Pay no attention...

to that GENDER behind the curtain!

You can all rest in peace tonight...the Great OZ has spoken. The Apels are no longer the crazy old-fashioned people who aren't going to find out what they are having. IT'S A BOY!! We were in getting a voluntary sonogram to help a person from our church that was training on the sono. Cate (Our Best Friend) and I were out in the lobby while Kirby, 1 Trainer, and 3 Sono Trainees were in the room 'learning'. A little while after Kirby had declared her desire to not know the gender, the trainer made a very awkward comment. "Oh look, he's adjusting himself. Look, he's got his hand's in his pants." And that's the ball game! Cate and I came in a little later and they were very bad about covering their "he's" with "uh..um, or she's". We went ahead and confirmed that it was a boy, so that we weren't left the next 20 weeks pretty sure but never knowing completely. Oh well, maybe next time....WE'RE HAVING A BOY!

Practice Hospitality

In Costa Rica, we were blown away by the kindness of the people there. There first two Ticos (that's what you call a person from Costa Rica) we met were Ricardo, our guide, and Ernesto, our driver. We spent three days with them as they took us around to some amazing places in their country.

Kirby and I were too old to sit in the back of the bus and were placed at the front with the other family. Everyone joked for the rest of the trip about my love affair with Ricardo. I always retorted, "It was love at first fact." Ricardo was passionate about what he did. Praise the Lord he was gifted with an outgoing personality, because it went perfectly with his passion for God's creation (he was a biologist). It was confirmed later thru our other encounters with tour guides that Ricardo was a rare breed. He didn't read from scripts or give us cheesy trivia. He knew everything he told us by heart. He would go on as far as he had your interest about how the ecosystem worked. It sounds boring, but through the lens of God's hand in it, it was fascinating. I asked Ricardo one time, after one of his more charismatic sermons, that if he could describe creation in one word (preferably) or a short phrase what he would say. He immediately responded, "Perfect."

Ernesto was less educated and fluent in English, but was quite and interesting and nice guy. He and Ricardo lugged around close to 900 lbs. of luggage and a loud group of 12 former highschool seniors for 24hr/day for three days. I have worked at summer camps and slept among some loud kids in my days and I can't believe they never strayed from their big smiles.

Our first two and a half days were pleasure focused and not quite business. We stayed at a nice lodge in the mountains. The first morning we headed out to an adventure camp and went cascade repelling. Repelling is like the second half of mountain climbing. We didn't climb up anything, but are trucked to the top and then we shoot down on a rope. Where it gets interesting is the cascades. We went down 5 different drops--the highest was 165 ft. high--through waterfalls!! By now you wondering if pregnant Kirby went, and the answer is an emphatic "Yes!" She's awesome--you should have seen her work the rest of the trip--what a girl! The doctor cleared her for pretty much everything we did on the trip and the setup for repelling pulls most of the tension and discomfort away from the belly making it a pleasing, exhillarating ride for both her and Baby. In fact, she had a HUGE milstone on one of the falls--she felt the baby move for the first time!! It was amazing. Our baby is either afraid of heights or an extreme sports athlete. Only time will tell.

Ricardo had stuck around Kirby and I during the adventure. We talked in between jumps. I don't remember exactly how we got into it, but Kirby and I were speaking with him on the difference between going to church and being religious and truly knowing God and following Him. Ricardo had made a comment about the religiosity of some of the country earlier and was now quite into our thoughts on the matter. We briefly gave him the Matt. 7 idea Jesus warned about as they called him up to take the plunge. As he was walking away, he asked, "So what does it take to be saved? I mean, do you have to be apart of a specific religion, or something?" And then ZIP, he was gone. I think both of our mouths were wide open. We knew God was there and working on him. How sweet. This is the point of the trip that I knew we were suppose to be here for sure. There never was this great time to stop and talk more, but we spoke again briefly and I wrote him a letter more carefully explaining his two questions. I have never seen anyone so grateful.

