We were recently blessed to be able to minister with Sam and Karen Knapp once again. Sam and Karen are missionary evangelists. They have traveled for several years from their home in the San Francisco Bay area to bless Baja California Sur with their ministry. Sam is a fiery 86-year-old ‘healing evangelist’ and we repeatedly hear ‘notable’ healing testimonies each year after their time of ministry in Los Cabos. Included in this trip’s team were Mauricio and Claudia Cardenas from Ensenada, who were a great help to us in preparation for the Carlos Annacondia Crusade.

While Sam and Karen were in Los Cabos for their spring trip, they asked if we would minister with them at Patti’s Kitchen (a local church and feeding kitchen in the colonia of Caribe). Karen had planned an ‘inner healing’ teaching and asked me to join her in praying for healing for the ladies. Then, she surprised our husbands by asking Sam, Richard, and Mauricio to plan something that would entertain the children while we ministered to the ladies.

Richard has a strong gifting for working with young children and immediately had a plan. He told the men of his love for puppet ministry and that we just happened to have puppets in Los Cabos with us. Since ministry doesn’t have to be complicated in the barrios to be successful, Richard tied a rope between two trees and threw a blue tarp over it for the puppet theater. Then the puppeteers began to practice, but ‘practice’ never happened.

As soon as the children who had come to the feeding station saw the first puppet, they started laughing and talking to the puppets. Then, other children heard them from the other side of the complex and joined them. Soon, before we knew it, the chairs were filling up and the show was on—before Richard even had a chance to give instructions to Sam and Mauricio. The lack of practice didn’t affect the performance at all, though. In fact, unbeknownst to us, Mauricio was another ‘natural’ as he named his gray and white kitty puppet, Meow-ricio!

The time with the women was also powerful. The women eagerly participated in Karen’s interactive teaching. When it came time for personal prayer, the response was what we have come to expect in the poorer areas of the barrios—most of these women have suffered much injustice in their lives, including multiple forms of abuse. Only Jesus can heal their broken hearts and set them free from the scars they bear and from lives no one should have to live!

The beginning of each year for the last five years has brought a flurry of activity. This flurry starts when Shane and Tracey Crowley come for their winter, short-term mission trip to Los Cabos. Their time with us is always exciting and productive, with Los Cabos looking better than before they arrived.

The last two years have been exceptionally amazing due to the generosity of High Grade Concrete of Spring Lake, MI. Two years ago, Tom Sturris of High Grade Concrete challenged Shane with a donation offer – he would make a donation to a charity of Shane’s choice for each bag of concrete Shane bought throughout the year. We have been greatly blessed by Shane’s choice to work to transform the landscape of Los Cabos through New Life Outreach. The generosity of both Tom and Shane has escalated our ability to effect change in our municipality.

This year’s projects included block walls around the perimeter of the church at Tierra y Libertad and some badly needed upgrading to the church at Valle del Cabo. At Valle del Cabo, the crew led by Shane and Richard, put up ten-foot block walls on each side of the church, which replaced some much worn OSB, as well as provided the structure with a ‘welcoming’ church appearance with a new façade. As you look at the photos, you will see a “mission look” peak, along with space for windows and a double-door entrance (the windows and doors are still in progress).

We want to extend a huge thank-you to Tom Sturris of High Grade Concrete, Shane & Tracey Crowley, and to all of Pastor Carlos Maciel’s church members that are always at our side making sure we have what we need!

For many years, one of our ministry goals has been to bring the Body of Christ together. The Lord honors unity among brothers and sisters in Christ. With this in mind, we were recently blessed to be asked to be a part of a barrio outreach at three different area churches.

Jen and Dave Limpert of Hope for Los Cabo gave us a call and asked if Pastor Carlos would like to participate in an outreach that was being planned by Brian and Jacqueline Ruple of Cabo Missions for Christ, along with several chiropractors from the United States. The Ruple’s ministry is actually relatively new in the area, so we were not only blessed by working with two other area ministries, but were also blessed to meet the Ruples for the first time.

