Multiplication...

Today in our Staff Meeting we read John 6, Jesus feeding the 5,000 (plus women & children :)  The disciples were invited to participate in the miracle through dispersing the 5 loaves and 2 fish, not knowing Jesus' plan.  It probably seemed ridiculous.  How could this tiny amount of food even satisfy one family here, let alone 5,000?  Yet the disciples took the humble offering of the boy and told everyone to sit down.  They obeyed and a miracle happened.  

How often do I look at the need and wonder how my small efforts could ever be making a difference?  There is so much need!  Each women in jail could use intensive counseling, healthy community, relationships, activities, etc. Yet, we have half an hour to meet with them on Sunday afternoons, sometimes developing into ongoing relationships. I spend a significant amount of time helping one farmworking family and their seemingly endless challenges of immigration, court, counseling, and basic things such as baby formula and signing kids up for school.  This is one family among many with similar challenges.  It can be overwhelming.    

Sometimes it feels like 5000 plus men, women, and children.  And yet, Im invited to take the loaves and fish that I've been given and hand them out.  Im not responsible for making the impossible possible, I just get to participate in the miracle happening by being faithful to what God is calling me to each moment.

Please pray that we remember that God makes the impossible possible and that He guides our moments & days.  Thank you for helping make this work possible as well! May you too be encouraged in each moment of your day!

Welcome to the USA!

an Alien or Angel?

In my June newsletter of this year (can see excerpt on previous blog entry), I expressed some despair at the direction US immigration policy seemed to be heading.  I asked you all to sign petitions and join me in praying, knowing that God has a heart for the immigrant and stranger.
  I see this throughout the Bible.  In the Old Testament, there is the repeated refrain to care for the widow, orphan, and stranger or ‘alien’.  In fact, of the 613 laws in the Torah, it is the most common mandate.  A couple of examples are:

•“He defends the cause of the fatherless and the widow, and loves the alien, giving him food and clothing.” (Deuteronomy 10:18)

•“The LORD watches over the alien and sustains the fatherless and the widow.” (Psalm 146:9)

•“Do not oppress the widow or the fatherless, the alien or the poor.” (Zechariah 7:10)

In the well-known passage in Matthew 25:35 ‘when I was hungry, you fed me…’, continues on to say ‘when I was a stranger and you invited me in.’ When we welcome the foreigner, the stranger, the alien, when we extend hospitality to ‘the other’, we are not only obeying a Biblical command but we are welcoming Jesus.  The author of Hebrews charges the readers: “Do not forget to entertain strangers, for by so doing some people have entertained angels without knowing it” (Heb. 13:2).  

What if this was the pervasive sentiment in a country with ‘In God we Trust’ on our dollar bills?  Treating and welcoming the alien as an angel? Changing US policies that affect our southern neighbors so people aren’t as desperate to migrate? 

Welcome to the USA!




Some of you will remember petitions, stories, and prayer requests for our friends Evaristo and Alicia.  A couple of months ago, we spent 4 hours working on a letter to US Dept of Homeland Security, explaining why it would cause extreme hardship on Alicia and their 3-year-old son Alex if Evaristo was deported.  Our community rallied and supported these two in protest that his petition to stay in the country had been denied and he would be deported to a country he barely knows.  A couple weeks ago Evaristo got a piece of mail from immigration (above picture). 'Welcome to the United States of America..." They accepted the waiver! Evaristo is now a legal permanent resident in the United States. In our lawyer's amazed words on the phone to Chris last week: "Evaristo was at the bottom of a very deep, dark hole five years ago. This is a rare, rare story. People need to know about this."

My friend and coworker Chris has been the leading advocate for Evaristo after he first met Evaristo 5 years ago in jail.  He writes,

     "It has been a five-year adventure through the annals of immigration detention, drug and alcohol recovery, migrant camps, gang politics, tattoo removal, living    together with Evaristo that has made him one of the most important people in my life and ministry. He has become a brother I never had, and one of my dear friends who stood as a groomsman in my wedding. This adventure has seen the dark streets at night where violence won, the even more frightening municipal and immigration courts where everything hung in the electric-anxious courtroom air before the prosecutor's words, then a wedding for Evaristo and Alicia, welcoming their son Alex into the apartment, college scholarships, jobs at welding factories and berry picking camps and ultrasound testing, fly fishing programs, getting old criminal charges vacated, and hundreds of community service hours. 

