The Italian Gringo

[Vince53]

After my wife and I settled down in Mexico, I began a weekly newsletter to my friends. It comes out every Wednesday, and this is this week's edition.

Greetings, Gringos! It’s high in the seventies here today, and I’m grateful to the Lord for getting me out of cold weather.

For the past several years, I have been writing on some technical forums, and I’ve been following the progress of Windows 7, the new operating system that comes out tomorrow. It’s an excellent system, and a big improvement over Vista. BUT, if you are using a computer that was designed for Windows XP, I advise you not to upgrade. While 7 will run on one gig of RAM, it will not run well unless you have at least three gigs of RAM, and XP will still run better. Wait until you buy a new computer that has 7 already installed.

Despite a lot of strep throat making the rounds, we had 80 in our various church services last week.

Two Saturdays from now, we are planning to take the Saturday morning children’s church to a large estate for a day of swimming, barbecues, and preaching. We hope that you’ll be praying for its success.

Can you serve God and get guaranteed results? Yes. Reading your Bible carefully, as well as more often, will bring an improvement in your life. This improvement will then give the Lord more to work with.


Adios, Vicente

 

[Vince53]

Greetings, Gringos! We hope that all of you are doing well. Attendance was up at our various services last week, and we are preparing for a six-hour long fiesta, barbecue, and preaching two Saturdays from now.

A missionary who recently moved into the area helped us pick up kids last Saturday, which is fortunate because my station wagon quickly ran out of room.

It looks like a shake-up is on the way at the orphanage, and it’s been coming for some time. It’s hard to believe that I have outlasted every other volunteer (I was wrongly fired one time, remember?) and only one paid employee has been there longer than me. I am not involved, so hopefully I can just ride it out.

Part of the problem is that the employees are poor people with nowhere else to go, so no one wants to fire them when they aren’t doing their job. Some of them are doing an outstanding job, and some of them are not. And then you have angry former volunteers who got upset over something and quit, but who still want to serve there.

The Bible tells us that “grace” give us the desire and ability to serve God. So how do you get grace? God gives grace to the humble. So how do you become humble? By submitting to authority. I have noticed over the years that Christians who quit because they are right usually wind up doing little or nothing for the Lord. Christians who submit to authority don’t always get treated fairly, but they wind up being used by God.


Adios, Vicente

 

[Vince53]

Hola, Amigos! It's sunny and pleasant here in the Gringo Zone, and I wish you all were here.

We had a big fiesta for the Saturday morning kids and their parents at an estate owned by Bill Gothard's Basic Life Principles group. They hope to turn it into a conference center and possibly a church and/or an orphanage.
We had 63 kids and their parents, and things went great. It was also the best week in the two-year history of Community Bible Church's multi-site ministry, with 116 in attendance.

The strangest thing about last week occurred at the orphanage when I was showing Bible cartoons on Sunday night. I usually have three services of about thirty minutes each. The kids kept demanding more, and each service was one hour.

Another oddity occurred on Sunday afternoon, when Nancy and I went to visit a couple in the church who had been sick. They raved about how much they appreciated us, and how we were the closest friends that they have. They've only been able to attend church a few times this year, and they are upset that more people haven't come to see them.

Even the animal shelter is doing well. "Tippy" is a friendly dog who had been returned three times because she tears up people's house while they are away. A couple fell in love with her today, ignored all my warnings, and took her home.

In 1 Thessalonians 1:4-9, Paul tells them that he knows that they are really saved. How?

1) The Gospel brought a change into their lives.
2) They changed their lives to become imitators of the apostles and of God.
3) They became examples to other Christians.
4) They themselves spread the Gospel to others.
5) Everyone else could see that their lives had changed.

Adios, Vicente
The Italian Gringo

 

[Vince53]

Greetings Gringos! Winter has set in, with temperatures in the sixties, so we're having a rough time.

Sunday was Nancy's birthday, and the church took us both out to eat. She got all kinds of greetings from around the world through the internet.

Saturday's children's church was down, but overall, we had one of our highest weeks ever. For the second week in a row, the kids at the orphanage wanted an hour's worth of Bible cartoons rather than the usual half-hour.

I took Nancy's to Domino's for their super grand-sized pizza yesterday. Dry and over-cooked, it is not as good as what the Mexicans serve, but we had a very good time.

