Dear Family and Friends,

Greetings from the deep south.  We wish you well in whatever circumstances you might find yourself.

Well, it's not New Year's - but it feels like it around here.  Summer days are becoming fewer and there's a chill in the air.  Stacey and Kari are in their second week of the new school year.  Activities are beginning to crank back up and we're getting back into a somewhat "normal" routine.

I, Marilyn finished last year burned out and in much need of rest.  We had a great summer, though full of activity.  Greg spent lots of time helping to plan and run a youth camp for the PCA churches throughout Chile - it was held in Puerto Fonck on Lake Llanquihue not too far from Osorno.  Stacey and Kari went and had a blast.  Since I stayed home and slept a lot, we asked Stacey if she would like to say a few words about the experience.  She had more than a few words so I am attaching her document.  We are so thankful for all of you who pray faithfully for our children.  At times I have grieved over the loss of cool activities for youth like are available at our church back home, yet we see God's faithfulness at work in their lives and are so pleased with how they are growing up.

SUMMER  YOUTH  CAMP
[Greg here - Wow, what a great week the camp was!  We had gorgeous weather, solid and meaningful teaching, and good fellowship between campers and leaders.  My prayer is that the youth put into practice the things that they heard that week.  Our theme was "The Final Countdown" and we dealt with issues like using our time wisely because our life is just a breath, don't be "stupid sheep" who just follow the rest of the flock blindly, what does it mean to live a holy life as a youth in today's culture with so many anti-Christian cosmovisions, be willing to expose and explore the blind spots that we all have, and be impacted by the intensity of what Christ did for us as our Savior.}

PAINTING  THE  CHURCH  (ANOTHER  YOUTH  ACTIVITY)
Our church has been in much need of painting for a long time now.  Sometimes when you're burned out it's good to get back in touch with your creative side.  Painting the church was like that for me.  We downloaded a Benjamin Moore program to be able to "paint" our own photos and show folks how we wanted it to turn out.  That made the job a lot easier and I had a lot of fun playing around with it and getting feedback from other people.  It was a job that had a beginning and end.  It was good therapy to see the transformation and now it's done (sort of) - not at all like working with us fickle humans.  I expected to have the same men of the church who have helped with workdays in the past, but the summertime pretty much only lent itself to the availability of youth.  We had a great time when people showed up and did some good bonding in the process.

PRAYER  REQUEST
We want to thank you so much for sending us through your prayers and/or financial giving.  It sounds so cliché, but we mean it.  We long to see people in the church here grow in their faith as this job causes us to do day by day.  We have asked so many times for prayer for various issues of the church.  I would ask now that you pray for us as we deal with lots of responsibilities, especially with the starting up of several activities for this time of the year.  Please pray that God would continue to be our source and strength.  Thank you all so much for your kindness and faithfulness to us and to our God.

Much love in Jesus,

Marilyn

Mailing address: Casilla 33-0, Osorno, Chile
Phone: 011-56-64-217-567
Web sites: www.mtwla.org/people/gsenter.htm
www.freewebs.com/senters4chile/index.htm

Contributions should be sent to:
Mission to the World
P.O. Box 116284
Atlanta, GA 30368-6284
(include account # 016869)

Stacey's Note

I must admit that before camp I had a sick feeling in my stomach. “I’m not going to know anyone, no one will like me, I’ll get put in a cabin with people I don’t know, this camp’s going to be 7 days long for Pete’s sake – what am I gonna do?!!” I thought. As hard as I tried, with prayer, consolation from Mom and my best friend, etc. I still felt worried early Monday morning as Dad, Kari, Gaby (my best friend whom I coaxed into accompanying me to the camp :D), and I loaded into the car and drove off to the bus terminal. As we neared the station, I saw the blinding glint of sun on a blonde head; “There’s Isaac!” I shouted. (Isaac Dye is a missionary kid in Viña del Mar) The ride to camp was fun – Kari, Gaby and I sat with Deanna and Isaac and caught up with each other. It was when we got to camp that problems arose. The leaders went around telling who was in which cabin, and I was dumbfounded to hear that I had been stuck in a cabin without Gaby (my security blanket, in a way)!!! I knew 2 out of 4 people in my cabin, but still thought “Oh great… what a boring week this is going to be.” Boy, was I wrong! The first day of camp, it seemed that everyone stuck with people they already knew, for the most part. Little groups of friends submerged; I assumed (wrongly) that the whole week would be the same, and I began to count the days until I would be back, safe at home. Too bad I started out the week that way. Luckily, I decided to make the best of the week, and ventured out to talk to people I didn’t know, and it sure is a good thing I did! By the second day the girls in my cabin were staying up late talking and laughing, and everyone was having a really great time at camp. At the end of camp I felt really close to all the girls in my camp, and I can see now that when God stuck me in there with them, he had a plan!!

One of the really fun things (that I’m glad some genius came up with) we did was split the camp up into alianzas, or teams. We had a blue alianza, and a green alianza, and I had the privilege of being on the blue team! On the first night we designed shirts for our teams (the blue team had the backside of an elephant with “Azul” written on it, and the green team had a cute little turtle!), and each day we played awesome games and did obstacle courses, treasure hunts, and missions to earn points for our team! The game I loved the most was towel volleyball where you use a water balloon instead of a volleyball, and stretch a towel between two people (there were three pairs per team) to catch and launch the balloon with! One night we had karaoke (wow, that was intense!), another night we had to improvise a costume for our Noche de Disfraces (I went as a nerd, hehe) and yet another night we had the Festival de Viña in honor of a big music celebration that was going on in Viña del Mar at the time. For the festival we had to sing a popular song, dance a traditional dance, present a comedy act, and invent our own dance routine. I was in the group who sang the song, and it was really, really cool!! We sang “Drive” by Incubus, which I find is really uplifting and liberating, even though it isn’t Christian. Our team won the 4 parts of the festival – yay blue!

We also took a hike to a beautiful waterfall (and all ended up soaked!), and got to swim in Lake Llanquihue (Yon-kee-way), next to the Osorno volcano every day! The waves were amazing, and we spent some truly incredible times together enjoying God’s nature. :)

About the Bible sessions, the thing that really stuck out to me, and to most everyone else at camp I think, was the day Uncle Verne Marshall told us not to be stupid sheep. Why? Because sheep are among the dumbest animals alive – they’d follow another sheep right off a cliff!! Uncle Verne told us not to be stupid sheep and follow the rest of the flock – instead we should follow the Shepherd.

Sunday night came, and we were on the bus home… camp was amazing, and I missed home and being able to shower for as long as I wanted without a HUGE robot-like grasshopper popping in on me, but I didn’t want to leave! Our week at camp was a huge blessing; it was so fun, we got to meet lots of new people, wash endless piles of dishes and actually enjoy it because we were with friends, be encouraged, among so many other things.

Camp was so special, I remember all these things and smile… and I thank God for being in control and making Puerto Fonck 2008 an unforgettable week!!!!!!

March 20, 2008