We have more than 10,000 reasons to praise the Lord!

At our church Comunidad Cristiana, El Hatillo (Tegucigalpa, Honduras) Valerie Umana-Anderson and Susie McCabe (from North Way Christian Community, Pittsburgh, PA) sang Matt Redman's song, 10,000 Reasons. Susie and her husband Mac McCabe are visiting us and are our long-time friends. We have known one another for more than 30 years. Both Mac and Susie knew my parents, Bobbie & George Anderson and I was able to have their two daughters, Shannon first and then Cami, in my Bible studies during two different furloughs home in Pittsburgh. After my father passed away in 2003, we have often stayed in their home when we are back in Pittsburgh, so Valerie and Victor feel so endeared to them, they call them: Uncle Mac and Aunt Susie. So, needless to say, we share plenty of history.

So you can imagine the joy we felt watching Valerie and Susie sing for God's glory at church. We do indeed have far more than 10,000 reasons to praise HIS NAME!

Enjoy this video of their worship to the Lord (4.35 min.)

Overnight Camp-out with the Sunday School class of 8-10 yrs

In our church, Christian Community, El Hatillo, during the first 6 months of the year, celebrate one Over-night camp-out per Sunday School class (4 classes of around 15-25 students each, ages 8-13 yrs. boys and girls separate).

We invite the entire class to come to our house Saturday morning and spend the night in tents camped out on our lawn. The teachers serve as camp counselors and I serve as the speaker and camp director, and Alfredo is in charge of Quiet Time and the final reflection on Sunday morning before we walk to our church, just in time for Sunday morning worship. I prepare the video clip (which you can see below) to show the church family what God (and their kids) did over the weekend. This will be our third year doing this and the kids look forward to this season with excitement. We take the older students, 14-18 years old on their own retreat to a nearby camp. 

They enjoy the activities like:

• Swimming in our little pond
• Playing games with the parachute
• Getting closer as a SS class
• Being taught in depth on one particular subject, this year the theme is: Friendship with Jesus and  others.
• Taking a night hike all by yourself in the dark
• Watching the stars
• Sleeping in tents with their friends
• Getting up at 5am to swim and become a member of the "Polar Bear Club"

These next blogs will show you some more images and details about what we teach and hope to accomplish. For now, I invite you to enjoy the 3:45min. video from our first Camp-Out with girls 8-10 years. 

Overnight Camp-outs with our church's Sunday School classes: Feb. class of 8-10 yr. girls

The theme of this year's series of Overnight Camp-outs is "Your friendship with Jesus and with others." We had in attendance 12 of the 15 girls in that age bracket (8-10 years old) so we were very pleased with the turn-out.

As you will see from the video clip below (3:45 min.), the highlights are swimming in our little pond, playing with our German Shepherd dog, Fofer, sleeping in a tent, playing games with the parachute, cooking your meals over the campfire, taking a night hike (alone in the dark woods!), and several said they enjoyed the Bible teaching on friendships.