our life as of present: August 2011

Monday, August 29, 2011

august update

Last week Josh caught the cold that been going around and then this week I got the flu part that was going around. So needless to say it has been a long 2 weeks, but we will survive. Sadly though, we did have a brother in the neighboring hall die this past weekend. He was in our hall before it split so he was known by many. He was 49 and still has a child in high school, but thankfully the congregations have been so supportive of his family. It is so encouraging to see the friends rally for this sad occasion. The brother gave a very encouraging talk and it also gave a good witness as there were many present that were not witnesses.

In September our hall will be very empty since many are going or have already gone on vacation. Josh has like 3 service meeting parts in September because of it, which is a good thing he now gets more practice. The problem here is there aren’t enough brothers in some of the halls (including ours); so many times one brother can upwards of 3 assignments on a meeting. For example, one night josh was supposed to read for the congregation bible study, do stage and also have the announcements as a 10 min. part. In our hall we have about 75 publishers, we have about 6 elders and about 4 servants, and our meeting attendance on Sundays is about 110-120. But in the islands the brothers have it harder. Erica (my old roomie here) and Antonio her husband live in the Marshall Islands. The island they live on is only a mile long and not very wide (you can see the ocean on both sides), but there is 16,000 people living on it. In their congregation Antonio and one other brother are the only 2 elders now – they have one other brother that is leaving soon to be the c.o. for the outer islands. Erica said they have about 40 publishers but on Sundays the attendance is about 100. On that island they are almost done building a kingdom hall with a missionary home above it. This building project has been a great witness, and Erica says they expect attendance to be even greater once they are in the new kingdom hall. She and Antonio serve as special pioneers and will get to live in the missionary home once it is complete which should be about October.

Since I have not been able to put much on this blog lately, I have been thinking of ideas for it when there isn’t much going on. One idea is sharing recipes (which i know I already kind have been doing). I think maybe I will do a recipe of the month for now and then maybe when I have more time make it once a week. If anyone has any good recipes for us to try please email them-always looking for something new to try. I will only post ones that we have tried and liked.

So here goes for month of august (and this was one Josh found and made for us the other night) our recipe is:

Tilapia with ginger marinated cucumbers

· ½ cup apple cider vinegar

· ¼ cup + 1 teaspoon packed brown sugar

· 2 teaspoons grated fresh ginger

· ½ teaspoon salt

· 2 medium cucumbers, sliced

· 1 (6oz.) container plain yogurt

· 2 tablespoons coarsely chopped fresh mint

· Strips of lemon peel and lemon wedges (optional)

· Cracked peppercorns

1. Preheat broiler. In med. Bowl stir together vinegar, ¼ cup brown sugar, ginger and salt until sugar dissolves. Remove ¼ cup of the mixture. Add the cucumbers and half the mint to the remaining mixture and set aside.

2. Spray broiler pan with non-stick spray, add tilapia. Brush ¼ cup vinegar mixture over the fish. Broil 4 to6 minutes or until fish flakes easily.

3. In another bowl mix yogurt, remaining mint and 1 teaspoon brown sugar together.

4. Place cucumbers on plates, top with cooked fish and yogurt mixture. Garnish with lemon peel, wedges and peppercorns.

o.k. so we had to make some modifications to this as we couldn’t find any mint, so we used dried dill and only had a fresh lime in the house, but I have to say I really liked it that way. And any time you guys try one of our recipes but you do it your way, let us know how it is, we are always game for edits or versions too.

Monday, August 15, 2011

convention highlights!

Since most of you were able to make it to the convention this year I will only share some of my favorite points and a few of the experiences that were shared.

· The first talk (“Why we need God’s kingdom to come”), the brother was talking about Satan and how he wants us to have bad feelings toward Jehovah so he twist things. He likened how we should feel about his is same as Jesus. He illustrated it like this – Think of how if you were the oldest and only child in a family and you became very close to your father and then along came a brother or sister but they grew to resent and hate your father, how would you feel?

· Second talk (“ How we know that God’s kingdom will come soon”), the scripture in Matthew 24:3,4 and explained that there are two groups of the spirit anointed ones. The first group is all dead, but the second group is still alive –these ones having been young when the first group died. As we know ones of the anointed would be still alive to see Jehovah’s day come, so that means it is very near since we know that the second group is getting older.

· Our attendance on Friday morning was 1,033

· The keynote address (Who are preaching the Good news of the Kingdom”?) talked of different ways to identify these ones. In the first point under what the content of their message would be, the speaker brought out that many religions today mix politics in to make it a more social thing. But as Jehovah’s people we teach the same as Jesus taught and it is a harmonious message. For example Time magazine wrote some years back about a priest who said he had in his travels around the globe asked Jehovah’s Witnesses what they preached. The priest said this of their responses –“They are all so stupid they all gave the same answer”! So it just goes to show how no matter where you are in the world people recognize we all are teaching as Jesus did, even if they don’t get it.