One of the greatest fruits of this ongoing story has not just been the transformation of the kind of guy our nation wants to throw away to a prized young leader in our community, but the transformation of the community itself: hundreds of people who have loved this longshot Solano family, helped with homework, helped with childcare, written letter after letter after updated letter about Evaristo's moral transformation. When people see the power of a life under transformation, they want to be a part of it. We want to be close to beauty.

A beautiful thing has happened. And great works of art take years. We won. Against despair and addiction and massive societal odds, we have gained a permanent resident in our community to enjoy. He is no longer alien to us or to himself.

It is truly a miracle!

Pressing in for more...


I exuberantly started this newsletter last Thursday, eager to tell of the good news!  Even in a week, there have been ups and downs and many delays to even finishing this letter.  Others have been arrested, some face deportation, and numerous people we know are caught in the chains of drug addiction. 
I have to remember the breakthroughs as I press in for more alongside the people I accompany.  I have to heed Christ's call, to throw the net on the other side, to offer my bread and fish when it feels like I am trying to feed multitudes.  He is the miracle worker, I get to participate in what He is doing.  


Please join me in interceding for the families whose legal, financial, and immigration barriers and addictions threaten to overwhelm and destroy our friends.  

Mutual Liberation

As someone who is in the ‘helping profession’, I am often in the perceived position of giving rather than receiving. However, at Tierra Nueva we often experience mutual liberation. As I encounter ‘the other’ I am encountered anew and changed. As I seek to help, I also receive. I delight in the friendships that have developed over these past years, no longer ‘social worker’ and ‘client’ but walking alongside people on the margins in advocacy and friendship. Recently I have experienced a number of beautiful moments of celebration and gratitude. The below stories are tastes of some unexpected gifts I have received this past month...not quite mutual liberation, but definitely blessing & teaching me! 

Bethany Presbyterian Church & Farm Festival!

The past two weekends, I’ve hosted two different groups from Bethany Presyterian Church in Seattle. Both were an immense blessing to us in various ways: helping with the farm’s vegetable harvest; painting our tall stairwell at the TN building; completely renovating our clothing closet, library, and kids room; and painting some old picnic tables for the TN garden.  It was great also to re-connect with these friends from Seattle. 

A highlight was an amazing farm festival! The BPC family group planned various craft & activity stations. There was face-painting, watermelon seed spitting, hat-making, balloon animals, dress-up station, water balloon toss, fishing for prizes, and the great surprise--a huge blow-up slide that the kids (and adults) climbed up and down for a delightful 4 hours! Mallard’s ice cream donated a huge tub of vanilla, which we handed out in overloaded ice cream cones topped with fresh-picked farm raspberries.  

A number of kids and parents kept exclaiming, ‘this is free?’ and ‘I can go on that too?’ People were incredulous that everything was free (well besides some tamales that I had a family make to sell for their profit).  It really was an incredible community gathering, bringing about 100 people together from our faith community, the Faith House, migrant ministry, gang initiative, and farm…in a delightful play day!  It was such a gift to be able to invite families I know to a fun event…and not have to plan and provide for the activities!  Thank you Bethany Pres Church!

