His days consisted of playing with dirt and a dog

We have people who come to the door of the kitchen asking for leftovers or water. A drunk guy coming from the beach stopped by to ask for a taco. If we have food we give it! We offer a glass of juice, water or a cup of coffee. A woman who is in her 30's dropped by with her three year old son. As we began to listen to her story we found out that her husband and her live nearby in a small trailer with no electricity or running water. They didn’t come here under the greatest of circumstances, We don’t really know the exact story but we do know it involves the husband and people that wear uniforms and badges. The little boy Aidan would be covered head to foot with dirt, he was a true boy, his days consisted of playing in the dirt with his only friend the family dog. We would give the family food, and we would think is there anything else we can do? One of our staff members and our human resources department begin to speak with her. She began to do some simple task around the base to help out. Then as time went by and relationships began we saw how God was working in this family. John was able to get a paying job, Linda helps us on a regular basis in the kitchen and Aidan has started his first year of kindergarten, a real milestone for him is learning to play with other kids and begin the process of getting more socialized. Since he has never been around other kids we have had to help him learn about finding a toilet to pee in when he had the urge, previously he would just whip it out and go wherever he was standing outside. We are all excited to be apart of this families story. It all started with seeing a need and meeting that need and then journeying
alongside.

Speakers, Home work, and...

OH MY! This week has been amazing and it's only Wednesday! I (misty) have been attending a "Go Team Seminar". This seminar is giving us essential tools for building support. It's been exciting and draining at the same time. We get to make vision/mission statements, revamp budgets, research websites, newsletters, draw up communication pieces, etc. all the while listening to some amazing stories, and biblical philosophy on how God has and will provide. It's all right up my alley! I love this kind of stuff!
Then... I hear that negative voice in the back of my head say, You can't do this... You're not good enough... You should pack it in... You are a failure... Has God really chosen you and Bill to do this...

ABSOLUTELY HE HAS!! and I recognized that all those little voices are LIES from the PIT.

Bill and I have a passion to encourage and serve others in anyway the Lord sees fit. If that means fixing sandwiches and cooking scrumptious meals for teams to come down to build a home for a family who has nothing. Than we will do it! We love being apart of what God is doing here in Ensenada. We also would like to journey alongside you and others who have chosen to share the message of God's mercy, love and grace, to others! We are all tools for God! No matter where we live and what we are doing, we are all about building the Kingdom of God in every nation, in every city, in every work place, and HOME.

SO YES I can do this! YES I am Good Enough! YES I should be prepared to move at any notice wherever God is leading our family, and lastly I have not failed, I'm only starting to grasp all that God has planned for us.... Well the last one is a stretch:) Who can even grasp God. But you get what I mean! Be encouraged friends! I am certain that God, who began the good work within you, will continue his work until it is finally finished on the day when Christ Jesus returns. Phil. 1:6

Amen!! let's get in the GAME:)

AND SO IT BEGINS...

Mission adventures is over and now we welcome the Homes of Hope season. These past couple of weeks we have been cleaning the base and getting the kids off to begin a new year in school. Joey is attending a private school for Grade one and Emily is in her second year of Kindergarten at the same private school as last year. She even has the same teacher! Both of the kids are excited to begin school again. Bill and Misty are excited for the fall to come, to us it means new teams, new students attending DTS, and new staff to pour into. Bill has been praying about starting a class for Mexicans to learn English. This past week we found out that a Juvenile Hall has offered to let our Youth Ministry "Revolution" in and they would like us to teach English twice a week to about 20 or so High schoolers. Praise God! Bill will begin this adventure in October. Misty has been given the task of aiding the Base leader in various duties, one she has come particularly fond of is transportation. She is using her organizational skills to insure that people who visit our facility get picked up from the airport and make it all the way down to our base and then back home again. She's really good at it, and enjoys it. She is also beginning a small group for the staff ladies. This too will begin in October. She's in the midst of searching for material to study. So if you have any suggestions don't hesitate to sign in and give your idea, she is always open for ideas! We are so blessed to be able to do this adventure! We thank God everyday for those of who are supporting us on a daily basis. Please know that we could not do this with out your prayers and finical support! So to you we say THANK YOU! You are making a life long difference for sure!!

