Well, we've had quite a bit going on lately. Just for kicks, I took the Holmes and Rahe Stress Scale test (which rates a variety of life events such as job change, death of a family member, illness, etc...on a point scale) the other night just to see where I rated and found I was well over 300 points. Actually, I came in at 321, which places me in the "severe life crisis" area with a 79% chance of a major health change. Interesting.

Anyway, we've been working hard to get into the house. We've given up on finishing and are hoping at this point to make it livable. One of the last big items we've been struggling to complete is our septic system. Last Tuesday we finally found a backhoe to come out and dig the pit. The next day I drove to all three hardware stores trying to find the right type of rock to put in the drainfield. Non of the stores had anything. I finally tracked down a trucking company and was able to have a load delivered. Now, our house is on the other side of a very steep hill that basically requires a four wheel drive just to climb. Because of this, the truck had to drop the rocks at the bottom of the hill which meant that we had to haul around 12 cubic meters of boulders over the hill, one truck-load at a time in our pick-up. We spent three days working on this and still aren't done. The day after the back-hoe dug the hole, the sides caved in. We worked on that all day the following day and got it opened back up again only to have another day and a half of torrential downpours fill the hole with water and mud. Yesterday, we started over again. It is incredibly difficult to get anything completed here.

Thankfully, things are going well with the skatepark and with our church. We had our monthly cookout on Friday night and there were quite a few youth that showed up in spite of the rain. At one point, the winds and rain were so hard that the movie screen blew down and we were all huddled against the office door trying to keep dry. At least the food was good. Church continues to go well as we work our way through Romans. Tonight we'll be watching a movie about the events that took place in Rwanda several years back called "Beyond the Gates" Two weeks ago we studied in Romans Chapter 5 and took some time to specifically talk about Paul's words regarding sin and grace. Where sin abounds, grace abounds all the more. Tonight, we'll talk some about the existence of true evil while we watch the evidence of God's grace in the midst of horrific events. It is a great movie and truly illustrates this point.
Next week, more work trying to get moved in. We could really use some prayer in this as our next door neighbor continues to make threats towards me (which is another stressor that I don't need at the moment). Thanks for following along with us.

4 Cruces: Water and other events

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This is a cool "before and after" video posted by missionary to Costa Rica, Barrett Cruce.

Part 1

I've never experienced highs and lows in life like I have here in the field. Life is anything but even-keeled. I never know quite how we're doing...are we being effective? Is there more we can do? Does anyone even care? How much harder can daily life get? Where are the thank-you's? Some days it is enough to make me wonder what the heck I was thinking when we picked up and moved down here four years ago.

No sooner does that thought enter my mind than God begins to provide encouragement...
We recently went to a New Year's Day pig roast, which is really a gathering of missionaries throughout Costa Rica at the house of our friend Bob Wilmarth, owner of the infamous Goat Farm (one smell and you know why it's "infamous"). We often feel somewhat isolated down here in Puerto because we don't have much contact with other missionaries and their families...people that understand what it's like. It was great to spend a day hanging out and talking with people that can identify with the different issues we face on a daily basis. To hear a seasoned missionary say..."Don't worry about things...it takes at least four years for most missionaries to even begin being effective where they are because there is so much to learn and so many hurdles to overcome" is so encouraging. To have someone else that has been working in country for many years tell us, "Wow, you guys picked the hardest place in the entire country to start a ministry" speaks volumes. To watch our kids play for hours with all of the other missionary kids was priceless. All in all, it was very encouraging.

Other encouragements...we were invited by a friend we met at the pig roast, to speak to a group of college students from Messiah College this past Tuesday. I hope they were blessed, but I know that we certainly were as we not only had an opportunity to meet some neat people and to share with them what God had done in our lives, we also had the opportunity to listen to a man that grew up in the jungle here in Costa Rica as the son of missionaries to the Cabecar Indians, an indigenous group that lives in the mountains behind Puerto. His story was very inspiring. He has gone through a lot in his life and has put up with things we can't even imagine in order to share the love of Christ with others. We felt priveledged to be a part of the evening.

