Click here to read our April '05 letter.

You're perplexed because it's not April yet (not even March). Here's the deal...we have to turn in our monthly letters to HQ more than a month before they actually get sent out in the postal mail, therefore you get to trick time and space - reading April's news in February (and people thought Einstein was sharp).

Annette and I each started a new blog today. Mine is called MexiLinks and is a space for pointing to services, stories, websites, events or other stuff that we found interesting and thought you might like knowing about. In other words: We Likey so maybe You Likey.

Annette's new blog is called Pre-text. The title comes from this quote, "A TEXT WITHOUT A CONTEXT IS A PRETEXT" It's a place where she'll publish quotes you can use as a pretext for thinking what you already think or as a precursor to reading the text in its full context or both.

To go to these new blogs, click here=> Pre-text or MexiLinks or find the appropriate links under Our Websites on the navigation bar (green strip) on the right-hand side of this page...you may need to scroll down.

We're finally making good on our promise of a "trip report" from our time in North Africa. Click here to see a few photos and their accompanying backstories.
(To view a photo's caption simply click on the picture when the full size version appears)

No travels. No guests. We are AT HOME and ALONE for more than 23 hours
for the first time since December 14th.

It's been an amazing 8 weeks of hopping the globe, connecting with and
participating in what God's people are doing to serve Him and mankind.
Most everything we saw is just under the radar...not on CNN, the
Discovery Channel or Entertainment Tonight. Yet I have no doubt that
the projects and people who we spent time with are having a more
significant, lasting impact on the social, political and spiritual
landscape than those who are on the world's radar.

(click pic for full-size version)
Ever since the youth event EJE finished I�ve been meaning to write to let you know how it went. A ministry trip followed by house guests combined with exhaustion from all we�ve done the past two months have kept that note on my to-do list instead on this blog, till now. But I just spent the afternoon with Veronica, the youth leader at our church, and am so full of joy and gratitude for all that God is doing in and through EJE that I had to spill some of that out to you.

It feels like now is the moment in which so many things we�ve been working towards during the past 9 years are blossoming. It would take pages and pages to tell you everything that has happened; from the kids whose lives were impacted by experiencing or working the event, to the families who were able to reopen channels of communication with their kids, to the huge the shot in the arm this was to the youth ministry and leadership development in our local community, to the encouragement and invigoration of the leaders who came from St. Andrews in Buenos Aires. So instead, I�ll give you a few snapshots quotes to illustrate what went on:

"Seeing the success and impact of EJE I am challenged to go out on a limb and try big things." Israel Flores, pastor of San Pablo Church

"If we learned one thing we learned that God will provide the resources we need for what He wants to do." Youth Worker, Veronica Dominguez

"EJE had become pretty routine for us because we've done it so many times, but this EJE shook us out of that routine and brought us back to the essentials, to serving kids and to watching God work in their life. I know our next EJE won't be the same because of that." Pedro from Buenos Aires

A 15 year old who disappears for days in the drug-filled world of raves, said to her family, "Thank you for bringing me here. I love you...you haven't lost me."

"I thought it was going to be really boring spending the weekend at the church. I really wanted to spend the time at the mall or doing something else but I am so glad I came." Jaime

Comments from more than one parent: "I don't know what you did with our kids, but they're so changed it's wonderful." "When is the next one so my other children can go?" "Can my son go through it again?"

I keep promising you more stories and photos from our time in Egypt, Ethiopia, etc...but I'm not holding up my end of the bargain very well.

Tonight I took the time to at least upload some new photos like the one above. To see them, just scroll down this page. You can click on most of the photos to see it's bigger or more detailed version (like the one above of the two Orthodox priests/monks from Lalibela, Ethiopia).

For the last 7 weeks we have been traveling and working together with great people from all over the world who love God and the people around them.

We travelled to 4 continents, 5 countries, 10 cities (New York, Frankfurt, Cairo, Addis Ababa, Lalibela, Sharm El-Sheikh, London, Miami, Orlando). We travelled almost 20 thousand miles, crossed 9 time zones and logged 59 hours of flight time (plus 20 hours of layovers).

Tomorrow we will finally get back home to Mexico and the thing I'm most looking forward to doing is sleeping in :-)

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(Annette asleep on her luggage during a layover at the Frankfurt airport, click to see the full-size version where our brother-in-law, George Randall, is watching over her)