Bruce Brief - Happy Thanksgiving!

“Home” for missionaries can be a little hard to pin down at times! But we are thankful to say that God has helped us to settle into and feel ‘at home’ here in our rented house in the little town of Spofford, New Hampshire. During the month of October, we gradually unpacked and established a routine while we enjoyed the beautiful colors of fall unfolding around us. We live close to Lake Spofford, so have enjoyed getting out to walk and enjoy the scenery.

 

As we look back at our summer travels, we are so thankful for safety on the road, good health, and such encouraging visits with friends and churches. We feel very blessed to be a part of God’s big family! Again, we’d like to share our thanks for your hospitality along the way, as you have enriched our lives in many ways.

 

This fall we are visiting several churches in the area, as well as taking part in several small group Bible studies here in our home church. Although they had a late start, our girls have made good progress in the homeschooling year, and should be finishing our first quarter by the end of this month. Homeschool co-op at church has been a good addition, and Kimberly is looking forward to piano lessons starting up next week, and the possibility of ski lessons during the winter. Now that’s something we haven’t been able to do in Ecuador! Keilah would like to do some ice-skating this winter, and both girls are enjoying youth group.

 

Our family doesn’t feel quite the same without Kenny! But we are happy to report that he is doing well and loves NTBI in Wisconsin. He is learning much, not only in his classes, but also as he holds down a job and learns to take responsibility for his own finances. We are looking forward to seeing him over the holidays.

 

Down in Ecuador our coworkers have started up our Adult literacy program again, so please keep them in prayer, both teachers and students! We were excited to hear the Milton’s wife, Delia will be joining the group of students this time. This is a real answer to prayer. Pray for Doug and Dorcas this month as they man the outpost alone. Chrissy and Andy are here in the states for a short one month visit, and will be returning to Ecuador in the beginning of Dec. Also pray the Doug and Dorcas will be able to find a reliable used 4x4 truck to purchase.

 

We wish everyone a Happy Thanksgiving!

1Ti 6:6  But godliness with contentment is great gain.

 

In Christ,

Kevin & Kathy

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Bruce Brief - Eastward bound!

We’re heading east….

Yes, we are in the final stretch of our summer travels! Tomorrow will find us driving from Missouri to Kentucky and points beyond as we gradually make our way back to New Hampshire to settle down for the fall, winter, and spring. We have so much to be thankful for…

…good friends along the way, and such wonderful hospitality!

…churches and folks that are interested in the ministry and want to help in any way they can

…safety in over 9,000 miles and 23 states and many hours on the highways, and a sturdy van

...the beauty of God’s creation seen in sunflower fields in North Dakota all the way to a cypress swamp in Mississippi (complete with an alligator!)

…God’s provision of a completely furnished house in New Hampshire for the 8 months we’ll be settled down (October thru May)

…the Williams family’s safe arrival back in Ecuador, and Shaubs who held down the fort alone until they arrived

…Kenny happily moved into his dorm room at NTBI in Wisconsin, and finding a job

…and many more blessings too numerous to jot down. Thanks, Lord!

The first week of October (October 3-5) will find us arriving in Spofford, New Hampshire, and moving into a house just a few miles from our home church and Kevin’s folks. We look forward to getting involved in our home church, beginning our homeschool year, and yes, perhaps even settling into a boring routine!! J Keilah is ready to get back into her normal sleep pattern, while Kimberly would just like to wake up without being confused about which state she’s in. Kevin and I are just ready to unpack those suitcases!

Thanks for your prayers, hospitality, and friendship!

Kevin and Kathy

Travel Highlights

on the road again :-)

After three weeks here in New Hampshire, we are out on the road again for points west and south. We are looking forward to seeing many friends and family, even though it entails many hours on the highways of our country! The end of September should see us back in New Hampshire, settling down for the fall and winter. We plan to be involved at our home church as much as possible, while visiting several other supporting churches in the area as time allows. It has been a joy to sit with our friends here over the last three Sundays, as we soaked in the praise and worship and teaching. Our hearts were thirsty for that sweet fellowship! We thank the Lord for these refreshing weeks.

Kenny came last monday morning with his driver’s license, the first step in settling into life here! He will be beginning classes at NTBI on August 17^th. His address will be 915 N. Hartwell Ave., Waukesha, Wisconsin 53186. He is excited to begin his studies! He will have many adjustments, as he not only adjusts to school and dorm life, but also looks for a part-time job to help pay bills. Over the next few months he will have to adjust to fall and winter weather in Wisconsin, as well.

Our co-workers Doug and Dorcas Williams flew back to Ecuador this week. They also have many re-adjustments to make as they settle back in there. Please pray for them and for Andy and Chrissy Shaub as they hold down the fort amidst all the changes!

