Iglesia Bautista Cordero de Dios:

Last weekend it was our privilege to preach a Mission's Conference for Iglesia Bautista Cordero de Dios and Pastor Octavio Davalos in Hermosillo, the capital city of our state. The church has a history of about twenty years and Pastor Davalos has been there now for about four years.

They currently support about twenty-eight missionaries here in Mexico and around the world and were excited to be challenged anew this year to broaden their vision. It was a real treat for us to to with them and I am not sure who was challenged more!

Pastor Davalos has a tremendous testimony. He left a contract with the New York Mets as a pitcher to follow God's will in his life to preach the gospel. He now makes about $160.00 a week as a fully supported national pastor! His hopes for his sons: to be missionaries to Africa. "And I thank Christ Jesus our Lord, who hath enabled me, for that he counted me faithful, putting me into the ministry;" 1 Timothy 1:12

"I Now Pronounce You Man and Wife":

This past Thursday we traveled down to Navojoa to help prepare and to be a part of the wedding for Jorge and Erika. Jorge is a young man that was saved during our time in Navojoa with the work there and Erika is the daughter of our good friends Pastor Ismael Zamarron and his wife Lourdes. The newly weds will be an active part of the ministry there at Iglesia Bautista Providencia and the Instituto Biblica Provedencia. Jorge is also planning to enter the institute to study for the ministry.

While in Navojoa we also had the opportunity to preach on three occasions and meet up with a lot of friends both in the churches and others in the ministry. It is a great encouragement to see what God is doing and to be challenged to continue faithfully. I was also able to make a detour to go by and see a friend who has "quit". He has been through some hard times and gave up and went back to his old life. I believe that he has realized his sin but feels as an outcast with nowhere to go. Pray for Lalo and his family.

Big Step Of Faith

Peggy's Sunday School Class:

It was a big step of faith and it requires a lot of work to prepare but Peggy is now teaching her own children's Sunday School class. She has about fifteen possible students under age nine although they have never all been in attendance at any one given time. All of them are children of adults who attend our services and it is a necessity to separate the children during the service to allow the adults to listen. It comes as no surprise that there is basically no parental control over a child's behavior in this society. This step in ministry was big for Peggy we have even received comments from some of the parents that the teachers at their schools have commented on the change in the child's behavior. God's Word does make a difference!

Sunday nights Abigail takes these children and reviews what Peggy taught them in the morning. Both Abigail and Peggy are always excited to see which one of "their" children will be at any given service.

A Basket Case:
A few Sundays ago our services were interrupted by a lady looking for help. She remained for the duration of the service and after service I began to deal with her and her needs. I have met basket cases before but this poor soul beats all! Her life is a MESS. Probably not more than thirty years of age with three small children. This past Sunday night will live in infamy as one of those stories that missionaries tell. I doubt that you would ever meet such a soul in the states unless you visited certain specialized care facilities. It is all an issue of sin and the answer is the Word of God. We need to see a miracle in her life and look forward to a future date when I can share the change that God has wrought in her life.

Agua Prieta

A couple of weeks ago Pastor Ismael Zamarron stopped by Magdalena on a Wednesday on his way to the city of Agua Prieta for a Mission's Conference at Templo Bautista Belen with Pastor Miguel. We enjoyed the overnight stay with Pastor and Mrs. Zamarron and then traveled with them to help them arrive at Agua Prieta. It was a joy for us to meet Pastor Miguel and his family and his people there at Templo Bautista Belen. The work was started in 2006 and is one of the few churches where I have seen an honest missionary vision. Amazingly most of his people are from the state of Chiapas (way south in Mexico). I was invited to preach on Friday night and enjoyed great liberty in presenting the great commission from the theme text of the conference, Romans 10:14,15. On Saturday we made our return trip to be in our place here in Magdalena for Sunday.

To The Regions Beyond

We continue to saturate our immediate town with the Gospel each and every week but are also interested in the regions beyond. To that goal with the help of Ezra and Jordan who were with us for a month we traveled to two separate towns specifically to soul win. The first town we visited was Cananea which is about 1 1/2 hours east and north. It is a mining town that is currently experiencing an old time shoot it out labor strike. People were open to the gospel, God protected us and we gave out more than 300 gospel tracts and spoke to each one we met personally. The second opportunity came in the town of Altar, which is about 1 hour south and west of us. Missionary Michael Weiss had it on his heart to witness in this town and invited us to go with him. Altar is a very unstable town at the heart of our current drug war issues and should not be visited. Still God gave us safety and we were able to give out about 600 books of Romans and used every opportunity to talk to all I met. I cannot stress how very important your prayers for our safety are. Thank you.