What happens when a born-again Christian becomes a disciple of a false prophet? This past week, I was amazed to see a Calvinist, a disciple of Saint Augustine, argue on a forum that John 3:16 shows that God does NOT love the world. False prophets offer people "pride," because their beliefs make them superior to other Christians. Some Christians are merely deceived and still do pretty well. Others take pride in their ability to defeat unskilled opponents in debate, regarding themselves as superior Christians. This pride corrupts their flesh, costing them wisdom.

And speaking of a loss of wisdom, I'm talking abut how independent Baptists, (I am one) are destroying themselves by following another false prophet at The Italian Gringo: Why Did God Do It?

See you next week, Vicente

 

[98cwitr]

you have a lot of time on your hands...what do you do for a living?

 

[Vince53]

you have a lot of time on your hands...what do you do for a living?

I'm retired. Heh, heh, heh.

 

[98cwitr]

great profession

 

[Vince53]

Greetings, Gringos! It's been a good week, and we hope that you are all doing well.

For some reason I can't figure out, we had a parade last week. Mexican parades still have live marching bands, and they also had horsemen and dancing. All the schools marched, and the route was packed.


And then the circus came to town. I'm afraid that it was a sorry shadow of last year's performance, as most of their good performers had moved on. "Tarzan" was barely able to get animals on leashes to run around the ring.


Last Saturday was the fortieth anniversary of the day I accepted Christ as Savior. In forty years, I have never found a promise in the Bible to be false.


See you next week,
Vicente

 

[Vince53]

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Greetings, Gringos! We hope that you are all doing well. We're suffering from night time temperatures that have hit the high 40's, and yesterday we had a cold, miserable rain. Right now, though, it's sunny and in the 70's.

My wife and I enjoy watching space shuttle take-offs and landings, although we have to get up at odd hours sometimes. But the space shuttle Atlantis made a perfect landing after a perfect take-off nine days earlier, and we watched them both live on our computers. Type NASA+TV into any search engine if you want to see the next one.

We had a great Thanksgiving at a friend's house, and then another great Thanksgiving at church. The Assemblies of God presented me with an award for my youth work, which is unusual, since I am a Baptist.

Justice at last! Three years ago, I let a cat escape from the shelter, and Barbara (the boss) really let me have it. This week, she let a cat escape. I didn't make fun of her, and later, she and I talked friendly for a while.

The Bible tells us that we are to fear God, rather than man. I've got some controversial articles on how Christian newspaper editors and college presidents (both of which are unscriptural offices) harmed Christianity during the last decades of the twentieth century, and how independent Baptists got out from under their control at The Italian Gringo

Adios, Vicente

 

[Vince53]

Greetings, Gringos, and welcome to another edition of The Italian Gringo!

At 56 years of age, I am one of the younger members of the Christian community here, and my wife and I have found a new ministry. We've started visiting and helping older Christians, some of whom have problems getting around. I never thought of it when I lived in the US, but there are probably people in your own churches who could use some help.

Attendance at Community Bible Church was down last week, as another church had a big party for one of the orphan girls who had just turned fifteen. The Fifteenth Birthday is a big event for Mexican girls, with much of the neighborhood joining their family for a celebration.

I try to be tolerant of other people, but on one Christian forum, Calvinists patrol different threads, attacking people who hold to the Biblical doctrine that God has called the entire world to salvation. John 3:16 tells us "For God so loved the world that he gave his only-begotten Son..." Calvinists actually use that verse to teach that God does not love the world. They explain that the word "world" cannot mean "world," because otherwise, God would love the world. They insist that the world "world" refers to people whom God has predestined to Heaven. Pointing out that "world" means "world" everywhere it appears in the Bible, classical Greek literature, and even the dictionary does no good.

If you stay with the Word of God and avoid mixing philosophy with your Christianity, you won't wind up believing doctrines like that.

Adios, Vicente
The Italian Gringo

 

[Vince53]

Greetings, Gringos! It's a dreary, rainy day, with temperatures in the sixties, but I still wish you were here.

I'm pretty happy about our last children's church. We had eighty kids, plus some adults, for our highest attendance ever. When I visited the route on Friday, I had kids taking me to their cousins and their friends, and we got some first-time visitors. On Saturday, I brought in 34 kids in my station wagon, with some of them taking me to their cousins for more first-time visitors. We were having a Christmas party, and we had to send someone out to buy more food, but it was a big success.

Attendance at the orphanage was down, while Wednesday night attendance was pretty good, and Community Bible Church had 111 people last week. With the cancellation of children's church for three weeks, we'll be down pretty far for a while.