Thanks,

Kevin & Kathy Bruce

Picking berries

Keilah and Kimberly picking raspberries in NH

(Kevin's parents' house and our van from Righteous Rides!)

Kenny happy with his blackberry - a gift from his uncle!

Bruce Brief July--goodbyes and travel

With our flight to the USA coming up in just a few days, we are in the midst of saying our goodbyes—not only to our Awa friends, but also to our coworkers and Ecuadorian friends. In a Latin culture, it is quite offensive to leave without saying a proper goodbye, so we are trying hard to do it right and hurt as few feelings as we can. J Leaving the Awa believers was especially hard for us. Even though the Awa heartily dislike showing strong emotions, many had tears in their eyes last Sunday as they said their goodbyes. Because they have such a difficult time handling these feelings, I think they actually feel a little upset with us for causing them to feel such sadness! While we look forward to seeing friends and family in the USA during this year of furlough, part of our hearts will definitely stay here with the country and people we have come to love.

Changes are in store for the Awa communities while we are gone! Construction is quickly moving forward on the bridge over the RV river, and the workers estimate that it will be done in about five months. At that point the road will continue further interior. At the same time, the Awa are carrying heavy loads of electric poles (made from a PVC pipe-type material, but still over 200 lbs each!), transformers, and wire up into the communities all along the main trail. There should be electricity in our community in just a few months! We can hardly imagine what it will be like to come back to both a road and electric service at the Outpost! These changes bring both good and bad influences for the people as the first electric items that most buy are televisions and dvd players, along with an abundance of videos full of violence and poor morals. Cultural change comes very quickly because these isolated people consider such movies to reflect life in the modern world, which they long to be a part of. With the road also comes easy access to alcoholic beverages. At the tiny community center of RV, there are already three bars/cantinas in place! Please remember the Awa believers as they learn to deal with these influences. Discernment only comes by God’s grace in their lives.

We are sorry to have been out of touch over the last eight weeks! Our not-that-old laptop computer bit the dust, leaving us hanging. I have finally been able to resurrect the hard drive and we have our email address list back. J We are thankful to have communications up and running again (even temporarily on a loaner computer)! For those of you who we have kept in the dark, our plans include flying into St. Louis the 10^th (this week!) and then heading west/north to see Kathy’s sisters, and then on to New Hampshire. Our three weeks in New England will be a little rushed, as we need to be on the road again by mid-August so we can drop Kenny off at the Bible Institute in Wisconsin. In September, we hope to head back to New England (from Oklahoma) by way of any of you who would like us to drop in! At this point, we can be reached best by way of email. As soon as we have some type of phone number, we will let you know. For the fall and winter we plan to settle in New Hampshire. We are still sorting out where we will live, but we praise the Lord for His provision of a Grand Caravan van loaned to us by a wonderful organization that loans vehicles to missionaries (Righteous Rides)!

Many thanks for your prayers for us!

In Christ,

Kevin & Kathy

A few pics from my Hike from Buenos Aires (Ecuador) to Palmira

June 2009 Bruce Brief news

What a month it's been! We are thankful for God's mercy and grace through the ups and downs of trying to pack and sort our three 'homes', many hours of travel for paperwork (and a broken-down vehicle), and a crazy schedule as we tried to keep up with ministry in the midst of it all. The Awa have been a little puzzled by all our comings and goings; actually, I'm not so sure we aren't a little puzzled ourselves as we wake up each morning trying to sort out which ones of us are coming or going today! Most puzzling of all is the fact that our laptop computer died last week and left us high and dry for communications (it's been dying over the last few months, generally making life difficult, but we had hoped it would last until we arrived States-side in July.)

A quick update on the paperwork, ministry, car, kids, and travel plans:

Paperwork: The Lord was gracious to us through the many hours on buses as we went back and forth to Quito five times renewing one USA passport and renewing our Ecuadorian missionary visas. In Ibarra we renewed our Ecuador i.d. cards, although we ran into some problems with Kimberly's 'cedula' (Ecuadorian citizen i.d. card) when the government records showed that her fingerprints had changed. (Apparently a mistake was made in reading her fingerprints years ago when she got her first 'cedula' as a baby.) Thankfully a few more hours waiting in offices cleared this up without too much delay! Then we were finally able to renew her national passport and are now all ready to fly. Thanks, Lord!

Ministry: Some of you may have heard that Humberto's wife, Maria Liria, fell off one of the cable foot bridges about 10 days ago. She slipped on a wet board, and fell with one of their children. Thankfully the little girl was okay and Maria wasn't hurt worse! She broke her arm in several places, around her elbow. Since our car was in the shop, Cipriano (our national pastor friend) was able to rent a truck to go in and get her, and the Shaubs headed for Ibarra the same day to be of help and encouragement to Humberto there. This accident brought back memories of their daughter Erika, who fell from a cliff and died about three years ago, and Humberto was quite nervous. Andy was able to visit the hospital every day. The doctor first cleared up an infection and then wanted to operate to put in several screws and a metal plate, but Maria and Humberto refused, so Friday the doctor sent them home to make the slow recovery with just a cast. I think he was a little frustrated trying to communicate with them! Andy said that Maria said that no doctor was going to put little nails in her arm! We pray her arm makes a good recovery despite the lack of surgery.

