Home | About | Publications | Gallery
|
|
Home | About | Publications | Gallery |
|
|
|
|
We have known Chilean winters colder and wetter than this one, but we are still happy that Spring is fast approaching. We have temperatures at night of 33 or 34 degrees and 60 degrees in the daytime. This may not sound too hard to take, but it is cold for us, especially at night and in the morning, due to poor construction, combined with a lack of insulation and central heat. The weather did cooperate well during our hosting of "U.S.ers" this year. Thank you for praying for interns, Becky Bomberger and Evi Dallman (who were here during June and July) and for the visits of three supporting churches - the Church of Christ in St. Joseph, IL, youth group of Grove Park Christian Church in Lakeland, FL and youth group of Deer Creek Christian Church in University Park, IL. Prayers DO make a difference!
At the end of all such experiences, we spend time evaluating and fine-tuning both our approach and the carrying out of the myriad of details associated with others being here. This year’s hosting of interns and churches went very well, but we always learn something valuable to carry into the next opportunity. We give the Lord thanks for each and every person that spent time with us this year and pray that each has left Chile knowing that God had a hand in every aspect of their Chilean encounter. Suffice it to say that everyone was impacted at least as much as the impact their presence made on others. As always, such "God-given" experiences always carry with them a potential far greater the experience itself.
Intern Highlights
Becky and Evi ended their time in Chile the first week of August. During their two months with us, they did many things, including:
living with a Chilean family
helping with many of our ministries, activities and outreaches
learning more Spanish
learning more about Chile and its culture
participating in weekly devotions - one in Spanish and two in English
helping in many ways during the visits of the U.S. churches
traveling to northern Chile and into Peru to experience other church works
making new friends
getting to know themselves better through the experience as a whole
Real missionary life is about steadiness and heart in the face of constant change and challenges. It is also a lot different in practice than in theory and both girls did very well!
We also enjoyed laughs during our visit to Arica in northern Chile. The five of us (Becky, Evi, Katie, James and Jack) planned an authentic, typical July 4th meal. We let Anita, our hostess, know ahead of time and she was all too happy to leave the cooking and planning to us. The menu consisted of potato salad, fresh fruit salad, barbecued hamburgers, hotdogs, corn on the cob, lemonade and yes, even hot apple pie with ice cream. The pie, by itself, made the whole experience VERY worthwhile. In buying ingredients as a "committee" (I, Jack, take full responsibility for this) we ended up with way too much food. Thus, we could have fed a whole neighborhood of people with all the potato salad alone and had to seriously "urge" those that came to take home leftovers. In terms of the purpose of the trip, though, our expectations were more than met through our exposure to working and cultural conditions very distinct to those in Santiago.
Church Group Highlights
In June, July and August, we were visited by three different church groups. They came to Chile with great expectations and attitudes, which stretched their comfort zones and extended themselves to others. All three groups were housed at the ministry site. They all worked hard, accomplished a variety of jobs, tried new foods, ate in Chilean homes and enjoyed one day outside of Santiago. All three were changed as a result. Here are descriptions of the groups that came:
The Christian Church of St. Joseph (St. Joseph, IL) sanded, painted, varnished, installed Styrofoam insulation, worked with the ministry outreaches, preached and taught. They also went to a Chilean school, saw Chile’s coast, the main shipping port and went souvenir shopping and sightseeing in Santiago in the rain.
Grove Park Christian Church (Lakeland, FL) lead a three-day Vacation Bible School during the schools’ two-week winter break, painted a fantastic mural on the large wall of our main meeting room ("salon"), played basketball and volleyball and went on a on-day ski trip.
Deer Creek Christian Church (University Park, IL) carried out a three-day VBS during their week with us, in addition to connecting in much of the same way to work and ministry opportunities (they accomplished A LOT of sanding up on scaffolding) and went to the coast and port, as well. They also did a special "puppet" workshop and incorporated puppets into their presentations.
QUESTION: When can you plan YOUR trip to Chile to experience first-hand what you support in prayer and with finances?? Aside from furlough time in the U.S. and one year of language school in Costa Rica, we have now served the Lord ten full years here. PTL! Our schedule is WIDE OPEN for the first half of 2006 (through July).
Please enjoy some of the photos we have taken by going to our Photo Gallery.
