The Class of 2026

Just over a week ago we said farewell to our students. On one hand, 15 weeks seems to stretch out for a long time, especially as energy levels slowly wear down from the long and intense days. But as the end approaches, one asks, How did we get here so fast? What is always amazing, though, is seeing the slow yet steady changes in each one of the students' lives. "Your labor is not in vain..." yet it is not our labor primarily but His work in them. This is the class of 2026 and here are some highlights of God's workings in their lives.  

The graduating class together with the full-time staff.

I had the chance to mentor a young man who actually had already attended CEC many years ago - the five-year-old son of a young couple. Vicente is the first second-generation alumni, his parents having attended in 2011 (the 2nd year of CEC) together with this two sisters. Though he was young, he had fond memories of CEC and those who were leaders at the time (including our founding director who has since passed away, Howard.)  This was one year before I started with CEC, so I didn't know them at the time, but since then as we've made trips to visit past students, I have come to know both his parents and Vicente himself over the past few years. 

While having hit some struggles in his faith in the recent past, God placed it on Vicente's heart to return to CEC, this time as a student himself - something he had wanted to do since the very first time he came. One of the things that quickly became clear as I got to know Vicente more, was how God had been working on him even as a child - the convictions that he had even as an eight-year-old, for example - his desire to serve the Lord even at that early age. Though his later-teenage years had some bumps and bruises, he experienced a type of re-awakening during his time of CEC.  The maturity in his faith - his genuine care and concern for others during the course, wanting to see others grow and step out in their faith - struck me as it is not something that one typically sees from a 20-year-old, let alone even others more advanced in years. Vicente was the first to begin clearing dirty dishes from the tables (we had to tell him at times to sit back and enjoy other people's company...) and also one of the first to cheer his fellow classmates on as they took on new challenges such as preaching for the first time. 

He himself is a deep thinker, and this would perhaps at times get him into trouble, but it was during one of our conversations, and later as he prepared to preach for the first time on life in the Spirit, in Romans 8, that a palpable peace came over him as he grasped more deeply the life we have in the Spirit as opposed to the life (even the Christian life) tried to be lived in the flesh.  This was just one example where it was exciting to witness the truths of the Word sink deep into his heart, taking root.  Still a very young man who is discerning where God might take him, pray for Vicente as he seeks God's direction in his life.

Another student who comes to mind when I think of God's transformational work in the lives of the students over these past months comes from the same church, located in Tecuala, Nayarit - two states down to the south from San Carlos.  We've actually stayed at Uriel's place a number of times over the years, his father being a pastor who has been deeply connected with CEC.  Their home lies just off of the main highway that we take on many of our promotional tours down south.  His father has plugged us into the local community to share about CEC with a number of the churches in the area.  So, it was a pleasure to have these two, Vicente, Uriel, and, Uriel's sister, Karen attend this year.

Vicente together with Uriel (on the right).

What struck me the most about Uriel was, being a very quiet and reserved individual, the transformation that took place as he opened up to the group around him and in taking on new challenges such as preaching for the first time.  It was not only this, though, but also how God really was at work in his heart.  He was heard to read the first half of the course simply because he was quite reserved, quiet, and guarded.  As he shared later on, though, he was led to some points where he was tempted to leave.  For many, in one way or another, the fact that you have to engage with the community around you (one of the priorities of CEC) can create moments of crisis, where you have to either respond or run.  Some choose to run, but Uriel, guided by some people whom God had placed in his life, chose to stay and grow, experiencing an openness and brokenness that perhaps he had not experienced before.  I had the chance of interviewing him in video at the end of the course (later I'll put together some highlight videos with some of the student's testimony...) and as Uriel shared about his experience of the course, he couldn't hold back the emotion as he reflected on God's work in his life.  In his own words, he shared, "I thought I was OK...there were things, though, that one doesn't see until one is put to the test....I thought, 'I can change,' but it was impossible...yet something within me told me to just stay, to just continue on."  

The transformation that came through the time, from beginning to end, was perhaps subtle, but at the same time, evident in so many little ways - like the steady growth of a tree.  From engaging more freely and naturally with his classmates, to sharing his vision for ministry as he returns home to help serve more intentionally in his local church through things like preaching, the Uriel we met on day one became a very different Uriel on the final week.  We are thankful for these glimpses into their lives, knowing that we only see a small amount of what God really does in their lives and hearts.  

Now as the students find themselves in a new "classroom," one outside of the familiarity and relative comfort of CEC, we invite you to continue to pray for them together with us.  One of the encouragements we send them away with is the promise of Philippians 1:6, which says, "He who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus."  CEC itself was not the "magic ingredient" or catalyst for change in their lives, but God's work in them during this time - and He will continue to work in them as they continue to learn to yield their lives to Him.  

Pray also for us as staff as we set out to plan the rest of this year including other conferences as well as trips to visit students and make new connections with churches.  ¡Dios les bendiga!

12 Disciples

As one month quickly turns into the next month and one year into the next, we find ourselves once again at the doorsteps of another CEC school term, after a one-year hiatus, looking forward to a group of 12 disciples, looking forward for Monday to arrive.

