Central American Adventure: Salvation, Loss, and Celebration

Some days in missions are a continual celebration of the things that the Lord has done. But for every day of feasting, there have been countless days of trial and perseverance. Just like Paul told Timothy, “The hardworking farmer should be the first to receive a share of the crops.”

We have been called to persevere through both days of trial and days of overflowing joy so that we can enjoy a full harvest, and this trip to Central America has seen both of these types of days.

Edwin

Our first full day of ministry in El Salvador, we traveled to the headquarters for the national agency in charge of all the orphanages throughout the country in order to track down the orphans we have come to know and love, since many of them have been moved. While speaking with the director of the organization, she mentioned a troubled youth named Edwin who had been in and out of psychiatric hospitals, and had been placed in a specialized room where he was restrained from hurting himself and others.

This piqued our interest. Jesus always went to the downtrodden and heavy laden.

The next day, when we traveled to the nearby orphanage, we immediately sought to befriend him, greeting him immediately as a friend. Because the officials at the orphanage have tightened their grip on the children, only five of the children were available for us to minister to. So each orphan had a entire group caring for them and speaking words of truth to them.

Two of our team members pulled Edwin aside and began to speak the gospel to him. And as they did, God opened his heart to respond, and the tears began to flow. After we finished sharing, he gripped the Bible, kissing and caressing it, and requesting that he could have it (though he was illiterate). The change in him was incredible. He embraced us over and over and over throughout the rest of the visit.

Unfortunately, we soon found out that the heads of the orphanage, who hate our work and have a reputation for cruelty, took the Bible from him, something he reacted extremely poorly to, and resulted him in being returned to yet another mental hospital. This news hit us like a brick.

We are in the process of trying to get him to be able to visit La Esperanza for an extended period of time along with another one of the orphans. But in the meanwhile, please pray for him, and pray that God would have mercy and change the hearts of the leaders of the orphanage who continue to oppress those under their charge, locking them up like a prison and showing them no compassion.

UPDATE: We spoke with the workers at the orphanage (who are friendly and love the children) and they said that as soon as we'd left, Edwin was asking if they too knew Jesus and he begged them to read more of the Bible to him when he returned (they already read Psalm 23 to him). So please continue praying for him.


Playground for the Poor
Several days after the orphanage, we commenced a small construction project to build a soccer / basketball court at the school next door to our building. In all the time we’ve known the teachers, they have only asked us for one thing: a court where the children could play that wouldn’t be on ankle-turning rocky soil. We gladly accepted, bought the supplies, and provided most of the manpower for the short project to be completed.

Meanwhile the teachers allowed us to go into the classrooms and to teach short Bible lessons, which the kids readily enjoyed. Over and over the teachers expressed their appreciation, and let us know one more need; they would love to have someone come and teach both the teachers and the students English for several months so that the children do not fall behind.

Please be praying that God would send someone who is capable of teaching both English and the Scriptures to this poor school and imagine with me for a moment that God uses us to turn this poor country area into a source of brilliant future leaders of the country who have not only been taught well, but who also fear God. Imagine the change that would bring this community!


The Only Help
After completing the construction project in El Salvador, we traveled to Honduras to continue the work there, where we spent the day climbing a local mountain up into a tiny Guatemalan border village, where we ministered the gospel to a crowd of eighty. Teachers from the local school brought their entire class to come and see us. After we had presented, they told us with incredible gratitude that they were grateful for the gifts and supplies we’d brought the children back in December when we’d visited.

They told us that everyone had forgotten them and that we were the only organization who was there to help. They asked us only to continue to meet the needs of the children, pointing out a local child’s shoes, which were almost completely worn to the point of being unusable. If you have the ability, please consider donating shoes, because this is one of the biggest needs we face in El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Nigeria, and wherever else we go. Imagine your children having to walk over mountains and glass strewn roads with threadbare shoes or none at all. So please join us in praying that God will provide for each and every one of these precious ones.



The teachers we spoke with ride a bus an hour every day just to go teach in this tiny mountain village. Yet their primary concern is for the children, not themselves. This is a pattern in the schools we have ministered in. The teachers asked us to remember the poor children, something we are more than willing to do, and it rings of the scriptures, where the leaders of the early church asked Paul to remember the poor. (Galatians 2:10)


Celebration


The next day, under a beautiful blue sky dotted with white wisps of clouds, we sat on the banks of a flowing river, enjoying a beautiful mountain breeze in what is one of the finest moments in missions – baptism.


