PRAYER REQUESTS

• Please pray for Frontline Missions family and specifically for the Winter family. Earlier this month Alan Winter, our friend, boss, and co-founder of Frontline Missions with his wife Heidi, went home to be with Lord after suffering a stroke on the way to Colombia and complications from surgeries related to that stroke. It has been and will continue to be a challenging time for all of us to adjust to his absence. We rejoice in that we know without a doubt where he is, and that all of us who are Christ followers have the promise of seeing him again when we are called home to be in the presence of the Lord. Although Jean and I don’t know the specifics we are very happy to report that the organization and mission will continue, that we will all do our best to carry on the rich legacy of love and service that Alan left here for us.

• Please pray for our next two teams coming down. One team arrives on March 31^st and the other team arrives on April 2^nd. It has been a little challenging making arrangements for two teams to be here at the same time but God has been making the way. Also, please pray that everything goes smoothly for us and both teams as we will be serving in many different locations and doing a variety of activities.

• Please pray for a young man named Ruben whom we met in Mezcalillo last week. Ruben was shot last October and is paralyzed from the shoulders down. The doctors said that with some physical therapy he has a chance to regain some mobility but at this point we really don’t know what that means exactly. He also has a pretty bad skin ulcer on his backside from being in bed all of the time. His sister and other family members are doing the best they can to take care of him but it is hard with very limited resources. Please pray for them too. Ruben has not been outside of his room since the end of October 2016. We are searching for an affordable wheelchair so that he can sit up and get outside onto his porch for some sunlight and fresh air. We are also trying to figure out if we can help him with some physical therapy. Please pray for God’s favor to go ahead of Ruben and us as we explore how to get him the equipment and treatment that he needs.

• Please pray for our shipment of goods from the U.S. to arrive soon and in good condition. We knew it would not be a speedy process but we would like to get not only our stuff, but also all of the materials that have been donated for us to distribute here. Also please pray for the goods to arrive at a time that we can go pick them up. The logistics will be a little challenging anyway but even more so if we are hosting a team at the same time. Praise God that we can always trust him with timing.

• Please pray for the family of Gloria Marina. She and her family live in Mezcalillo and they were the first family of Christ followers we found there in January 2016. They are facing some very difficult personal situations right now, and the religious leaders in Mezcalillo are putting a lot of pressure on her to not associate with the evangelicals or do anything to help the new church get started. See below for a praise regarding this situation.

• Please continue to pray for Arcamón. We’ve been doing outreach here since January 2016 and the work continues to be very difficult. People’s hearts are hard and they don’t want to hear about Jesus. We are encouraged because there was a time long ago when La Campa was like that too. See below for a praise regarding this situation.

• Arcamón continued-please pray for the family of Oliverio. We first met him in January 2016 on the day he had a bad construction accident. We took him home from the medical clinic and have visited with him and his family several times since then. They are a very friendly family and we always enjoy our time with them. Pray that they are the family who will help us establish the evangelical church in Arcamón one day.

• Please pray for two more communities we’ve learned of with no evangelical church or outreach taking place, Nuevo Cedros (we visited briefly last year), and Poso Verde. Since Nuevo Cedros is very close to evangelical churches in two other communities it does not seem likely that we will pursue starting a church there but we still need to learn more and pray more about Poso Verde.

• Please continue to pray for San Cristobal; the work has been restarted and we are beginning to see some fruit. Please pray for the church to grow, that the Holy Spirit will move mightily, and that more people will choose to follow Jesus.

• Please pray for wisdom as we share, and for people to be receptive to the message of love, forgiveness, and salvation available through Jesus Christ.

• Please pray against a spirit of fear that controls a lot of people we meet. Many people hear the truth and know they need to make a change but they are afraid for lots of different reasons. The reasons aren’t that important, just that they find courage and strength to not be scared or intimidated by others.

• Please pray for the continued encouragement from our friends and family in the states. It is amazing what a blessing it is to receive even a short note from loved ones.

• Please pray for wisdom and finances regarding our truck. The repair bills are mounting rapidly and the amount of lost time spent in Santa Rosa waiting for repairs are taking their toll on us. Not to mention the value and necessity of simply having a reliable vehicle for ourselves and our teams. God has been so good to protect us and work out the timing on the breakdowns so that teams have not been affected (except once last year) but we really need to know how to proceed. Should we keep fixing this one or get rid of it? Should we keep it to use in the mountains and for hauling construction materials and buy another one for teams and non mountain road driving? Do we really have the money to buy another truck in the first place? Is another truck a want or a need right now??

• Please continue to pray for us to have wisdom and discernment to know what projects and ministries the Lord wants us to participate in and which ones we should leave alone. There are so many opportunities that it can be overwhelming trying to know how to choose. This is still an important request since we have more projects than we have resources for at the moment.

