My Last Post of 2011 – Praising the Lord for His Many Blessings!

This is my last post for 2011. Hard to believe another year has passed us by. I started this blog in January of 2011. At first I was fearful that I would be able to keep up with it, or that I would enjoy it. The blog itself has been a huge blessing, as it allows us to let people know what is going on in our life and ministry. It is also great that our friends can interact with us through the blog. I thank the Lord for our blog: DiasoLifeontheBorder.org.
I also thank the Lord for the many friends that he has given us to encourage us along the way. I wrote some posts about our champions. And more champions!
Just a couple of days ago I got together for coffee with one of my champions, John McKeever. John strengthens me as he gives me perspective. He helps me to remember how far we have come. Believe it or not sometimes I do get down. I think about all we have left to do rather than what God has already done. John was one of the friends that encouraged me to start my blog, and to work on my email prayer updates. Thank you John!
Dawn and I have a number of champions, and by mentioning a few I realize that I’m leaving out a number of people who have spurred us on. I’m grateful for all of our champions. David Quintanar, who I wrote about earlier in the year has been a huge encouragement to me. Dick Gascho, who’s been a great friend and coach to me over the last few years. He also helps me to keep things in perspective, and to work on setting achievable goals. Dawn also has some great friends that come alongside her. Then there are many families that hearten us along the way. Thanks to all of you who have stood with us, strengthened us, encouraged us, motivated us, cheered us on and believed in us during this long journey!

Another huge ministry highlight for us in 2011 was the Living in Grace conference we held in Tijuana in November. More people looked at our blog on the day we launched our ministry in Tijuana than any day of the year. It was so good to have my friend and colleague, Bill Yarbrough with us leading the conference. It was wonderful to hook up with Daniel Nuñez and the great people he has connected with in his ministry. I enjoyed being able to have my son, David Jr. join us for part of the conference. A good friend and co-worker, Jim DeWitt flew in for the conference, and to learn more about our ministry on the border. BEAMM teammate and friend, Ray Call helped out. We had a great group.
I pray this will be the first of many such ministry events where we will see the gospel go forth, and be a blessing to other ministries. I’m so encouraged by Daniel Nuñez. He’s a gifted and godly leader that’s doing a great work in TJ.
Dawn and I appreciate your prayers for David Jr. We learned on Friday that he will need surgery for a torn meniscus. Now we have to figure out when and where. He leaves for college on January 9. Never a dull moment with our family.
Thank you so much for loving us, and for taking an interest in our lives and our ministry. It’s been a great year! I can’t wait to see what the Lord will do in 2012. Happy New Year!
In His Grip, Dave
DiasoLifeontheBorder.org