Happy Birthday, Mark

Saturday, February 19, we celebrated Mark's 14th birthday. We celebrated with a small party with just three friends.



They played video games, watched videos and ate. The main celebration was the next day because that morning our older son Daniel and his wife Naomi arrived in Santa Cruz where Daniel will be completing the second half of his student teaching requirement to graduate from Indiana Wesleyan University in April. So we ate again and had a couple of more presents.

As we celebrate this event in Mark's life I am again thankful for the amazing gift of Mark that God brought to our family. For those of you who don't know his full story, I will spare you all of the details but will just give a short summary. On April 4, 1997 I went on a trip to the South Yungas, a tropical valley area north of La Paz, with some of the brothers from the church. The purpose of the trip was to help with the establishing of a new congregation. While we were there it rained tons on Sunday, the day we were to return to La Paz, and the road was a mess trying to get out back home. When we arrived in the town of Chulumani, a town several hours from La Paz, we were told by the police that the road was closed due to a mudslide. He suggested that we spend the night there rather than in our car alongside the road somewhere, so we did.

In those days telephones were still rather new outside of the major cities but Chulumani had recently obtained service. So, Monday morning, the 7th, I called Niki to let her know that we were coming but might be late and not to worry about us. There was a landslide and we would need to go home by a different route. As I was getting ready to hang up she said to me, "I should tell you before you hang up that I told them we would take that baby. Is it alright with you?" We had heard about this baby boy the day before I left needing someone to care for him. But we had no conversations about adopting or even offering foster care. As I returned to the car to start our journey home, I said to fellow missionary Charlie Wix, "Charlie, congratulate me. I think I'm a new father."

We arrived home sometime during the late afternoon. Being the first Monday of the month it was Missionary Fellowship night. That night at the meeting the big joke was, "What else doesn't Gordon know?" Apparently everyone else already knew that I had a new son before I did.

Anyway, that is how God brought Mark to us. I suppose there is a little bit more to the story but I'll save that for now. I want to end this post by simply saying one more time, "Thank you, Lord Jesus, for bringing Mark into our family. I can't wait to see what you are going to do through him."