Reality quickly destroys the romantic idea of "missions"...whatever that is. There is only one thing that matters in the end...the call of God. Were you called? You had better go. If you weren't called...if you're not sure beyond a shadow of a doubt that God has put a calling on your life you better stay home because without the surety of a calling, there are better, simpler and easier ways to pass time. Don't do it because it sounds cool...like a good thing to do. It will destroy you. Living here has helped me in some small way to identify with the subjects of Hebrews Chapter 11. I don't know if we will ever see the results we hope to see in our lifetime, but I know beyond a shadow of a doubt that God has placed us here. Case in point? Barring something unforseen, after having to wait a full year since she accepted Christ, we'll baptize Anastasia tomorrow night before house church. One small drop in a very deep bucket but another huge source of encouragement.

4 Cruces: The opposite of discouragement

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Pray for Barrett and Amy and the girls if you think about it and click over to their blog and leave a comment to let them know... thanks... bryon

Well, it seems to get harder and harder to put together an update. In trying to get the house finished, we're falling way behind on our communications. Please forgive us. We don't have a phone line out where we live and it can sometimes be pretty difficult to get online at all.

It is now Tuesday and I am trying to get caught up on administrative duties, communication with potential staff members, etc... We are also working like crazy to finish the house. Our goal at this point is to make it livable so that we can move in. Our contractor is doing good work but I have decided that he is terrible at math. We are now so over our contract amount that we are close to having to shut down. Third world calculating finally catches up with us. Anyway, I am spending as much time as possible working on-site myself both to make sure that workers continue going strong and so that I can get as much done myself as possible. The roof is 98% complete, the flooring is 80% complete and hopefully we'll have a functioning water system and bathroom in the next week or so. We could definitely use prayer in this. We want to finish and move so that our living situation is stable and we can put all of our energies into our work rather than being so distracted. I keep reminding myself that this is a short time which will increase our long-term effectiveness.

As for church, things really seemed to go well this past Sunday night. We had a pretty large crowd...the largest in quite some time, and everyone really seemed to connect and enjoy the night. I took a slight detour from our ongoing study through Romans to talk about faith. We have just finished Chapter 4 where Paul spoke about Abraham being made righteous because of his faith. There's a lot of talk in our culture about faith, but all too often, faith is an end unto itself. We spent a couple of hours Sunday night looking at faith from a biblical perspective before we head through the rest of the letter to the Romans. I really enjoyed teaching and everyone seemed to enjoy listening and discussing as we went through the study. My hope is that we will continue to grow closer as a body and that we will also begin to grow. Please pray for us and for our effectiveness. Please pray for the new Christians as God molds them into new creations.
Finally, we'll also be celebrating a baptism this next Sunday afternoon. If all goes according to plan, Sebas (who has been part of our church since the beginning) will baptize Anastasia whom he shared Christ with early last year. It will be an exciting time.

4 Cruces: life

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We celebrated Christmas yesterday...first by opening presents in the morning. The girls really enjoyed their new Polly Pockets dolls and we all got a kick out of the new socks that Santa brought for us to wear in our boots (I'll include a photo of that soon). We are sort of at the end of our rope waiting for the house to be done. It isn't easy living in such a tiny house with no storage space, sporadic running water and rain often blowing in. We are also all sick at the moment so rather than trying to throw together a Christmas dinner, we went out for a treat to Chili Rojo and had a great Turkey dinner courtesy of Andrew (the owner) and his wife Ikuko. We took a family photo before we headed out. Here we are in our Puerto finest...ready to paint the town red...and green.

We celebrated Christmas at house church this past Sunday evening. It was almost a wash. Our plans were to have a Christmas dinner around 5:30 or so, read some of the Christmas story from the bible and then watch the movie "The Nativity Story". Well, our friend that was cooking the pork roast (smoked turkeys were the only traditional option and they were $100 each) got started cooking several hours late as he had trouble finding some of the things he needed. We ended up just waiting around, talking and hoping until almost 8:00pm when the roast was finally (mostly) done. Then, someone showed up with fireworks and created quite a side show. It was rather chaotic and hardly anyone made it through the movie, but we were able to celebrate in the end. That is sort of the way things seem to go down here. Flexibility is one of the necessary spiritual gifts...or you just break. Here's a photo from our evening.