The Season is almost over and its time to name the most valuable player

Yes the Mission Adventures season in finishing, we are now into the outreach portion of the 5th cycle. I need to give a big shout out to a very special person who has been a huge help and encouragement to me in the kitchen this Summer... Aubrey Faith. She spent a lot of time helping out and making my life more manageable. I had plenty of time to do all my planning, shopping, spending time with Misty and is just really an amazing person. Jesus is doing a lot of neat stuff in her life and she is getting ready to go to Australia to attend a YWAM school about primary health care. Its going to be a sad day when she leaves but me and Misty wish her the best.

Wednesday Morning

As the week rolls on I am busy in the kitchen, Misty is getting the house ALL HOMEY. I told her that yesterday, when I was a kid our house was alright, when I was on my own I would try to make things look nice but I never succeeded, but Misty always has made our house or apartment lokk so much like a home wherever we are whatever we are doing. I really appreciate that about her. We have been really blessed by the Kalin family who are here for the second year. Tom, Mindy and their daughter Ashley are here for a few weeks and they have helped so much with getting stuff for us, and Tom reinstalling our satellite dish, spoon racks, electrical things, ripping out the old kitchen etc etc. As soon as we get the kitchen all straight I will post pictures of the finished project and the view overlooking the skate ramps and volleyball court on the side of the YWAM base. The ocean too!

I was tired from all the weekend activity, and yesterday I needed the alarm clock to wake up; today I am back to normal and awake at 4 having to try to be quiet as a mouse while I have coffee and read emails and everything else so early. I do have my work desk set up now though, so once I get an actual key to the office I can go up there in the early morning and do stuff and be noisy and out of earshot of the people here that actually sleep normally. I actually like the quiet of the morning to piddle around and wake up gradually so that at 6 when the action starts I am at temperature and ready to go and not standing like a zombie. I also go to bed a bit earlier too though.

Misty's boss Kody has been away for a few days, he was with a group that went to Juarez Mexico to help out the YWAM base there. Flooding had damaged the area where they are and we came down to help in the neighborhood, and try to do repairs to the Wall at the base. It was still raining with more floods happening though so every project they were trying to do was wiped out before they finished. I heard that and I was sad, then I thought "that reminds me of the kitchen" Anyhow all the team arrived back on Monday afternoon, tired and a little bit in need of a good hot shower. That base has a master plan being worked on and I think it involves some sort of flood control or flood diversion. I will ask the person who is working on that project what is going on so I can report what the plan is so readers will have a sense of closure.

Monday!!! Another Cycle starts!!!!

Last weekend was pretty fast, I had no time to even have a computer on much less post on the blog. We have been in the process of changing apartments from across the street to a 2nd floor apartment here on the actual YWAM Base; we are pretty much settled in except for one small detail: our kitchen cupboards need to be purchased and installed. We also need to move our Satellite dish over and get it re installed, along with a ceiling fan we have at the other apartment. The important thing is that the beds are over and the living room is set up and it is a lot roomier than across the street. The living room is wider, we had to make a sacrifice, and have everyone together in the bedroom though to get the roomier living room and awesome view of the ocean. It took a lot of thinking about it till we found a way it would work but Misty and I feel good about it. The way the walls were set up and the giant wardrobe in one corner that was installed there was no way to have 2 rooms out of that space. We are going to set some privacy dividers but for now its a good arrangement, everyone has lots of space and the goofy wall next to the bedroom window makes an awesome walk in closet with PLENTY of space for the stuff we have. A lot of people helped us move during the weekend and without them it would have been impossible.

The kids are having a good time living on the base and they have been spending a lot of time playing with the other base kids in an unhurried fashion and things don't get cut short when it is time for mom or dad to have a time out, all we have to do now is just go home and keep the door open to hear what is going on.

SO that's how things are today,

Praising God

Hey everybody!!!

So right now it is friday morning and I just got back from across the street at the YWAM base where I enjoyed a cup of coffee. It was really quiet there and I sat in the courtyard and just thought about stuff; I thought about our apartment and our moving process, yesterdays trip to the water park in Tijuana, my children, the birds that were hopping around in the courtyard, I also thought about how blessed I am today that I can get up and just relax and think for a few moments before the day really gets going. It was nice.