We are struggling to finish up our year of literacy study. With the local elections (today is voting day) and several community happenings, it seems to be difficult to get all our students together long enough to administer our last tests. This next Friday and Saturday we should be meeting for the last time before we leave. Please pray that all 9 students will make it and finish their exams!

4-Runner: Thankfully is back on the road, 'running' again! It took quite a stack of money and about three weeks, but we are glad to have the vehicle again. With so much travel in our schedule this month, we were sure missing having the Toyota, although we gave the local truck drivers some good business!

Kids: Kenny is now a high school graduate...as of Friday! He graduated at the top of his class (okay, we home-school so he WAS the class...but he still did great!) We celebrated with apple pies and ice-cream yesterday. Of course, immediately after the party, on our way down from RV, he fell and sliced open his knee and got to go get a tetanus shot. Hopefully he'll be walking again in a few days, as he has promised to travel with a medical caravan team from Kentucky. Kimberly finished fifth grade several weeks ago, and Keilah will finish up her freshman year with a big Geometry test today or tomorrow. Our kids are gearing up for big changes in the next month as we pack up and say many good-byes.

Travel plans: We have our tickets for the 2nd week of July, flying into St. Louis. We are privileged to have the use of a van for the year, loaned from an organization called Righteous Rides. We'll be heading to New England from Missouri for a few short weeks, and then will head out again to the Midwest sometime in August. Beyond that, we have made few plans, although we have done much praying that the Lord will direct our days and miles. Our full-to-the-end schedule here hasn't left us much planning time!

We are savoring our last moments with our friends here. Last night I enjoyed an hour sitting with Awa friends on the porch at the Awa Center. Gloria wanted to know how she should handle having a drunk and unsaved husband, while Guillermo (her husband, sitting right there) lamented about so many friends pulling him to drink, now that he is the Palmira community leader. Leandro sat back and listened, asking a few questions of his own. I was thankful for yet another opportunity to share God's wisdom for living, and the fact that many people are praying for Guillermo's salvation. Today I am heading out with Luis Alfonso, for the long hike in the back way to RV, making a map for the community of where the road will hopefully be put in one day. Our hearts are pulled to these people...please pray for us as we have a few last chances to encourage our Awa friends. Saying good-bye, even for a year, is hard!

Because of God's mercy,
Kevin and Kathy

Bruce Brief--May ~ Paperwork and Red tape await us :-(

Although not exactly our favorite past-time, paperwork is on our must-do list this month. For some time we’ve known that we had to renew our visas before the end of May, but in looking over our other paperwork we had a few surprises. (This stuff all adds up, especially having two kids with dual nationalities!) So just this week we realized that both Kimberly’s Ecuadorian i.d. card and passport will need to be renewed before we leave for furlough, and Keilah’s USA passport was already expired (oops!) So Monday found us on the road again, going to Quito to renew Keilah’s passport. Thankfully that went well, and we are waiting to begin the process of renewing our visas. We ran into a few snags trying to renew Kimberly’s i.d. card, but hope to be able to find a creative solution to the student card (proof that she is studying) that they require. Your prayers will be appreciated!

We are also in the home-stretch for finishing up our homeschool year! In just a week Kimberly will finish up fifth grade; Keilah will soon be finishing up her Geometry, Bible, and Spanish with her cousin Laura to complete their freshman year; and Kenny will be doing his last lesson in Calculus and completing his Visual Arts course to close up his senior year by about mid-June. It feels like quite an accomplishment for Mom and Dad to have started with Kenny back in 1996 with kindergarten and now to be finishing up highschool! I’m wondering who should get the diploma---Mom or Kenny! :-) But yes, we are proud to be the parents of this young man, and are excited with him as he turns 18 this year and prepares to step out on his own. Kenny has applied to New Tribes Bible Institute for the fall semester, and would like to continue his studies at college afterwards. He just has to decide what to study, since at this point he wants to learn everything from linguistics and languages…to history…to computers and technology!