Finally, the house. Please pray that we get through this in one piece. It is definitely a different world down here when it comes to construction. Overall, things are going well but the words "stay within budget" don't mean anything to the contractor and the laborers. We are finding ourselves in the position of either paying more or having them all walk...and there isn't much more available to pay. It is very frustrating because I have tried to plan well and stay on top of things the whole way through the process. that only works when all parties are on the same page and unfortunately, that is next to impossible. It looks now like the house will go up to $10,000 over budget and we have no control over this. Even though we have a contract, there is no ability to enforce it and the contractor has no surplus even if we could. We either come up with the additional funds or they walk away when we can no longer pay. Very frustrating, especially since we are so close to finishing. I will be glad when this is over. Anyway, here is a photo of the house taken yesterday.

Very simple...open air construction; no air conditioning; lots of ventilation; rainwater catchment system with over 2300 gallons of water storage to get us through drought periods. Definitely a different way of living. Our living area is on the second floor to increase security by limiting access to one point. Below is a storage area, homeschool area and a guest room (if you feel like visiting).
We can't tell you all how much we miss seeing you at this time of year. We have not visited the States for over a year now and it is really starting to seem like a long time. We know this is where God has us and we are comforted by Him but from time to time, we do miss home. Take care and God Bless.

4 Cruces: Christmas

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Wouldn't you know it...right as I'm getting ready to get online, pay some bills and take care of a few other important things, the motherboard on my laptop fried. I haven't been able to get online for almost a week, which is really bad when I don't get that many opportunities anyway. Thanks to Dell's warranty, the computer is running again and we're back in business.
We are in San Jose right now, getting ready to head back to Puerto. We brought the girls in for a couple of days to do a few fun things for Christmas (beats hanging out in our 250 square foot house). We also met up with the builder to buy a few items so that they can continue working. Please pray that the house gets finished on time and close to the budget we had originally worked out in the contract. I am discovering that contracts in Costa Rica are more of a guideline than an actual figure you can hold someone to. In the end, you pay the additional amount (whether you have it or not) or the builder walks away when there's no more money for him to spend. There are no reserves for him to pull from if he goes over budget. If he goes over, you go over.
We are also going to pick up a turkey today for our Christmas feast at house church. Everyone is looking forward to that. We're going to eat, read a little bit of the Christmas story from the bible and then watch the movie "The Nativity". I hope everyone reading this has a great Christmas. Enjoy being with your friends and families. Take time to thank God for all of his blessings and for sending Jesus to spend some time with us and for taking the heat so that we don't have to.

4 Cruces: Craziness and Christmas

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Weather... Actually, that's not totally true that the rain won't stop...it just won't stop for long. It did stop for about five days...enough to begin drying out. We had about five days of dry weather which ended with a bang earlier yesterday morning. The sky opened...again. It's been raining most of the day today and we're looking at another four days, unfortunately. Already, Limon is cut off from San Jose by flooding and I believe the road is closed between Puerto and Limon again. Right now, it's raining so hard on the zinc roof of the skatepark that I can barely think. The good side is this...for us it is an inconvenience but for many others it has been devastating. Many people have lost their homes and belongings in areas close to us. Thank God we are in good shape...we can deal with mold...but many others have not been as fortunate. We were able to help a little by taking clothing and food to our local grocery store which was collecting for the relief effort. Please pray that the rain will stop so that people get a chance to get their lives back together. This is the rainy season, but we have just experienced the most rain this part of the country has had since 1941.

The House... As for us, things are going alright. We had a great Thanksgiving with Amy cooking up a storm (with help from the girls) and Whit joining us for the meal.

On the housing front, we lost almost two weeks of work but were able to get a few things done last week. Unfortunately, two things happened that slowed us down considerably. The styrofoam roofing insulation that was supposed to have arrived almost two weeks ago never showed. In addition, three of the additional workers that had arrived to speed things up went home due to the bad weather...the day before the rain stopped for five days. That meant that we weren't able to get the roof on when it was dry and now everyone is back and it's raining. Pura Vida!