Our New Email Addresses
As you know, our new church plant in Chile is called La Iglesia Cristiana "Jesús Es EL CAMINO". In English, that translates as "The Jesus Is THE WAY Christian Church". We created two new Email addresses that can be more easily remembered and related to our work here:
To contact us in English. JesusIsTheWay@ChileMission.org To contact us in Spanish (especially for our Chilean contacts) JesusEsElCamino@ChileMission.org Both of these addresses are "live" and available for immediate use. Although the previous DCCCChileMission@hotmail.com address will still work, we encourage you to use the new ones shown above. We will also be using the new address from now on for sending messages. Thanks for taking the time to make this change.
Ministry Developments
CHURCH SERVICE: Approximately thirty people now attend our Sunday morning church service, with over twenty children and adults in Sunday School. As a church, we have recently purchased fifty good-quality chairs and help pay for utilities at the site. We recently completed a three-week sermon series on tithing, inside of a larger focus on stewardship and blessings. In Sunday School, the adults are now completing the learning of an evangelism tool entitled "Pacto de Paz" (Peace Treaty), so that all can have materials and be equipped to share Jesus with others. Our testimonies and love are opening up opportunities to talk with those around us. Every one of us needs to be able to know what to say, when that moment arrives and even look for opportunities to do so.
ADOLESCENTS (TEENS): Our teen group continues to grow, with the Lord’s blessing of our efforts to reach and attract them. As we have mentioned before, the key (as with adults as well) is teens inviting teens, combined with an atmosphere and content that makes contact. Our highest attendance was one week ago, when nineteen showed up.
This weekend, Jayme, Janine, Katie and Luis are going to an annual South American youth leaders conference just over the border in Mendoza, Argentina. Our other adult leader, Gonzalo, can’t go due to having to work. We are serious about children and youth, as statistics show that the vast majority of Christians accept Christ before eighteen years of age.
NEW men's GROUP: We have been blessed in the church with eleven men members and have become aware of the need for men to serve, support each other, do projects together and continue to grow in the Lord. If we are not growing, neither will our families. Twice we have gone out on Saturdays to do service projects for others and it gave us all great satisfaction that could not be attained by other means. It lends credence to what one author wrote, when he said that women form relationships face to face, but men form relationships shoulder to shoulder (thanks to Bob Grove for that one).
The Men's Group meets every Wednesday evening, where we are growing through a conversational study of a book by Jim George, entitled, La Influencia de un Hombre de Dios (The Influence of a Man of God). Several of our members have never been Men of God before, let alone men of influence. Members of the group take turns in coordinating the study. Each member also has the same maximum value as the others and the same source of strength - God Himself. Another key component of our time together is our time of sharing the personal challenges we’ve had during the week, along with answers to prayer and victories. The idea is to be real and honest with each other, but in addition to the support that the meeting provides, men are learning how to stay in contact with each other during the week. It’s not enough to have just our families for support - we, as men, also need each other.
So far, in the short time we’ve been meeting (we started in July), everyone is encouraged and we are in the process of forming our Vision Statement, our name as a group and a Bible verse that we feel best defines our purpose and identity. Every fifth Wednesday is a special night in which we have games, a barbecue or other type of relaxation together. We will continue doing one special service project per month.
Ministry Team Changes
Richard and Paula have opted not be a part of the ministry board of directors at this time. However, they will continue to be active members of the church, with Richard coordinating the the young adults and music praise team and Paula coordinating the Saturday afternoon children’s outreach and activities.
We have also begun a monthly ministry coordinator meeting, where we can plan forward, give support and encouragement and keep ministries on track within the main focuses and vision of the church. We have a big emphasis on evangelism, maintaining a welcoming, growth-oriented atmosphere and on persons coming to the point of making a commitment to Jesus and being baptized in Him and then connecting to his kingdom work. All teachers and leaders are encouraged to attend this meeting.
Construction
In this month’s Recent Photos (Click here: Construction Updates), we have included pictures of the finished interior of Humberto’s new house on the ministry site. The kitchen is still under final development, with cabinets being made and installed by our worker, Juan. He sure does a good job of every construction-oriented task we give him! Good progress continues to be made on the other half of that duplex and we still hope to have it almost completed by year-end. Then, we will be demolishing the small adobe house and start-up of the other duplex at the front of our site. Does anyone want to come down in November or at the first of next year to help? We’re in summer then and the weather is fantastic (even better than going to Florida) and we don’t have mosquitoes here!
