"Field Posts"

In a small lush river ravine, mostly forgotten and hidden, just north of Les Cayes on the southern peninsula of Haiti, I unexpectedly met Christ (or at least one who took being Christ-like serious).  This is a video of the River and School. It happen during a visit to a country church called Les Rois (pronounced Lay Wah), in the Picot (pronounced peeko) Church district.  Picot Church is in a long term Sister Church Partnership with Trinity Bible Church in Lafayette, LA, facilitated by Reciprocal Ministries International .  Trinity Bible has donated substantial funding to help build/rebuild a school in Les Rois.  We were going out on a recon mission to figure out what needs to be done.  After riding out across the valley and up into the mountains on our four motorcycles, we quickly found ourselves scaling down the side of a mountain (which I would think is impassable even by 4 wheel...

After a long day of finance work here in Haiti, we took a break and rode motorcycles out across the valley and up into the hills.  This is the sort of thing that I don’t get to do in the US!  Gary, Benjamin and I had a great time!

Timothy Keller’s book “Prodigal God” insightfully revisits the Parable of “The Prodigal Son” in Luke 15.  He appropriately renames it… “The Parable of the Two Lost Sons”.  After reading this book, I am more embarrassed with self, yet more confident in Christ.  I am more aware of sin within the church, yet more motivated to love missionally within that church.  Conviction. Fresh wonder. Awe.  Heartache. A celebration of the sufficiency of the Gospel message. Wow, what a great transformative read.  If you read this book, the sin of self, that you may be very aware of, or totally unaware of, will be laid bare.  You will encounter your depravity as if looking in a mirror.  You will be called to repentance.  You will find love. BTW, “prodigal” means lavishly extravagant.  Yes, God is/was lavishly extravagant in his love for me, for you, for all of humanity. Truly, a phenomenal read. His point? We mistakenly focus too heavily on t...

I created this video for a missions conference we will be attending.  This version is slightly altered.  I have also embedded this on our website homepage at www.robandbecky.com .

Sadly, I wouldn’t really label this a must read.  It was a short book, with an intent to motivate us to really appreciate the depth and intensity of God’s love.  Brennan Manning is very well respected, and he should be, but I just didn’t really get this book.  I appreciated some of the “story” parts of the book, but other than that I was sort of lost. Many many seem to love it.  I guess I am in the minority! Also, I could have done without the overly verbose and mystical style.  Maybe I am too simple minded, but it just seemed that he could have come down to earth a little. Rob

I sort of joked halfway through reading this book, “if I could write a book, this is the book I would write”.  Well, that remains to be true.  Richard Stearns, president of World Vision, does a great job of calling the church to action.  This book took so much of what I have thought, experienced, and dreamed about and put it between 2 covers. This book is really a must read for Christians and non-Christians alike.  Stearn’s thesis, which I think he supported nicely, is that we as Christians often forget that caring for the needy is inherently a part of the Gospel, not a potential byproduct of the Gospel.  Jesus’ heart’s passion was for the weak, the needy, the unjustly persecuted, the hungry, the thirsty, the naked, etc.  Many believer’s focus so much on praying the salvation prayer, or even on our individual relationship and eternal life with Christ, or even on getting others saved, that we forget what it means to love Jesus and therefore love our neigh...

you would have thought someone was murdering her.  Tessa: 3 years old, sweet most of the time, with the tendency to be borderline-whiney.  This precious girl tells me at random times throughout my day, “I love you Mommy” and with pure joy and excitement in her voice “I grow up in Haiti!”  Not to paint a perfect picture, I have heard her scream before:  at Drew when he teases her or in anger at Braden when he steals a toy (or just sits down on her toys) or just when she doesn’t want to share! Today I heard Tessa scream and cry in pure fear, and there wasn’t much I could do to calm her down.  The culprit: a massive mosquito with a leg-span the size of a nickel. We were driving to church to drop Drew off at preschool, driving thru traffic at a snails pace for who knows what reason.  Drew says, “Mommy, there’s a fly in the car” and I look back to see a huge mosquito flying around.  The next thing I know Tessa is screaming  and crying with her arm...