We have a DTS going on at the San Diego office this summer. I think that is a great place to do a DTS in the summer because the schedule is so crazy here in the summer that they get lost in the shuffle while Mission Adventures is happening. The Students are going to come here for a week though pretty soon to build a house and spend a week of lecture here in Ensenada. I was thinking of the worship times they have so when I came back home I got on YouTube and looked up David Crowder and I found a neat version of his O Praise Him song that has a guy walking around a city listening on his headphones and then Praising God in the Streets here is the link here I hope it works ....


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IpVsF4W8V2Y




And now to provide more details about other things I mentioned. Our Apartment situation is that we are getting an Apartment at the YWAM base, we ripped out the old cabinets in the kitchen and cleaned that all up with a lot of help from the Kalin Family who are spending a few weeks here working with us. Dad Tom does construction and all kinds of other stuff back home in Washington and Mom Mindy and Daughter Ashley are very handy as well. SO the kitchen is ready to receive the new cabinets and the apartment is all cleaned up and ready to move into, we have already brought things over and its just mostly big stuff. Misty and all the above mentioned painted the living room and dining area with some fresh paint and it will be very livable in just a couple of weeks.

Yesterday we went to the water park in Tijuana as a small group of just a few families and had a good time, I did slides and Misty and Joey did even more than me, I was really impressed with Joey going down the big water slide on a tube. He is the real man in the family. It was a good day, the terror of slinding down a steep tube in the dark as I am gasping for air because of the fright is so mind clearing!

So after this weekend we will get started with cycle 4 of Mission Adventures, this group is just 2 churches but the last group on Cycle 5 are going to be massive, we are going to go out with a bang this year. Today I am going to drop off the shopping list at Costco for Mondays delivery and get my office area upstairs finally cleared out, I have been doing any kind of administrtive task at home in our apartment in the past but those days are soon over because the dining table will be a dining table. My summer resolution is to not have the table all covered up with a laptop and papers and my Macho Kitchen Man Bag etc.

Tuesday July 22, 2008

Well, two years ago today we were in Ensenada visiting the YWAM Base and checking this place out before finalizing plans to come here. It was the end of the 3rd cycle of Mission Adventures and we arrived in the early afternoon and went for a whirlwind tour of Ensenada and visited a building site. Enjoyed a pizza dinner and watched part of the final evenings program. So, here we are and as the second year of actually working here is about to finish I feel we have laid a foundation for ministry. We are getting more and more fluent at Spanish, we are building relationships in the community, we are finding our way around much quicker than ever before and we are seeing more and more opportunities to serve the Lord, encourage other people here on the YWAM base and really feel at home here.

I (Bill) am in the kitchen and as the days and months go by I see that I have opportunities to get to know the other staffers here on the base and when schools are going on I get to meet and work with and spend a lot of time with the students in the afternoons when we do work duties. I used to want to be on DTS staff years ago when I was first in YWAM but that never happened but now I finally see that I get to spend more time with the students than they do with speakers or most of their school leaders. SO many minds to poison SO little time!!! Actually I am not poisoning minds I plan to spend lots of time encouraging them however that happens as we are doing life together those afternoons. Misty is busy keeping up with the tasks that Kody the base leader gives her, but she is always seeming to get into really good conversations with the other girls on the base and I see her pouring herself into these girls and young women and I am so proud of her.
Joey and Emily are as sweet and wonderful as ever and it so fun to listen to them talking to the spanish speaking people on the base or out in town.

So, what we are saying is we really want to stay and keep on doing what we are doing. I will be sharing more about what is going on this summer, we have a lot of stories that we are behind on so watch out more is coming.

SCF is HERE!

Hi everyone Summer time is flying fast! Generation from SCF landed here in Ensenada on Monday, and now it's friday! WOW! They have been a huge blessing to us here. Today they take all the training the have been doing out in to the city. First stop one of our local church's they will do dramas, games, and a vacation bible school program for the kids in this colonial.  To see some photos of our team through out this week check out this website at http://www.flickr.com/photos/ensmaphotos . Then choose the the MA Summer set and pick the date you would like to view. These sets are placed up their daily so check back to see your favorite missionaries:) Please continue to pray for these students here, like I said previously they are heading out for the outreach part of their training. Pray that God would use these dramas, and VBS to reach the kids and teens and maybe even some adults to begin their journey with Christ. We are really excited to have SCF here it always feels like home when they are here!