The outreach included a team of chiropractors. They arrived with several portable ‘adjustment tables,’ along with a lot of clothing and gift items. They planned on ministering to around one hundred people just at the Church at Tierra y Libertad alone, including providing lunch for everyone. The chiropractors bought the food and Pastor Carlos’ wife Janet headed up a kitchen crew from the Cristo es el Camino Churches.

The chiropractors specifically asked for worship with a gospel message and an alter call for salvation. Escary, one of Pastor Carlos’ associates, preached a powerful message. He also led the youth praise team in worship. The presence of the Lord was heavy, leaving the participants with even more than the gifts of chiropractic adjustments, a special lunch, and clothing; all of which were expressions of the love of the Lord.

By the time the day was over, we were blessed with many new acquaintances and the final estimate of people served was around 220. Just in case you’re wondering about the original estimate of feeding 100, Pastor Carlos asked his people to please leave the food for others, and in true form they gladly passed the food on to others.

We do want to thank Jen and Dave Limpert and Brian and Jacqueline Ruple for the invitation to participate in such a tremendous outreach!

We conduct a chapel service at Palabra de Vida−ran by Bill and Jacki Glaubitz−once a month. Just recently, we were blessed with an entirely new ministry experience. Bill called just three days before Palabra de Vida’s first wedding ceremony and asked if we wanted to do the “lasso ceremony.” We had no idea what it was, but it sounded like fun so we said, “Yes” to the invitation.

In case you are interested, the “lasso” or “rope” ceremony is all over the internet. Richard and I did the research and Richard−who is great at ceremonies−touched everyone’s hearts with his rendition. The lasso is actually made of one large loop made into two, through “tying the knot” in the center. It is a Hispanic tradition, probably originating from the Catholic Religion, where long rosary beads were used with a cross hanging between the loops over the shoulders of the bride and groom. In later years, it has become very common in protestant churches with couples of Hispanic descent, and can be made of many different materials.

Part of the excitement and beauty of this event is what a great accomplishment this wedding represented for both Hector and Palabra de Vida. Hector went through Palabra de Vida’s ten month program and was given the utmost in complements from Bill, who said with no hesitation, “And he did everything he was told to do without complaining!” He gave his life to Christ early in the program and is still a passionate follower of Christ. Since there are not many men who even graduate from the program−especially completing it the first time through−Hector himself represents another accomplishment for Palabra de Vida. Hector continued to make right choices and soon into the ‘transition’ period, he was blessed with a good job. Then, to top it off, Hector made the Godly decision to marry Tommy, rather than even considering living together!

The bride and groom did all the work. Palabra de Vida supplied the venue and Pastor Michael Galles from Cabo Church (where we attend on Sunday mornings) officiated. What Tommy’s family did in decorating the center was lovely. Even Jacki was amazed at how beautifully transformed their room for chapel services became. A caterer was hired and the men currently in the center graciously served the guests. There was also a beautiful wedding cake and the festivities included the traditional cutting of the cake. In all, it was a wonderful night and was a glorious celebration of how the power of God can transform a life!

Believe it or not, another year has come and gone. This year’s celebration was held at the recently updated Church at Tierra y Libertad during the Sunday evening service. There were approximately 264 in attendance with, according to Pastor Carlos’ estimation, another 100 regular attendees not at the celebration. For Richard and I, it was our 7th Anniversary Celebration with Cristo es el Camino, and just as in previous years, the joy and celebration just flowed into the surrounding neighborhood.

The night started at 6:00 p.m. Richard and I were late due to previous obligations; Pastor Michael and Laura from Cabo English Church were out of town for Thanksgiving and Richard had the honor of preaching at both services at Cabo English before rushing over to Tierra y Libertad.

Every year, the congregation does an amazing job of decorating for the anniversary. There was much time and effort given and the decorations served as a frame for the glorious celebration in the Lord. Everyone is honored at the annual celebration and it means a lot to them to be an active part of the local church. The assistant pastors were introduced and honored, and of course, Pastor Carlos, his wife Janet and their family—Paola, Carlitos and Joshua—were treated like royalty. There was great music from the praise team, soloists and from the youth band, which was led by their talented leader Escary; and since there are always many visitors invited to their celebrations, Pastor Carlos gave a powerful sermon on Christ being the door to eternity. He gave an equally powerful altar call.