Fifty-eight Awa joined us for the Believers’ Conference Easter week. The Lord worked out such details as the lack of town water service, a shortage of propane tanks, and kids’ school schedules. Thanks for praying! The Millans and Rosales, our two staff families in Lita, played a key part in preparing the property for the Conference and working through these difficulties. Doug Williams flew in from Virginia to shoulder a major part of the teaching, along with our Awa neighbor, Milton. It was encouraging to hear the feedback from the believers. When Kevin asked on the last morning what they had learned from the teaching, many took turns to stand up and share. Meregildo shared that as he listened to Doug’s teaching on the family, he was reminded that this was very different from the way his father had raised him. “But I’m happy to hear God’s Word, so I can know what God says about how to live as a family.” He went on to share more specifics of what he had learned. Juan Carlos, Meregildo’s oldest son, came to conference and quietly listened to each teaching session. As we celebrated the Lord’s Supper with the believers, Juan Carlos quietly asked to take part. As his father questioned him about his sincerity, Juan stood his ground, saying that he was believing. Paulino, another of the believers, also proudly presented his two daughters, Sandra and Diana, who were baptized this year. It is impossible for us to see into these young folks’ hearts, but it is apparent that several of the believers are passing on their faith to their children. And so we came away from Conference encouraged with what God is doing in the Awa believers’ hearts.

Thanks for your prayers!

Kevin & Kathy

Casilla 10-01-692

Ibarra, Imbabura

ECUADOR

+593 9 478-7811

http://brucekev.blogspot.com

Photos of our 12th Annual Awa Believers Conference!

RE: Bruce Brief - Awa Conference coming up!

This is just a quick update for those of you who were praying! We will get some more details out later and post some pictures, but for now I wanted to respond quickly the prayer requests that we had posted before the conference.

 

Below are the original prayer request and a brief response to each of the Lords grace and provision!

 

 

1.       There has been no regular water service at the Mission Center since the big rain. Pray that the town will get the pipes fixed and normal flow restored before the conference. The electric service has been a bit sporadic as well.

The Lord provided water every day! There were a few times the water was off for just a few hours, but because we had prepared by filling every container we could before the conference we were able to function normally. The electric stayed on the whole time as well! It is kind of funny as Sunday afternoon after the conference it did go out for a couple of hours. ;-)

 

2.       There has also been a shortage of propane gas here in the north of Ecuador, especially out in the rural areas. Pray that we will be able to refill the empty tanks soon.

We were able to fill our tanks before the conference and we had plenty of propane.

 

3.       Pray that the Lord will work out the details for the Awa to be able to come. In the community of Palmira, the head teacher has decided that their school will hold classes all Easter week and he has told the believers that their children cannot have permission to leave (Thursday and Friday).

The Lord brought us a good group of believers.  Even some from Palmira as they chose to come down and miss the two days of school anyway. Praise the Lord for this stand of faith. Most of them had to make sacrifices in order to come.

 

4.       Pray for our partner Doug as he prepares and travels down from the USA to be here.

Doug made it fine, and even said that it was one of the nicest trips he had made as far as airline and schedule. Praise the Lord for this! (Doug does not like to travel all that much! J )

 

5.       Pray for us also as we try and coordinate all the supplies needed, including a refrigerator. Transporting all the supplies to the Mission Center from the city can be quite the challenge, as even the main road has been closed off and on with more landslides.

The Lord helped us accomplish this even with my back out! Praise the Lord. We were able to hire a truck to bring a fridge and freezer down with a load of the bulk stuff ahead of time which turned out to be a real blessing, and saved me an extra round trip between Ibarra and Lita.

 

Many thanks for praying! The conference went incredibly smooth this year. Easter Sunday with them was a highlight for me, and a real blessing as the believers shared what they had learned during the conference! It has been many years that we have been waiting for that kind of feedback! During times like that I realize what an enormous privilege it is to be allowed to take part in the Lords work!

 

 

Your servants,

Kevin & Kathy

 

 

Kevin & Kathy Bruce

Liebenzell Mission

Casilla 10-01-692

Ibarra, Imbabura

ECUADOR

+593 9 478-7811

http://brucekev.blogspot.com

 

Go for it!

Is there still enough road?

Bruce Brief - Awa Conference coming up!

Greetings from Ecuador!

Yesterday we had a Jordan-crossing experience—or at least it seemed like that to our family! As many of you know our car has been stuck in RV for the last 6 weeks as a torrential rain February 15^th wiped out the road between us and town. We headed out Monday with the car, not knowing how far we could make it. The Lord helped us make it all the way down. It is quite a story, and you can read more about it on our Blog if you want. Suffice it to say we had to dip our feet in the waters before we saw the Lord part the ‘river’! Thanks for your prayers!

