We arrived back in Honduras Monday noon and by evening had pretty much settled in again. Pastor Nelson and Juliza Batista arrived that night at 8 pm and stayed at the Paz’s hotel. They came out this afternoon and then we had dinner at our place tonight. We were able to get caught up on several things…. Nelson Osorto, computer teacher, preached three times while the pastor was gone and several of his students are attending church regularly. Three have accepted Christ
Nelson and Juliza Batista arrived in San Pedro Sula at 8:30 Saturday evening, 26th of January. Even though we had never seen them, we had no problem recognizing each other; there was an immediate feeling of kinship. We are so very grateful to the Southern Reform Church in Kalamazoo and to First Fruits Ministry in Tulsa with their pastor, Eleazar Bermudez in Venezuela to help make this possible.
We spent that first night at the Paz Family hotel in San Pedro and then Sunday morning we took them out to our house in Los Portales for a time of discussion and prayer. In talking to Nelson it is very clear that he has had experience in developing a church and leading its people into discipleship.
An hour before the service at our village church, one of the members brought a meal for all of us, including the Paz family. Again it was a good time of fellowship and a further opportunity to get to know the pastor and his wife before the service began at 3 PM. Nelson did not preach this first Sunday; actually this was Selvin’s (Luis’s son-in-law) last Sunday to preach for a while. Nelson and Juliza did introduce themselves, gave information about their background and their plans while they are here.
Since the parsonage is not yet finished the Batista’s are staying at the Paz Hotel in San Pedro Sula. Gathering Hearts donated a significant amount to get the parsonage finished.
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.
Eleazar Bermudez arrived Tuesday morning to teach the pastor’s training for two days. Today all of the Gathering Hearts classes were cancelled so that they could come to his service this morning and this afternoon.
This is an evangelistic outreach to those students who do not know Christ.
Eleazar has in mind a potential couple who could come for a year to help the church grow. Please pray with us about that. It would be a great benefit to have a pastor living with the people and actively developing the church.
Tuesday night Mauricio and Maci Mayor joined us for dinner to meet with Eleazar. We strategized about the church and ministry.
Below: we provide lunch for the attendees.
Gary (rt) Eleazar and Pastor Severias (left) with other church leaders.
Today we had Luis Paz and family along with Denny Boersema for lunch to discuss the church and the appointment of the pastor. Even though we come from varying points of view, I think we are in agreement about the type of person we need to pastor the church.
We also talked about Gathering Hearts and some of our plans for the future, including our plan to begin manufacturing goods for sale in the US. At that, Luis said, almost incidentally, that he had a vision of us using his house here and the rice processing plant as a place to begin manufacturing goods.
The meeting was held in the new church.
You could have knocked us over with a feather. In fact, I asked him to repeat it just to be sure we understood it correctly. We had thought that we would need to purchase that building to use it and wondered just how we were going to get those funds.
Other aspects of this manufacturing projects seem to be coming together as well. Yesterday Flor told me that Alfredo is planning to come back Honduras from North Carolina soon; it sounded like quite soon. From the very start, he is the one we had in mind to be in charge of the woodworking operations. Today we had a message from Margaret Brewer saying that she and Linda Bullock are planning a trip here shortly after the first of the year. They are coming in order to train the sewing ladies to begin making articles for sale.
Helens Snipes left at about noon on Friday. Afterward Cheryl and I ran errands and then met Mike and Sherrill Gasinski for dinner. We have gone to church together for the last several years but never really got to know them very well. We had a great time of fellowship together. Cheryl and I then went to Frank and Phoebe Harrison's to spend the night as it was well after dark. We also had a great time with them. Frank had been studying the book of First Peter and shared some very encouraging thoughts. On Saturday we ran the rest of our errands and then went back to the mission center for the evening. On Sunday Cheryl was the worship leader at church and I had the communion meditation. Afterward we went to the airport to pick up Denny Boersma who had come from Michigan to help with the process of selecting a new pastor for our church here. During the afternoon we met with the Honduran representatives for the Reformed Church, and then attended church service and meeting afterward with the pastors who have an interest in helping us fill the pulpit. Denny has been working on the water filtration system today, and also additional computer connections to the satellite dish. But we have also had a couple of prayer, talk sessions about how to best choose the pastor; and about preparing for the first phase of construction of the dormitories. These were extremely productive times and we are very much encouraged with regard to both initiatives.
