IT'S BEYOND ME

Hello From Ann

The Purpose of this Blog: To share updates, insights  and resources about work, missions, music and digital photography with fellow bloggers, friends and family.

My newst Blog Entry follows right after this Hello!

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See the What’s New-ACCI page to get an update on my job partnership with AdventiveCCI. I’d love to have you come along with me in this new ministry opportunity. Visit www.adventive.ca.

See the Ann & Missions page for the most recent postings on my missions involvement abroad.

Helpful Resources are listed or you on the Ann & Music and Ann & Missions pages.

To contact me directly regarding ACCI please use annhinrichs@adventive.ca .

Scroll to the bottom to post a comment…

Check out the Photo Gallery pages and Ann & Music page. Let me know if you’d like to purchase any of the images (at a reasonable price) or a a music CD. Just email me the name of each image/CD title, shipping info, and how you’d like to utilize the photos. You can contact me at annlhinrichs@gmail.com . Funds will go toward my ACCI expenses and mission needs.

A Little About Me: I love going to museums or to the Guthrie Theater with my husband, Luke. I love flowers, travel, meeting new people and learning about other cultures. I love Italy and Italian food as well as Belize and Haiti. I love solitude (0r time spent in “active silence”). I enjoy photography, writing music and painting–when I have time. And I adore my 50 nieces and nephews and investing time in my god-children’s lives. I love long walks at dusk and quiet evenings at home.

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Winter ACCI Newsletter 2012

Click on the Newsletter Image, then keep clicking  on the image each time it appears until it enlarges to a readable size!

Back From Belize-March 2012

It’s difficult to know where to begin, having been gone for 20 days serving in Belize. As I share about all that happened, all that God did, feel free to take a short cut by viewing the videos I have included on this blog entry. For more details, read along as you desire.

The first video shares about our hearing care team that served across central Belize, the first half of my time in Belize.

The second video shares about the Canada team that came from Ottawa Canada, Chapel Ridge Church, to serve in the southern regions of Belize alongside Pastor Herdie Castillo’s church in Hopkins Village.

I had technical difficulties at every level with Internet availability, passwords, phone cards, you name it, it didn’t work. So, I wasn’t able to give updates as I’d desired. Also, if I was in a place to choose between using technology and connecting with people, I chose to connect with people, as I’m sure you’d understand.

Hearing Care specialists Dale Woodard, Karen Blaylock, (and friend Erica Wilson traveling with me from Minnrsota)  met up with me on our layover at the Dallas airport and we all were able to fly together in to Belize. I had asked Erica to come along to help serve with the second team from Canada in Hopkins Village as this team was new to Belize. She was able to ride along with our new missionary friends Scott and Holly Holder (also friends of Pastor Herdie’s in Hopkins Village) from Georgia who arrived with us and she arrived in Hopkins the first night. We began our time having dinner together in Belmopan.

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PART ONE

Dale, Karen, Kathy McDonald (from YWAM Belize) and I began diving into all the pre-arranged opportunities that Kathy had carefully and prayerfully put in place for us to participate. Kathy shared the miracles she had already experienced before we’d even arrived in Belize:

-          The paperwork for customs clearance for all the hearing care supplies came through literally hours before our plane landed.

-          Several God appointments had happened with individuals needing hearing care

-          Churches and organizations responding with humility, compassion and great cooperation to the needs to help  those in need of hearing care—posters went up, radio ads were done, churches announced, medical facilities advertised…

Our Objective:

Dale and Karen come to Belize to both serve those in need and survey where a possible long-term partnership may develop for the future. So as we served, we also stayed aware of the needs and what God may be leading them toward for later on.

We have already learned that there are no audio-gram machines in Belize and no one offers new battery replacements for hearing aids. Sparse hearing care overall was the conclusion as we began.