Sacrificial Generosity
  Exhausted yet happy, I took 3 kids back to their parents who were visiting my young friend Celia who had just had a baby. We sat in the hospital, the kids running around telling their parents, grandma and aunts about the festival. It was this family I had invited to make tamales, both because they are delicious and because I know they could use the money. Some are working 2 jobs right now, yet have been out of work or skipping to be with Celia having a baby. To my shock and apology, her sister-in-law Elizabeth, a young mom of 2, had ended up making 175 tamales by herself, between midnight and 11:30am. Even still, all was laughter in the hospital and they seemed grateful for the money made from the tamales. At one point they all started talking in Mixtec and then before I knew it, money was being shoved back into my hand by the elderly Elena, saying ‘por su gasolina’. In confusion, at first I resisted, telling them that this was their money they had made from the tamales. The whole family had stopped and were looking at me, as Elizabeth clarified, ‘Bethany, we want to give some of this money to you, for all you do for us.’ I couldn’t believe it, and although attempted refusal in the end I knew I needed to receive it.  More than the actual gift of the money, the family’s earnest and sacrificial generosity continues to bring tears to my eyes.



Blueberries Galore!  
Blueberry harvest is in full swing for my farm-worker friends, and I am getting to taste the fruit of their labor (literally! ;). Yesterday Marcelino and his family came to our worship service with a huge bucket of blueberries to share. Today a young couple Sara and Eleazar brought their buckets straight from work to TN for Salvio and I. It was a quick stop, Sara checking out the clothing closet for some new items, Eleazar getting their mail that comes to TN, and they were on their way to their kids’ doctors’ appointments. They are regular visitors at TN and friends that I have enjoyed visiting in the camps for the past number of summers. Marcelino and his family are among few who still migrate to California in October. So their kids start school in Skagit, transfer in October, and then again in May or June when their family moves back up here. A regular pattern.  Sara & Eleazar on the other hand, stay in Skagit in a nearby apartment, to which I am a frequent visitor.  Eleazar might get some work, but otherwise they will join many others who buckle down and try and make it through winter on little to no income.  



Dream Fields

Check out this new book and DVD that was created by the Migrant Leaders Club of Mount Vernon, Washington! 

To Order the book on Amazon kindle or paperback go to: <http://dreamfieldsbook.wordpress.com/>  

It is full of poems and stories by middle and high school migrant students who want to educate others about what it’s like to walk in their shoes. Janice Blackmore and 15 students presented at our Volunteer Advocacy Training a couple weeks ago, and did an amazing job! 

They invite you to walk with them, 

hearing their stories about living as children of migrant farmworkers in Skagit Valley

beginning of my 5th summer....

June 1st: Completing FOUR YEARS at Tierra Nueva!

After quitting my case manager job and subletting my apartment to a friend, I moved up to Tierra Nueva in the summer of 2008.  Three months, was my plan.  I’ll do a full-time internship at Tierra Nueva for my MSW, and then move back down to Seattle.  Well, plans changed and I moved into a house with other girls come end of summer, in Mt. Vernon.  Now, 4 years later, I’m starting my fifth summer at Tierra Nueva. 

I'm so grateful to be here at Tierra Nueva.  I have learned so much these past years it's hard to pull into words.  I have grown in my understanding of God's unqiue and powerful involvement in this world.  I feel immensely more connected to God, experiencing what it truly means to be the branch connected to the vine of Jesus.  I can't live without Him, let alone try to minister to others, and have any positive impact without Him.  I feel increasingly rooted in grounded in who I am as God's beloved, participating with him in the work He is doing to bring His Kingdom here on earth. En la Tierra como en el Cielo.  On Earth as it is in Heaven.  I am grateful for my community here at Tierra Nueva, together learning how to seek a Tierra Nueva. 

day-in & day-out happenings:

 

       •  going to the Snow Goose Produce for their massive ice cream cones with our new interns and the Sanchez kids

       •  organizing a meeting with Mt. Vernon Law Enforcement, Juvenile Detention Center, CPS, and other service providers to address CSEC (commercially sexually exploited children & youth) in our community

       •   running into 3 people this week who are caught in the clutches of drug addiction, yet speak of hopes for treatment

       • receiving fearful phone calls from an undocumented father of 5 who is nervous about his immigration status

•  planning a baby shower for a 16-year-old girl who is due in the beginning of July, worried about how she is going to pick strawberries this summer

•  talking with a recently single mother of 4 with the youngest 4 months old, finding out she is unexpectedly pregnant

• hearing that the U-Visa part of VAWA (Violence Against Women Act) is potentially going to be gutted in the Act’s renewal, eliminating benefits for undocumented immigrant victims of crime.  

