Chivilcoy Celebrates 156 Years

On Friday, October 22 the President of Argentina, along with her husband (the previous president), the provincial governor, local mayor and other officials visited Chivilcoy for the city's birthday celebration.  Our curiosity got the best of us, so we went to the city's main square to have a look!  We ended up waiting in a mass crowd for two hours for the President's late arrival.  Once she and the other politicians were on the platform we went home to listen and watch on TV.  According to the local paper 22,000 people filled the plaza in this city of just 70,000!!!  If you follow Argentine news, you may have heard that the presidents husband, probably the most powerful person in Argentine politics, died of a massive heart attack just five days after he was in Chivilcoy.

Debbie, Rocio (one of our youth), Danny and Kristi

A literal sea of people spilling into the plaza (left) and filling the entire width of a four lane avenue.  The municipal palace is seen in the background.

View of the platform

Flags and hats are worn by syndicate members.  Argentina has very powerful syndicates.

Four thousand students from local schools were present to sing.  Some of our own youth were in the group seen on the steps of the Catholic Church in the background holding flags.

President Kirchner comes onto the platform (far left in tan outfit)

A large screen in front of where we stood gives a close up view of the politicians, with Mrs. Kirchner and her now deceased husband on the right.

Mother's Day & Youth Night

On October 17th. Argentina celebrates Mother's Day. This year we worked with our youth to prepare them for heading up the entire worship service.  They did a fabulous job picking hymns, leading the service, playing all the instruments, reading Scripture, poems and several meditations.  The kids from children's church also sang.  Pray for God to raise up faithful servants from among our youth!

Diego was the service leader.  Some of you may remember praying for him a couple of years ago when he suffered a stroke while playing soccer.  You would never know today that anything happened to him.

Children's church is a new ministry in our church, which helps to provide three things:  teaching oriented to children ages 4 to 8 years; ministry opportunity, especially for our youth; a little quieter atmosphere for the preaching time in the worship service!  The children's church kids prepared a special number for the mothers.

Ailen was one of two young ladies who shared a poem in honor of our mothers.

Walter had the important task of giving the announcements.  Many of you prayed for Walter around the same time as Diego.  He has suffered from a complex sickness involving his immune system.  His health is stable, and past symptoms cured.

Rocio was our pianist.

Most of the youth group sang a special number.

Braian did Scripture reading.  Braian and his family attend church regularly and need prayer for salvation.

Jonathon read a meditation.  He's growing in Christ, and will be baptized in November.

Our son Danny also read a meditation, and obviously we're proud of him!

Matias read the final meditation.  Matias is brother to Walter (above), and really seems to be growing spiritually.

They youth did a fine job with the music, which they participate in regularly.

An excellent group was in attendance for the Mother's Day special meeting.

Pastors Gathering in Chivilcoy

In September, one of our National colleagues suggested a day retreat for missionaries and National pastors to gather in Chivilcoy for fellowship with Deb's folks and to receive needed encouragement from the Scriptures (Deb's dad preaching).  Most of our colleagues were able to make it, and the granite counter top in the new kitchen was being installed as they arrived!  Not only did we enjoy the Word and the fellowship, but we were able to use the new kitchen at lunch time!

Pastors and missionaries are encouraged as Dad "P" preaches

National pastor and missionary wives

National pastors and missionary men

Important Advances on Phase I of the Church Building Project

In mid September Debbie's parents and another couple (Scott and Gail) visited from Maine and gave us a hand finishing off the new kitchen just off the new multi-purpose room.  Scott painted the portion of the kitchen walls not tiled as well as the ceiling, including the large ceiling in the multi-purpose room.  Much waited for new kitchen cabinets were built and granite counter tops installed.

The kitchen floor and walls were tiled just prior to the arrival of our visitors.  We ordered the granite counter in advance so they could see it installed before returning to the States.

The pass-through with and aluminum shade makes it easy to serve refreshments into the multi-purpose room

Painting the multi-purpose room and kitchen ceilings was a major job that required cleaning stucco residue from the entire perimeter and cutting the joints in addition to rolling out the paint.

Thanks, Scott and Gail for your hard work!

Thanks Dad and Mom for your hard work!

Saturday Night Youth Group

Each Saturday between fifteen and twenty youth gather for three hours of youth activities.  Martin, our youth leader leads the youth in an hour of singing and study of God's Word.  Later, the young people play games like ping-pong, volleyball or UNO.  Others may sit in circles playing guitar and singing.  Sometimes organized games are prepared in advance.  At some point refreshments are served, which could be anything from pizza to cookies.  Please pray for three or four who come who are not saved.  Pray also for growth and maturity in those who attend regularly.

Debbie leads organized games

Passing the bean!!

Chilling out with the keyboard and guitars

Ping-pong, the all time favorite of almost everyone!!

May to September Fall & Winter Memories

Winter vacation with the whole family in Tandil, Argentina.  Sleeping in, excessive snacking and UNO marathons occupied most of our time!

Hiking around the hills in Tandil

Kati, Debbie, Andy, Danny and Krist
Tandil in the background

Danny's 15th. on May 17th.

Kristi celebrated her 17th. on August 11th.

In mid August Andy joined the Northland Soccer Team in Paysandu, Uruguay for sports ministry.  Kati returned to Northland a couple of weeks later.  Airport good-byes are never fun, but are a normal part of missionary life.  It brings us great joy that Kati and Andy are in Bible College.

May 10-21 Work Team from Clinton, Maine

We're grateful for the back-braking work of six men from Clinton, Maine who spent ten days helping to install over 100 concrete steel reinforced fence posts on the southwest property line at camp.  Their contribution meant the completion of the goal of getting all 171 posts in.  In addition to installing the posts, numerous projects were completed inside the maintenance building to make it more efficient for day to day work.

Left to right:  Cliff, Jacob, Dave, Ben & Caleb
Back:  Dwayne

Cliff used his welding skills to build a basket for our electric
winch.  This helps us to store things in our second level storage area

Work begins to finish installing the posts along the fence line.

Dwayne ran the mixer all day long!

Daily "asados" (barbeque's) helped everyone to look forward to work! 

Gathered at the last post!