Monday, August 30, 2010

ESL Classes

"Learn English Using the Bible!"
This was the approach we used to offer free English classes to the general public. We placed an ad in Facebook and quickly had 25 interested students. The campaign was for the entire month of August and we had about 15 students that went through the entire course. We studied words and passages from the book of John. Several of the students have decided to keep studying with their current teachers after the course had completed. We pray that each of them will not only learn more English, but more importantly, gain a better understanding of the Bible. Perhaps their study will encourage them to follow Christ.

Sunday, August 22, 2010

Dia del Niños

It was an absolutely beautiful day and we had more than 70 in attendance on Sunday. The weekend also marked "Dia del Niños." In the USA we have Father's Day and Mother's Day. In Paraguay they have those days AND a day for children. So, after services we had a little "Midway Carnival" where we had several games set up for the children to play. If they won and collected enough tickets they could use them to get a toy. Everyone had a great time and their were lots of smiling faces!

Thursday, August 5, 2010

“An open door just a few doors down”

Heidi, Maria, Faviola, and Raul after Maria was baptized

It took a considerable amount of time, effort, and money to get from Paraguay to Panama in order to meet up with my team mates for a short term mission trip. We had all traveled to the Darien jungle to evangelize the surrounding area, as well as, encourage the church there and teach some classes. We were excited about the possibilities! We stayed at the Hotel Felicidad in Metiti and traveled down the road to the church building everyday. A young woman, Maria, was a guest at the same hotel in which we were staying. She told us she was from Nicaragua and was traveling with her husband. He worked all day in the jungle while she and her daughter, Faviola, sat around the hotel. Since the ladies of the local church were preparing lunch for us, we decided to invite Maria and Faviola to join us. They really enjoyed themselves. Then, Maria started asking some questions and wanted to know more about this “church” that she was seeing. We shared the Gospel with her and she decided the next day to be baptized. It is interesting that we had all traveled from different parts of the world, but through a chance meeting in a mutual location, another soul was added to the Book of Life.