Tonight we had dinner with Larry and Ruth Ann Wells of First Baptist Church Broken Arrow and with the Brister's from Parkview Baptist Church in Tulsa. Over the years they have been very successful in church planting and church growth in Venezuela. It was they who sponsored Eliezer and Karina Bermudez's visit to our mission center in the springtime to hold pastor training and education sessions. Last night they described to us a plan that Eliezer and his group have developed to evangelize the entire nation of Venezuela. It is incredible. That really typifies something we have had in the back of our minds as we have said on occasion that the pastors are the hope for the future in Honduras. I hope that we can gain from their experience and understanding to begin developing such a plan for Honduras.
Denny Boersema mentioned to me yesterday that he and Pastor Dan have made contact with another pastor who worked in Honduras for many years. He was saying that maybe they will contact this man; he could give them valuable information that perhaps we could apply to our pastor training program.
The first week of February a special friend, Isaac Hotz, led a group of residents, interns and other medical personnel from Northern Colorado School of Medicine to minister at the Mission Center.They were here only three days but saw more than 600 patients.In addition to care typically given during the medical brigades, this group also performed outpatient surgeries.At the end of their three days there was still a long line of needy people waiting to be seen.This is an illustration of our great need to build the dormitories as soon as possible so that more medical teams can come and perhaps stay longer.
The team used the Gathering Room for triage.
The expanded care of this group has led to another great need for ministry: that of follow up care.We saw many people this time with serious illnesses and injuries that need to be seen regularly after the team leaves.Cheryl has begun to respond to this need using the medical contacts she has developed in San Pedro Sula.Following up on one of those leads, she was able last Friday to meet with a surgeon at one of the government hospitals.This physician is quite willing to see our patients and even spoke of visiting the Mission Center.
ELEAZAR AND CARINA WITH THE KUNEY'S
It was one of those divine appointments. Through a dear missionary home hostess, we were introduced to a man from Tulsa who has a heart for Latin American missions and has done short term missions over the past thirteen years. We spoke of our need for pastors to be trained in our village churches to accept and disciple new converts and he spoke of a pastor and his wife in Venezuela who have started churches and trained pastors. It was a perfect fit.
This meeting resulted in Eleazar Bermudez and his wife, Carina, traveling from Venezuela to Honduras to launch a pastor’s training program in our mission center. Eight pastors attended Saturday, February 20, and in addition to the training, a strong bond and unity began to be established between this ministry and the village pastors. In addition, Eleazar and Carina visited and ministered in local churches in this area. This again strengthened our bond with the pastors. We have a long way to go, but a great start.
We so pray that we could find a pastor like Pastor Bermudez who has a heart for the people and a passion for God. It is difficult to find a pastor who would want to live out in our very impoverished “campo” area. Our desire is that this new pastor will accept the converts from this ministry and disciple them and grow into a functioning church that serves their village.
This comes at a time when we are working with our landowner, Luis Paz, to begin a church right next door to the mission center.
Luis Paz has begun construction and our students will help continue to finish the building.
Besides ministering to the pastors, Eleazar and Carina shared with our students of all vo-tech schools. Classes were suspended so that students for both morning and afternoon shifts could attend. Carina is a talented vocalist and gifted at leading praise and worship. Eleazar held their attention through his own testimony and books that he has written. Since we have sixty new students in the computer classes and another shift of sewing classes, this is quite an evangelistic accomplishment.