Hello again everyone,
As you can imagine, a lot has happened over the past 4 months since our last update. Our family is doing well aside from a nagging cold/cough that we’ve all had our bouts with over the last month or so. High fevers with the kids had us a bit worried as we’re still only figuring out this parenting thing. Blood tests, a couple of trips to the doctors, shots for Wolfie. What an adventure. One night we were up late with Olivia during our recent trip to the U.S. She had a high fever… and this just so happened to occur shortly after the Swine Flu thing broke out. We prayed hard, worried through the night, and thank God she was fine the next morning. But it was a scary moment for new parents like us. Anyway….. on with the update.
The Kids
Wolfie is a great kid. He is full of laughter and has a tender heart. During Easter Sunday, the kids were taught the song, “hosanna, hosanna, hosanna in the highest”… and now, every so often Wolfie (and Olivia) will spontaneously burst into song singing these words, “Osanna, Osanna, Osanna haaayes”. For Stacey and I, we couldn’t have greater joy than to see our kids already learning to songs in praise to God. I imagine it brings a smile to their heavenly Father as well.
Olivia gives us a lot of joy. While she’s in her “terrible twos” right now…… She has plenty of occasions of sweetness in her. Getting a cup of water for Wolfie, or getting his binky/pacifier and putting it back in his mouth for him. Hugging her brother until he gets annoyed with how hard she likes to hug….lol. Olivia has also learned to swim on her own over the past 3 months. Next comes surfing!!!... I hope. Below is a pic of her at her birthday party last week. She's the one in the pink bikini.
Ministry with Stacy and Lyle
Stacey has been managing well as she juggles the responsibilities of being mom, wife, follower of Jesus, bible-study leader, part-time baker for the café, and homemaker. I’m pretty amazed at my wife and how she “does it all”. While I’m often the one reminding her to slow down and not overdo it, I have to say there is part of me that admires how well she does in all of these roles she plays. One highlight of the past four months has been the women’s bible study she lead on Beth Moore’s Breaking Free study. She led the study in our home on Tuesday mornings, and it was a true blessing to all of the women involved. Interestingly, the study consisted not only of locals, but also had a mix of international visitors: A woman from Czechoslovakia, a woman from Finland, a woman Turkey (whom I mentioned in the last update letter) and our friend Kai who is originally from Canada. All of these women were/are in important seasons of transition in their lives, and I’m confident that they would all testify that time they shared in this study was a true blessing.
As for me… I’ve been pretty busy as well. Making a life/ministry down here doesn’t come easy. To make ends meet, I perfrom music 3x a week at the Marriott and once a week at Witches Rock surf Camp. In addition I officiate weddings and play music for people having Desitnation Weddings here in Costa Rica. While those things allow me to meet our financial needs down here, more than anything my heart is in what God’s been doing in the ministry realm. In recent months, two ministries have surfaced mostly by means of God working in the hearts of people in our congregation. First, a men’s bible study has formed out of a core group of 4 guys from the area of Tamarindo and the beaches south of us who are hungry to grow in their faith as we fellowship weekly over coffee and scripture. We meet at the Café every Friday morning from 8-10:30. Not only has it been an encouragement and blessing for all of us, I think it is also catching the attention of our regulars who come in and out while we are meeting on the front porch. Second, about 3 months ago, I proposed the idea of forming discipleship group with some of the young 20 something folks whom God has brought forth to be leaders in church an ministry in our church and in the area. They were instantly eager to start, and since that time we have been meeting regularly on Monday mornings from 8-10am for prayer, bible study, and discussion revolving around Oswald Sanders’ book Spiritual Leadership, and Tim Kellers’ Reason For God. For added richness to our discussion, we have also include our Café interns in the group. I have to say that these to events are both highlights to my week. Their enthusiasm and hunger to dig into their faith and into ministry is contagious. God is doing great things in our church and in our area, and we are grateful to be a part of his plans here.
Café Café
Some of you may remember me mentioning our Café Intern Marlen in the last letter. She was originally to be here for only 3 months and well….. 3 months turned to 6, and now 6 months has turned into committing to serve with us for an additional year. Marlen has been instrumental in the Café ministry, leadership of the Tamarindo Christian Surfers ministry, as well as hosting weekly youth group meetings at our church….. and did I mention being a regular on our Church’s missions/outreach events. We are grateful to have her with us for the coming year.
New Interns- Just last week, we had 2 interns arrive from Houston named Raquel and Hannah.
They are college students at Texas A&M, and will be with us until mid August. Already, Raquel has plugged into Sunday music at church, and Hannah is pretty pumped to help with the children’s ministry on Sundays. In addition to serving, as I mentioned earlier, they will also be participating the Tuesday discipleship group while they are here. We are thankful for them and pray that they are blessed as they become part of our ministry community.
There is so much more that has been going on, but as as was the case with the gosple of John, if we tried to record all that Jesus is doing in our area, there wouldn’t be enough books to contain all of the stories. We are truly blessed to be part of the work God is doing in our area.
Thank you all very much for your prayers and support of our family and our ministry.
Grace and Peace to you,
The Watson Family
PRAYER REQUESTS
• That God would give us wisdom, discernment and openness to anything “new” that he have us do in our community to be a witness to non-believers in our area.
• For God’s continued growth of our Church community in depth of spiritual maturity, and in numbers as our heart is to reach unbelievers.
• For God’s continued financial provision for our church and for our ministry in these uncertain times economically.
• For our faith and obedience to Christ to Grow every day.
