June 14, 2015

How is Your Spanish?

June 14, 2015

Zinnia at Ron's mom's house

Today was a great day!  I am exhausted.  That seems to be my general feeling lately.  Got up at 7:00, had breakfast, and got ready for church.  At Sunday school we had a very full house in our class.  There were 26 present.  The two new couples from last week were back and we had another new couple.  When I was arriving at the church, I ran into this newest couple and their 4 children looking for their class.  I showed they where the children would go and where I thought they would attend, but their teacher (our son) was not in the class yet.  So they ended up coming to our class with the two youngest children.  I happened to have a Bible story color book in my tote bag and a box of crayons so I let the little boys use them during class.

Golden Shower tree

Church was excellent.  Our pastor is out of town for the Southern Baptist Convention and he had someone else filled the pulpit in his absence.  The sermon went along with a series our pastor has been doing and was very good and useful. 

Cluster of blooms on Golden Shower tree

Following church Ron and I went by his mother's house and he took something to her that she needed while I photographed her Golden Shower tree in the yard and some of her flowers.  Beautiful!!  She was still sleeping so we did not wake her.  We picked up a lite lunch on the way home and enjoyed lunch with good discussion.  Jeff and Barb were taking a load to the McAllen house so we did not do lunch with them.

Close up of Golden Shower tree blooms

It was a relaxing afternoon.  Ron and I talked for a long time and then I napped a little.  At 5:15 I left to go to Mom's to go with Mom and Janet to a graduation ceremony for students at the Instituto Biblico Internacional at Camino Del Rey Church. Camino del Rey is a church that started MANY years ago as a mission of our church. They now offer training in their "International Bible Institute".   It is our understanding (and we are not very good in Spanish) that Carmen finished her first year in the Institute and received her certificate for that. She plans to start the second year in August. She attends classes on Monday nights and does LOTS of homework during the week. She is able to meet all of Mom's needs and keep up with the school work. We are so proud of her and so very thankful to God for providing such a lovely, Godly woman to care for Mom. God has been so good to meet this need for both Mom and Carmen.

Carmen graduating from her studies 

At the graduation ceremony, there was a lot of music with a small amount of it in English but the rest of the evening was in Spanish. The the graduates entered following the music part of the service.  Next they each received their diplomas, while a little information was shared about each one.  Next was a sermon in Spanish to the graduates, starting with 2 Timothy 2:15 "Study to show yourself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth."  Using my limited Spanish, it seems the rest of the sermon was a challenge to the students to always speak the truth of God's Word.  My kind of preacher: a lot of emotion!  It was an excellent service.  We took photos following the service and then went out to supper at Carino's to celebrate.  

Golden Shower tree

The evening was special, but we were all very tired by the time we got back to Mom's.  I headed home and spent time on the computer.  Ron and I chatted for a while and then he got what turned out to be a false alarm on  his mother's Lifeline alert.  The company called to say it had been set off but she did not respond to calls.  She had just accidentally set it off and did not know it.  A false alarm beats a real emergency any day.  

We continued watching the young female woodpecker 

study the world outside her hole in the tree. 

It was another long day, but so very good.  God is good.

 Sunflower at Ron's mom's house