• writing letters with Evaristo & Alicia, helping them articulate the 'extreme hardship' that it will be if Evaristo is deported

    •  taking care of a Triqui friend’s 3 year-old daughter so she could take a class at Pregnancy Choices

 Im also continuing to enjoy being a women’s jail chaplain, co-leading Bible Studies, doing one-on-ones and just recently began corresponding via a new email system with one of the former Skagit County Jail inmates who is in Purdy.  It was fun to go into jail a couple Sundays ago, and have a woman tell me that she hasn’t had cravings for drugs since we prayed for her 3 weeks ago!  ‘The obsession is gone!’ she tells me with new light in her eyes.  'This thing works!'  

Praise the LORD! 

Elena and Araceli

Our Summer Hand-Made Sale!

Brenda enjoying an afternoon nap

New Earth Works

This is a short video about Tierra Nueva's newest venture,

New Earth Works

 Underground Coffee Project, New Earth Bread, & New Earth Farm! 

Check it out! If you are between Bellingham and Seattle area, you can go online and order veggies, bread, and farm and pick them up at one of 8 church locations Sunday morning, or come to Tierra Nueva!

 For more info go to: http://www.newearthworks.org/

'IMMIGRATION' on the ground level

  Farmworkers (mainly the newest wave of immigrants) are not an issue to address, but people that I care about, fellow inhabitors of this world and citizens of God's kingdom. I am grateful for this privilege of becoming friends with some of these hardworking families.  I dont usually write so 'politically', but when politics impact people, 11 billion undocumented people in fact, it's hard to keep quiet! :) I want our country’s policies to treat all people humanely and fairly, acknowledging the incredible contribution they are in fact making. Our country’s Social Security benefits $6.8 billion dollars every year from the work of undocumented workers who indeed pay income taxes and yet don’t qualify to receive refunds.

  Unfortunately fear is increasing in the undocumented immigrant community. Between the Arizona law in Supreme Court this week and Secure Communities program that was enacted statewide in the beginning of April, fear is unfortunately somewhat understandable. Last summer, several of us from Tierra Nueva joined other immigrant rights leaders in meeting with our Skagit County sheriff and police chiefs to persuade them to not join this program. However recently, Immigration Customs & Enforcement (ICE) got their foot in on the state-level and it is now a statewide mandate.  This means that when people are booked into Skagit County Jails (with probable cause for arrest but no conviction), their fingerprints are not only sent to FBI but also to ICE.

    Contrary to the goal of ‘removing criminal aliens from our communities’, as we know, not everyone arrested is guilty. So unfortunately it means that innocent people will be deported, splitting families and making it even harder to survive on minimal employment, let alone the level of trauma. Although this may seem to address the ‘problem of undocumented workers’, it in fact ignites fear in the community. People are less inclined to call the police for emergencies, which compromises our communities’ safety.  Even though it doesn’t give police the ‘right’ to ask for documentation, that is the word that has spread and something I’m trying to tackle at late-night phone calls and home visits.  “No, the police don’t have the right to stop you without reason or even ask for your documents.” No, racial profiling is not legal.  At least, not yet.  

Please join with me in interceding for humane US policies, and click on the below links if you want to advocate for some options on the table. 

To participate in a current action opportunity through Sojourners' Christians for Comprehensive Immigration Reform, click here

or to sign a petition for Obama through Witness for Peace, click here

Stories from the Fields, Streets, and Shores

   This week, one family who has worked nights digging clams on Puget Sound shores for ten years, showed me their records of hours worked and how many pounds of clams per shift.  As I did the math, knowing that they get paid 30 cents per pound, I realized that on some of the coldest nights in December, one elderly woman worked 11.5 hours, picked 6 boxes which weighed 211.50 pounds to accrue a whopping $5.52/hour.  Another night, she worked 10 hours from 6pm-4am, picking 2 boxes for 75 pounds and thus $2.25 hour. Fear and economic desperation keeps them from reporting this violation of labor rights.  Even right now in warmer weather, her fit adult son (father of 5 kids), is making between $8.60 and $14/hour. Since they get paid per pound, this amount doesn’t include the hour-plus time they spend in the boat, waiting for the tidewater to come in so they can return.