We did walk into these days ahead with prayer and were humbled by the opportunities that lay before us all. As we got ourselves organized, and I had a high learning curve myself, our first stop was at the Cayo Deaf  Institute located on the edge of Spanish Lookout, a portion of the Mennonite community serving through a small deaf school of about 18 students.

We saw 29 people that first day at CDI. All of the students were re-evaluated and hearing needs checked while the people from those stories that Kathy had shared with us prior to our arrival, came as well. Story after story, new case after new case arrived with eagerness, all ages, for care.

CDI was an amazing experience. A wonderful dedicated Mennonite staff, house parents and teachers were dedicated to these student’s lives. It was touching and a very new experience as we watched the kids play ball outside, quietly, no yelling, just signing. The lunch room only sounded the clanking of their tin cups and dishes and an occasional thump on a table to get someone’s attention, then the hands flew with sign language. I could always hear the wind, the birds and it was the quietest day I’d experienced in a very long time.

Miracles happen!

Dale and Karen were able to serve all of the patients with some kind of hearing help. Two of the children, Jefferson and Janille tested totally deaf. In both cases, we were able to pray over them, waited a bit to see a few more people, and then re tested them. In both cases they were then rating at a mid range which meant they would be able to receive hearing aids after all. God is so interesting. Why not completely heal them, right there, on the spot, why part way? I’m okay with not knowing the answer to that question and trusting that God does have a heavenly, perfect perspective on things that is His business only.

But one little girl taught me something profound. Vanessa expressed that she didn’t really want hearing aids as the silence felt more comfortable, all sound to her was “noise”, annoying so she preferred the quiet and not having them at all. This made me think, God is a perfect Father to us, he knows what we can handle in measure, maybe his perspective is to be completely trusted and not questioned. More to ponder.

Santa Elena, Cayo

Cornerstone Fellowship Church was our next place of service on Saturday. The hearing needs are great on this side of the country. It was very hot today. We were blessed to serve inside the church, many people waited all day to see Dale and Karen. Today we saw 4o people and 11 were fitted for hearing aids. Most of our cases were itching ears and cleaning ears. Touch was powerful, prayer unending as we felt led to minister in this way to each person. The church served cake and juice as people patiently waited for hours for their turn.

One dear man, Carlos, was an amazing experience. I helped Dale for over 2 hours clean this man’s ears. He had so much blockage he said he couldn’t hear in one ear for over 25 years. He had paid doctors in the past, had been given medication and his hearing remained the same. We prayed as we worked, Karen and me switching off with helping Dale. Finally after 6 water changes and 2+ hours, everything cleaned out and he could hear. He was so excited I thought he was going to break something!

We had an opportunity to pray for a grandpa and grandson who both had a skin disorder and prayed for the breaking of generational ties to this sickness and tears flowed as we agreed in prayer that only God could change this condition.

Finally, a nurse came in and had 3 hearing aides (dated older models). She still had a $1000 loan to pay back for her latest hearing aid purchase. She had been praying and the Lord told her to give a financial gift to her church for some needs that they had. The Pastor’s wife told her that a hearing care specialist was coming so she lay awake all night before we had arrived anticipating seeing Dale. He fit her for two new updated hearing aids, for free, she was completely overcome with joy. We shared that we believed God was blessing her for her obedience and she was humbled and awestruck as she left.

I believe in God-appointments. I believe that God is in control. I believe that he cares and is aware of our needs. I believe that His promises are true.

Our Sabbath

We were able to attend Kathy’s church, Step of Faith, in Belmopan and worship together. Dale was asked to share and we also had the privilege to meet Miss Blanca and her 6 children. Miss Blanca is an abandoned wife that lives at the top of a steep hill in a one room home with stretched plastic walls, an outside kitchen and a shower stall that others blessed her family with recently. This family is so dear. Kathy’s church has taken them under their wing and continues to include them and minister to their needs. We had the privilege of taking some provisions to her and visiting her home high up on the hill. It was so fun and so sobering to visit with them. She raises melons and baby mahogany trees to help them get by as well as sells tamales in the village. I learned so much from this dear woman about faith and hope.