Since my last update, we finished off the year with two major events - one being hosting Millar College of the Bible (Pambrun, SK campus), where ten students spent a week and a half here at CEC in a cross-cultural missions module.  A number of hours were spent in the classroom with various teachers looking at the challenges and realities of what cross-cultural missions look like.  We also spent time off-site at some local churches and ministries, getting a small taste of what it looks like to be and interact in a cross-cultural setting, hearing from those on the ground, and experiencing some of the challenges that one faces in a new culture and a different language than one's own.  

The Millar group of students on one of their off-site ministry experiences.

From there, in mid-November, we hosted our yearly fall conference where one of our regular adjunct teachers, Beto Ramirez, came in and shared about keeping ourselves grounded in Christ through His Word amidst a society that is increasingly turning away from Biblical principals and a Biblical worldview.  About 25 people from the area, including some of our alumni, spent a couple of days with us.

CEC Conference - Nov/25

These events capped off a unique year, where we didn't have our regular course in January, but one full of great opportunities such as these, and many others both on and offsite.  Perhaps what has stuck out the most is how we were able to see firsthand not only the need but also the hunger for God's Word, not just with our on-site programming, but especially as we had more time to invest offsite.  As December rolled around, we were pleasantly surprised to see a number of applications roll in for this year's program, two of which came from one of the churches we first made contact with this last September, when Guillermo and myself took our trip down south.  That church in particular expressed a deep interest in us returning to their area to spend more time teaching in the future.  

By the time Christmas rolled around, we already had eight students registered, probably the earliest we have ever had such a large number of students.  Now as we get the final preparations under way, we have our 12 disciples packing their bags and planning to arrive this coming Sunday.  They come from a number of different states: Sonora, Baja California, Nayarit, and Zacatecas, from places we've been working with for a long time now, and some, as I have already mentioned, from new contacts that have been recently made.  It is encouraging to see the ministry of CEC grow in its reach simply because it affirms the vision for ministry that God has placed on our hearts to do.  As we've learned from 2025, our plans may not play out as we hope they would, but we can still rest in God's leading in our lives and in this ministry as we step into this new year, and this new season.

So, we ask for your prayers for these coming 15 weeks, our final day being May 1st.  12 students, 15 weeks, many opportunities (and challenges!) await us.  

• Pray for our team as we navigate everything from the details to the bigger situations we will face in the coming days.  
• Pray for myself as I get back into teaching some of these materials that have been sitting on the shelf for a couple of years.  
• Pray also for each one of the students, that they would be receptive to God's working in their lives over these next months.  

AND, thank you for your continued prayers for myself and for this ministry!  ¡Dios les bendiga!

Open Doors

Many miles (and many days!) have been covered since the last update - there's lots that has happened!  But during that time I was able to connect with many of you, spending a large part of August up in Manitoba, and then several weeks on the road where I travelled down to the southern-most coast of Mexico together with my coworker, Guillermo.  Yes, it's the same Guillermo who I wrote about previously, who got significantly sick on our previous trip to the neighbouring state of Chihuahua.  As I shared in the last blogpost, without a doubt, the experience, as he sat in the hospital for ten days, had quite the opposite effect from discouraging any future outings - if anything, it served to inspire a renewed vision for the urgency of the work at hand, wherever and however that might look, as God continues to lead.  That was certainly the case over the last month as we took off in the CEC-mobile, a little four-door Corolla, that travelled many miles throughout Mexico, over the course of nearly three weeks this past September.  In about ten different stops over nineteen days we saw God continue to open doors in ways that we honestly, didn't expect - and we look forward to how He will continue to connect us with people and churches hungry for His Word, all across Mexico.  

Click on the map to see our route, and the places we visited.

Here are some highlights from this trip together:

Over the course of those 5,000 kilometres traveled, we were able to visit some of our alumni, Leoncio being one of them, who studied in CEC in 2016.  He lives in Mazatlán, our first stop on the trip, together with his wife and three children.  It had been a number of years since I had last seen him, but he continues to pastor a little church that meets in a recently constructed building made of pallets with a tin roof.  Leoncio hasn't changed a bit.  He continues to passionately and boldly preach the Word both to his congregation and as he's out on the road during the day making deliveries of the product that his wife daily prepares in their house - refried beans (a Mexican staple!)  Through this home-business, they are able to provide for their family and it also enables him to have the freedom to continue to serve in ministry, the routes he takes daily themselves serving as opportunities to minister to people throughout the day.  He regularly goes to different areas in the city, sharing openly the Gospel; they also have started a children's ministry where they regularly provide a meal and biblical teaching to children in the community where they serve.  If you spent just five minutes with Leoncio, even without knowing the language, his love both for God and for others would be more than obvious.  It is so encouraging to see, even after all of these years, how many of our students, like Leoncio, continue to minister faithfully, in spite of whatever difficult circumstances they have gone through.  This was just our first stop.