Our Annual Awa Believers Conference is coming up next week (April 9 to 12^th). As always, there are obstacles as we prepare. Many of you have asked for specific prayer requests

1. There has been no regular water service at the Mission Center since the big rain. Pray that the town will get the pipes fixed and normal flow restored before the conference. The electric service has been a bit sporadic as well.
2. There has also been a shortage of propane gas here in the north of Ecuador, especially out in the rural areas. Pray that we will be able to refill the empty tanks soon.
3. Pray that the Lord will work out the details for the Awa to be able to come. In the community of Palmira, the head teacher has decided that their school will hold classes all Easter week and he has told the believers that their children cannot have permission to leave (Thursday and Friday).
4. Pray for our partner Doug as he prepares and travels down from the USA to be here.
5. Pray for us also as we try and coordinate all the supplies needed, including a refrigerator. Transporting all the supplies to the Mission Center from the city can be quite the challenge, as even the main road has been closed off and on with more landslides.

Thank you so much! We have already seen the Lord moving and preparing hearts for the conference and know that He is able to take care of these details as well!

Kevin & Kathy

Kevin & Kathy Bruce

Liebenzell Mission

Casilla 10-01-692

Ibarra, Imbabura

ECUADOR

+593 9 478-7811

http://brucekev.blogspot.com

I think I saw it wiggle!

We are out with the car!

Yippee! We all felt like hollering for joy yesterday, as our family made it down from RV WITH the car yesterday!!! A big praise…we decided it was like the Israelites crossing the Jordan River…as we definitely had to ‘’step into the water in faith” ! We are really thanking the Lord today.

 

It’s a really long story! Friday the bulldozer made it up and worked past our car and our hopes soared.  We can see across the valley thru binoculars. But we were teaching Alfalit, couldn’t leave immediately, and kept waiting to see a truck pull up to Nep’s, but no vehicle arrived. We wondered if the second tractor had the road torn up down below putting in tubes. Friday night it rained 2 inches in RV, evidently harder down toward Lita. More creeks brought down rocks and junk and at one place the road bed washed away. We also heard that the 2^nd tractor got pulled out. Juan came to church Sunday and told us how terrible the road was, impassable, and the tractor drivers had left. So, we were about 90 percent sure on Sunday that we couldn’t get the car down, in fact we woke up Monday and I told Kevin, The car is safer where it  is, let’s just leave it. In family devotions on Monday we prayed together, just if it was God’s will, to get the car out (shaky faith, though, at least mine was!) And it was foggy, we wanted to see if PERHAPS the bulldozer started up…we thought we could follow it back down?! Maybe. But the thought of those (rather lazy) tractor drivers coming from Ibarra, walking three hours to get up to the bulldozer…well, just we knew it wouldn’t happen.) But as we left and hiked over…Kevin and I both felt, what is to be lost just to see how far we can drive down and see? At the least it saves most of us a few minutes of hiking (Kevin would still have to take the car back to park it safely at Neps in our little parking place there at the end of the road.)  

 

So, we started driving, feeling a little funny…we actually drove about a minute before we had to get out and move rocks and find a way thru…drive a few minutes more and all get out and work again….a few more yards down the road and all get out and work again….the fourth place it took us an hour of work to get by (Bayron Chuquisan’s).  First there was mud, then past that a very narrow pass over a rocky creek, squeezing by a huge rock….etc.) We threw rocks and threw  rocks and Kevin tried two times to get thru the mud but had to pull back out. Each time he went in though he made some more ground…we worked another 20 minutes and threw in more rocks right where we could see the right tires would go….so on the third try Kevin headed into the mud going as fast as he could, it was downhill, with Kenny and Keilah pushing….yes! He made it thru.  (I told him only he could do that out, it takes some nerve to drive like he was doing!) Around the corner we worked again (at Agustin’s. He came out and told it was hopeless to get down…park your car here, don’t park it down at the school in La Colonia, there are bad people down there who will hurt your car….we said we’d go a bit and see, and bring the car back if we couldn’t any farther.  At this point we didn’t think we could get back to Nep’s as the mud we came thru at Bayron Chuquisan’s would now be UPHILL.) So then two minutes and around the corner we found the washed-out road place they had all told us about. There was just a tiny bit of roadbed left….Kevin at first didn’t think enough to squeeze the car by on…but…hey, God is opening the road up before us…so let’s not give up now!  We saw it would take some work but there was room…a tight corner, the creek was really a big hole at the corner and would have to be filled in with rocks…but the BIG obstacle were two big rocks right on the narrow part of the road. We reminded ourselves of Numpty Physics…a game the kids and Kevin like where you have a challenge and have to use the laws of Science to solve…like gravity, levers, etc.  Okay…we got a pry pole and worked on the biggest rock first, figuring if we got that one, the rest is possible. We couldn’t get it very far. Then we moved to the other rock and got it over the edge. But back to the other rock…now we were starting to feel discouraged. This one big rock (maybe it weighed 600 to 800 lbs…) it was in muck…very heavy. Then Kevin hurt his back, he thinks it was another rock he picked up to move, maybe an 80 lb rock. Then with his back starting to hurt, all we could think of was to work the rest of the way thru so that we could get the car over to maybe pull the rock just out of the way…but the terrain was really rough. I didn’t know how much maneuvering he could do with his back hurt, not much space, on rocks and uneven ground. Keilah said to Kenny, maybe a truck could just pull up right now…with help! (But we KNEW a truck couldn’t pull up, the road was blocked farther down, as far as we knew) Kenny said he had just stopped to pray in his mind. And I had just been praying for help, i was thinking of maybe some Awa coming by???. Kevin started walking back to start up the car, while the kids and I tried to fill in the creek some more. We looked up and LO and BEHOLD!!! A bright red pick-up truck pulled up. One man got out,…then another one…another pickup pulled up…six  or seven men!!! They just kept getting out! It was the bulldozer driver and helper, and the bosses of the road crew…coming out to inspect and get the bulldozer back working again, they were trying to make it up to the bulldozer to take up diesel and the drivers. They were VERY motivated to drive thru and not walk… I told Kimberly to quick take a picture of that pickup and the men, they were definitely angels from God!