Church... Our house church went well on Sunday. We finished going through the second chapter of Romans. It was a real hoot discussing the finer spiritual details of circumcision...not your everyday bible study topic. My goal each week is to simply and clearly, without a lot of "christianese", explain the scripture in a way that is interesting and applicable. I think this happens most of the time. Anyway, it went well Sunday and everyone seemed to go away with a clear understanding that we're not saved by what's on the outside...and hopefully a deeper devotion to Jesus. It is really cool to see people beginning to see themselves as the church. We are talking about starting some type of mid-week meeting that would be different from Sundays and we're talking about how we as a church might be able to begin reaching out to others. Please pray for us in this...although we've been at this for a couple of years now, we're still starting from scratch.

We would also appreciate your prayers for our safety and the safety of people in town. For a variety of reasons, crime has increased dramatically here lately with armed holdups, car-jackings, etc... This is the type of thing that won't really affect the safety of a visiting mission team but is a concern for those of us living here on a more permanent basis. I won't go into details but we would definitely appreciate your prayers.

End of the year giving:
As you consider your end of the year giving please consider the following...

Support for us as a family...your support of our family as missionaries enables us to do what we do. Prayerfully consider joining the Cruce Family Support team. We continue to need people to join our support team on a monthly basis. For options, click on this link to Shepherd's Staff or to donate electronically, click here.

Support for the ministry...your support of our ministry enable us to maintain the skatepark, purchase new skateboards and sponsor local youth as they compete on the national surf circuit. You can donate to our ministry through Alternative Missions by clicking here. Then, click on "Other Designation" and fill out the information making sure to indicate that your donation is for Puerto Viejo.

Sometimes it can get pretty lonely down here as the holidays approach and we want to be with friends and family. Thankfully, we have a very large extended family in all of you. We want you all to know how much we appreciate your continued interest and prayers as we do our best to be faithful to God's calling.

4 Cruces: it won't stop!!!

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We've had an interesting couple of days here... Last night, there was a 6.2 earthquake across the border in Panama. We were woken up just after midnight last night with the entire house rolling and shaking. As groggy as I was, it was a surreal experience. Maili (if she had been awake) would have felt like she was in the crow's nest of a sailing ship. Her bedroom is in the very top of the house, about 20 feet off the ground, level with the canopies of the surrounding trees. This was the first real earthquake we have experienced here and it was something else. Back in 1992, a huge quake hit the area cutting Puerto Viejo off from the nearest city (Limon) for around two months. Food, etc... had to be brought in by boat. When I think about these kinds of things, I realize that we're only a step away from being in the middle of a third world disaster. That's when I have to remember that we are in God's hands. Definitely exciting.

It rained hard all night and has been raining non-stop today. The rivers and creeks are full and we have a small river running across the yard of our house. Now that we are living back in the hills, transportation is an issue and we have been without our quad for three weeks now which has made life a little more challenging. Getting Makena to school, taking care of other errands and simply getting back and forth from the skatepark come with a whole new level of difficulty. I can't wait to get the quad back because biking to work several miles in heavy rain on a single speed bicycle, up and down hills, is not the easiest thing in the world. It's not the worst either, but I'll be glad to have my transport back. Life here in the jungle comes with a whole new set of challenges and some days simply consist of taking care of things just so that we can continue to be here.

Later this afternoon I'll be opening the skate park if the rain lets up a little. The entire park is covered but when a big storm like this blows in, the rain gets on everything and skating can get a little dangerous. We'll see how it goes but I'm not holding out too much hope since squalls keep blowing through. The rain is also putting a damper on the house construction. They are a little behind on getting the roof finished and can't really work up that high when things are so wet. Hopefully, they will get it done during the next dry spell and then can work every day un-impeded by the wetness. They're supposed to be done by the middle of next month and we're wondering how they'll make it. Another day in our lives... At least I didn't get peed on by the bat again.

4 Cruces: Firsts...

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This is a great post from Barret Cruce down in Puerto Viejo, Costa Rica. Barrett gives us a great snap shot into what it takes to live and do ministry on the field and in the jungle.