   It seems slightly ironic, that as floods of tourists come to visit our Skagit Valley tulips this Spring, tended to mainly by newer immigrant workers (documented and undocumented), the anti-immigrant sentiment is on the rise nationwide. As you see tulips in stores, enjoy tasty berries this summer, and maybe eat clams, will join with me in thinking of the farmworkers who labor long backbreaking hours to bring these treats to your table?  

Taize & Easter

I celebrated Easter Sunday morning, waking a bit too early for my liking but gave me a chance to rise before dawn and go to the Taize church with only a handful of people in it and spend some time there before the church was filled at 10:00am with literally around 6,000 people! It was quite amazing! The size of attendees had grown considerably over the week, with people coming from all over the world.

After the regular Taize song style prayer service, 'Christ is Risen! He is Risen Indeed!' was translated into around 15 languages. The first phrase was said from the front followed by people all over the church shouting back their responses in their own languages. Sometimes there were 4 respondents, like Swahili, whereas when it was said in German it sounded like half of the church shouted back the response! It felt very appropriate to celebrate Easter with such a huge number of people speaking so many languages.

Halfway through the week, it was estimated there were 500 Spaniards, 500 Portugese, 1000 germans, and who knows how many from Netherlands, Poland, France, Italy, Russia, Lithuania, and on and on! Including me, there were 4 from the US, and 4 from Canada! After a daily bible study led by one of the brothers (monks), I was in a delightful discussion group with people from Germany, Switzerland, Austria, and Belgium.

Still, my initial longing for a personal retreat, felt a bit out of question at moments, especially as i stood in line for food with maybe a thousand youngsters from all over Europe. so, I headed off on my own to walk the beautiful countryside. I also spent Friday and Saturday at a silent retreat place, 1km from Taize, still attending the prayer services, but getting a much delighted in time of real quiet and peace.

Im incredibly grateful for this time, as well as time afterwards with my dear aunt and uncle. I feel restored, rested, and aligned more fully with the Risen Lord.

Taize: Holy Week and Easter 2012

Vacation! This past week, I enjoyed visiting some dear friends in London and now am being treated like a queen by my Aunt in Burgandy, France. It's been gorgeous weather, so I am definitely soaking up the sun! Tomorrow I head to Taize for the week, where I get to spend Holy Week. I am very much looking forward to this week, and unsure what to expect! I do know the schedule, which is as follows:

Daily Schedule:

8.15 Morning prayer

12.20 Mid day prayer
20.30 Evening prayer

Thursday evening 5 April

20.30 Celebration of the Eucharist (with the feet washing)

Friday evening 6 April

20.30 Evening prayer followed by prayer around the Cross

Saturday evening 7 April

20.30 Evening prayer and the life commitment of one of the brothers of the community

Sunday 8 April : Easter

10.00 Celebration of the Easter Eucharist
20.30 Evening prayer

Towards a new theology of liberation

I just completed a 4 day training in Paris, on holistic healing. Bob Ekblad (tn director and founder) and Gilles Boucomont a local pastor in Paris organized and taught the course. I got to be the one TN delegate to go and am really glad!

It was really helpful, developing a more thorough understanding of body, soul, and spirit and the way we are affected and require holistic healing. It's hard to put it all into words, but my eyes were really opened to more of the spiritual world--and the incredibly power and presence of God. I personally was impacted through a slight paradigm shift, as well as see potential for ways it will affect our ministry. Much more to be said.