We are grateful to Humberto and pleased to share with you that he successfully underwent two operations this year to insert lens implants in both eyes. He has a detached retina condition, with very poor vision, requiring him to wear expensive special contacts, without which he was worse than legally blind - especially and certainly diminishing his ability to respond to problems at night at the ministry site. Both surgeries were a decisive success, eliminating the need for contacts, reducing the likelihood of eye infection and leaving him with better vision than even the surgeon thought possible.
These surgeries would not have been possible without the generous help of four churches and their members, who together contributed the $4,000 necessary. Thank you Lord for churches that continue to live and act in the encouragement and writings of the Apostle Paul!
Special Prayer Need
Those of you who have visited Chile know Carlos W. He is a married, middle-aged man who lives in our neighborhood and who has always been open and friendly with all of our visitors. He and his wife have four children, the youngest of which is thirteen. Carlos is a sign painter by trade, primarily making his living painting numbers on buses and painting all types of signs as well. This year he got into trouble making license plates (which is illegal), not knowing that some of those plates were used on stolen cars. He spent some months in jail and is now free again.
Early in 2004, he received a donated computerized machine to use for his business. This machine was confiscated when Carlos was arrested early this year and he is, at this point, still unable to take the initiative, without Jack’s help, to investigate its possible return. In the meantime he has been half-heartedly trying to work and is now helping his brother-in-law, who makes lamps and furniture out of wood.
More than the matter of the machine, Carlos is also struggling because he has never followed up in his role as a father. He has low self-esteem and has lost the respect of his youngest son. The bright spots are his friendship with us and his participation in our English Club with his son. He has participated twice in the new men's Group, which has, in turn, been praying for him. Some of us have been to his house and shop talking with him and with his wife and son. Still, he goes forward very confused and can’t quite open up and make a decision to let the Lord work in his life. His family is strongly Roman Catholic by tradition and, more than anything, we have been encouraging him to search for a real Jesus, who is the only one that can help him find the strength, value and path that he now lacks.
We continue as friends and while he respects what he sees in all of us in the church, he remains closed. Please pray for his heart and mind to be opened and for the scales that cover his eyes to fall away. As far as we know, his family is not against his participating in and attending our services. We in the church were the ones who came to their aid with food and with some needed funds in their time of need and who visited him in jail. Pray against his real shackles - confusion, discouragement, hesitation and his knowledge of a disappointing past. He considers himself a failure. Pray for our effectiveness in being able to penetrate his darkness with the light of Jesus. Thank you all for your faithfulness in this effort!
On A Humorous Note
Lastly, included in the photos that accompany this newsnote is a photo of Janine next to the poster picture of the woman candidate for president of Chile. She is the socialist party’s candidate and elections will be held late this year. (Chile’s current president, Ricardo Lagos, is from the same party.) The candidate’s name is Michele Bachelet and she and Janine could be twins, appearance-wise. It’s funny, because sometimes when we’re out, someone will exclaim, "Michele Bachelet!" It’s just good that Michele has a good public image - ha ha. At this time, she is the front-runner in all the polls.
In closing, as always, we’re happy to be able to be in communication with each of you and thank you for your continued prayers on our behalf and for the church and its work. This will be the seventh year in a row that we have had a booth at the National Missionary Convention and this year will be Janine’s turn to represent us there in Atlanta, November 17 through 20. Both Katie and James will also be there as part of each of their times in the States to raise prayer and financial support before returning to Chile in January. Each is making valuable contributions to the work of the team. They are looking for churches and individuals to contact and visit between mid-October and mid-January. If you are interested in supporting James and/or Katie, please Email us and we can discuss these possibilities.
Katie Hayden Katie@ChileMission.org James Coons James@ChileMission.org Jack Swanson Jack@ChileMission.org Janine Swanson Janine@ChileMission.org
James and Katie have their own individual newsletters. You can view them (as well as all of our past newsletters) by going to our Publications Page or by clicking on one of the links:
God bless you all!!
Love, in a church-planting, church-leading, one true God,
Jack and Janine and the Chile Mission Team
Swanson's News Notes | Katie's Korner | James' Journals | Other Publications