Ever been woken up in the middle of the night because a bat peed on you? If not, well I've got one up on you. A few weeks back, we heard our nightly visitor fly into our bedroom. All of a sudden, I felt a spray of liquid on my legs. I told Amy, "I think that bat just peed on me." She wasn't impressed and immediately went back to sleep. I thought about it for a few minutes and decided there was no alternative but to roll over and go back to sleep as well. What are you going to do at 2:00 in the morning? Just another one of the unique experiences we've had here in the jungle.
I'm in San Jose right now. I met with the builder this morning to purchase such necessary items as toilets, sinks, door knobs, etc... for the house. We are getting closer and should have the roof in place by the end of next week. He tells me that we're only a month away from being done and although they are working fast, I have a hard time believing it. We'll see. We're hoping to be in by Christmas. Also, our water problems may be solved soon. Rather than trying to come up with another $10,000 dollars to drill a deep well to the aquifer, we are going green. We have decided to begin harvesting our rain-water by installing a system of large storage tanks and a filtration system. With Whit's help, I calculated that we can capture enough water from our roof alone to satisfy the majority of our needs for the year. We'll still have to watch it during the dry periods but with our surface well for back-up, we should be in pretty good shape. Just don't plan to visit us in September or October or you may find out what it means to "fetch the water".

Here's a recent picture of the house.
It is amazing to me sometimes how much time and energy you can expend here just trying to live. Some times we spend a good part of our week just taking care of things that enable us to continue with life. Add to that the homeschooling, ministry and construction and life is full.
Speaking of "ministry"... everyone seems to be enjoying Romans. What a great letter. We are well into chapter 2 right now and will continue on next week.

Since I am stuck in San Jose right now, Amy, a very brave, talented and flexible woman, is leading house church. She is leading a discussion and prayer evening which should be a great time for everyone. We lost a few people earlier in the year as they made decisions which took them out of fellowship. It was pretty discouraging but as we've been faithful to keep meeting, teaching and caring for each other, the group that remained has gone deeper. Several that were coming previously have even returned. That has been encouraging.

A typical "service" looks like this: most everyone begins showing up between 5 and 6pm. We share a meal each week and many times the guys bring lobster and fish that they have caught right offshore on the local reefs. We start cleaning and cooking and end up eating between 6:30 and 7:00. Then, we fill up our coffee mugs and open the study in prayer and worship. After 5-6 songs, we begin the bible study and end with discussion and prayer. Afterwards, everyone pitches in to clean up and hang out a little more. What I love about this is that it is so all-encompassing. It isn't just showing up for an hour and then rushing off to the next thing...our service lasts for 3-4 hours.

People are really connecting and are enjoying spending time together. It makes me think that this must be similar to what it was like in the early church. A cool thing to think about as we work our way through Romans.

4 Cruces: Happenings

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  Well, it's been a long time since I last posted. Living out in the jungle is great but it makes it more difficult to do things like get online and blog. Things are going well overall. The house is moving along and is pretty much on schedule. The workers are finishing the first layer of stucco on the walls this week and supposedly, will be starting the roof next Monday. This is great since we are just starting to enter rainy season (it has been raining all day).

We are really excited to get into the new house but there's still a way to go yet. We are still in need of a permanent solution to our water problem. Right now, the only real option is to have a drilling truck come out and drill a deep, perforated well. That is a tall order out here. We'll see what happens.

House church this past Sunday was great. We had some visitors... Pablo was back from Spain and brought his parents with him. They had never experienced anything like this before and seemed to really enjoy it. I saw him the next day and he said that they hadn't stopped talking about it. Please pray for Pablo. He came here last year to buy land and fulfill a dream of starting a surf camp. As things go here...it took more money and time than he had planned and after 9 months of trying, he gave up and went home. He had been coming to our house church for several months before he returned and really experienced a change in is perception of God and his knowledge of the bible. It is awesome to hear him say (after experiencing so much difficulty and frustration) that he believes that God had him here for a reason and now when he returns to Spain, he wants to build into people rather than a project. A real life changing experience for him.

Anyway, Sunday evening we started Romans. We watched the moving "Gladiator" the week before to really get a feel for Rome and the time period before getting into the scripture. The movie really provides a great backdrop to discuss the spread of 1st century Christianity. Everyone seemed to enjoy the message and we had some good discussion afterward. Studying Romans for the first time over 12 years ago at Calvary Chapel Tucson really changed my life and I am so looking forward to sharing that with everyone in our house church. Please pray that lives will be changed and that everyone will be so excited about their faith that they will share it with their friends and families. What a privilege to be here doing this.

4 Cruces: What up...

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