January Catch-up!

Greetings from Hermosillo!

Just wanting to update you all on what is going on here!  This year in Arbol de Vida we are focusing on the family (marriages, parenting, etc) and so we are getting ready for a marriage retreat (Feb 19-21) that will be a first in our church along with other discipleship and teaching throughout the year.  We are looking forward to this important weekend for the couples and have had a great response from the family of God abroad to help sponsor all the couples that wouldn’t have been able to go due to finances.  Thank you!!!  Please pray for our marriages in Arbol de Vida and that all will attend this retreat.  Just like everywhere else these days there is a great spiritual battle being fought to hold on to our marriages. 

Shelli is busy these days with homeschooling, working out the vision and involving people in Safari Biblico (the Sunday School and VBS curriculum ministry) and reconnecting with the hospitals and doctors in the SMILe ministry (Child Life Therapy with burnt, disabled and sick children).   Please pray for my dear wife, that the Lord would give her direction, wisdom, patience, called co-laborers (by the Lord of the harvest), time and energy to see what He wants done done.  And to not do what He doesn’t want done.  Confused yet?  Basically, that His perfect will would be done.

Please pray for me (Greg) as I work with the church leadership in preaching, counselling, youth minsitry, worship ministry and administrating in the local church.  Please pray for wisdom in some difficult and complicated situations we are trying to help our brothers and sisters through.  I need wisdom to lead the missionary team here too.  Please pray also for Lane Elliott and I as we start an adult youth leadership discipleship study focusing on preparing servants for being great in God’s kingdom (where servants who never stop serving are the great ones). 

Please pray for the Soup Kitchen that we are partnering in with a Free Methodist Church just a few hundred metres from Arbol de Vida with help from both churches (and Lane and Sheri putting their passionately compassionate hearts into it).  Every Saturday there are 50-100 kids attending that may or may not otherwise have had a meal that day.  Lane has more info on this ministry (with videos even!) on his blog.  www.laneelliott.blogspot.com.  Take a look!

We are enjoying the servant hearts of a group of Canadian couples right now.   Paul and Esther Weeks are here for a month.  They are living in the dorms at the church and serving in many areas that are right in their giftedness!  For example, Esther is teaching sewing to a group of ladies that could make it into a business to support their familes, Paul is building storage for the soup kitchen supplies and other wood-working projects.  Jack and Lucy Vogt are here till the end of February and are serving in teaching English, cooking classes, Bible studies and much more.  Again just letting the gifts God has gave them be useful to Him!  And then we are so happy to have Reg and Linda Toth back till May or June with the blessing they are to the ministry here in many ways which among them include construction, teaching English and compassion ministry.  God’s family is amazing!

Well, I need to wrap this up.  God is great and I love seeing it more everyday in His Word and His creation.  I’ve enjoyed the privilege of seeing some the universe closer-up since we got back with a telescope that a dear friend sent along with us to Mexico.  It seems that God continually wants me to see His greatness lately whether in His word or in the work of His “fingers (Psa. 8:3)” when I see galaxies milliones of light years away.  To think that He is WITH ME is all I need to keep serving Him joyfully.

In Christ,

Greg Neufeld for Shelli and the niños