• Please pray specifically for two projects we are very interested in starting in La Campa in partnership with Pastor Emilio\Torre Fuerte. They involve medical and education-details will be shared as they develop.

• Please pray as the Spirit leads for the following pastors, their families, and the churches represented: Pastor Wilmer (San Pedro Sula), Pastor Emilio (La Campa), Pastor Jose Maria (Santa Teresa), Pastor Arturo (Gracias), Pastor Samuel (Mataras), Pastor Roberto (Gracias), Pastor Modesto (Gracias), Pastor Marco Tulio (Cruz Alta), Pastor Amilcar (Monqueta), Pastor Rosita (Gilguarapez), Pastor Jorge (Caiquin) and Pastor Marco Antonio (Olominas), Pastor Walterio Cruz (Tegucigalpa), and Pastor Arnoldo (Coalaca).

• Finances (see praise below). Please pray for our financial support to continue coming in strongly and consistently.

• Please pray for our personal prayer lives to grow stronger and stronger. We can run around and do a lot of things, but without prayer we will not bear lasting spiritual fruit.

• Please pray that we don’t neglect to maintain our relationships in the midst of doing ministry, the most important one being with our Lord, then with each other, then with our friends and family, while we continue to establish ourselves and our ministry in Honduras.

• Please pray for our faith to stay strong, and grow even stronger, for continued protection from spiritual attack, and for strength when the attacks do come.

• Please pray for us to be bold and courageous, to not miss any opportunities to glorify God, and to draw people closer to Jesus.

PRAISES

We have lots of praises this month to share with you!

• Praise God for the successful installation of two water purification systems-one in La Campa and the other in Mataras. The churches in these communities are working to get the word out that there is now a very, very affordable source of pure, healthy water available to them.

• Praise God for all of the great teams who have come to serve with us already this year. The amount of lives that have been touched and all of the great ministry that has been done are too much to write about here.

• Praise God for the two new churches under construction right now in Mezcalillo and Mataras de Caiquin.

• Praise God for all of the teams that have committed to coming to serve in Honduras later this year, more details to follow.

• Praise God for a peaceful celebration at the annual festival in La Campa last February. There was a lot of people, extra noise, traffic, and garbage in the streets, but all in all it was very peaceful compared to previous years.

• Praise God for a great and refreshing time at the HFMM conference in Siguatepeque in February. This is a great organization and we are thankful to be members of this group.

• Earlier this month while our team from KY was here one of the ministry activities we did together was to show a movie about the life of Jesus in several communities. The day we were scheduled to show this movie in Mezcalillo, at the home of Gloria Marina, we learned that she had received a letter from the local religious leader telling her not to show this movie. Praise God for her courage to stand firm and allow the movie to be shown. There were about 70 people from the community who came to see the movie that night so many seeds were planted. Praise God for her courage to also host a medical clinic in her home that same week, and for the courage of her three sons to work alongside of us to build the evangelical church in Mezcalillo.

• Even though the work is difficult in Arcamón we have reasons to praise God. First, we praise Him for the fact that it is difficult. The difficulties prove to us that we are doing what we are supposed to be doing there. Second, we praise him for the good relationships we have with a few families, including Oliverio, in Arcamón. Third, we praise Him for the good relations we have with the director and teachers of the school in Arcamón. We have an open door to bring our teams into the school to teach the kids as often as possible.

• Praise God for the continuing increase in our language skills. We both still have so much to learn, but at the same time more and more people are complimenting us on our advances.

• Praise God for the donations we have received for several different construction projects. We are not a construction ministry per se but construction does have its place and we are grateful for three for sure, and maybe four, new churches and two new Sunday school classrooms and small kitchens at two of our existing churches that will go up this year.

• We continue to receive encouragement from so many of our friends, praise God for the encouragement from our brothers and sisters in Christ.

• Praise God for His continued faithfulness to provide for our needs through our friends and partner churches that faithfully and generously support our ministry.

• Praise God for the great friends He has brought into our lives in La Campa, San Pedro Sula, and El Progreso. We are especially thankful for Pastor Emilio and his family, the Perez family, Pastor Jorge and his family, Pastor Wilmer and his family, and Tony, Juanita, and Rommel-our Hotel Plaza Victoria family in El Progreso.

• Praise God for all of our prayer supporters because we can’t do what we do effectively without the prayer support of all of you.

From L to R, Pastor Mark Payton, me, and Pastor Jorge, on the construction site of the new church in Mataras de Caiquin.

Brandon and Annmarie playing with the kids during the medical clinic in Arcamón.

Pastor Rick Lucas with a new little friend in Coalaca. Amazing how kids always know how to find the grandpa when they have an “owie”.

Jean and Lucy presenting our Honduran cooks with their signed aprons. These three women learned how to cook American food and did an amazing job taking care of the KY team for 3 weeks.