For the last 15 years Kathy and I have been planting the Comunidad Cristiana of Tenancingo while training church planters for a regional movement.  

 

On Sunday, June 12, 2011, I passed my senior pastor role to a very capable Mexican pastor, Richarte.

        

We are sad because we love the church and it is hard to leave. 

 

We are confident because Pastor Richarte's character and gifts have been proven over the last 15 years; he is the pastor to take Comunidad Cristiana into the future.

 

We are hopeful because Kathy and I can focus on leading the regional team we have been developing for so many years.  

 

Our team will plant churches in the most forgotten towns of our region and will advance the City of Refuge to help the most oppressed peoples in these towns; abused women and children.

 

                              Modernizing?

 

For the last fifteen years, we have watched Tenancingo sluggishly modernize. The local government updated the city square with a band shell and a wide, red brick walkway. Chedraui, a Walmart-style superstore, assembled a mostly prefabricated superstructure at one of the ingresses to the traditional Tenancingo market. The mayor sought state assistance to build a new wholesale flower market where local merchants can sell to florists nationally.

 

Yet, while the city square, local shops, and businesses are being modernized, domestic violence laws and practices are not. Most women in our neighborhood think it is acceptable for their husbands to smack them around. Other women in Tenancingo know better, but they put up with it and a lot more. 

 

But, Kathy and I believe there is hope for the homes of our region.  

 

We have seen many homes in Tenancingo refurbished through the renovation of hearts.  

 

As a child, Juan Manuel, a good friend of our, was beaten repeatedly by his father, and he regularly witnessed his father pummeling his mother. Juan Manuel could have forged ahead with the four-hundred-year-old abuse cycle that afflicts so many Tenancingo families: he could have routinely clobbered his beautiful wife and children.  

 

But, Juan Manuel encountered Christ, and decided to lay a new foundation for his children's future.  

 

Last year, when Juan Manuel and Judit were renewing their wedding vows, their eighteen-year-old daughter, Brianda, publicly thanked her mom and dad for being loving parents. She then thanked her father for loving her mother. She said, "Dad, you have showed me how a man should love a woman. Thank you."  

 

 A new superstore in Tenancingo is kinda cool, but real reconstruction of our region needs to begin with a new foundation.

We thank you for praying and supporting us.

You are an important partner with us as we lay the  foundation of Christ in Mexico. 

 

I Corinthians 3:10 By the grace God has given me, I laid a foundation as a wise builder.... 11 For no one can lay any foundation other than the one already laid, which is Jesus Christ.

   
   With love,
  Chris and Kathy