 

The bulldozer helper guy knew just what to do with a pry bar, and of course he had plenty of helpers. So Kenny helped the men get that rock out of the way (Kevin told them he’d hurt his back). They told us that the road was clear all down below, there was another tractor working to clean up the mess down below.

 

And we made it down! We knew it was the Lord, as we really didn’t expect the tractor drivers to come up til Tuesday (we had dentist appts and meetings all day Tues…had to come out Mon night or very early a.m. Tues before they would work) In fact, the tractor drivers very likely might now have come up except that their bosses had come along.

 

AND, the boss guys told Kevin that they are in for the  long haul, they are clearing out right now just to get the crew in that is going to build the bridge over the Rio Verde….and the road will continue. We assume if the contractors get in to build the bridge, they will need to focus on keeping the road clean and open for the heavy equipment to get in and out.

 

Wow! We have so much to do this week…I know we could have done it without the car but it just makes everything so much easier and simpler. Kevin might take a load down to Lita mid-week, hopefully the fridge and freezer we are buying for Lita property, along with all the groceries and supplies. We are buying hose and fencing to give out to the folks who lost a lot in the big rain. Also Proclaimer food supplies, etc. We are getting the trailer fixed this week so that’s how he’ll get it all down. I think we’ll have two loads worth. I’m still not sure how to do all this buying and loading without Kevin able to lift much…but the Lord will help us manage.

 

Thank you Lord! Now one more obstacle to conference…there is still no running water in Lita. They have only had water a couple of days since the big rain Feb 16^th. It’s getting really old for keeping hospitality going. And thinking of conference with 80 or more people for conference for four days and no water….well, we are discouraged at the prospect. Evidently the big rain Friday night also wiped out more tubes, we did see the team out working on it yesterday on our drive out.

 

Hope that wasn’t too boring with all those details…I know some of you had been praying that we’d get the car out…thank you. We are thrilled to see what God has done!

Kathy

 

Bruce Brief - March already!

Greetings to all!

We wanted to give you a bit of an update after all the rain we had a few weeks back. Things have dried out some. The trail is back to normal, but our car is still trapped at the end of the road. The good news is that a tractor IS working on the road and making progress every day. I expect it will still be another three to five weeks before we can drive our car out though!

Pushing the mud around

We ran out of propane the day before all the rain and landslides fell, and we are still without. We have since learned the tricks of cooking on our 55 gallon drum wood stove, and how to build a fire with wet wood! We are looking forward to a trip in a couple of weeks with horses to bring back our supplies we bought and stored in Lita as well as some full propane tanks. Altho I can’t say we suffered too bad, other than a few late meals waiting for the stove to heat up.

Kathy with our first Pizza

Our neighbor Milton’s house was very close to some land slides. Please pray for them to have wisdom as he is wanting to move his house (not that strange for the Awa people to move their house every couple of years). The big problem is that he doesn’t have a lot of good places on his land, but I think the family is a bit scared to live there. We haven’t seen or heard of any other houses that are in quite as precarious location as his. In all this Milton is a joy to be around as he continually sees God’s hand in all of life’s circumstances. Praise the Lord for the work He is doing here.

Milton’s house with landslide right next to it.

Another side of Milton’s house with big crack right on the trail up to it.

Thanks so much for your prayers for us and the work here in Ecuador!

In Christ,

Kevin & Kathy

Kevin & Kathy Bruce

Liebenzell Mission

Casilla 10-01-692

Ibarra, Imbabura

ECUADOR

+593 9 478-7811

http://brucekev.blogspot.com

Update on rain

Hi all! Thanks for praying, we woke up to clear and sunny skies today (Tuesday)! What a blessing, as the hot sun did a lot to dry out and firm up the ground. Here’s just a quick summary of our weekend and the heavy rains…forgive me for not being very organized, my thoughts are all in a jumble today as we sort out from under the mess!