Two weeks prior, the number to be baptized was eight. The day before the baptism, the number swelled to eighteen. And on the day of baptism, twenty-eight were baptized into the name of Jesus Christ, including one girl who confessed faith that very day. This means that roughly a third of the entire church got baptized.



About a hundred people came from both sides of the river, crossing from the nearby village to participate in the celebration. We sang together, shared a word on baptism, and then started the festivities. And as we continued to baptize, more came forward to proclaim their death to the world and their new life in Christ, including one of the former leaders of a group that is hostile to the gospel.



The young, the aged, the single, and the married all came forward to proclaim their love for Jesus Christ. And on the bank, a man from the nearby village sat down and watched the entire thing, as person after person came forward to the waters of baptism.

Was the entire thing blissful? Not exactly; many of the members of the church, especially the aged, cannot swim and looked about as comfortable in the water as a fish on dry land. They seemed eager to get out as soon as they could, clinging to those doing the baptism with surprisingly catlike reflexes. So humanly, it always doesn’t look pretty, but spiritually it is fantastic.

Each person represents a life changed, a life Jesus has rescued from domestic abuse, from drunkenness, from violence and sexual sin, and most importantly, from the just and righteous wrath of God. Each person has a new hope and new life. Each head that drops in the water is a testament to Christ’s burial along with our sins, and each person that is lifted out of the water is a symbol of Jesus’s resurrection and the new life He provides us.
And so in baptism we proclaim that we are clean; Christ has cleaned us from our sin and we are now free to live for righteousness. So praise God, He is continuing to grow his church in the villages of Honduras and Guatemala. Pray that God would draw those who publically proclaimed Him closer to Himself and that He would help them through any persecution that may come from such a bold declaration.

Joyous days like this only come through careful work and through bold preaching of the gospel to the lost, even at great personal cost. This could be the norm in the United States as well, so pray that we would become bold like our brothers and sisters in Honduras and preach the gospel like they do, that we may too share in the Lord’s harvest.

“Those who sow in tears
shall reap with shouts of joy!
He who goes out weeping,
bearing the seed for sowing,
shall come home with shouts of joy,
bringing his sheaves with him.”
Psalm 126:5,6

In Christ,
- Paul

Confidence in the Son

It’s now been over a month since I got back from Nigeria, and memories from the trip are still flowing strong, reminding me of the great things the Lord did, and is still doing there. I have absolute confidence in the Lord, who continues to work in the hearts of men to bring them to repentance and to transform them into the likeness of His Son.

Imagine that! Those of us who have believed are being transformed into the very image of the Son of God! And we have hope that since He has begun such a work in us, He will finish it. It is with this firm hope that I am able to go to places like Nigeria with absolute certainty that God will work through me.

The Stephen Centre: Joy and Forgiveness

We spent a large portion of the trip ministering among the children of men and women who were killed for their faith in Christ. Everywhere we went, tiny hands grabbed for ours. And we spent our time teaching the love of Christ and the forgiveness of Christ in the classrooms and as we walked and talked with the orphans.

The time in the orphanage was full of powerful teaching and incredible, joyous insanity. We would often go from a time of incredible teaching into a time of celebration or a game. One afternoon, we gave some of the boys an American football, and then were horrified as we watched them play an incredibly violent variant of rugby / football on concrete. As I watched them hurl each other into the pavement, I remember thinking, “They’re going to kill each other!”

Seeing the problem, we quickly rushed in and began to teach them how to play properly (two hand touch!).

By the end of our time we’d formed teams and had a small series of matches, which they enjoyed incredibly. I ended up coaching / quarterbacking for one of the teams. While we were playing, a young man named Yakson walked up and joined our game. The people on my team said, “Oh, he’s fast.”

So, not knowing what to expect, I handed him the ball the next play. He took off like a lightning bolt, dodging and weaving through the defense to score our first touchdown. When it was over, I had to collect my jaw from the floor. They said he was fast, but I’d never seen anyone run like that. If he were in the States… well… watch out college football!

