Date: Mon, 25 Jun 2001 09:22:11 -0700 (PDT)
From: Joy McMasters <maestrajoy@yahoo.com>
Subject: Saludos de Mexico (2)

I feel like part of my family away from home now after over a week living with them and April and I will begin our ESL class ministry tomorrow (Tuesday) night at 7pm local time. We have planning and preparation left to do, but we´re excited because our church seems very supportive.

I have had some struggles with culture shock that wouldn´t have been possible a couple years ago--I have discovered that I have to be very careful about spending time with Jon in public because of the tendency toward gossip here. Since we are here as missionaries, we have to be especially careful. Hopefully, this will stop being an issue because the issue itself has the potential to turn into a distraction, even if our relationship isn´t one.

April and I seem to have gotten really close to our family very quickly since we spend so much time talking after dinner each night. We have also gotten really close to each other as we pray and talk nightly, and this is a huge blessing for both of us since we both have struggled with a lack of really close constant friends. I am glad she´s from Bakersfield because that will make it possible for us to see each other after we return to California.

We will start learning our clown show soon so that we can begin performing it on the street in front of various churches as a way to reach out to the children of the community and then share the Gospel using the bracelets we will be making. Last Saturday, we went to Chapultepec, a huge park where many of the museums are and where people just go to hang out on the weekend. We discussed tracts such as the Four Spiritual laws in Spanish and taught the guys on our team how to braid so that they could make the yellow, black, red, white, green, and yellow (again) bracelets.

We went to the Zócolo with our teams to see Diego Rivera´s murals at the national palace, take pictures in front of a giant Mexican flag, and see the Catedral Metropolitano. I was excited to see that the scaffolding that was up the past couple years had finally come down and the ceiling was repainted. Unfortunately, now they´re using jackhammers at the bases of the columns to try and fix them somehow so the place was full of dust. Since the city was built on a filled-in lake, it sinks a little every year and the really old buildings are falling down.

I guess it´s time for prayer requests and praises again. Praises:

• I feel really close to the family and April and I have seen clearly some ways to bless them.
• Our church is highly grounded in Biblical truth and solid in Bible study.
• Tonight, we have the opportunity to join the family Bible study that our papá leads.
• I am seeing God´s love and mercy more clearly than I have in months and He is healing many of the things that I had struggled with most.

Prayer requests:

• Continued vision for ministry.
• Sufficient rest (yesterday I took a nap and still had to go to bed at 10:30 because I was so exhausted).
• The health of our Mexican family and rest for them as well as they work really hard and get even less sleep than us.
• Preparation for the ESL classes and opportunities to show God´s love through them.
• Improved health as my cold is still around and yesterday I thought I was going to loose my voice.
• Continued wisdom in how to make the best use of my time (which I have to split up between ministry, Spearhead activities, time with family and April, and time with Jon).

¡Que Dios les Bendiga!
(May God Bless You!)
Joy<><