It was fun to stop in and say hello to the KTIS radio/Northwestern College team from Minnesota doing a country-wide conference and visit with friends Chuck Pollack from North Carolina, Dan, Mark, Aaron and Anne and see my friend Brad from way back experiencing his first mission and trip out of the country. They were hidden way back in the jungle, air humid and thick, and all the noises that go with it surrounding them.

Belize City Deaf School

Miss Kathy had no idea this particular school existed. It was government run, inclusive of deaf students among hearing students, it’s organized and receives some consistent help from another mission every November. However, this mission apparently wasn’t able to come this past November, so the needs were in front of us all. They had 35 people signed up waiting in a room around tables, all day, for their turn to be examined. This school had some tools to help with testing. So we felt that today was about helping them catch up a bit and also a few God-appointments from older folks that the hospital had sent over for exams. Dale was able to help them, a motorcycle accident victim, a car accident victim receive their first hearing aids. Really powerful. Today we also trained in Tatiana from YWAM to help the next 2 days in Belmopan as I would be moving on to do team set up in Hopkins for the Canada team. It was wonderful to build this relationship, see what resources they did have in case this helps Dale and Karen help others in the future.

I was also able to have a couple meetings and discussions with YWAM in regard to some other potential new partnerships on behalf of others in the US and will be relaying that information to those parties in the weeks ahead.

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PART TWO

Set-up time in Hopkins Village

Tuesday – Thursday I said my goodbyes and I was off to Hopkins by bus to accomplish much in a short amount of time. Dale and Karen remained in Belmopan and for the next 2 days and would see many others that came from surrounding villages, many that lived at poverty level, to have their first hearing care tests.

I arrived in Dangriga, transferred on to the Hopkins bus, in the pouring rain, arriving at my room rental by noon. The very first thing I did was sit down with a dear friend over chicken and rice as we talked about our lives for an hour and a half. A very painful conversation as I listened to his heartache and yet the hope he had in his Savior.

The next days were filled with confirming arrangements for the team at the schools for the HIV teachings, hours at the clinic for Asthma care, the Asthma training in Dangriga for the doctors and staff at the Southern Regional Hospital, meals, housing, water, youth meetings, evening men’s/women’s meetings, evening service, Sunday school…and the list goes on. I was also in amongst all the planning able to spend some time catching up with close friends in the village.

My Birthday in Hopkins

March 6^th was my 4o-something^th birthday the day I arrived in Hopkins. I was able to celebrate with Morgan and Dorothy and Erica by going out to dinner at Yugadah. Morgan turned 66 on the same day as me.

I was awakened on the 7^th by a call from Luke with the sad news that our dear ACCI Italian missionary friend, Alessandro Sacco, had died in a car accident in Mexico on his way to a tent meeting to share his life story. Please take time to read the attached article that our friend Mark Ellis from God Reports, wrote about Alessandro’s life. He was beyond unique, he was heaven-sent, appointed by God for a life of service that I wish I could only try to emulate. http://blog.godreports.com/2012/03/diminutive-italian-evangelist-killed-in-mexico-had-premonition-from-the-lord/

This mission time away for me was full of joy and a measure of grief that would poke out through the joy every now and then as I absorbed the reality of Alessandro’s death.

Welcome Canada Team!

Friday I bused to Belmopan and decided to take young Jones with me as the Lord had laid it on my heart to spend some focused time with him, speaking into his life, discussing whatever God put in front of us. Little did I know how important this time would end up being for him personally. God was in control of this time together, that’s for sure.

Richard picked up Jones and I near the bus terminal and we spent time getting the trailer and van ready, had lunch with he and Rosa at home and then headed off for Belize City. We talked for hours catching up on many things. It was life-giving and so wonderful to talk together.

The team came through customs without any problems! It was a miracle they only paid a small amount at customs with all the meds and supplies they had with them. We couldn’t get medical papers in place from the minister of health in time for them as we did for Dale and Karen. God truly intervened.

