1st place winner of the snow sculpting contest in Frankenmuth (no...we weren`t the ones who did it! :))In the morning we were up again and off to Frankenmuth.  We visited Bronner’s, the world’s largest Christmas store, and went to Zehnders for lunch to experience their world famous chicken. YUM!  We also happened to be there right after a snow and ice sculpting contest, so we got to see all the finished products.

All in all, a great trip and despite everyone thinking us crazy for driving so far for such a short time, we’d probably do it again!