Leoncio (left), together with his family, the congregation, and Guillermo (back, centre).

Our next night (don't worry, I won't go through every single stop!) came about through a young man who had studied English at the Consiervos program that has run out of CEC the previous year.  David, whose dad is the pastor of a church in Tepic, Nayarit, had invited us to come and present CEC in their church.  What quickly came to realize the incredible work that God has done through them over the years, through a man who had never had the pastorate in his sights, but whom God has used to help reach far into the neighbouring mountains, the Huichol people (one of the many indigenous people-groups in Mexico).  We met with one of those communities, a group of people who many years earlier had had to leave their homes and re-established themselves close to the city, now with a thriving and growing Christian church.  We had the chance to share with them the ministry of CEC with some of their church leaders, several of whom expressed a sincere desire to continue to grow through study.  We left greatly encouraged seeing not only the work that David and his dad were involved with (even partnering extensively with a number of Mennonite believers from the state of Durango) but also seeing how God lead us to these thriving communities at the heart of some of Mexico's indigenous people-groups.

David (front), his dad (left), Guillermo, and myself.

Our next two stops featured pastors/churches that we had visited the previous year, but in both situations we saw the doors that were already open, swing open even wider.  Specifically in one, we had intentions of visiting a second pastor in the immediate area whom we had met last year.  Unfortunately, we had misplaced his contact information and were not able to communicate with him, so our plan was to seek him out once again.  As we arrived to our destination (the same contact we had last year, who had connected us with this other pastor previously) we heard about some unfortunate circumstances that had taken place to this other pastor - the one we had lost the contact information for.  However, our hosts began to share about how they had recently made some inroads to two local pastors alliances in the region, how God had been opening up doors to them.  They presented this opportunity to us, inviting us to return and connect with these alliances, and (as would become a familiar tune during this trip) spend more time in the area preparing some mini-conferences for these pastors/churches.  Our original plans of connecting with that other pastor were effectively "foiled" however, they were replaced but something far greater than what we had originally anticipated.  We began to see that the doors were opening not only to share about the ministry of CEC, but to become more involved on the road, on-site at these churches.

One of the churches we visited, just outside of Guadalajara, Jalisco.

On our way to the furthest point we would visit, the southern coast of Oaxaca, we found an even greater openness.  We spent two jam-packed days visiting and participating in four church services, the first one being at 6am, Saturday morning, in this small, rural church where the people started filing in, almost a hundred in all (and this was a "smaller" number than normal).  We typically were given the opportunity to preach, as well as share about CEC's ministry and the opportunity to study in the coming year.  As we interacted with the people and particularly some of the pastors in the area, we quickly saw not only the need, but even more so the desire to receive help, specifically in biblical teaching.  Our host (who is himself a pastor, the father of one of our full-time staff members here in CEC) put the offer plainly on the table: we will provide the facilities, the accommodations for the people, prepare meals, and even compensate for travel costs: just come and teach!  All of this to say, the opportunities seemingly abounded in this trip, more than we had anticipated.

One of these churches, who received some Bibles that we were able to bring with us, thanks to some generous donors.  Resources like these are harder to find in the southern part of Mexico as opposed to areas closer to the northern border.

From there our journey took us back to an area we know very well, where we have had a number of students attend over the years, and a place that is almost like a home away from home already, with how warmly we are received by the church community there.  Some of our past students, through a recent youth retreat, made contact with a couple of churches within a few hours of their church, who were very interested in hearing more about the ministry of CEC as well.  This led us to a couple of our last stops, to new churches whom we had never had contact with before, one of which urged us as well to come back in the future, to spend more time with them, and to share some more extensive teaching with them, not to mention people who were interested in attending CEC's program in the new year.  

All in all, both Guillermo and myself, were elated with these new, opening doors, and excited to see where these lead us as we move forward.  It seems over the past couple of years specifically, in thinking about the ministry of CEC, God as slowly been opening more and more doors, providing more connections, with more people, and more opportunities, not just onsite in San Carlos, but beyond as well.  We reflected as we made the trip back home on how we sensed a hunger for God's Word and a desire for help, especially as we travelled further south - the precise kind of support that CEC seeks to offer in collaborating with the churches in Mexico through biblical teaching.  We see that He has led us specifically to these kinds of places, and we are grateful to be a part of it.

As I write this, we continue to make our plans for next year, with applications already coming in for January.  Also, in a couple of days I will head up to Phoenix to pick up a group coming from Millar college of the Bible, SK, who will be spending a week and a half at CEC while we host a transcultural missions module.  Beyond that, we are also looking forward to a conference the beginning of November as well as a six-week, Saturday night study in Ephesians, hosted by Guillermo, here onsite.  This year will quickly come to a close with just enough time to catch our breath before we run headlong into January and the new course.  

Thanks for your continued prayers for myself, and for this ministry here.  I am thankful for this opportunity to serve, and for the many ways that God continues to work amongst us, through this ministry, and in the lives of the students who have come through CEC.  ¡Dios les bendiga a cada uno de ustedes!  May God bless each and every one of you!