The most meaningful part of our time there was a precious moment where the leaders of the Centre asked us to lead a time of prayer with the orphans. We prayed with the orphans through Romans 12:10-21, especially the verse that says, “Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse.”

With tears streaming down their faces, the children prayed for the people who murdered their parents.

It’s incredible that God would so move that a child would seek to forgive the men who took away those who were most dear to them on this earth. And after that prayer, I received a letter that said, “When my father was killed I swore never to forgive those who killed him, but when my Sunday school teacher told us about how Jesus died for my sins, I forgave them.”

While we were there, twelve of the children confessed Christ as their Savior. Others were excited about the prospect of going out and ministering to the very people groups who had killed their parents.

The gospel is that powerful. It teaches us to forgive and to love as Christ loves us. It utterly transforms us, and that is why I am not ashamed to preach it.

Makoko: Hope for the Hopeless

We continued our ministry to Makoko, a sprawling slum built over a lake that more closely resembles a sewage treatment plant than a lake. Due to malnutrition and disease, the average life expectancy here is twenty-five, the only method of transportation is by boat, the only shelter is a small tin roofed hut, and the average person survives off only $1 a month, but amidst all this hopelessness, the prophecy from Isaiah 9 continues to be fulfilled:

“The people walking in darkness have seen a great light; on those living in the land of deep darkness a light has dawned. You have enlarged the nation and increased their joy;”

As we prepared to leave for the school, a young man named Noah, the school teacher for Makoko, jumped on our boat. Joy literally radiated from his face like I have never seen before. And when he opened his mouth, scripture poured forth as he recounted the promises of God to us.

This reminded me that amidst all the sickness, the disease, and the pain, God is providing these precious ones with hope and joy.

Noah received Christ three years ago and has been preaching the gospel throughout Makoko since that moment. He is now looking forward to the opportunity to serve with us in other locations. When we told him about the next place we were planning on ministering, he began to grow excited: the very people we are planning on ministering to are his original people, and he speaks their language fluently. God’s providence continues to amaze me.

Pray that Noah would get the opportunity to serve powerfully among his people as he has in Makoko.

Otere: God speaks through His Son

The last day of the trip was honestly the day I was looking forward to the most. For some reason, since the beginning of the trip, I felt a strange confidence that God would do amazing things in this village. Up til this point, the gospel had been preached many times, but no one in the history of this place had ever become a follower of Jesus Christ, although they were willing to add Jesus to their list of gods and beliefs.

Jesus is not another belief to be added to a list of good luck charms. He is the only one able to satisfy God’s just wrath and the only one able to satisfy our deepest longings. Because of this, we all resolved to preach on the superiority of Christ and the sufficiency of Christ as He is found in Hebrews 1.

Unfortunately, the night before this was to happen, I became fairly ill, and I’ll spare my readers the details of said illness, but suffice to say, it was unpleasant, and left me lying on the floor aching the next morning. It was five minutes before the team was to leave, and I was considering staying at home, but God gently reminded me that I didn’t want to miss the events of the day.

And somehow, I got up. And not just me, but another member of the team who was suffering even more severely than I was!

We arrived at the village, greeting the chief warmly. And he in turn told us that, “God had sent us” and not to worry for our safety, because, “God was with us.”

After our time with the chief, we got to work, each of us in turn preaching the gospel for two and a half hours. And at the end of that time, eight men stood up and confessed Christ, forsaking all others. And their first question as new believers was this, “When are you coming back to teach us again?”

This is why I have confidence to preach Christ and Christ crucified, and to rely on Him to bring the increase. We did not go to entertain. We did not bribe with gifts or money. We preached Jesus Christ, the One in whom I have absolute confidence. He is the only One who has the power to turn back God’s wrath and to bring us safely through death.

God used our faithfulness and His word to bring eight new brothers into the fold—the first believers ever in the region. And I am overjoyed to the point of tears, even as I type this. These men are even now receiving weekly training in their new faith from our Nigerian brothers who work hard for the gospel.

Know that the God we serve is still, as always, mighty to save.