 

From Sunday afternoon to Monday morning, we received about 7.5 inches of rain. It was like a week’s worth of rain fast-forwarded into about 18 hours. During the night and early a.m. hours, we could hear roars that almost sounded like planes going overhead. As the daylight came we realized we were hearing landslides all around us as pieces of land and trees would give way. The roars would start quietly and get louder and louder, as we would look to see what was falling next. The land across our little notch has five or six landslides, many of which we watched fall. Looking toward Lita northwest up the valley Kenny counted over 30 landslides, some of which are covering the road to Lita. The main trail is washed out or mud-slid in several places just close to the Outpost here, and our water-hose was knocked out and one section lost. We made the kids all stay home and were glad when we later saw that right next to our clothes-washing place had landslid (is that a word?) down the mountain, just a stone’s throw from our houses. The back side of our mountain, southwest of us, has a large section gone. Many of the Awa are evacuating to safer places, including our closest neighbors Porfidio and Milton. In Lita the electric is out, houses have fallen over the bank, the road to Ibarra is closed with landslides and missing sections of road. It seems the skies just let loose over this whole area! Most of the Awa said they’d never seen anything like it. Many of them, like Miguel, Milton, and Porfidio, will have to move their houses and replant most of their crops.

 

Milton and his family arrived at our house about 9 a.m. on Monday, soaked and shivering with cold. They had heard a roar near their house about 5 a.m., and when he shone his flashlight he saw that the mountainside near their house had just disappeared. The kids were scared and crying, but Milton said he prayed and asked God to take care of them, and then told his family they would wait til daybreak. As the light broke he realized that their house had landslides on three sides of it and he realized it was urgent to get his family to a safer place. After packing up their most precious belongings, his guitar, and dry clothes, they set out for Milton’s dad’s house around the west side of our mountain. They found that side blocked with another large mudslide, so ended up coming up here to our house. We were glad to offer them shelter and lunch. Virgilio, Paulino and two of his sisters, along with their families, all were here about noon, all heading to their houses. (Paulino’s family had all been gathered at his dad’s because they had killed a cow.) Since the main trail was washed away, they all had to climb the ridge across from us to get back on the trail on the other side. Paulino was worried about his house and his five kids he’d left behind in Palmira, wondering what he’d find when he got home. He said if all was well he’d back tomorrow to help us fix our water-line. Milton and Porfidio have now taken their families back down to Milton’s dad’s house to stay for the next few days.

 

Because of the electric outage in Lita, we aren’t sure how long the back-up power on the cell phone tower will last. We aren’t sure if the tower just has a back-up battery or a generator, so don’t know how long our communications will hold out. (We do have a radio.) But we are thankful….we are here, safe and sound, and our houses and mountain-top are still standing! (Thank you, Paulino, for picking us out a sturdy house-site!) The Shaubs had just brought up 2 months of supplies on Saturday. We are running low on propane for our stoves, but we had just got our wood-stove up and running. None of our Awa neighbors or friends have lost their houses or were hurt. Kevin and Andy worked most of today and have our water running again, at least a short-term fix. Our car is definitely not going anywhere, but it’s parked in a safe location that didn’t landslide. And the list goes on! Thanks for praying!

 

Kenny took some pictures this morning…they are posted at http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2019194&id=1205725599&l=5a95e

 

 

Kevin & Kathy Bruce

 

PS – Wednesday update: Paulino came back down. His family in Palmira was fine, though they got a bit scared too. Today we worked on the trail across from our house, and got it horse navagable. The government hopes to get the main road from Ibarra to Lita opened by Sunday, but who knows when we will get tractors for our road from Lita to RV. The rivers where so muddy that a lot of the fish were dieing and many Awa took adavantage to scoop them up. Paulino told of some of the Awa getting 25 pounds or more of fish! He brought some down for us which we cooked up for lunch today!

RAIN

Hi all,

 

This is just a short note to ask everyone to pray for us. In the last 24hours we have had over 7 ½ inches of rain and it is still raining steady. That much rain means that there are landslides all around us! In fact we can see from our window several that took out the trail across the way. I also talked with the folks in Lita and the rain there has washed out several bridges and there are a couple of houses that have slid. Our own neighbor Milton came up here with his family and whatever they could carry as there are landslides on three sides of his house. There are also no lights in Lita so I don’t know how long the cell tower batteries will hold out, or how long it will take them to get the lights back on. The road between here and Lita I am sure is blocked in multiple places, which means our car is not going anywhere soon. 

 

A kind of ironic thing is that we ran out of gas yesterday, but we had just installed a wood stove. I guess we will be putting it to the test over the next few days!

 

Thanks for your prayers.