Nancy and I are cautiously starting a new ministry of helping isolated older people, and it back-fired yesterday. We were friends with a retired Methodist minister who had quit attending church after word got out about his paying an outdoor waitress to let him grope her. I ran into him yesterday, but he bitterly blasted me, the church, and other people who had tried to help him. He spends most of his time in his apartment, bitter and isolated, blaming everybody but himself for what happened.

The Army-Navy football game isn't as popular as it was when I was a boy, but it is still one of the great conflicts of college football. My dad and stepdad both fought in the Navy during WW2, and last Saturday, Navy beat Army for the seventh time in a row.

Adios, Vicente

PS. I made three trips in my station wagon.

 

[Vince53]

Feliz Navidad, to all my frozen friends up north. With night time temperatures plunging into the high forties, we feel your pain.


Speaking of pain, I was sicker this week than I've been since getting here, but I'm recovered now. I had to miss church for the first time since arriving in Mexico, and they told me that I was missed.



At a Christmas party we attended, Nancy and I won first prize, two very nice ornaments, for winning a trivia contest.



Chio is a troubled girl at the orphanage who has always used violence to get her way. We became friends after the other girls persuaded a gang of girls at the school to beat her up. Chio has been behaving lately, but she isn't used to people being nice to her. At the animal shelter, she expected the dogs, cats, and even the birds, to attack her.



It is an inevitable part of life that you reap what you sow. What most Christians don't realize is that the passage teaches that you reap what you sow by affecting your flesh with sin. In other words, people won't necessarily do to you what you do to them. Instead, you change yourself by your sins, in ways that hurt you. I told last week about a retired minister who is heavily involved in inappropriate contentography. He is bitter and isolated after driving off Christian friends, including me, who tried to help him. Now he has lots of time for his inappropriate content.

Feliz Navidad!



Vicente

 

[Vince53]

Happy Year, Amigos! ( They don't say "New" in Mexico). It's in the sixties down here, but we're struggling through.


Last week, we had a record high 39 kids jammed into a large room for Bible cartoons at Wednesday night church. God has blessed Community Bible Church of Chapala and its multi-site ministries, and we're looking forward to another good year.



There's a painful lesson I've learned over the decades: you can never trust a compromiser in a fight. Some born-again Christians will "take the high road" during conflicts, acting as though they are too spiritual to fight, but when the fight catches up with them, they'll fold. And they'll fold fast.



One church down here is built on compromise, and they have elders who are both saved and lost. The current pastor is a genuine Christian, and there was a strong move to fire him and take the church away from God's Word. One strong fundamentalist elder quickly turned on the pastor when the fighting started and took a group of other Christians with him to another church in exchange for a leadership position in the other church.



But the Christians won. The church lost a lot of people, and then it started growing again. The pastor told me that over the years, he has observed that whenever a fight starts over the Word of God, most of the elders who are genuine Christians will run.



God tells us that a double-minded man is unstable in all his ways.

I have more on this at The Italian Gringo

The point is, don't be a compromiser, and don't trust a compromiser.

I hope that you'll remember to pray for Nancy and me during the coming year, and we'll be praying for you.

See you next year, I mean, week.

 

[Vince53]

Greetings, Gringos! We're all suffering from a cold spell, with night time temperatures in the forties, and our Mexican friends are having a rough time of it.

Things have gotten rough at the Mexican church where I hold the Wednesday night children's church. A few months ago, the pastor left his wife for about twelve weeks, but she won. She now controls the church, the orphanage, and their family. She's hostile to men, Gringos, non-charismatics, and people who don't speak Spanish, and she's run off most of the volunteer workers. Most orphanage workers are now paid, and even they have a high turn-over.

For over four years I've taken kids to the animal shelter to play with the animals, and it is the only Christian youth activity in the Gringo Zone. She messed it up last Saturday, and I am not allowed to do it anymore.

Her husband can't stand up to her, and she has made it clear that I'm not welcome at the church or the orphanage. I decided to quit, the kids piled all over me, I realized that I'll hurt them if I do quit, so I'm sticking it out.

Tonight at church, attendance was way down because of the cold. The pastor decided to cancel the sermon by the guest speaker and have an emotional service instead. Then one lady started crawling through the back of the church screaming and wailing, her teen-aged daughter was helping me with the kids, the kids started laughing at her and her mom, she started crying, some of the other kids were afraid of what was going on, and I was the only one there to take care of it.