Joey's Turning 6

Yep he made it to 6 well almost. Joey's birthday is June 13 and once again we are hosting Dress up as a Superhero birthday party! All the staff and the Mission Adventure staff get so excited to make their costumes it a great sight and a wonderful time for Joey and the base kids to not to be the only ones dressed up. If you would like to contribute to Joey's b-day, you can send him b-day cards, E-mail notes, Legos, Any action figures, or whatever God puts on  your heart. He loves to get mail and who doesn't love to get presents. If you have a desire to send something off to Joe or Emily or any of the base kids, send them to Joey Moss Ywam Ensenada Base 1oo west 35th street Suite C, National City, CA 91950.

Bill and Misty this whole week have been in training for Mission Adventures, It's been great getting to know these students. We can't wait for Sparks Christian Fellowship to come down and serve alongside us this summer. This year they will be building a home for the Hernandez Chavez Family. Gillermo age 20 and his wife Azucena age 35, Erik age 18, Areli age 11, Jorge age 5. The text below is from the Homes of Hope selection.   

Gillermo and Azucena have been married for 2 years.  Guillermo is Azucena’s second husband.  5 years ago she decided to separate from the father of her children because he hit her a lot. 

Her husband is very young, but very responsible.  He loves Azucena and her children like they were his own.  Her and her mother-in-law bought a piece of land on credit, and are sharing the payments. When they finish paying off the lot, they are going to change the title to be for two separate lots.  Their property is divided into two parts, and on her mother-in-law’s side, another organization built her a small wood house because she had always lived with Azucena. Please be in prayer for this family and for the Sparks Christian Fellowship team that will be building their home

Let Me Tell You How I Really Feel About Emily and Joey

As you can see from looking at the History of this BLOG there is a lot of material in here about Joseph and Emily. It's because we are proud of them and they are very easy on the eyes too. Especially compared to looking at pictures of Bill. But I do want to say in all seriousness, we are so happy they are here with us and they get to participate in Ministry stuff with the parents and they open doors that would have been closed had they not been there.

Building Houses, building Lives

Hey I know it may sound a little bit corny, but that's a good way to describe what we do here with YWAM Sa Diego Baja. This photo is from last November but it is important to publish now because so many things are in the picture.

First the Lord is glorified because some of His Children stepped out of their comfort zone to make a LONG drive to build a house and then quickly turn around and make another LONG drive to go back home and get back to their regular lives.

They blessed a family that needed a clean dry place to live; giving them more of a future for themselves and their children than they had before. For years this family will remember how they were blessed with this house and how incredible GOD is that He provided them with this house.

While the house was being built relationships were made between the family and the team from Sparks Christian Fellowship that came to build, between the Team and the Staffers from YWAM San Diego Baja, and even family ties were strengthened while the house was being built.

Yeah so this is one of the things the Moss family is up to here in Ensenada, Baja California, Mexico. Thank you for allowing us to be part of this.

1 day of baseball practice

Enjoy! These boys are soo cute:) Oh to be 5 and 6 again!

Spring Break Update

Ok so now it’s the 24th of March and we are a couple of weeks into spring Mission Adventures, in the morning it is off the hook with over 250 people eating breakfast and then off to build or do evangelism in town. This week we have a lot of skateboarders with us so in the afternoon when they come home they take over the parking lot of the apartments and generate a lot of noise. Mostly it is the boodaloodaloodaloodaloop sound of wheels going on the tile walkways. I made the same sound myself when I was a freshman in High School and the Vice Principal promptly confiscated my skateboard, for right now at least it is a skater friendly area so there will be no confiscations of skateboards or any other toys for that matter.

Misty has finished the Spanish School and is now practicing and it has truly given her the courage to just get out and communicate, and be free to make mistakes and learn out on the streets. So THANK YOU Sparks Christian Fellowship for the financial assistance, and good job Misty.

We are into the second week of Spring vacation for our 2 kindergarten students; I had seen them getting pretty stressed out from all the exams and research projects they were having to turn in, plus there was the chemistry lab in the afternoons’. They are doing pretty good right now though, today we went to see Horton Hears a Who. In Spanish it is called Horton y el Mundial de los Quien. I also saw that a new comedy that came out called Drillbit Taylor is there also but in Mexico it is titled Guardespalda Escolar, which means school bodyguard. Emily and Joey liked the movie.