We spent our first night at My Refuge Christian Ministries with Richard and Rosa Smith. Our first morning before leaving for Hopkins Village we were able to listen to their vision, hear the history of MR and visit the radio station as Dr. Chuck recorded an interview about Asthma care. We toured Youth With A Mission, crossing the suspended bridge, to learn about their ministry from Kathy McDonald. Then off to Hopkins!

Canadian Team Highlights!

There’s just so much that happened through this team I can’t possibly do a day by day account. So instead I’d like to give some overall observations of my own and then you can watch the video to see the flow of our ministry time together.

Everything I’d listed on my previous blog entry of prayer needs and ministry events did happen! It was remarkable to watch this team serve through their gifts, talents and obedience. They never complained. Though some dealt with sickness, they looked with hope and anticipation into every opportunity and treated others with compassion, respect and care, including toward each other. I was in awe.

I think some of the most significant experiences for me were:

- Watching a desire of my own come to fruition by sharing the hope of Christ with over 140 Hopkins and Georgetown students through the HIV class they offered. The kids listened to every word, took notes, asked questions, participated and the teachers were completely supportive. I walked around and checked in with the teachers making sure they were okay with what was happening in front of them. I tried to help transition them section to section so they knew what was next, and they were so supportive. For me, I’d never seen so many students sit so quietly, respectfully shushing each other in order to hear, in all the years coming to Belize. God was working. Also, the team offered classes and crafts to the younger students in Georgetown that was based on the story and life of Noah. Really encouraging and well done!

- Taking the next step as a team after the team from my home church, Plymouth Covenant Church, had built a home for two young gals in great need. We got to seal it, paint it and put latches on the doors and windows. I love the body of Christ and how we can work together.

- I thoroughly enjoyed watching the nurses Andrea and Chris, and Dr. Chuck give asthma care to so many Belizeans. This is a great, great need there and they touched many people through their gifts and talents in Hopkins, Dangriga Southern Regional Hospital and Independence Village. Praise God!

- It was also a joy to see each team member start to develop relationships one on one. Through the different events we had offered, relationships were born. Clinic care, the Asthma class Chuck taught, with the kids from the schools, Sunday school at the Pastor Herdie’s church and the Youth group night… all the way up to the camp fire our last night together. God was at work through relationships.

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For me personally

I had some new experiences during my time in Belize:

I SAW TWO TOUCANS! It was so beautiful. I’d only seem Toucans one other time back in the 1990’s so this was a blast. Karen and I were walking on the YWAM base by the suspended bridge and saw them fly from one tree to another. A little desire I’d had for a very long time. I felt so blessed!

I learned so much from Dale and Karen about hearing care. I was just gitty the entire time watching, listening, and learning new things. I was just a sponge.

I attended a Garifuna wake for Vincent’s father who had died the second day I was in Hopkins. It was a new experience to watch the coffin be carried into the home, doors remaining open and coffin displayed as friends and family stayed all night eating food, playing games and paying their respects. 100’s of people were there. It was a blessed time of community.

Young Jones was the first person to greet me when I arrived in Hopkins Village, pushing a wheel barrow of coconuts in his bare feet. He hugged me so hard I couldn’t breathe. And that’s where he remained for most of the time in Hopkins, next to my side. I was so blessed to see how the team blessed him as well loving on him, getting to know him, investing in him as he lost his father a year ago to alcoholism.

I also had some private times or prayer with dear ones that needed  breakthrough and renewal. It was a privilege to stand in agreement in prayer as we walked through some deeper waters together. God is so faithful.

I laughed a lot on this mission! My room mate Alysson was a joy and we had a lot of good laughs. The entire team had such a dry sense of humor I was constantly cracking up about something (including seeing them taking pictures of my row of underwear drying on the line outside of my cabana…)

I chose to read through the book of Luke in the Bible during my time away exploring Jesus’ daily life example, his rhythm of life in ministry, rest and community and did discover some significant things I’d never seen before. A rich time in the Word for me personally.