1 Timothy 2:12 is a very unpopular verse these days: "And I do not permit a woman to teach or to have authority over a man, but to be in silence." When a church practices disobedience to this, problems are inevitable.

We had a huge dog returned to the shelter this week, because the owner has to return to the US. While I was walking him, a car stopped and the owner expressed interest in the dog. I persuaded him to walk the dog back to the shelter, he took the dog home, and everyone is very happy.

Attendance at the orphanage last Saturday (when I had planned to quit) hit a record high at forty. We'll be re-starting children's church this Saturday after a three-week vacation, so your prayers are appreciated.

Actually, after a week like this one, they're really appreciated.

Adios, Vicente

 

[Vince53]

Wow, Gringos! For the first time, I'm glad you're not here. The Gringo Zone is getting free of the worst cold spell in 34 years, with daytime temperatures never getting out of the fifties, and about three weeks straight of night time temperatures in the thirties. Remember that most houses here do not have heat.

The pastor of the church where we do Wednesday night children's church is stuck in the US again, this time trying to bring his father's body back with him. And the pastor where we attend church on Sunday had his house burglarized today.

People have reported a large, muscular Mexican in Ajijic who runs up to people without warning and attacks them. He attacked a retired Gringo from the Baptist church last week, breaking his nose and his cheekbone, but he's out of the hospital now.

A friend of ours who is an elder at Little Chapel died suddenly last week. We attended their Sunday evening song service, none of the people who were supposed to lead showed up, and I would up conducting the service. Surprisingly, it went well.

Two Mexican boys showed up at the song service, explaining that their father had deserted them and they had no money. We fed them, and Nancy and I tried to drive them home, but we had to give up on a mountainside and let them walk. Our car just couldn't handle the road.

I'll be busy tomorrow, trying to set up Christian cartoons at another orphanage just outside the Gringo Zone. A storm had knocked down their power line, and they had been a week without electricity for forty teen-aged boys.

And the cute German Shepherd puppy that I told you about last week? The one who got adopted in only three hours? She is back at the shelter. Meanwhile, we found a very pregnant German Shepherd Husky tied up outside the shelter this morning, so terrified that she couldn't move. We lifted her into a vehicle to drive across the street to the vet. He says that she'll live, and the puppies are due in a few days.

I hope February is better than January.

Adios, Vicente

 

[Vince53]

Greetings, Gringos! Boy, am I glad that February is over. We are having a week of cold, miserable rain during the dry season, and this is the worst weather the Gringo Zone has had since they started keeping records.

When burglars robbed our pastor's house, they got his checkbook and the Assemblies of God missions checkbook. In Mexico, you are responsible for securing your checks, so when they wrote $8500 worth of checks the next morning, the bank told him that he is responsible.

But we've had good news. Today I begin showing Christian cartoons at Hope House, an orphanage for teen-age boys just outside the Gringo Zone. And after being stuck in the US for a while, Raoul was able to get his father's body back here to be buried. They had two funerals, because so many of the Mexicans have odd work schedules.

There's been a shake-up at the orphanage. The woman director is hostile to me, but a missionary friend told me that she is now in charge. I had a problem believing that, until the former director's brother told me how upset he is about the way the board of directors treated his sister. Tomorrow I will be attending a meeting and can find out what really happened.

Adios, Vicente

 

[Vince53]

Greetings, Gringos! Hopefully, we're pulling out of the worst weather in the recorded history of the Gringo Zone, as heavy rainfall continues during the dry season.

I'm pleased to report that our son John has rotated out of Afghanistan, and is now stationed in Alaska. We'd like to thank all the people who prayed for his safety.

There's been a big shake-up at the orphanage, and Annabelle, who founded it, is no longer in charge. With no money from the government, Annabelle raised funds from American churches, starting in a pottery factory and moving them last year into a garden paradise. Needing funds to feed a growing number of children, she put fund-raisers on the board, and they brought in money from major American charities, as well as raising money from wealthy retired Gringos who live here. The steady process of removing Annabelle from power began at least two years ago, and now it is complete. There had been conflicts with wealthy donors who wanted control, and the wealthy donors won.

Me? I'm listening to bitter complaints about the board, but they are not interfering with my showing Bible cartoons Saturday evenings. I had told about a missionary couple who moved onto my block, and they are now in charge of the children, but not the orphanage as a whole. I agreed to help the two over-worked women who care for 23 younger children, and I arrived to find six other Gringos helping as well. One of them drove out to buy $100 worth of groceries.