· Also in the keynote address he brought out another point as to what reasons we preach the good news. He actually helped us to see what we don’t do it for – money like many other religions. He brought out the scripture where Jesus stated “you receive free, give free”. He also mentioned 2 Corinthians 2:17 that bring out we are not peddlers of the word. He gave an example of how the Catholic Church does not follow this. The speaker said that when a person dies the family will have a mass for that person and they are charged $10 for it each time. But what is this mass for? It is to save this dead person from purgatory. As we know the bible does not teach of purgatory, so not only is the church lying to their parishioners about what they are supposed to be doing, but they are committing fraud for their own selfish gain.

· In the talk “will you make sacrifices for the kingdom”, there was to 2 brothers that told their stories of how they have done this-very encouraging. One younger brother went down to help out with the relief work after hurricane Katrina twice. At the time he was in college, but his experience and joy he had helped him to make the choice to quit college and move to Mexico to lice where the need was great. After a time there, he then heard about the need here in Micronesia and thus ended up moving here to help.

The second brother and his wife came about 2 years ago after also hearing about the need. He brought out that for the first time his wife is able to pioneer and they have been able to draw closer as a couple and grow spiritually. He also has been able to conduct his first progressive bible study, the young man was getting baptized the next day!

· Attendance on Friday afternoon was 1,035

· On Saturday during one of the symposiums there was an interview of a sister from our hall. This talk was on how there different ways in which ones are coming into the truth. He story is this: she grew up in a atheistic household, so when she had questions she would ask different ones, but was very confused and never found a satisfying answer. Her and her husband, were racing sailboats when one of the guys they knew had been studying with the witnesses and gave them a truth book. When she read it, she knew she had found the truth. Her and her husband quit racing because of the bad environment/influence. She even turned down a job to be a make-up artist on a popular t.v. show in order for her to pioneer. She says she finally found the happiness she never thought she could.

· Attendance Saturday morning was 1,134 – 4 were baptized, one of them Janessa who just graduated this year from high school. We are so proud!

· In the talk “Parents – shepherd you children with toward kingdom blessings”, the speaker asked a question that all parents can ask themselves – Am I a communicator? Do I create an environment that my children feel they can be totally open with me? I thought this was really nice because now a days it seems too many parents are busy that they think just asking how their child’s day went is o.k. But the speaker brought out that young ones especially those in school are facing some pretty bad things their peers are doing and they need to be able to tell you parents about them, so you can help them to better handle these situations and their peers. He also brought out that parents should review how their parents talked to them, so that you can adjust your was of communication so your child is not just telling you what they know you won’t react badly to.

· In the talk “Are you behaving as a kingdom citizen”? , the speaker brought out the scripture in Proverbs 27:11 and he said to put our names in their when we read it. This helps us to see how we are each individually responsible to Jehovah, even young ones.

· Saturday afternoon attendance 1,147

· In Sundays public discourse (“will humans ruin this earth”?), there were 2 points I though very interesting to think about. One was an illustration – when you are really sick and you go to a clinic, you wait for the doctor to tell you what is wrong, not the receptionist of the nurse because you know that the doctor is the most qualified. The same should be for us, we need to wait for Jehovah to fix this earth since he is the only one qualified to do so.

· The second point was that when we look at the pictures in the literature we receive do we view them as like a travel brochure in order to picture ourselves in the new world?

· Attendance Sunday morning 1,250

· In the last talk (God’s kingdom will crush all other kingdoms), there was an experience given in relation to being faithful to the end. (Warning it might make you cry!)

In 1990 there was a young sister who had been born with a disability that left her an invalid, but she never let that stop her from serving Jehovah. She was able to get baptized – they did so in the bathtub at her home. Soon after, she wanted to axillary pioneer. So the brothers in her congregation arranged for ones to come over and hold the phone to her ear as she witnessed to ones she called. This encouraged the congregation so much that the amount of pioneers in her congregation doubled! On one of her phone calls she spoke to a man who had lost his sight in an accident and thus felt like ending his life. As they spoke she asked him questions helping him to see what good things he had in his life. This got the man to reconsider. He asked her to come by his place to tell him more about the bible, but she told him she was unable. He didn’t understand, so she told him of her condition and how it left her bedridden. He then asked her what he could do for her. She told him that if he was willing to then she would send someone to study with him. He did accept. Currently he is still studying but the young sister has died.

· Attendance Sunday afternoon 1,341

I hope you all found it very encouraging as we did. It definitely gives us all a lot to think about. For those of you, who may not have made it, just let me know if you have any questions

Friday, August 12, 2011

just a note....

I'm very sorry I have not been able to post more, things have been really busy. As I mentioned before we have had company since before the convention and work schedules have been weird with that also being busy. I am working on trying to put together the highlights and experiences from the convention to post hopefully next week.

I hope everyone is doing well, please email-we would love to hear whats going on back in the states.