Guatemala Update
February 1, 2008

God has blessed the ministry in Guatemala with great advancement in the past couple months. Your prayer and financial support has been an integral part of this advancement. Thank you so very much!

After four months of living and serving in Guatemala we have finally seen our prayers answered with the official inauguration of Iglesia Bautista Vida Nueva, Guatemala in one physical location for corporate worship on Sunday mornings.

God gave us the amazing privilege to pastor two small groups during the past four months. One group has met in Santa Catarina Pinula, another in our home on the “Road to El Salvador”. Each of these groups has averaged 8 adults. We have had the joy of caring for these folks, counseling them through all their problems and most importantly instructing them in the Word of God both in group and individual settings.

This photo to the left was taken recently of the group in Santa Catarina Pinula. This photo to the right was taken recently of the group on the “Road to El Salvador”.

During the final days of 2007 we learned that God had provided the funds for us to be able to rent a place so that we could form one congregation. The search began…at first, we believed renting a space at a local mall, Pradera Concepcion, would be the best option, but this option turned out to be only accessible to the folks who live on the Road to El Salvador. Then the Lord guided us to an area called “El Obelisco” located at the end of Boulevard Los Proceres. “El Obelisco” has the unique characteristic of being the convergence point of 14 of the 21 zones the capital city is divided into. This would have given us the opportunity to have a church available to this city of 5 million inhabitants.

Our hopes were to find a place available for rent on Sundays, the more we looked the harder this became. Most owners rent on a permanent basis, not by the day or hour. Most every place we looked at was offered to us as “all or nothing”. Then, just as we were to throw in the towel, God led us to the Westin Camino Real Hotel, located in Zone 10, just one block from El Obelisco. This hotel offered us the use of 2 large meeting rooms for three hours every Sunday morning (one for adults and one for the kids) at a very accessible price and within our budget. We are convinced that God provided this place to us at a crucial time.

January 20, 2008 was marked on our calendars as Inauguration day. From this day forward, it will be recognized and celebrated as our anniversary. On this day we were blessed to receive a very helpful and supportive group of 15 members of Iglesia Bautista Vida Nueva, San Salvador. They came to literally “branch out” with us. We all arrived to the hotel as early as we could to get everything set up and to receive all the invited folks.