I'll be meeting with the educational director on Thursday to see if I can help with the computer program, which I used to run before being wrongfully fired over two years ago.

Meanwhile, I have been able to start showing Christian cartoons at Hope House, a teen-age boys' orphanage just outside the Gringo Zone. We had 77 in all our outreaches last week, and we have a very small ministry to seniors now.

Adios, Vicente

 

[Vince53]

Greetings, Gringos! We hope that all of you are doing well. I’d like to ask prayer for Nancy, who has been to the doctor three times in two weeks with a terrific allergic reaction to something. She’s doing better, but still having a rough time.

I am now teaching a computer class, helping in another computer class, helping with the little kids, and still showing Christian cartoons at the orphanage. Three missionaries from Wisconsin showed up for three weeks to help with the chicitos (kids four and under—we now have 23 of them) who were being cared for by two women, one of whom is mentally ill.

With funds running low, they are having a drinking party this Sunday, with tickets going for about 25 dollars apiece. When you arrive, you buy booze at the bar. They have raised about $6,000 from ticket sales so far. I have helped persuade two people not to quit over it. One fellow drives some of the kids to school and to the doctor’s. Another donates chickens once a month. I’m also opposed to drinking, but I pointed out that they aren’t involved in the alcohol, the board did it, they have to feed these kids, I am staying out of it, and I helped talk them out of quitting. A third Christian worker did quit, and he’s working four days a week now in a kitchen that feeds the hungry.

Maybe I shouldn’t have talked them out of quitting. I was taught that I should separate from the orphanage for having alcohol. But then I wouldn’t be able to help as many people. So I’m doing the best I can.

I was able to show a Christian cartoon at Hope House, an orphanage for teen-age boys just outside the Gringo Zone. A social worker, who needs to teach a class there in order to get credit for her Master’s degree, watched what I did, went to the board, and demanded that she get my time-slot to teach her class. So they got rid of me and gave her my time-slot.

We had a total of 90 last week in all our services, not counting the computer classes and the chicitos, so we were blessed with a pretty good week.

Adios, Vicente

 

[Vince53]

Greetings, Gringos! We hope that your weather has improved as much as ours.

The drinking party at the orphanage was a great success, with about $11,500 in donations, $6,000 in ticket sales, and profits from the sale of alcohol that they are keeping secret. One upset volunteer did a partial boycott before resuming his activities, and things are going well.

I was surprised by the number of responses I got. No one felt that I should quit. A few people were upset that they would have a drinking party at a Christian orphanage, but most felt that it was okay. A small number were upset that anyone would object to it.

Meanwhile, I was able to get Windows 98 installed on another computer, and the kids love working on the computers. Someone donated another old one, and the classes are growing.

Three missionary women are helping with the toddlers, and after one week, they are in shell-shock. With two more weeks to go, they didn't move when someone announced that a toddler was missing. I asked everyone on the site, and one of the older kids found her.

Calvinists like to quote John 6:44, which tells us "No one can come to Me unless the Father who sent Me draws him; and I will raise him up at the last day."

But they're not too happy with the next verse: It is written in the prophets, 'And they shall all be taught by God.' Therefore everyone who has heard and learned from the Father comes to Me.

God the Father draws ALL men to Christ by teaching them. Those who respond to that teaching come to Christ.

Adios, Vicente

 

[Vince53]

Greetings, Gringos! For many of us, the weather has improved, and we sure did need it.


Just as we were getting ready to quit, attendance at our Saturday morning children's church has gone back up. Behavior is fairly good, and the kids are learning. Don't quit serving God because it's rough. Our pastor told us that when they first arrived, their goal was to start ten new churches in one year. One year later, their three biggest financial supporters had died, and they had no new churches. Ready to quit his ministry and return to the US, he was suddenly called to become pastor of his present church, and things are going well.


Things are going well at the orphanage, and I am now there four times a week. Gringo volunteers are all over the place, and Annabelle, who founded the place, is struggling to deal with her demotion by the board. People whom she is hostile to are serving in many areas, and she seems to be coming to terms with it.



The Bible teaches us that salvation is the result of God's grace (kindness). We don't deserve it, and we can't earn it. But it also teaches us that successful Christian service is also the result of God's grace. The Apostle Paul wrote that he worked harder than anyone else, but it wasn't really him, it was the grace of God in him.



See you next week,



Vicente