April 2023 Update

We hope you are doing well this month as we celebrate the resurrection of our Lord and Savior. We all need to take the time to reflect on the sacrifice Christ made and the victory He achieved for each one that will believe on Him.

This last month, we had the opportunity to host a 12-person work team from one of our supporting churches.  This was a great time of fellowship while accomplishing a lot of work.  Our main goal was to pour concrete in the backyard of our first church.  We have the desire to remodel that church property to allow for a larger sanctuary.  We poured the floor and I hope to put a roof over it sometime this year or next as finances allow.  Due to the size of the work team, we were able to get a lot of other extra projects accomplished too.  Some of them painted the outside of the church and sealed the roof while the others did the cement work.  Due to blockades, we had to change plans one day and work at our current church instead. There we primed the walls, landscaped the grounds, sealed the roof, and finished some electrical installation.  This was a huge blessing to both of these churches.  The team was able to accomplish projects that would have taken us months to do on our own.

Also, during their stay, we held a youth meeting with all 3 of our churches and 2 other local churches.  We have never done this before due to the distance separating the churches.  It was a blessing for our family to witness what God can do with a handful of hardworking people intent on serving Him in whatever way is needed.

Over the years, I have noticed that when we move church locations, we lose some of the people we are trying to reach.  It could be that they stop coming because it is too far for them to walk, or they were not grounded in their faith.  However, I have also seen that many of those same people slowly return in the following months.  This seems to be happening once again in our current church. Many people have begun to return, and we have seen several new visitors come as well.  A few people have made professions of faith and have been attending regularly.  Please pray for these new families.  Some of them are fighting personal battles.  We are trying to be an encouragement to them, and we don’t want to see them lose hope during their trials. 

We have spent time this month working to better equip our 3 churches.  I sat down with each pastor, and we did an evaluation of each church’s current state and their vision for the future.  During this time, I was able to see that our first 2 churches are in need of some extra attention.  They have experienced some extreme hardships as a direct result of all the national political, health and economic problems over the last 2-3 years. They need healing and some extra encouragement to stand fast and continue to grow.  We have spent a lot of time talking with them, giving them resources for evangelism, and encouraging them to keep working toward their goals.  I think our "evaluation" helped all involved.  It caused the pastors to think about their vision for the ministry and what they need to do to achieve that.  It helped us to see where we can continue to work to provide the help they need.

Thank you for your continued prayers for the ministry here in Bolivia.  Please continue to pray for our family but also for our churches and their pastors as we all press forward for the Glory of God!