As you can imagine, a lot has happened over the past 4 months since our last update. Our family is doing well aside from a nagging cold/cough that we’ve all had our bouts with over the last month or so. High fevers with the kids had us a bit worried as we’re still only figuring out this parenting thing. Blood tests, a couple of trips to the doctors, shots for Wolfie. What an adventure. One night we were up late with Olivia during our recent trip to the U.S. She had a high fever… and this just so happened to occur shortly after the Swine Flu thing broke out. We prayed hard, worried through the night, and thank God she was fine the next morning. But it was a scary moment for new parents like us. Anyway….. on with the update.
The Kids
Wolfie is a great kid. He is full of laughter and has a tender heart. During Easter Sunday, the kids were taught the song, “hosanna, hosanna, hosanna in the highest”… and now, every so often Wolfie (and Olivia) will spontaneously burst into song singing these words, “Osanna, Osanna, Osanna haaayes”. For Stacey and I, we couldn’t have greater joy than to see our kids already learning to songs in praise to God. I imagine it brings a smile to their heavenly Father as well.
Olivia gives us a lot of joy. While she’s in her “terrible twos” right now…… She has plenty of occasions of sweetness in her. Getting a cup of water for Wolfie, or getting his binky/pacifier and putting it back in his mouth for him. Hugging her brother until he gets annoyed with how hard she likes to hug….lol. Olivia has also learned to swim on her own over the past 3 months. Next comes surfing!!!... I hope. Below is a pic of her at her birthday party last week. She's the one in the pink bikini.
Ministry with Stacy and LyleStacey has been managing well as she juggles the responsibilities of being mom, wife, follower of Jesus, bible-study leader, part-time baker for the café, and homemaker. I’m pretty amazed at my wife and how she “does it all”. While I’m often the one reminding her to slow down and not overdo it, I have to say there is part of me that admires how well she does in all of these roles she plays. One highlight of the past four months has been the women’s bible study she lead on Beth Moore’s Breaking Free study. She led the study in our home on Tuesday mornings, and it was a true blessing to all of the women involved. Interestingly, the study consisted not only of locals, but also had a mix of international visitors: A woman from Czechoslovakia, a woman from Finland, a woman Turkey (whom I mentioned in the last update letter) and our friend Kai who is originally from Canada. All of these women were/are in important seasons of transition in their lives, and I’m confident that they would all testify that time they shared in this study was a true blessing.
As for me… I’ve been pretty busy as well. Making a life/ministry down here doesn’t come easy. To make ends meet, I perfrom music 3x a week at the Marriott and once a week at Witches Rock surf Camp. In addition I officiate weddings and play music for people having Desitnation Weddings here in Costa Rica. While those things allow me to meet our financial needs down here, more than anything my heart is in what God’s been doing in the ministry realm. In recent months, two ministries have surfaced mostly by means of God working in the hearts of people in our congregation. First, a men’s bible study has formed out of a core group of 4 guys from the area of Tamarindo and the beaches south of us who are hungry to grow in their faith as we fellowship weekly over coffee and scripture. We meet at the Café every Friday morning from 8-10:30. Not only has it been an encouragement and blessing for all of us, I think it is also catching the attention of our regulars who come in and out while we are meeting on the front porch. Second, about 3 months ago, I proposed the idea of forming discipleship group with some of the young 20 something folks whom God has brought forth to be leaders in church an ministry in our church and in the area. They were instantly eager to start, and since that time we have been meeting regularly on Monday mornings from 8-10am for prayer, bible study, and discussion revolving around Oswald Sanders’ book Spiritual Leadership, and Tim Kellers’ Reason For God. For added richness to our discussion, we have also include our Café interns in the group. I have to say that these to events are both highlights to my week. Their enthusiasm and hunger to dig into their faith and into ministry is contagious. God is doing great things in our church and in our area, and we are grateful to be a part of his plans here.
Café Café
Some of you may remember me mentioning our Café Intern Marlen in the last letter. She was originally to be here for only 3 months and well….. 3 months turned to 6, and now 6 months has turned into committing to serve with us for an additional year. Marlen has been instrumental in the Café ministry, leadership of the Tamarindo Christian Surfers ministry, as well as hosting weekly youth group meetings at our church….. and did I mention being a regular on our Church’s missions/outreach events. We are grateful to have her with us for the coming year.
New Interns- Just last week, we had 2 interns arrive from Houston named Raquel and Hannah.
They are college students at Texas A&M, and will be with us until mid August. Already, Raquel has plugged into Sunday music at church, and Hannah is pretty pumped to help with the children’s ministry on Sundays. In addition to serving, as I mentioned earlier, they will also be participating the Tuesday discipleship group while they are here. We are thankful for them and pray that they are blessed as they become part of our ministry community.There is so much more that has been going on, but as as was the case with the gosple of John, if we tried to record all that Jesus is doing in our area, there wouldn’t be enough books to contain all of the stories. We are truly blessed to be part of the work God is doing in our area.
Thank you all very much for your prayers and support of our family and our ministry.
Grace and Peace to you,
The Watson Family
PRAYER REQUESTS
• That God would give us wisdom, discernment and openness to anything “new” that he have us do in our community to be a witness to non-believers in our area.
• For God’s continued growth of our Church community in depth of spiritual maturity, and in numbers as our heart is to reach unbelievers.
• For God’s continued financial provision for our church and for our ministry in these uncertain times economically.
• For our faith and obedience to Christ to Grow every day.
