Not Enough

     It’s after 11pm and I’m getting tired. Not really sure why I’m writing except just to say hi, and that I’m still here. Today I spent about 6 hours shopping in Panama City, for stuff for the 2 teams we have coming this weekend. They’re going out to Boca Del Monte to finish the construction project that we started a couple weeks ago. I wasn’t planning on going again, but I got asked to go along and decided it was a good thing to do. I think I’m leaving this Sunday. I got my hair cut today, so that was a good thing. I was starting to look like David Crowder. (not really) I ate lentals for dinner and they’re causing the usual bean effect in my body. (This is random night in case you couldn’t tell.) It’s 11:48 and I really need to sleep. Oh and I’m listening to Rich Mullins. I miss that guy…….Good night y’all.

So lately I’ve been noticing that the worship seems to be changing at Crossroads Bible Church where I attend. It just feels less alive somehow; less like we’re really worshiping God. It’s not a musical problem, or maybe it is… It just seems like the musicians and singers are “too good”, or maybe I should say there’s too much focus on having everything just right. It’s very well done musically. Nobody is playing wrong notes; the people singing have beautiful voices. But it’s so planed and polished that I’m having trouble really worshiping. I wish somebody would sneeze or something just to make people laugh and lighten things up a little. I don’t know…. me of all people shouldn’t be critical, because having led worship quite a bit I know it’s not easy, and I don’t like it when people complain about the way it’s done. But yeah, I just hope that were not so worried about having everything done so perfectly and structured that that becomes the focus.

So the other day I got to go to the beach with the RCF team. We went to a beach on the carribean side, close to Playa Blanca where I went about a month ago with the DTS. This beach was somewhat the same, but is a lot better for snorkeling, which is what we went for. It was really cool! Got to see some pretty awesome stuff below the surface.

One bad thing about snorkeling though is that your body stays in about the same position the whole time. You’re always face down, which of corse means you back is up towards the sun. So even though I wore 45 spf sunscrene to the beach, my back is quite red, and my chest and stomache are still pasty white. So yeah, I’m not really sure why I’m telling you all this, except that I just wanted to use the title “turn or burn” tootles…..

So this last little while I’ve had the incredible joy of getting to do some repairs on my Honda Fit. First thing I had to replace was the battery. For some reason the battery acid seem to dry out really fast down here, so if you forget to check and add the fluid, which I did, pretty soon your battery is junk. 

In addition to the battery, my rear wheel bearings were going bad which made the car really loud, and was probably starting to get a little dangerous. The bummer thing about Honda cars here in Panama is that the only way to get parts is through the dealer, which of corse means you pay through the nose. Both the rear bearings were bad, but the dealer only had one in stock which I paid about $135 for, and the other I had to special order and get sent from Japan which cost about $185, and might take 30 days to get to Panama. Oh the joys….. So anyway I got the worst of the two replaced, and it really made a huge difference in the quietness of the car, and the way it drives. It was kind of a lot of money, but I’m mostly just glad it’s getting fixed.

I’m going to fire my editor

Ok a little more about the Boca del Monte trip. One thing I didn’t say in the privious post was that the road to get up the the village are quite interesting. The area is very mountainous, and the road in and out really shouldn’t be called a road. We had about a 2 hour ride in a really tough Toyota 4 by 4 to get up to the village. It was lots of going up and down hills, with ruts so deep the trucks nearly bottom out. So anyway, we were coming down the mountain and everything was going fine. I was in the back of the truck, which had a cage on it kind of like a ladder rack, with like 9 other people. I couldn’t see where we were going because of the rack, and then all of a sudden we hit something and stopped. The truck didn’t move so we got out to see what happened. It turned out that the tie rod had come off on one side in the front, and the driver had no steering. What we ran into was a rock and bank just off the edge of the road. The scary thing is that 30 feet back there was no bank, just a drop off. Had the tie rod come apart a few seconds sooner we probably would have gone over the edge. (these are things you should never tell your parents)

Yeah…. So at the time it didn’t really bother me, but later as I was thinking about it, it kinda freeked me out. It was like postponed shock or something.

It was kind of a scary situation, but at the same time it let me see just how much God was watching out for us. I know that God is sovereign, and as long as He wants me alive and well on this earth, that’s exactly how I’ll be. God is in total control. Nothing slips by without Him knowing. Nothing gets by without His consent. We serve a good God and need not fear what may come. There’s a lot of peace in knowing that. 

     Last week I spent several days with a team from RCF up in a Gnobe indigenous village called Boca del Monte. We went to start a building project and do evangelism.

     The building project we’re working on is to replace a rather primitive non functional kitchen at the school in Boca del Monte, with something slightly more modern. Our goal in the few days we were there was to get the old torn out and and the floor and a sidewalk poured, which we almost completed. Lots of digging and mixing concrete by hand… There’s another team coming soon that will be continuing and hopefully completing the project.

     The team did a couple evangelistic outreaches while we were there, using dramas and so on… We didn’t draw huge crowds, but I think it was pretty impacting for some people. I know at least one guy came to the Lord.

     I had a really good time going with the team. It was lots of people I knew from RCF which was nice, and also I was ready for some time out of the office. A few nights up on the mountain was just what the doctor ordered. 

     So I guess it’s about time to update this blog. Sorry to all my faithful readers who have had to read the same story about Playa Blanca everyday for the last 3 weeks:-)