I have a very great helper in the kitchen right now named Imelda, she was here last year for about 5 months and returned last fall and did a Discipleship Training School. So for now I have her very able hands in the kitchen and it is a true blessing. Imelda is a graduate of the Cordon Bleu Cooking School in London England and has 6 years of experience in restaurants in England and Canada. We are going to have an intern from the Cordon Bleu school in Portland, Oregon here for a few months in the summer I am also looking forward to that, this intern did the baking and pastry program, so we will be trying to get a lot of homemade bread, pastries, and muffins. The main goal right now is to get a true team in the kitchen so the workload gets spread around a bit better.

Sunday March 9, 2008

Hello everybody, it is Bill here the Moss Family is enjoying an intimate breakfast of cereal and blueberry muffins and Herbie Rides Again is on the television. Tomorrow we will be ending a somewhat "quieter" season and will start the Spring version of Mission Adventures; we have 4 weeks of teams coming for a week at a time. There will be a lot of High Schoolers running around.

Misty is about to start the third week of her Spanish School, the class goes for 8 hours a day and she is doing really good. They started with lesson 1 and they are now on lesson 10, she has a couple more weeks left and then to practice. Joey and Emily are about to start spring break and this week they are going to participate in a Mini Olympics. They have been going to gymnastics on Mondays and Wednesdays for a few weeks now and Joey likes the bar and the trampoline. On the bar Joey does something called the Alligator where he moves hand to hand sideways along the bar. Emily likes practicing jumping with her class of 3 year olds and she also likes Cinderella which doesn't really have too much to do with Gymnastics but she talks a lot about Cinderella; she really wants to see Cinderellas house but for now we might just have to settle for a trip to Sleeping Beauty's house because Cinderella's house is in Florida.

Spanish School

The first week is over and I feel great! I've been fighting off a flu for the past ten days, the "Spanish Flu" as my friend Shelly says. I tell everyone I'm in Kindergarten, The teacher is soo nice and soo patient and our class is really small only four students the second level class that is also going at the same time has 9 people in it and they have to pay 5 pesos every time they speak english. My goal for the week was to get a star on the Special board.  Which I did on the last day in the last hours of class!! YA MISTY! We as a family went to church this weekend and for the first time since I've been here I could understand some of what the preacher was saying, and most of the words in the worship songs. I just need to keep practicing and know that for a while I'll sound a bit foolish to my Mexican Friends, but I need to keep it up! I've been given such an awesome opportunity to go to this school that I don't want to waste it! Bill as been amazing during this time, he has been Mr.MOM and he did and is doing a great job! The kids are excited that mom is finally going to speak Spanish. They've been practicing with me all weekend long, and Joey has been helping me with my numbers which I get mixed up all the time, it makes him laugh and that makes me smile! 

Joey and Emily at the Flag Ceremony at School

Hello Readers,

We have been home for about a month now, we celebrated Christmas, sent the fall DTS away on outreach to Peru, received the January DTS 23 students, hosted

 2 sets of Deluxe teams, and the kids started school after a long winter break.

  

We got to visit our cousin Jimmy for a couple of days right after New Years, his mom passed away and he came home on leave from Iraq. Considering the circumstances it was a good visit. We hung out, played board games, Misty got to go see Chris our cousins get sworn in to the Marine Corps, and Joey went to the Marine Corps base and came home with a regulation haircut they call it "high and tight".  It's growing out now and he's going let the freak flag fly for now, maybe in the spring we can get it cut again.

 

Joseph and Emily have been enjoying school, last Monday Mom and Dad went to watch the "honoring the flag" ceremony; it is a big deal there, so much so that if you are late to school during the previous week you do not get to participate. Misty is planning to post the video that we shot soon. Joey is getting more independent at home and doesn't need to be constantly entertained, and we are getting ready to change bed arrangements for the kids; we are going to put in a top bunk for Joey and put Emily on the twin size bed below and graduate Emily from the little toddler bed.  Emily is excited to have a big bed.