I just have to leave you with one last observation of something that always amazes me. I’m an administrator by gifting and I am always amazed at what they are able to put together in a short period of time. Time and time again, I see the site at the beginning of the day and think, “We could be in trouble,” but by the time the opening words are spoken, everything is transformed and the events go on very smoothly (this is Mexico). I’ll use the transformation of the sanctuary area into the fellowship hall as this year’s example. Instructions were given to the congregation as to where to stand for the first phase of set up, then the second and lastly the third. Everyone stood up, continued to visit and within ten minutes, the large round tables you see in the photos are put up with the chairs neatly arranged around them. Just as quickly, the table cloths were carefully laid out and the serving of the food and beverages to the tables started immediately−like a well-trained army!

Just in case you’re curious, the cleanup started shortly after 10:00 p.m., with the last of the faithful servants leaving close to 10:30; and yes, they still go to work and school the next day. Things are different south of the border!

Thank-you for your co-laboring with us for the transformation of Los Cabos!

During our early years of ministry, we were taught anything done for the Kingdom of God is going to have opposition from the enemy of our souls. Satan hates God and—consequently—hates us. Whether you knew it or not, the moment you received Christ as your Savior you were inducted into the Army of the Lord. However, unlike a physical army on this earth, trying to hide would be futile since Satan and his minions know you by the Spirit of Christ who lives in you. The reality of this spiritual conflict is that−until Christ’s physical return to earth−we can expect every attack on the kingdom of darkness to be countered from the hosts of darkness. Nonetheless, attempting to move into ‘self-protection’ and draw back, does not remove us from the Army of the Lord or the enemy’s recognition of us!

I shared this preamble to let you know the enemy does not want the minds and hearts of the Mexican people being renewed with the Biblical values the Avanza sin Tranza program is derived from. We have had several counterattacks from the enemy over the last two years, but we continue to persevere.

Juan Mesa, the newly-appointed Director of Education (from the recent change in municipal government), recently gave us a call. He had previously expressed his department’s need for a value-based curriculum for the schools in our municipality, but he called with the good news that he was ready to implement the program.

With only a few days’ notice, Daniel Valles, Director of Avanza sin Tranza, happened to have an opening in his schedule and was able to fly down from Ciudad Juarez to meet with Director Mesa. Daniel, Richard and I were thrilled to be able to meet with him. Director Mesa is a very gracious man and deeply concerned about the children under his charge.

The meeting was a great success with the only remaining details being the date and time for the training seminar. If all goes as planned, the training should be shortly after the first of the year, making room for a firmly established program before the end of the school year. Daniel was also able to reiterate the importance of implementing Avanza sin Tranza in the government and in law enforcement.

Please pray that any plans the enemy has for resistance will be thwarted and pray for Director Mesa as he arranges the many details necessary for the implementation of the program in the ninety schools of Los Cabos.

The Avanza sin Tranza programming has no funding behind it apart from the modest cost for implementation, material and training Daniel must charge for the movement to continue. Please pray for the program to spread like wildfire in Mexico, along with the additional funds New Life Outreach will need for further implementation in our municipality.  If you would like to financially support the Avanza sin Tranza program, please contact us today.

May the Lord bless every one of you for your faithfulness to the work He is doing at the tip of the Baja Peninsula!

We were thrilled to have several members of our ministry team with us in November.  While here, they were able to take in the Monday ceremony, as well as pray for the area during our regular ‘Monday in the Marketplace’ event. We highlighted a special 'Avanza Sin Tranza' appointment we had in the blog below, but hadn't posted pictures from the ceremony that day.  Here is a look at the team, as well as the Monday in the Marketplace ceremony...

We were thrilled to have several members of our ministry team with us in November.  While here, they were able to take in the Monday ceremony, as well as pray for the area during our regular ‘Monday in the Marketplace’ event.