Youth Activity

This has been a busy month for us on purpose and by design. One of the many activities that we have had is a youth night. We have had others but are at the point that we hope to make this a normally scheduled activity. It is the responsibility of a church to teach their young people and to interest them in the things of God. To not take advantage of opportunities such as youth nights would be a travesty of ministry responsibility! It is our prayer and hope to reach tomorrow's generation today. God can be honored, families can be uplifted, our youth interested and souls will be won if we addict ourselves to ministry.

The Work Of Missions

I recently came across some very interesting statistics on the work of missions. It would seem that this generation of believers is losing ground on reaching this generation's souls. This information came from Gil Anger and you can see it for yourself at http://www.reachingbeyondborders.org/statistics.html but let me share some highlights.

* Since 1950 the work of missions has lost 1,000 missionaries per year

- only 50 take their place each year

*Today there are approximately 5,000 "Independent Baptist missionaries"

* 1,000 American missionaries return home each year*

* 75 % of new missionaries will return home never to return within the first 3 years

* 43 % of all missionaries never complete deputation

* less than 1 % of all Bible college students will consider foreign missions

Are you aware (according to his research) that:

- 14 of the 48 listed European counties have not a single missionary!

- 20 of the 156 listed countries of Africa are without a single missionary.

- 11 of the 43 listed Asian countries have no missionary!

- 19 of the 28 listed Middle Eastern countries have 0 missionaries!

- Even 6 of the 48 listed American countries have no missionary!

Zimbabwe with a population of 11,343,000 has no missionary. The island nation of Seychelles with a population of 79,000 has no missionary. Even in some America nations such as Martinique with 407,000 has no missionary. French Guiana with 163,000 has no missionary.

Mexico is listed with 206 missionaries. A ratio of 1 missionary for each 487,136 souls. There is much work to do. Why not join in? If some of these countries are a little to distant for you then come to Mexico and replace us and we will ask God to send us to one of the zero nations of the world. If God is not sending you then please realize the importance of your personal involvement in sending others just like The Harris Family to represent Christ to the uttermost part of the world.

Pre-Service Bible Study

Neighborhood Witnessing

The Ladies -ready for services

How To Get Stuck in a Monsoon

Chiles Rellenos Con Camarones

Those who know me best will find this the most difficult to believe. This was a meal that I (Steven Harris) prepared and cooked. We have a friend who is a widower and it was his birthday. I had invited him to a birthday supper and had asked him what he wanted. The joke was on me though because he facetiously said "frijoles rellenos con camarones" of course I heard chiles rellenos and went searching for a recipe. The meal turned out very well so I will share it with you.

Buen Provecho!

Chiles Rellenos con Camarones (shrimp):

4 poblano chiles (roasted)
1 red bell pepper (roasted)
3/4 pound deveined shell-on fresh shrimp
4 ounces shredded Montery Jack cheese
w ounces shredded fontina cheese
1/2 cup fresh corn kernels
3 tablespoons diced white onion
2 tablespoons chopped fresh marjoram
w tablespoons chopped fresh cilantro
1 quart vegetable oil
4 eggs, beaten
1 cup medium blue cornmeal

# 1 - Roast Chiles (after roasting, pull off skin, slit to remove seeds, leaving stem end intact)
# 2 - Roast Peppers (after roasting, seed and dice)
# 3 - Grill or dry-roast shrimp (shell and chop into large pieces)
# 4 - In mixing bowl mix bell pepper, shrimp, cheese, corn, onion, marjoram and cilantro, Mix well
# 5 - Stuff poblano chiles with shrimp mixture; press gently to seal
# 6 - Heat oil to 375 degrees in a deep heavy-bottomed pan. Dip stuffed chiles in beaten egg; dredge in cornmeal. Deep fry until exterior is dark blue (4 to 5 minutes). To reduce fat calories -bake for 20 minutes at 400 degrees instead of frying

Youth Camp 2010

Each year we participate in a summer youth camp. Although our numbers were down we had six churches involved and a very good week of activities and preaching. I believe that this year went exceptionally well.

The last two years we have incorporated a time of soul winning into the camp week. This year we went soul winning right before services on Wednesday. All the campers then came to services at Iglesia Bautista de Magdalena. This is our monsoon season though and we had our first heavy monsoon at 5:30 PM just as everyone was out soul winning. Although everyone came back soaked to the bone it did not dampen the spirit of our services!

The campers from our work, Iglesia Bautista de Magdalena, included Abigail and four first time campers at youth camp this year! We look forward to next year and what God will continue to do with these campers for the remainder of this year.

Camp Activities