This Sunday

Theme for 2010

"The whole Bible. The whole church. The whole year." That's our theme for 2010. We have started a new Bible reading program to motivate the church to read the Bible daily. Besides a calendar of readings for the year, we are providing a weekly devotional guide to help everyone understand what they are reading. Some will read the entire Bible this year, others the New Testament, and a few will read through the Gospels for the very first time. We are excited about what 2010 holds in store. Pray for us as we follow through and reach our goals.

Christmas Sunday

December 20th was a big day for our church, the first Sunday that we were able to use the space on the second floor of the building. It was awesome! Besides enjoying all of the space for our Sunday morning service, we had an evening Christmas party with food, fun, and fellowship. The cooks and servers did a great job with grilled meat, rice, salad, bananas, and cupcakes. At least 170 people showed up to eat. What joy to be able to serve so many!

More Space

Our increasing attendance on Sunday mornings means that we need more classroom space for children and more general meeting space. We are building a temporary auditorium on the second floor of the educational building. This space will eventually be used for three classrooms. Using this area for general church services will open up two more classroom areas downstairs for use by the Sunday School. We are grateful that the Lord has provided what we need for these spaces and we believe that he will provide what we need to finish them out properly. Our constant numerical growth is a wonderful blessing and a challenge.
The man who pushes the ice cream wagon arrives each Sunday around the end of the service. He does a brisk business as people hang around after church and visit.

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.