Baptisms

What a great day! We had 135 in church and then a big crowd went to the beach for baptisms. Nine believers made the first step of discipleship, following the example of the Lord Jesus. This is always very exciting for me personally and for our church family generally. The group included a young married couple, four people from one family, a couple of boys, two teenaged girls, and two men for whom we have been praying for quite some time. Each one gave a clear statement of faith in Christ and shared a few words of testimony, encouragement to others, or gratitude to the Lord and those who have helped them come this far.

Baby Dedication

Our church is blessed with a lot of wonderful children and some good folks to work with them. The Pazos family is very involved in all of our church ministries and have been especially gifted in working with children. A couple of weeks ago they made a family commitment in the dedication of their infant son Christian. Cecilia is one of the leaders of our Sunday School ministry. She not only teaches, but also coordinates the other teachers and administers the materials and supplies. Javier is a very capable teacher of both children and adults. He is part of the administrative team of the church and serves in the Travesía outreach ministry. We are very thankful for this family, as well as the many other families that have made our church in Manta such a wonderful aspect of our work in Ecuador.

Construction Continues

We are not yet finished working on the first floor of the educational building, but with attendance well over 100 each Sunday, we already need to add space. You can see that work on the sidewalk is underway. Also a temporary metal roof is being built on the second floor. We will add perimeter walls to that area to make a larger meeting place for services. We should be able to seat around 135 in that area as opposed to the capacity of 90 in the classroom area we are now using. We will also have more room for children's classes since all of the first floor classroom space will be available for the kids. We should then have total capacity of 180 to 200. This is Stage 1.5 of the building project.

Leadership Team

We are grateful for the servant-leaders that God is raising up in the church in Manta. They have done an amazing job during the four months of our absence, and the church has grown because of it. Our first Sunday back they arranged to take Joy, Teddy and I out for a Chinese dinner. How generous! We took pictures. From the top down: you know who we are, Javier and Cecilia with their two children, Juan and Barbara (their kids are grown), Alfredo and Wilda (their children are adults), Darwin and Jessica and their daughter, Luis and Melanea with their son. One family was out of town, David and Monica, and they have three children. Please pray for these families.

First Sunday Back

November 8 was our first Sunday back in Manta! On Saturday, the ladies held a surprise birthday and welcome home party for Joy. It was great to see all the ladies express their appreciation for Joy's ministry and friendship. We also got to see some of the new babies!
On Sunday there were over 100 people in attendance. One of the children's classes made a welcome sign: bienvenidos. The letters are a little bit out of order. One of the faithful women of the church was able to bring her husband to church for the very first time and they asked if we would present their baby daughter and pray for God's blessing on her life as we do for all of the children. This gives us a wonderful opportunity to witness about the necessity of parents knowing the Lord and teaching his ways to their children from an early age. Please pray for this father's salvation!

Back "Home"

Joy, Teddy, and I returned to Manta yesterday afternoon! We are very happy to be back at home. There is a lot to do, and we are excited about the next steps in this ministry. We are looking forward to Sunday, our first Sunday back at our church after four months away. We also have meetings Saturday: Joy with the ladies fellowship, and Tony with the deacons-in-training. We have already been hearing about all that has been accomplished, and we look forward to sharing ideas for the future. We are excited about a couple of Christmas projects we have in mind to help local Christian foundations that work with street kids and orphans. We will keep you posted. Please keep praying for us.