Gary, Nicolas and I went out again to the impoverished area and presented the Gospel with the "Storying" method. We prayed with one young man to receive Christ.
Second house in homeless housing project finished. What a great fulfillment to help these poor people get houses. There are seven children that live in this house with their parents. One of them is the little boy, Jose Manuel who is crippled. We will soon select the next recipient. Please pray that we could find a lot to build Lourdes her house.
Yesterday Lourdes took us to see that the lot she was interested in. Much like the last one, it was in a very low area and would have required a great deal of fill dirt. Nevertheless, we looked it over carefully and tried to imagine how it might work out for her and for us as we try to help her build a house. She had understood that the lot was going to cost $2000. However, when we talked to the owner, we learned it was $6000. That was out of the question for all of us and put us back to square one
We also had a meeting yesterday with the directors of Happy Days private school to discuss scholarships that are being funded by a group from Tulsa. The directors, Rosa and José began by saying they are going to match those 10 scholarships with another 10. Thus, 20 very needy students will have an opportunity to begin receiving a very good education. (We will need to help them to purchase more desks). They also reported that Laurdes’s his three children, Carlos, Perla, and Esmeralda are doing very well. They invited one of the teachers into the meeting who said that in his class, which includes older students, Perla is at the top of the class.
This morning we had a meeting with those in charge of the biosand filter project in Seis de Mayo. The OSU engineering students handed the project over to this group and they have done a good job. They have built and sold 19 filter units and have a list of 30 more people who want to buy one. They are using the money from the sale of the units to invest back into materials and labor; and they have a little left over as profit.
Oscar stopped by this morning and I was able to tell him that we have the money for his surgery and that we have an appointment with the surgeon on Monday.
This afternoon we had a meeting with a man who is connected to an organization that supplies pastors. We had a good visit about our situation here and how it might relate to his organization. He seems to feel confident that they could supply the pastor that we are looking for to fulfill our various roles. It was our first meeting and we will stay in touch.
Thirteen years ago this week, Gary and I and four of our five children arrived in Honduras to start work with a ministry that was to build an institute south of San Pedro Sula. That ministry left that year, but as God would have it, we remained and begun a work in a “jungle” like area north of San Pedro where we have developed a ministry to the impoverished campo people. Looking back we marvel at God’s goodness to us in building a mission center that houses vo-tech schools, Bible/English classes, a feeding kitchen, children’s program, medical and dental clinics and twelve employees. And it is also our home. There is now a church, and we are close to filling the pulpit with a trained and called pastor. This gives us faith to look forward as we hope to build dormitories, finish construction on a production center where the very poor can earn a living, and continue building houses for the homeless. Between these lines are numerous obstacles to all of the above. And we have and do now face fierce warfare, but we would have never seen this side of God if we had remained in our comfort zone. Our work is prayer. We pray and show up and we look to God to manifest His Glory. Please continue to pray for us as we meet the challenges.
Gary and I enjoyed being with other Honduran missionaries during the Missionary Conference last week-end, Sept. 27th-29th. . A Pastor Steve Johnson, president of Latin American Mission, was the speaker and his messages focused on forgiveness. It is great fellowship to join with such kindred spirits of missionaries from all over Honduras. Many of the missionaries that we started with are now gone and we miss them; but we were encouraged that there are several young couples that have started mission work here in Honduras.
Today we are to meet with the leadership of the water filtration system who have been part of the Oklahoma State University Engineers without Borders engineers water filtration systems. Water filters are still being constructed by the locals and we are encouraged that this is an ongoing project. Also today, we are to pick up our Ford van that broke down on us last week. With putting in so much money in repairs, we feel it is time that we pray for God to supply a pick-up truck and either sell or donate this Ford van. We were able to finally get the government issued license plates and use the newer van to make the trip to the capital for our residency legal work and then on to the missionary conference.
We did not get good news from the Electric Company here about getting connected. All of our industrial machines take three phase electricity. There is no three phase for miles around, so it would be very costly to bring it out to us from Puerto Cortes. We would be required to purchase all of the poles, cables and installation. Please pray with us about that. Meanwhile, we have a local worker who will finish surfacing the walls and plugging up all of the holes out in the production center.
As most of you know, we were hoping to purchase a house for Lourdes and her five children as part of the homeless housing project. In the long run it would save us money to get this one, already built on a lot, because Lourdes does not own any property. We met with the owner on Monday and requested him to show proof of ownership or some kind of deed. Since then he has raised the price $2000. This is probably because we are Americans. This has been disheartening, we are praying about what God would want to do in this situation.
Today our water pump system is down again and it looks like we are going to have to purchase another tank, etc and replace the main part of the system. We are not sure if the repairman knows how to really pull this off, but they always say they can and then may end up breaking it more. He was to have been here early this morning, he has not showed up yet. Gary and Nicolas had to go to the electric company to appeal to them to get the electricity turned on for the production plant. They told Gary that in order to get 220 out here we would have to pay for the poles and wiring to bring it in from who knows where. Then they require us to hire (their) engineer and copy down all of our electrical blue print. Then there are pages and pages of requirements that we would need to fulfill.
Pray with us as we investigate the housing for Lourdes and her five children. Meanwhile, we are in the process of building another home for the homeless in El Sauce.
We went to another area of the El Sauce campo and met with some other families in need of housing. It was very difficult because there are so many living in what I would call great poverty …literally in the mud. It was so difficult to choose who would receive a house and who would not. We finally settled on a family of nine children; one who is severely handicapped. This week our workers will begin hauling in the materials for this family.
This is the family that we (and our workers) chose to receive the next house. There are nine children altogether that will live in this one room house. Normally they just sleep inside the house and do everything else outside the house.