In the service of Jesus Christ, my Savior, my Hope, and my Confidence,

- Paul

Prayer Requests: Pray that God would encourage our new brothers and sisters in Christ, and that He would continue to grow His church. Pray also that God would raise the funds so that we are able to dig water wells and provide for both the physical and the spiritual needs of the people there. And pray also for me, that I would preach the gospel fearlessly as I should.

If you would like to partner with us or contribute to the ministry, feel free to send a check to:
SOS Ministries,  PO Box 16712,  Clearwater, FL  33766  

Please put the particular project you have in mind in the memo. If you wish to donate to my support, write “Paul W. Support” on the memo.

All donations are tax deductible. Thanks for your prayers and support!

Water of Life

Yesterday we visited the church in Akankan, a village that had never heard the gospel preached prior to our coming two years ago. In a climactic moment in the middle of a thunderstorm in 2010, most of the village professed faith in Christ.

And ever since we started ministering in that village, we have also been attempting to put in a water well to provide clean drinking water, which would be a massive improvement to the current system of drawing water from a fetid pond about a quarter mile away.

But for whatever reason or other, our attempts to drill the well using several different companies have all failed. And as a result, many have left the gatherings, saying that we were unable to provide for them.

When Jesus preached about the four types of seed, he spoke of a kind that only grew up for a moment, but as soon as trouble came, it withered and died. Unfortunately, that appears to be the case for those who came to the faith only expecting that we would provide water. Their interest is in physical things, not spiritual realities.

And yes, drinking water is unbelievably important, and we are still doing everything we can to get the right drilling company out there, but the whole situation reminds me of the woman at the well that Jesus spoke with over 2000 years ago in John 4.

Her concern was physical water, and not having to walk to the well to draw it.
Jesus’s concern for her was for living water, and her finding eternal life.

“… whoever drinks of the water that I will give him will never be thirsty again. The water that I will give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.”

Whoever drinks physical water will be thirsty again. And no matter how healthy that water is, he or she is still going to die. Whoever drinks living water has fellowship with the source of life, God Himself. And the person who drinks living water will never taste death, nor will he ever need anything else to find satisfaction.

This is the message that we preached. That God does not promise physical water. Because although physical water is important, it is also temporary. God is far more concerned with our eternal joy than our temporary happiness.

In reality, God doesn’t promise physical prosperity. He promises trouble in this life, saying:

“Indeed, all who desire to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted.”
and
”In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.”

The promise is not that we will avoid trouble. The promise is that no matter what we go through, we have joy, because we know that we have friendship with God. We not only experience life, we experience it more abundantly and eternally.

And as we preached these things, those who have remained in fellowship were agreeing vehemently. For them, following Christ is the primary joy and the primary aim of life, not a mere water well.

And the amazing thing is, there are now men and women traveling from four different villages to hear the preaching of the word of God every week. These men and women are our dear brothers and sisters, and the reason we have traveled across the Atlantic to brave mosquitos, blazing heat, dangerous roads, and the loss of almost every comfort we have in the states.

It’s worth it for our family that God has redeemed. And it’s worth it for His glory.

As you have time, pray that God will continue to grow and strengthen them.
Pray that God will help us to finally drill a well to serve the whole village.
Pray that God will restore those who have fallen away.
And pray that God will continue to spread His good news of hope and joy throughout the region.

In the service of Jesus Christ,
- Paul

Nigeria Bound

By the grace of God, I am sitting in the Houston airport typing this en-route to Nigeria. I am confident that the Lord is going to use our team for awesome things as He always does.

The church there is hurting from persecution on the outside and from the pain of watching many walk away from the faith. It’s painful, but not surprising. As the Apostle Paul wrote, “We must go through many hardships to enter the kingdom of heaven.” And even Jesus promised us that, “In this world you will have trouble…”

And that would be discouraging if the thought ended there, but Jesus continues: “… but take heart, I have overcome the world.”

I can go with confidence into a hard situation knowing that Jesus has already overcome, and that no matter what, there is victory in Christ Jesus.

That having been said, your prayers are greatly appreciated as we go to serve the poor, the broken, the destitute, the widows, and the orphans. There is great power in the prayer of the righteous.
I hope to report soon on the wonderful things God has done in Nigeria as we preach, teach, admonish, and bring aid to the least of these.

In Christ,
- Paul