It's also been great to be with the Ekblads, meet others from the Uk, France, Sweden, and exploring Paris a bit too!

welcome the 'stranger' and 'alien' includes ALL people

Over the past 3 weeks, Salvio & I have presented on ‘The Faces of Immigration: the Lives of Today’s Farmworkers' to five different groups: our TN Volunteer Advocacy training in Bellingham, Pregnancy Choices, Whidbey Island Presbyterian Church, Lopez Island High School Group, and First Presbyterian Church of Bellevue. As the immigration debate rages on in this country, it is encouraging to be welcomed with open ears and hearts to various communities eager to hear about the lives of those who are often hidden in society. Unfortunately the current political rhetoric all too closely echoes the voices throughout history that have worried about immigrants ‘draining our economy’. The solution repeatedly proposed is ‘to build a wall’ and keep ‘those immigrants out’!

How are we called as Christians to respond? How does the Bible view ‘strangers’ and ‘aliens’? “Of the 613 laws in the Torah, the one that appears most often is the directive to welcome strangers” [Andy Newman, NY Times, 3.8.07]. More than once, Scriptures tell us to not mistreat aliens because we know what its like. "Do not mistreat an alien or oppress him, for you were aliens in Egypt” Exodus 22:21; 23:9. We are also reminded that we are strangers of this earth and citizens of heaven [1 Pet 2-11, Ps 119-19].

In the New Testament, Jesus invites us to see and serve him in those around us. “... I was a stranger and you invited me in” (Matt. 25:35). We are also commanded by Jesus to love our neighbors, this includes people who look different from us and/or come from a different country. In fact, the author of Hebrews writes, “Do not forget to entertain strangers, for by so doing some people have entertained angels without knowing it” (13:2).

What if the US religious rhetoric was transformed into viewing strangers as angels, not aliens to be ostracized from society? What if in each person we saw the potential for mutual liberation, for cross-cultural transformation, and more simply as a precious human created in the image of God? As C.S.Lewis says, “There are no ordinary people…Next to the Blessed Sacrament itself, your neighbour is the holiest object presented to your senses”(Weight of Glory, p.9). It is a privilege to be able to welcome those who come through our Family Support Center doors on a weekly basis, to offer a cup of tea, hear people’s stories, and assist them as they navigate life in the US. By the grace of God, may our eyes be opened to see all as our Divine maker created and designed each to be.

transformed lives transforming society

We are noticing an increasing interest among our local Skagit community to learn more about 'gangs' and indigenous Mexican 'farmworkers', similar to a role TN played years ago, educating the community about farmworkers. I'm convinced that our role as advocates extends from the micro to the macro level. As we engage with our community's social services, collaborating together and providing trainings on how to provide more culturally appropriate and effective services to the people we love and work with, I hope we will experience wider community change and understanding.

Since Tierra Nueva pursues the most marginalized of people, part of our role as advocates is helping people get jobs, housing, navigate court systems, learn to live healthier and more sustainable lives, or as some may say... becoming 'functional members of society'. However, ideally, it isn't just the individuals we work with that are invited into a new way of being. 'Society' or the dominant groups with money and power also need to be provided avenues for change. Judgments, stereotypes and misconceptions abound that prohibit the marginalized from being welcomed as equal members of society, equal in humanity.

Last month, Ryan, Teddy (two of my coworkers/friends) and I went to Catholic Community Services Mental Health program here in Skagit to do a training on 'Gang Culture'. [The three of us are depicted at the left in our trip last year to San Francisco and LA]. The 20 or so mental health therapists were really receptive and eager to hear about our work and how gang members are fellow humans who, like all humans, want to belong.

Many youth have joined gangs in our area as first or second generation immigrants. Their parents are working 2-3 jobs and rarely at home, unable to provide the nurture and mentoring that kids long for. Kids grow up both yearning to be accepted and to belong, and seeing gang life glamorized by media and older gang members. Ryan explained our TN value of mutual liberation and how he and other TNers have seen the importance of welcoming gang members one by one into their home, adopting them in a sense into a new sort of family.

