Fantastic weekend

After several days of no Internet service, we are back on-line (obviously). Imagine, somewhere around the 20th of September, a truck struck the telephone pole outside the property on the main road. The jerk it sustained broke our telephone lines, cutting both phone and Internet. I managed to investigate what damage had been done and found the broken connection. I filed a report and then I proceeded to reconnect our lines. Last Friday morning, I heard a terrible bang, but thought the washboard highway had just caused a dump truck to rattle his bed. Later in the day, our neighbor came home to no phone or Internet. We investigated and discovered that another pole in front of the property was cut off at ground level by a blow from a truck (the terrible bang above). At least four of us filed reports of the cut wires. Finally, on Monday, they sent a truck with two new poles and four workers. The poles were installed quickly, the wires re-stretched and left hanging. They reported they had received another call and that someone would come "mañana." In Latin America, it doesn't mean tomorrow, it means "not now." However, Tuesday is a national holiday here - All Saints' Day - so we figured no one would show up. But yesterday, bright and early, one man came to see what all the complaints were about. He spent from 9:00 AM until about 2:00 PM trying to fix the mistakes and to connect a business and three houses again. The phone company had to pay him overtime rather than to keep the four man crew here maybe 30 minutes longer. You figure!

Lasso

"Christian Carlos" married his sweetheart of several years on Saturday. If you do not remember, after he came to church as a Mormon, got saved, got his life, philosophy and Eternity changed, Ann asked him for his cell phone number so we could contact him if necessary. He states, "How will she know which one I am. Maybe she has several 'Carlos' in her book." He snapped his fingers and said, "I know, put my name as Christian Carlos." Well, in relating that story several years ago, we found that it hit the heart of many people because for months we received comments and questions about "Christian Carlos." He had known Guillermina (a feminine form of William - Willamina?) for years in the deaf community but they were never a couple. Carlos made a long list of all of his friends and started going down the list witnessing to them. Many came to know the Lord, came to church for a public confession, got baptized and still continue with the Lord. One of those converts is Guillermina. Shortly after she agreed to be baptized, they started dating. Recently they had announced their intent to get married, but only after he had found a good solid job, put back money for the wedding and the future and made sure both families were in agreement.

In the normal state of things, the wedding was announced for 4:00 PM. At 4:45 they finally decided to start without Carlos' mother. She had been busy helping prepare the food for the event and didn't arrive until most of the service was concluded. You will notice in the picture both are very somber. It was not a matter of not being happy, they were ecstatic. They both are very serious people when it comes to things of the Lord, and they both felt this was the second most serious thing they had done in their lives. A few moments later, they were both in smiles from ear to ear, but Carlos often went very serious if there was another "event" to take place: the cake, the flowers, etc. He so wanted every detail to be perfect. I hope you all enjoy the pictures as much as we enjoyed watching these two young soul winners join their lives together.

Thank you for continuing to pray for this country. It isn't getting any better. Last Tuesday they ambushed 20 police officers about 50 miles from here and killed 9, with one still missing. All of the police cruisers whisked by our house here on the highway, so we knew something big was going down. We remain as your servants for deaf souls.

Gary & Ann

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