On another somewhat related note, when we got back from Costa Rica, we were blessed to have a sweet girl from Germany stay with us. Many of you met her. Her name was Anna. She was an exchange student three years ago at Consol and ended up being one of Kirby's Young LIfe girls. On both of her visits to the USA she stayed with less than hospitable families. For 8 days we kidnnapped her and tried to show her that all Americans were not rude and inconsiderate. I was frequently reminded of the hospitality we were shown in CR and how we were suppose to be the most hospitable people as God's children. Abraham ran in and cooked the 3 strangers bread and food. Lot took the angels in to stay with him and would have sacrificed his own daughters at their expense (this was not right, but think of what he was willing to do for strangers). And we're told in Romans 12:13 to "Practice hospitality". I'm sure there will be more on all these people to come.

Now on to the trip

Honestly, everytime I sit down to journal about our trip, I never know where to begin. So I guess we'll just have to start at the beginning. Kirby has been apart of Young Life at A&M Consol. High School for the past four years. This last year (our first year of marriage) Kirby and I sat in on the Senior Leaders meetings every Monday night. Kirby was able to focus on a few key girls and keep relations with others not in the leaders group, while I was blessed to watch my wife's beautiful heart in action and, also, partake in some much needed reviving and encouragement of my own heart through the lessons and fellowship with the kids.

This year's group of 10 seniors (7 girls,3 guys) was amazing! Never, never have I seen such humility and honest, real desire for the Lord. There were times they would fail or religiosity would get in the way. But to see how quickly and vulnerably and unashamedly these guys and girls would confess that to the group and repent was incredible. The growth we witnessed over the last year was phenominal and was only evidence of the Lord's work through 4 years of seed planting by some faithful leaders.

Since this was such a stand-out group, a mission trip was created that they might have one more chance to minister and put into action the things they had learned and experienced through out the semester and we were invited to go along. Here's where it began for me for sure and Kirby might chime in as well.

A struggle of mine had been how to know what God wanted us to do. We went through the Experiencing God class at our church and had very throughly covered this question. Henry Blackaby explains very well that the problem is we always want to know "what is God's will for me?" instead of "what is God's will?" (As I write this, I am realizing how much I have even struggled with the very question even these past few days--ha--praise the Lord!) I was so sure that Kirby was suppose to go and finish what God had started with her, but I really stuggled if I should go. I wasn't sure what my part was in this group, but Kirby had made it clear that she was not going away to anywhere for 10 days without me. So, we were both in or both out.

I wrestled with this. I just had been hired on full-time with my company and didn't want to ask for more than one weeks vacation time already. My bosses are generous Christian men and I knew, most likely, that they would say "Yes" whether they could afford it or not, so I did not want to take advantage of them. I prayed (a little) and tried to seek some wise counsel. All I knew was that Kirby needed to go and I couldn't keep her from it.

Money. Finances are such a weakness of mine. We had to raise support...and there were two of us. How were we going to raise so much money? I wrestled more and more.

We knew from all the advice that we were given, the class that we were in, and our time in prayer that all we had left in this decision was FAITH. We had to take a step and if we were to go, the Lord would provide. If not, He would not. (I waivered through this whole process.)

Well, the money had come in pretty quick from some faithful friends/family at first. But, the week before we had to have all of it in, we were sitting $1500 short. We got serious again, for we had lightened up on our prayers a bit when the money started coming in. So, all we could do was ASK. We asked the Lord to prvide this amount in one week. In 5 days, we had all of the money commited to us and by that 7th day we were paid in full! Praise the Lord! We could not have gone if just one of the faithful people in our lives had not given their money. God provided so well!
Of course, we knew without a doubt that we were suppose to go to Costa Rica (yeah, sorry, I still waivered until the day we left...God and I are straight though, don't worry).

And so began an experience and lesson in FAITH that we will not forget...

First Trimester Tally

Ok, getting back on track...the final vote for the First Trimester Caucus was overwhelmingly: GIRL. Can't wait to see how the voting turns out in the Second Trimester Primaries!

PS - We won't be giving our votes away so early next time.