Teddy recently joined Ryan, Ramon and Ramon's 2 kids in the TN apt. He soon will get full custody of his 1 year old boy, and is getting to learn how to be a single dad alongside Ramon who has done the same. In front of the room-full of mental health therapists, Teddy beautifully articulated a bit of his own story, gently disarming their previous conceptions and calling them to a greater love and acceptance of all people. It was especially fun to see how they approached Teddy afterwards, a definite change in attitude from the initial skepticism and surprise at seeing this tall tattooed young man coming into their conference room, to an elderly lady at the end saying, 'Teddy, I like your tattoos'. We could hardly get him out of there afterwards, as the therapists kept asking him questions and thanking him for coming. He lives a life testifying to the power and love of God.

For whatever reason, March is full of speaking events for me and my coworker Salvio (as he can). Would love your prayers for these events, that those we are speaking to might be changed and called to truly 'welcome the stranger' in line with the Biblical mandate.

Mexican Farmworker Lives 101

March 1st, TN Volunteer Advocacy Training, Bellingham WA

March 2nd, Pregnancy Choices, Mt. Vernon WA

March 16th, Lopez Island group at Tierra Nueva, Burlington WA

March 18th, First Presbyterian Church of Bellevue, WA

Human Trafficking

March 7th, Skagit Valley College, Mt Vernon WA

TN Family Support Center & Skagit Against Slavery update

March 8th, Whidbey Island Presbyterian Church, Oak Harbor WA

changes and Change groups

Last week I got to go to Bethel Church in Redding CA, participate in weekend services with my parents, sister and her family, as well as an Honor & Empowerment Conference and evening worship at a Healing conference! It was amazing, and great to be with my parents, sister, bro-in-law, nephews and niece. I received a lot through worship and some prayer times, as well as some practical good refreshers on boundaries, confrontation, team dynamics, interpersonal communication, and personality styles.

I came back pretty refreshed and…invited to exercise new practices and paradigm shifts immediately back in Skagit Valley and ministry with Tierra Nueva. Salvio (my FSC coworker) is in Mexico visiting his parents so I’m by myself in the Family Support Center. Even though God has been changing me and inviting me to surrender the weight to him, the practical needs of people still feel like they are on my shoulders. Here are bits of the day and convo in my head ;)

‘This lady’s son is in prison. She thinks he was going to get out this year, but now I call the prison and they tell me he’s got two more years. Tears fill her eyes, and I know what I can really offer is to pray with her. Her husband is really ill, unable to work, and she needs to be home taking care of him so she can’t work either. They are desperate for rent money. ‘How much money should we contribute to their rent payment?’ If I drop the ball, don’t get the info to our bookkeeper in time and mail the check, they will be late and maybe receive an eviction notice. I hope I don't drop the ball.

A new lady walks in, I ask her how she is, and immediately she starts crying. She has gone everywhere looking for help with their gas bill which is due today otherwise it’ll get cut off. ‘Should I say yes to helping with this new person’s utility bill? And help with some gas money?’ Ive never seen them before, but I think we can help with some. She and her husband are disabled too, so can’t work. If we set up a payment plan, and put at least $20 down it will help keep their gas on. I ask her as well, if I can pray with her. She is gladly says yes and gets her husband in the car to join in, and we pray. I think I needed to stop and pray more than anything.

Please pray for me as I navigate the very practical and sometimes emergent needs of people. I’m noticing myself turning quicker and quicker to God, however it can all get pretty overwhelming. Also, please pray for more FSC advocates, for God to grow our Spanish-speaking team!

Elizabeth and I started our Women’s Change Group last night! This has been a dream for a while, to have a space for women to gather and grow deeper together. The Genesis Process Change group is a good structure that seems appropriate. God is really filling in the gaps, with providing people for child care and bringing women who seem ready.

We had 6 women last night (3 babies! and 5 other kids next door) including one volunteer advocate, and a couple more are joining next week. Three of the women know each other because of their gang related boyfriends, some hating others (not pictured). We spoke to this, encouraging people to open themselves up to change and leave their judgments at the door. Elizabeth spoke about stagnation and the hope formula, faith leads to risk leads to change leads to hope and renewed faith!

Please pray with us for this group, and for Elizabeth and I as we lead the time.