It was while they were here that we had the opportunity to speak with the head of La Presidente Armida Castro’s security team.  We had met and talked with him previously, but had not been able to present him with an Avanza Sin Tranza—Thrive without Bribes—packet or talk with him at length regarding the program.  The program is designed to teach Godly character, ethics and morals.  The program does not directly reference the Bible, but teaches God’s ways, that a people and a nation might be transformed.  When you do things God’s ways, you prosper. Changing the mindset and teaching a nation His ways has the power to transform a nation!

As Richard presented him with an overview of the program, he shared with us the need for such training.  He shared the struggle with domestic violence, as well as other struggles the people, police, and public servants face daily.  He also shared, though, that with budgets tighter than ever, he could not see paying for such a program—no matter how desperately needed.  We were thrilled to share our hearts and to be able to share our passion for bringing the program to the area through sponsorship, so that it would be free to the schools, as well as to the government officials.

We are currently working with the newly appointed head of the Los Cabos education department and are excited to begin training teachers, that they may train our students in these Godly characteristics!  We were thrilled to have the opportunity to speak with our friend, the head of security, to see if there might be an opening there, as well.

If you are interested in sponsoring the Avanza sin Tranza program, please contact us today.

As always, thank you for all of your prayers and support!

On Monday morning, October 1st, our new Presidente (Mayor) of the Municipality of Los Cabos, Armida Castro, conducted her first Patriotic Ceremony in the San Jose Plaza.

To give a little background on the election:  the Mexican people—desperate for change—voted in an extreme leftist-socialist president for the country.  He is commonly referred to by the acronym of the first letters of his four names: AMLO. AMLO represents the political party MORENA and is the first president of Mexico from that party to ever be elected. AMLO’s people flooded the poorer areas of Mexico encouraging people to vote, as well as reportedly paying people to vote for him and the MORENA party. From what we’ve been told, this is one of the factors that led to the loss of the election of our former mayor, Arturo de la Rosa, and the victory for the MORENA party in Los Cabos.

As a ministry, we will be in continual prayer for Presidente Castro, and will also be offering our services to her administration in any way we can. Pastor Carlos and Isidoro were actually the first people in line for an appointment with la Presidente for the opportunity for us to congratulate her, present the availability of Avanza sin Tranza for her administration, and to offer our services to her in any way we can. We have also been in contact with the new Director of Education. He loves the Avanza Sin Tranza program and is sending the material we gave him to every one of the principals of the ninety schools he oversees. We are looking forward to working with him, as well.

Please spend much time in prayer for Presidente Armida’s team as they establish this change of government in Los Cabos. There are many decisions to be made before she is officially sworn in on December 1st.

We just recently returned from Transform Our World’s 28th Global Conference, which was attended by over eight hundred delegates from over thirty countries from around the world. It was held this year at the Marriot Santa Clara Convention Center near San Jose, CA. Ed Silvoso, at age 73, offers programming throughout the conference that is the conference equivalent of the most engaging extreme sport. The participants leave spiritually charged and inspired for another year in the trenches in their particular sphere of influence. TOW’s tag line is, “Ordinary people doing extraordinary things with God.” The conference videos are not yet available online, but if you would like to sample some of the inspirational videos available on the TOW website, check them out at: https://transformourworld.org/transformationondemand/

I can’t possibly even begin to fill you in on all the magnificent testimonies of what God is doing around the world, so my only hope is to peak your interest with personal highlights. The opening night speaker was Loren Cunningham, the 83–year-old founder of YWAM, who is still flying from country to country, leading the ministry in great exploits. We heard Loren for the first time last year at the conference and we can’t hear enough of his amazing testimonies from around the world. We’ve known of YWAM for over 30 years, but we had no idea of the impact that YWAM and Loren Cunningham have made in world events. Last year, we heard him give an account of a current national event that only God could have arranged and that we’ll never forget, but since we heard it at one of the un-taped meal sessions, I’m not allowed to share it here. The next time you see me, if you ask me about Loren Cunningham, I can share this tremendous “God story” with you.

