Spiritual - Emotional - Mission update

So, we have been talking alot about our weekend adventures lately - they are note worthy because they are out of the ordinary routine and very exciting, and we can't wait to share our photos... but here, we do much more than exciting weekend trips... we have a week full of teaching and other things. So this blog is going to be a bit about that! (and after that, Tim wrote a new blog on our last and best cenote adventure!)

School is fabulous, it is going much better and continues to improve each day. Recently, I realized that I was not praying intentially for my kids, and I knew that had to change. I've been diligent in praying for my kids everyday and have really felt my heart open to them and I love them more and more each day! What made me realize the great need to pray for my kids was when I gave a kid who is normally well-behaved a detention. Her mom later talked to me and explained that her alchoholic and abusive father (who is divorced from her mom) came into town and my kid was supposed to visit with him. The appointment with the lawyer went too long and she wasn't able to see her dad, and doesn't know when she will be able to again. This all was going on in the days before she got detention. It made me realize in a hit-me-in-the-face kind of way how much is going on beneath the surface of all of my kids. My worst kids and my best kids all have things they are dealing with or struggling with or learning. I need to keep each of them in my prayers....

This incident gave me the idea of having prayer partners for each of my kids. So I asked for people form the US to partner with my kids and to commit to pray for them everyweek and to send them letters 3 times this year. The response was overwhelming! I got all the support I needed within 2 days! It was so neat to see God provide the support for me and my kids! All of my kids are sooooo excited that people from the US are praying for them and writing to them - its amazing how excited they are actually! Its cute! Thanks to all of you who joined with me in this project.

At school Tim and I are both developing strong relationships with each of our kids and truly love them and love being teachers! Tim is also getting to know some of his students outside of class. He gives piano lessons to two students (as well as teaches guitar to two other missionaries). His gift for music is truly a gift here, he now leads the worship band for the English service and is doing a fabulous job as lead guitar and lead singer!

We are both enjoying being a permanent part of the mission called Hocoba. There Tim and I are in charge of teaching Sunday School to the 18 kids ages 1 to 12. It is a challenge with so many kids with such a wide range of ages, but we feel blessed to have this opportunity. The church is Hocoba is in great need for financial support, right now the sanctuary is made from sticks wired together and a tar paper roof. The sunday school room is of cinder block but does not have electiricy. Also, they are in need of sunday school supplies, right now all we have available is crayons. Glue, sissors, tape, paper, makers, and BIBLEs are in need. Our church has a vision to build a cinder block santuary, as well as provide electiricty to the sunday school rooms and future santuary. Becuase of these needs, I have start a project partnering financially and in prayer with Hilliard United Methodist Church. God has really laid in my heart to try to the best of my ability to help find financial support for the Hocoba mission. The Mayan people of Hocaba are very loving and welcoming to us. The mission is quite wonderful, there are about 25 kids under 18, and around 12 adults. It is so wonderful that there are so many kids coming to sunday school so that they can be brought up believing and can change the face of the small Mayan village of Hocaba. Our mission church there is very needed, seeing as it is the only Chrisitan church there.

Please continue to keep Tim and Kari in your prayers. Everything is going fabulous here, we are healthy, safe, happy, and feel incredibly blessed by God to be able to be here serving Him.
Please pray:
1. For our continued health and safety
2. For the spiritual and emotional lives of our students and that Tim and I will have the wisdom to know what questions to ask and what prayers to say to speak to our kids needs
3. For the Hocoba mission, that the church would continue to grow, and for Tim and I to have the patience and wisdom to teach the Sunday School class. Also for the heart of the Hilliard United Methodist Church to open to Hocoba and provide financial support.
4. For Tim and I as teachers - that we continuing improving and learnign new and better ways to teach our kids

Below is what Tim wrote about our past weekends AWESOME CENTOE ADVENTURE!!! READ ON!!!!

