God is at work
Thank you for praying! And thank you for everyone’s concern about business cards. Kaila will be bringing some for us next week (thanks to the encouragement from several of you…and someone offering to pay for them). Since Tuesday we have been able to pray for a pastor we ran into at a restaurant, pray for a pastor in his home, and yesterday completed day 1 of our training with 16 pastors and leaders from 4 different churches! Our model for training is encouraging each pastor to bring 3-5 leaders from their church with them so that they learn together how to be able to go back and train other people in their churches as a team! We have found this creates a greater level of unity, support and encouragement for the pastor to be able to implement the trainings, and empowers the leaders in the church to raise up other leaders. One pastor we talked to said the vision and methodologies Para uses shows “we are not trying to come in and try to change the foundation of churches, but to equip and empower pastors and leaders to be able to fulfill the calling of their church by coming alongside them.” Yes!
The drive Tuesday went super smooth with no issues at the border and no issues with the van! But we learned today, apparently driving the wrong direction down an unmarked one way street draws the attention of local police. God showed us favor, and they had mercy in the poor gringo (and Belizean) missionaries.
We survived the 99 degree day (the next three are 100, 101, and 103) for a remarkable and fruitful day of training, prayer, and pouring into pastors. We ended the night by taking the host pastor and his wife out to dinner for some local tacos and tortas! Hey that would be a great name for a food truck! And one pastor in our group - who will rename nameless, but rhymes with dustus - couldn’t resist an ice cream stop. And then wrapped up with a team meeting and our nightly prayer time.
God is at work. You are here with us because we couldn’t be here without your prayers, support, and encouragement. You are Para. We are Para. Estamos Para.