Ministry News
Merry
Christmas! We hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas. Christmas in
Mexico is celebrated a little differently than it is in the U.S. The big
celebration here is on Christmas Eve with a big meal around midnight
with fireworks, friends, and family. Gifts aren’t exchanged very often
on Christmas here. The children will receive their gifts on 3 Kings Day,
which is on January 6th. We had a nice quiet day celebrating our
Savior’s birth with just our family.
We had a good trip back to the U.S. for Susan’s brother’s wedding. It
was good to see family and friends. We were also able to visit several
new churches to raise some additional support. We praise the Lord for
His provisions. The churches were very generous. We enjoyed our time in
the States, but it’s good to be back home now.
We are pleased with the progress we see in the church people here. The
Sunday before last, we had 67 in attendance! We are now at about maximum
capacity for the building that we are renting. We need to find a new
location soon.
Enrique, one of the men in training for leadership, has been teaching a
new believer’s class on Sundays before church for a few families that
are new believers. It’s great to see new people coming to church.
We’ve also seen people take on new responsibilities, which is exciting.
In October, some people from the church went to a conference on teaching
children. They came back from the conference and started a Bible club,
which has been running around 30 kids. Some of them have also gotten
involved in the children’s ministry at church as well.
This Sunday, we had our annual Christmas banquet. We rented a party hall
since there is not enough room in our current building. We had between
110-120 in attendance. Quite a few church people were involved in the
program. The children did a nativity play, others did special music,
while others made the food or helped with the lighting and setting up.
Lino did a great job clearly presenting the gospel. At least one person
raised their hand to receive Christ as Savior. We were pleased that our
neighbors also attended.
It’s exciting to see what God is doing in these final stages of this
church plant. Please pray for wisdom during this critical time of
training the leaders and transferring responsibilities. It is a joy to
see fruit for our labor.
