Rachel Chapman a servant of the Living God
This is how the mesa where we live looked last week:
Behind our house
I just took this picture a few hours ago!
Green grass!! The grazing animals are LOVING it!
This is how the stream looked just a week ago:
Dry - not even a pool of stagnant water
Now it is gushing!!
Beautiful waterfall where the stream drops into the Canyon
Thank you, God, for the rain! Thank you for your provision for the Earth, for the Nahuatl people, for us, and for the animals. You are a great God!
Windows – √
Doors – √
Floor – √
We got a call today from the village. The team has finished the floor! Woohoo! And, they installed all the barred windows and the outer doors. WOW! And, they even had time to stucco the kitchen. Thank you, Lord! The guy who made our cabinets is going on our next work team and he wanted to install the cabinets, so now he can! 
And, to top it all off, one of the pilots who flies for our organization here flew over the village yesterday and took a few pictures of the progress. He just sent us copies. So, here’s what it looks like as of Wednesday at 2:30.
Where is the work team?
You can see the tarp over the schoolroom to shade the floor so it doesn’t dry as fast. There is black plastic on the floor in the kitchen and the other part of the schoolroom so the concrete will sweat and not dry too fast. You can see the windows already in. It doesn’t look like our blue throne is installed in the latrine yet. That will come very soon, I’m sure. Great job, guys!
Another angle
Now, we’re just lacking a roof!
One of the elements of the Holy Week festival in the ceremonial center is food. Within about 10 minutes of arriving in town, a young man about 20 came and offered us food. He escorted us to one of the two “cocinas” set up in the main area of town. His father, we learned, was one of two that had the privilege of providing food for the festival goers for the 4-day festival.
The kitchen was a roof with 4 half-walls chest high. There was one entrance. In the middle was a raised work area knee high made of adobe.
the kitchen
In the far corner was a stove.
the stove
This stove is similar to what the people use to cook in their homes. It is heated by a fire under the metal discs. The fire is fed through a hole in the wall from the outside. They cook their tortillas directly on the discs and sit their pots of beans on the discs to heat and cook. People usually only have one metal disc on their stoves in their homes.
In the other corner on the far wall was a corn grinder. This is the first grinding the corn gets on it’s way to become a tortilla.
The corn grinder
Serving Pots and Eating Bowls - no utensils. You use your tortilla to get the beans to your mouth.
These are the pots/serving bowls that the beans were served in. We grabbed a small clay bowl and filled them up with beans. We grabbed a pinch of salt sitting that was sitting in a bag on the raised work space. Then, we heated a couple tortillas up on the metal disc stove and “Bon appetit!”
I grew up celebrating Easter with my family, a bunch of friends, and a good meal. While we were out in the village, Sarah planned a feast for our Easter celebration.
Making Easter Dinner
We made mashed potatoes with a hand beater.
Mashed potatoes by hand
Creamy and lumpy
And, Sarah made a delicious blueberry pie in her cast iron skillet on top of the stove.
The crust
Blueberry pie filling (it was canned)
Blueberry Pie with Crumble Crust
The feast
Green Beans with Garlic, Creamy Mashed Potatoes, Pepper Roast Beef, and Leftover BBQ Pork that we had to eat up
Some of the cute kids of our village…
Our house goes up!
The guys got back today from the village. They hauled over 30 pick-up loads of dirt to fill in our foundation! The building team took a break so that they could just shovel the dirt from the pickup right into the house. The team got started again when they’d finished the fill. We have 6 rows of bricks up as of Monday. Every day, they do 2 more rows of bricks. And, there are about 20 rows all together. It’s going fast now!
There is a work team coming this weekend, so on Monday, the guys will head back to the village with them. They’re hoping to be able to pour our cement floor and our bond-beam on top of the adobe walls! It’s moving along!
We made it back last night. It’s been a LONG two weeks. Check back soon. There will either be one big, long post about our trip or maybe several short ones!
One quick picture - the drop-off in late afternoon
My sister comes in 1 hour to spend Christmas with me! Time to go pick her up!
We got in last night (Saturday). The trip went very well! We are all very encouraged with what we found out. Our prayers were answered! I am going to be posting more this week – pictures of our trip, etc – so come back for more info!
visiting with the girls
Right now we’re doing laundry, recovering from the gruesome travel, and getting ready for several days of meetings with our church-planting consultants who are coming tomorrow. But, I will be working on some posts, too, to share pictures and details of our trip.
The new Las Moras church-planting team
I praise the Lord for the team that He has provided. It is a unique blend of two mission organizations working together for a common goal – to see God raise up a mature church among the people of Las Moras and the surrounding area. With diversity of backgrounds comes different perspectives which, as we rely on God for wisdom and direction, makes us a stronger team.
Growing up I saw first-hand how different organizations worked together to reach the unreached, and it has always saddened me when I see the body of Christ divided and not fellowshiping or working together. I am blessed to be a part of this unique team.