 

Bill has a kitchen team now, and we hired a guy named Salvador from Ensenada to help out with cleaning for a few months.  Salvador has been a huge blessing to us all and is filling a need we have on the base to just help out in the kitchen and clean and organize.  Also two other YWAMers, Saul and Moises are helping with the cooking also.

 

So that's what is going on lately, keep reading we will be posting again soon.

 

Ahh a week of rest... Well for some...

Since last we wrote we have been taking it easy. Our base leader and most of our leadership have gone to a leader conference in Guadalajara, and the DTS students are in TJ for a week. So it's just been the base core that has been here. It's real quiet and a nice pace for a couple of days. This weekend we will have three teams here building homes, for our needy families. One of those teams are our very own Sparks Christian Fellowship! We are soo excited and can't wait for this team to arrive.

Juan, Eufemia, Carlos, 9 Juan, 5 this is a post from our HOH team, it has been translated from Spanish to english but you all will get the idea.

Juan and Eufemia came from the state of Oaxaca A very poor part of Mexico. They are looking for a better life here in Ensenada. Juan bought some land on credit and he built a small room with home made mud blocks. They don't have water or electricity and they decided to live in this way because they can't pay the rent of a better house. SCF will be giving the a gift of a home to this family this weekend. Please pray for SCF and the family as they begin building, it has rained all day today and it'll be muddy :) how fun is that! They are on the road as of this post but have reached Tijuana so they are in Mexico now!

We will try to keep you posted during the weekend.

Happy day after Thanksgiving everyone...

Misty has a new job here on the Base she is the new hairdresser... na, she is the personal assistant to the Operations director, Kody Sprang. she will be helping him stay organized, and on schedule, and any other duties that may need to happen i.e. cutting his and a few others hair. (Sandy Foster would be so proud) Now she has a desk to sit at, a Mac Powerbook, and her very own Nextel to communicate with; it is actually a Blackberry unit so I am jealous of her cool stuff. As you know with great power comes great responsibility so be praying for her with all the stuff she is responsible for.

We all have been quite busy here hosting lots of teams and local groups as the building goes on in the community of "Antonio Melendres", this past couple of weeks we have had large teams from the US, alongside the neighbors, rehab center, Pastors, they have built 6 homes in that community and over 14 homes in various other Ensenda locations. So within two weeks we have built 20 homes!! This is a huge praise! We will in a hard working month do about 20 homes but this has been two weeks. My head is spinning.

During that weekend we had the great experience of hosting a group from SCF, Eric, Lisa, Hilary, Dave, Matt, Dane, Stephanie, Anna, and Amy were a lot of help AND A HUGE ANSWER TO PRAYER !! They drove here all the way from Sparks, Nevada and finally arrived at almost 11PM and were up at 6am the next day working. We all cooked, cleaned, organized, visited the community Antonio Melendres, helped with the house build, went downtown to the Red Light District. We witnessed a mugging, experienced a gentlemen totally repent and give his life to Christ, listened to two guys totally wasted speak with us with more biblical truth than anyone we've heard from in a long time (Quentin, you'd be so proud). We went to a local church the next morning, had lunch and shopped and even played a bit of Domino's on Sunday evening. It was FAST and crazy; but above all it was very good. We were so so so much encouraged when we saw our friends from home and meet some new friends. We cannot wait for next week !

Yesterday was Thanksgiving and we had a big feast last night. We ate Turkey, Ham, Mashed Potatoes, Sweet Potatoes, Green bean casserole, Pumpkin Pie... all the good stuff. It was a great team effort and everything was delicious, and I am glad it's over. I looked at all the stuff that was left over and remembered why back home a lot of people go out to dinner at a local casino for thanksgiving dinner and skip the whole clean up part.

Joey and Emily participated in the Revolution day festivities at school earlier this week; Emily was dressed up as Adelita and Joey was Francisco Madero. He wanted to dress up as Francisco "Pancho" Villa but maybe next year. It's really cool to see them experiencing the Mexican culture!

And as the weekend comes up we have a bunch of teams arriving (SCF included) and homes are going up and families lives are changing forever. After that a quieter regular week because the 30 + DTS students are going to be gone to Tijuana for a week and... take a deep breath... Soon we will be coming home to visit before Christmas, we can't wait to see all the changes that have happened at home and visit with family and friends.