I did a lot of driving on this particular trip. I was glad to serve in this way and help with the holes, bumps and curves of the roads.

It took me an unexpected 2 days to return home due to flight delays and bad weather, but I did arrive home safely by Tuesday afternoon March 20^th.  I was blessed to spend the first night at the Radisson in Belize City, free meals and room and a voucher for $600 to use this next year instead of staying in Dallas at my expense. God was way ahead of me.

In Closing

I leave this mission time humbled, honored to have served with these two teams and so privileged to be able to return to Belize again standing alongside the work of God there. It will be an additional joy to see what plans God has ahead for both of these new teams in the future through possible partnership in Belize.

To God alone I give the glory for everything He has done!

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Back To Belize!

“I’m just making sure my own obedience is up to date…” – CT Studd

I had the privilege of attending a Member Care Conference this past weekend that was a timely gift for my preparations to leave and serve in Belize.

A common theme was throughout all the workshops of “caring for the soul” of our missionaries, beginning with ourselves first. Also, there was solid teaching about Jesus’ ministry example he lived before others, keeping a rhythm of solitude in prayer (seeking the Father’s heart), the need for community and investing in community (his walk with his disciples), then ministry, then back to solitude, community, ministry…

For this mission, my preoccupation continues to be a desire to walk in obedience to the Savior’s voice as we walk through new doors, develop new relationships and serve in new ways unlike I have had opportunity to before in Belize. Also, to keep that rhythm and balance Jesus so wisely lived of all components needed for longevity and effectiveness but most of all, intimacy with the Lord.

I’m not sure how much I will be able to blog while in Belize as I will have limited time and technology to do so. I do my best as we take this all day by day.

FIRST HALF OF BELIZE MISSION

- MARCH 1-8

My Belize schedule begins in partnership with YWAM Belize–Kathy McDonald, Dale Woodard (ACCI project missionary) and Karen Blaylock (Dales hearing care assistant) as we explore together the needs of hearing care in Belize. We will all participate in hearing care opportunities to those in the greatest need as well as prayerfully respond to doors as they open in front of us day to day.

Friday, March 2 – Spending entire day at Cayo Deaf Institute

Saturday, March 3 – we’re heading west to the Guatemalan border to San Ignacio – The Lord opened another door to have a hearing clinic in one of the churches there

Sunday, March 4 – joining Kathy’s church service, Dale will share have about his vision and plans.

Monday, March 5 – heading to Belize City for the day – to work with another Deaf Institute. I will meet up with my church Belize team from Plymouth Covenant Church to do some debriefing and help with my own prep for going back to Hopkins Village later this week to serve with the new Canada Team.

Tuesday and Wednesday, March 6-7, – 9 to 5 – clinic at Kathy’s Church in Belmopan

I will travel to Hopkins Village March 6 to do set up meetings in Hopkins Village to prepare for the Canada Team’ arrival on March 9th.

Prayer Requests for March 1-8:

1. Customs – full duty exemption for our equipment is approved prior to our arrival

2. Clear communication for all hearing clinics between us and those we serve

3.  Protection as we travel by car with Kathy McDonald around the country

4. Health, strength, rest, clarity and wisdom in each day and conversation we encounter

5. A release for ministry opportunities – for the divine leading of the Holy Spirit to  lead people to the clinics that need the Lord and hearing care

6. Mostly importantly, for our families care and well being as we are apart from them.

SECOND HALF OF BELIZE MISSION – March 9-19

The rest of my mission time in Belize continues in a partnership with Pastor Herdie Castillo in Hopkins Village, hosting and co-leading a brand new team from Ottawa Canada, Chapel Ridge Church with team leader Mike Brown.