Hello blog readers. This is Tim Reimann coming to you from Merida, Mexico. You haven’t heard much of me in our first 78 days, but Kari has been doing a wonderful job of documenting our hot Mexican adventure. Credit must be given where credit is due and Kari definitely deserves some credit! With that being said…I’ll tell you about our day, while trying to stay inside the lines of what really happened.
This morning Kari and I woke up on the new sheets of our king size bed, after a comfortable night sleep. Comfortable and roomy. After getting ready slowly for our long day we were picked up right on time by Robert and family. We stopped by Lupita’s house and picked up her, her son and Angelica. From there we departed; Robert, Anita, Dan, Caleb, Havie, Lupita, Angelica, Kari and I. We packed into Roberts van and headed for Cuzama. The car ride there was typical when leaving the Merida outer limits; Flat landscapes and armored police vehicles with officers holding battle rifles.
When we got to Cuzama we were delighted that it was still a cool 98 degrees and overcast, perfect weather for spending the day outside in the Yucatan peninsula. Now, this trip was described to us as a once in lifetime trip because of the cenotes, but also because of the transportation. In old plantations here in the peninsula the means by which they transferred the cash crop back to the ranch buildings to be processed was by a horse or donkey lead cart. These carts are on a rail track…here they are called trucks, and that is what we took to the cenotes. A rickety, primitive sitting cart pulled by a malnourished horse driven by a Mayan man with a machete. About 30 minutes after we departed we arrived!
As we stepped out of our truck, we noticed nothing out of the ordinary. There were Mayan men lounging in the shade along with iguanas and other various reptiles. I didn’t even notice the entrance to the cenote which ended up being a two foot by two foot hole in the ground marked off by a couple 2x4 pieces of wood.
I was the first person to climb down the latter, or rather the pieces of wood held together by metal twine. As I descended into the cave it took a little bit for my eyes to adjust and when they did my breath was immediately taken away. At the end of the latter was a wooden deck which is what I was standing on when I was looking at what my brain was telling me had to be water. I couldn’t believe it. It was like I was looking at a National Geographic photo…only with the taste, smell and dampness of the really thing. There was a single hole in the ceiling of the cenote letting in a thread of sunlight shining on perfect water. I would say it was like glass, but glass would look like the Rocky Mountains compared to this underground pool. It was perfect because it has never been exposed to the elements. You could see all the way to the bottom of the pool perfectly…it was almost as if the water got clearer in the deeper areas. This was taken right before we got in. We are about six inches away from the water and about forty feet from the bottom of the pool. As everyone else came down to join me they were all as breathless as I was.
Kari and I quickly got ready to go in along with our companions. Anita, Roberts daughter, and I were preparing to enter the water, I had her ripple the water so that I could how far the leap was from where I was to the surface. Even though it was only six inches, it could have been twenty feet for all I could tell.
The temperature of the water was blue raspberry kool-aide. It is exactly how it sounds, perfectly refreshing and intoxicating in beauty. Kari and I swam, explored, and jumped into the raspberry water. A half hour passed and it was time to load up the truck and vamos to the next cenote. The second was more like the ones that we have been to before, but it was still very interesting and very unique. The water was crystal clear. When we strapped on our goggles we could see all the way to the bottom, which is about 50 yards. There were a clump of roots hanging from the ceiling of the cenote which were climbed by both Kari and myself. For those of you who know my fear of heights, you will be happy to learn that I am slowing getting less scared of “the jump.” Jumping off high places into cenotes is good practice.
We swam in the second cenote for a little more than a half hour, packed up and then left for the third cenote. This one was the most interesting and coolest. It wasn’t until our time had half expired when we discovered how cool this cenote was. Looking from the light into the dark isn’t that special because your eyes are adjusted to the light and can’t see the dark…right? Well it wasn’t until 5 of us, lead by Kari, got up enough courage to start swimming to the other side of this very deep cave. After we had swam about 75 yards, half way across to the other side, we found that there was a ledge that we could stand on. Also we discovered that once our eyes adjusted to the dark, we could look back under the water where we had just swam from and see the perfect silhouette of people swimming some 200 feet away. Not just that, but since the change in perception, the water now looked that delicious blue raspberry color. Again we could look down and see the bottom of the cenote and make out every rock facet and every feature of blind fish swimming 30/40 meters below us. It was absolutely, truly amazing! The best cenote trip to date! Every cenote we go to has been totally different than the one before it, which is very encouraging because each new cenote that we go to gets better and better.
After traveling on the rickety truck and swimming at three different cenotes we were happy to vacate the water and dry off. We made our way back, riding back from the middle of nowhere on our horse pulled truck. The ride in and of itself was very cool because we would look behind us and we saw the rail track fade into the distance as well as the butterflies would stir as we would jostle by. It was very pretty.
This trip is something that we highly recommend! We can’t wait until the Mason’s come so that we can go back to the blue raspberry kool-aide water and dip our longing feet in again! God is good…and uber creative!