BRUCE’S RAMBLINGS

Well, due to the blizzard of Feb 2010, church is cancelled for this Sunday.  Below are three video clips i created to encourage your worship if you are stuck at home!

Cornerstone Community Church Snowed in Sunday Sharing: Bruce and Tom on "being in a "yes" position in life... from tom yaccino on Vimeo.

What does it mean to place our lives in a YES position.  As we finish our series called “Walk On” we are taking a look at how we can get excited all day long about the things of God, but if we are not in a YES position, we may never get to hear or participate in God’s great plan for our lives. 

Here is an Update on Haiti, as how we are participating as we are coming alongside of the Red Del Camino.  

When we serve in the Dominican Republic, we are apart of a far reaching network that ties into churches in eight countries of the south.  Here is a video of church member and servant of Comunidad Cristiana Shalom,  Julio Murillo of Costa Rica (my personal friend pastor Roy Soto’s church)on  how he was in a YES position after the earthquake in Costa Rica, a year ago.  Julio was filmed 72 hours after the tragedy and he had lost his home, and most of his belongings... yet his main point was that it was not because of the earthquake they are doing what they were doing, rather because serving God is just what they do. 

Jim Wallis on The Daily Show--the question is not: how will we survive the economic crisis. Rather, the question is: how will the economic crisis change us?

Below is a note from Brian Mclaren about his trip to Bethlehem:

A highlight of our time yesterday was hearing Rev Mitri Raheb share five observations about this part of the world. He said ...

1. There are too many peace talkers and there are too few peace workers.
2. There is too much politics and too little care for people on the ground.
3. There is too much religion and not enough true spirituality.
4. There is too much humanitarian aid and not enough economic development.
5. There is too much pess-optimism (swinging from optimism about the next big project to despair when it doesn't work) and not enough steady hope in action.

It's a great privilege to be among the Palestinian people here in the city where Jesus was born.

Funny UMD college prank

this was R&R time - but this short video shows a good snapshot of the culture!

We have been coming to Santa Rosa, Bani, Dominican Republic long enough, I have given myself the assignment of investigating our past projects.  Read for yourself my report!

This was the chief cause that inspired this trip. Elen is starting a school, now that the children from the preschool she operates out of her home are moving up. Public education is not good and private education is out of reach for the poor. She has already hired committed teachers who will work at a rate to keep the cost down. It will cost less than $15/ month per child for a ten month year. (Actually that is still out of reach for many children so we will set up a scholarship fund) The teachers have or are working on a degree and have the government-required curriculum. Our workshops were addressing questions like: How do you keep the classroom environment creative? How do you keep things moving with short attention spans? What do you do with children with disabilities? How do you run a chapel? What are creative ways to teach math and creative reading? What is the best way to do classroom planning? And more. We had 17 teachers attend, some from Elen’s school and the rest as a way to help teachers of the community. They responded very was very strong.

 Here are some short video clips!

Here is the certificate time - very meaningful

Here is a testamony from one of the DR teachers about the Teachers Workshops

Here is a testimony from Becky about teaching the workshop

Here is a testimony from Patti about the workshop

 We did lots of work in the school, mostly painting. It was cool making the place look like new. The joy on the community’s face, watching the place transform, was priceless.

AND THEN THERE IS A SHORT VIDEO CLIP!