 

Kevin & Kathy

 

Kevin & Kathy Bruce

Liebenzell Mission

Casilla 10-01-692

Ibarra, Imbabura

ECUADOR

+593 9 478-7811

http://brucekev.blogspot.com

 

Example of life here. :-)

Click here for a short video of me crossing the Tululpi river with our 4Runner.

Bruce Brief--January

Dear friends,

Here is a brief update on happenings at the Outpost!

 

Christmas

December 22^nd we celebrated a special Christmas Sunday with 75 Awá (plus or minus a few, it was hard to count!) While we were a little disappointed that many of those who were invited didn’t show up (many were dealing with hangovers from another community’s Christmas bash the day before), yet we had quite a few visitors. Both Paulino and Milton enjoyed the opportunity to share with their own people the importance of Christmas and the gift of God’s Son to pay for our sin. In fact, Milton preached for almost an hour, sharing from passages in Ephesians and Romans that he had carefully marked and studied for the occasion. His great desire to communicate showed clearly in his earnest tone and gestures, and he didn’t mince any words as he encouraged the Awá who were laughing in the back to be sure and listen carefully so they could learn how to escape going to hell. Kevin also shared a short message, and several of the children stood up to recite John 3:16 in Awá.  After the long service, we shared a meal of boiled pork, rice, plantains, yucca, and onion salad, which many of the ladies had helped to cook. The food was plenteous, which here in Awaland means the party was a success! We do pray that the unsaved Awá who visited that day went away thinking about God’s gift to them. December 28^th we repeated the program in another Awá community, with a smaller group of believers and family members.

 

2009 is here!

Happy new year! Since January is one of our rainiest months, our year began with lots of rainfall, muddy trails, and a few new mudslides on our road. With the cooler temperatures and dampness, we Bruces are known to down lots of coffee and tea while huddling around our cookstove. (Okay, it only gets down to about 60 degrees, which means that many of you New Englanders would get out your summer attire. But if you add the dampness and brisk winds and fog that blow over our mountaintop..well, we get cold!) But in the next week or two we’ll be enjoying warmer and drier temperatures here in our house thanks to a new addition---a wood stove made out of a barrel! We’ll try to post some pictures when we get the stove functioning.

 

Conflict

Heavy on our minds this month has been the conflict between Virgilio, one of the believers, and his brother Francisco. There has been tension between the brothers for years, and a few fights from time to time. Over the last month or two, we have felt the old conflict re-surfacing. In December we heard rumors that many were saying that Kevin must be teaching Virgilio bad ways from God’s Word. We began to pray that God’s testimony in the community would not be hurt, and that Virgilio could choose to work things out in a Godly way. Monday, December 29^th, another one of the believers (Milton) called Kevin to quickly come down to the community meeting, as there was trouble between the brothers. Kevin arrived to find the two men hollering back and forth, with the whole community taking part, yelling about the rumors and gossip and problems. “So-and-so said you said you were going to kill me!” Francisco was yelling, although Virgilio denied this. On and on the conflict went, while Kevin tried, without much success, to encourage the men to work out the problem calmly. The fight soon turned into a fist fight, and then a machete was pulled out.  Kevin said his knees were shaking as he looked at the two muscular fellows there fighting, knowing he had to intervene somehow. (Yes, we do need your prayers! We feel very inadequate at these times.) Milton said that he was also scared, so he started to leave. “But the Lord gave me strength to return, so I did,” he told us later. Milton grabbed Francisco, while Kevin pulled Virgilio away, bringing the fight to an end. As the men gradually calmed down, the community leader wrote a paper for them to sign saying they would respect each other’s land borders and not threaten each other anymore. Virgilio said he would forgive his brother and signed it, although Francisco refused to sign it saying that if he ever heard any more he would just wait by the trail with his shotgun. Later, as Virgilio made his way home from the meeting, he stopped in at our house. This time Kevin was able to share with him many principles from God’s Word about how to handle conflict, and he listened carefully. “How can I treat my brother kindly when he is so bad to me?” was one of his questions. This opened the door to sharing many truths. You know, God forgave us for all our sins when we were just dirty, ugly sinners! Virgilio asked us to pray for him, which Kevin did. The next Sunday our kids acted out the parable (of the unmerciful servant) Jesus told when Peter asked Him how many times we are to forgive our brothers. (See Matthew 18:21ff).  Since then, we have sensed a calmness in Virgilio, and a slow change in his attitude toward his brother. Please pray that he will be able to put into practice the new truths he is hearing from Scripture. It is definitely a battle to leave behind the old ways of dealing with such a problem.

 

Thank you so much for your prayers!

Kevin & Kathy Bruce

 

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Kevin & Kathy Bruce

Liebenzell Mission

Casilla 10-01-692

Ibarra, Imbabura

ECUADOR

+593 9 478-7811

http://brucekev.blogspot.com