Como Esta Amigo?

The Lord is alive and working mightily amongst the Chilean people. The evidence is all around and His love is a transforming miracle. How blessed we are to be able to witness the work and be partakers of such love. There is a song called “Why me Lord? “ And it asks “what have I ever done? To receive even one, of the pleasure I’ve known?” I think each one of our team has experienced those words in their heart this trip.

Today started out as a trial and ended with blessings galore. There was a break in the town water system, something that has never happened before but it left us and the whole city with no water to clean, cook, or worse yet, to flush toilets with. It was out most of the day and we had to buy some garbage pails and use some of our empty totes to hold water. We had to call the fire department to come out and fill up all of our vessels as to be able to at least clean up a bit and flush all those toilets. As it turned out the water system was fixed right at the time our workers were coming back in from their jobs. The Mayor told us that it was actually an electrical system failure and not a water break. He also laughingly added that the electric system was owned by Americans. He was just chiding us of course as this is one of the most grateful of people we have ever come across in all of our travels. He showed up at our dwelling as planned with some Mapuche dancers. It turned out to be far more informative and fun than we had anticipated. There were children and adults participating and they did their traditional dance along with horn blowing and drum beating. The native garb was very colorful and beautiful. He said the most celebrated time of year for the Mapuche is their New Year, when the day and night are equal. There are not as many old traditions remaining and the local Mapuche teachers are trying to resurrect the old ways. He went on to say: “American culture has invaded us”. During his talk he also said that we have made a good impression on the Chilean people and that he hopes we will be able to come back sometime. This is one country that is trying to give as much to us as we are trying to give to them. It really is amazing. The Mayor also noted the fact that he thought there were probably no native Indians serving as Mayor in America and said out of 352 Mayors in the country of Chile that only 4 are Mapuche. I have a feeling he is right about the case in America but wonder how I could find out for sure? A few questions were asked of him and one was what are the biggest challenges you face and his answer was : getting fresh water to all of the people no matter how far out they live and also for them all to have a dignified home to live in and making education available to all the children.

At last nights meeting Pastor Rigo had just sat down before closing in prayer while Maria sang special music. He heard the Lord very clearly tell him that someone in the church is leading a “double life” he at first felt a little timid about saying something about this in front of everyone. But then he thought, well the Lord has told me this He must want me to say it. He used words to that effect in his plea at the end. Well after church was through a brother came and confessed to him saying the exact words the Lord had said to him. They prayed together for the Lord’s guidance on his life. Sometimes the power of the Lord can make you just tremble when you see how He moves. He always gives us a chance to come back to Him. The whole universe is waiting to see what we will do with the gift given to us.

The new church is looking great! They have started putting up the forms to pour in the bond beams tomorrow. Darrell Hardy who is the V.P. of Latin America Maranatha was at the work site today looking over the building and commenting on what a nice job we are doing.

At the children’s program tonight little Christian Miller requested that Kim show the Elijah video for tonight. He said he had already seen it with his friend and it was great. The video did keep almost every child entranced with the exception of one little 5 year old dark eyed beauty. She kept coming back to Kim B. to sit on her lap and get hugged up, talking to her the entire time in her sweet little baby Spanish. Bonds are being made here that will last through out eternity.

Today the medical team treated 125 patients, the dental team treated 34 and the optical team fit 129 people with glasses.

Hold tight my fellow laborer in Christ, we are almost home. If you look carefully you will see Jesus at the finish line waving us on!

Smiles from Chile, Jennifer Young, Mission Reporter