Friday, March 9th

After I spend a couple of days meeting with doctors, principals, teachers, pastors, etc. I will travel to Belize City (picking up the van with Richard Smith in Belmopan) to go pick up the Canada Team. We will spend the night at My Refuge on Friday.

Saturday, March 10 – We travel to Hopkins Village, stopping to introduce the team to a few other ministries along the way.

Sunday-Saturday – March 11-17

We will be serving in a variety of ways. Relationships being priority one, we will also be:

- offering a Asthma Clinic at the local area hospital for staff and doctors

- serving Asthma care at the village clinic

- visiting two schools teaching about HIV/AIDS and abstinence

- spending an entire day investing in the Georgetown School (another Garifuna village)

- Participating in youth events

- Participating in a local outreach with the church in a nearby Garifuna village

- Sharing in Sunday School, evening church service

- offering our talents and gifts through one on one relationships and needs as they arise

- helping Pastor Herdie finish a couple of work projects in great need

The order this all happens is always a mystery, but God is in control and before us, preparing the way for his Kingdom plans.

Saturday-Sunday, March 17-18

- Team Debriefing, day away and travel day.

Prayer Requests for March 9-19:

1. Safe travel as I am traveling alone to and from the village by bus

2. Safety in the village as I stay with friends

3. Rest, strength and health to have all the energy and mental capacity needed to serve others and walk through each day

4. Wisdom to discern what to say yes and no to

5. Creativity to finalize the plans for the Canada team

6. Divine encounters from the Lord as I watch, listen and walk through each day

7. Please remember Luke as he is home and we are apart for this time. That God would pour blessing upon him for allowing me to serve in this way.

A friend called me today and the Lord gave her a vision as she was praying for me that a warrior was standing in front of me, on the offense, protecting, warring and standing in a place of the offensive move, loaded with armor. I had a very similar vision in prayer myself of Jesus standing in front of me and being so tall that I could not see the top of him or his head. He stood with a staff as a shepherd.

What a beautiful picture, Jesus the shepherd and a warrior going out ahead of us. And we have the utter privilege of following him. What a honor to serve the one and only, true, living God.

“Obedience comes before revelation”

Often when I am preparing for a mission trip, I have the privilege to watch Jesus orchestrate circumstances almost like a dance, as we plan and prepare for these short times of service. We’re going away from what’s familiar, security and stopping all of life’s-routine to completely make ourselves available to serve some place else.

I am learning so much about obedience throughout the years. I have watched person after person say yes to the call the Lord puts on their heart to go, usually not knowing what lies on the other side.

My favorite thing to witness and testify about is after a yes is given in obedience, how God starts to move ahead of us on our behalf doing His agenda. He delights in proving himself to us again through his active care, active involvement and love toward us as his servants, sons and daughters. It’s so humbling.

Check this out!

Here’s an example, just one of many, of how this happens. Dale and Karen said “yes” to going to Belize and serving in the area of hearing care. As we have been working with our friend Kathy at the Youth With A Mission (YWAM) base in Belmopan, here’s what happened. She writes in an email to me:

“Sooooooo here is like the most coolest thing that happened to day – you must share it with your friends. So I was in Spanish Lookout and Country Foods gives us a crate of eggs once a month – so while I am there the guy brings the first 4 flats over and is signing that he can’t hear – and then I meet another guy that can’t hear. Then I call out the manager and he tells me that one of the guys has a wife can’t hear as well. As we are all talking this  lady gets out of her car and asked me about the guy that is coming with hearing aids – so I tell them what I know – and she shows me her hearing aid and says it is giving her trouble and that she needs new batteries but they are really expensive and hard to find. And then she tells me about her 14 year old son who also needs a hearing aid. I am so amazed – in just going to pick up some eggs – the Lord opened a door really wide – so I got phone #’s and contact information – wow I never new Belize was so in need of hearing aids until to day – pretty cool and wild all at the same time.”

Jeremiah 7:23…“Obey me, and I will be your God and you will be my people. Walk in obedience to all I command you, that it may go well with you.”