The emphasis at this year’s conference was the impartation of the anointing of the Holy Spirit to the conference delegates in order to enhance their results for transformation in their many different spheres of influence. We were blessed to receive many prayers of impartation from brothers and sisters from around the world, but one such prayer left me with a lasting memory. This impartation came from the very large delegation from Hong Kong, led by retired Judge Barbara Chan, YK Chan and Pastor Wong. When they got up to report what they, as one of the oldest and strongest moves of transformation with TOW, could impart, they gently declared, “We carry humility,” and they−with many influential delegates−certainly did! Humility was an amazing ‘God empowering” attribute to choose to impart to the delegates from other parts of the world.

The next moment that was especially meaningful to Richard and I was to hear Pastor Norberto Carlini from Resistencia, Argentina. Pastor Carlini was, and still is, one of the foundational pastors of the powerful revival that swept over Resistencia in the mid-1990’s. This revival was largely due to the (then) relatively unknown evangelist, Carlos Annacondia. Ed Silvoso was a part of that move. Cindy Jacobs was called to the area in the early days of her ministry.  These, along with a handful of believers we have just ‘come across’ in Los Cabos, were all called to the area during this time. Ever since working for an entire year to host the Carlos Annacondia Crusade in Los Cabos, we have been amazed at what God used Carlos Annacondia to do in Resistencia and the change it made in the brothers and sisters who were a part of that move of God.

Ed had Pastor Carlini come to the conference to share what has happened in the city since God began to change the city. Ed asked for the privilege to translate for Pastor Carlini and the power of the presence of the Lord flowed between them like fire. That was at the morning session, with a teaching luncheon following—with Ed again translating for Pastor Carlini. It was during the luncheon that Richard and I rushed over to tell Pastor Carlini about Carlos Anacondia’s crusade in Los Cabos in 2016. We then told him we knew of the unction of the Holy Spirit on the Argentine pastors, and asked if he would be willing to impart the fire to us. He was delighted to pray over us and we are grateful to God for that moment!

In order to share our last ‘special’ experience, I need to quickly share that while we were in Michigan in August for our annual excursion to our home base in Muskegon, MI, I was in a severe auto accident and our mini-van was demolished. I was miraculously spared serious injury, apart from extensive bruising, 18 stitches, a broken left thumb and a broken right arm. We were scheduled to fly back to Los Cabos one week after the accident, and all the American doctors were very helpful and told Richard how to remove my stitches, along with giving him instructions for caring for me during recovery. I only share the story of the accident to tell you that I had a cast on my right arm during the conference and that is key to what I am going to share next…

I had been asking the Lord to have mercy on me and heal my right arm faster than the predicted three to four months but, of course, I did not have confirmation that He would choose to do a faster work of healing. Pastor Kris Valloton, associate lead pastor of Bethel Church in Redding, CA, had just taught in the morning session. Bethel Church originally had a mission school two hours north of us in Mexico in our state capitol of La Paz until not long before we first came to the area in 2010. We heard through the grapevine that there were several encouraging prophetic words spoken over the Baja at that time, so when Richard saw Kris Valloton in the hall after the session, he asked Kris if he remembered any of the words. During that short pause in the hall, Kris, who also runs the School of Ministry, looked at my cast, asked what had happened and said, “I’ll have to pray for you tonight.” This was special because Kris carries a heavy anointing for praying for the sick, even though the purpose of this meeting wasn’t for personal prayer.

The session he referred to was actually late afternoon and we were ready. We ran right up to him after the teaching. He quickly, but gladly, prayed for my arm and then had to rush to catch his plane home. From that time on, my arm felt much better, but we do not have confirmation. My orthopedic surgeon from Muskegon, MI had already told me just to get an x-ray in Mexico and send the DVD via the internet to him and he would read it for me. We still haven’t figured out a comfortable and economical way to get an x-ray yet, but either way, this was a special divine appointment with Kris Valloton.

I need to bring this to a close since I am typing with one hand—and my left one at that. Check out the material on the TOW website and enjoy the photos from the conference. A big thank-you to all of you that made it possible for us to attend this year’s conference!