Article submitted by Randy & Brenda Purcell, Country Directors in Guatemala
Encounter Church
In our last letter we said that we would update you with “before” and “after” pictures of the home of the single woman in our Guatemalan church who has 5 children and lives in rough conditions. Thanks to the team from Encounter Church in Louisville, Kentucky, they were able to install an indoor toilet and privacy walls, along with a new roof to keep the rain & wind out!
Pastor Michael Boehm also was the speaker for our pastors/pastors’ wives special event. The team was a huge asset in helping us serve the food to the 70 pastors and their wives! A big thank you to those that helped with purchasing Christmas gifts for the pastors and their families and for the donations for the food this special lunch!
In our last letter we shared that we had a special donation from a Guatemalan organization of Christmas gifts for the children in the feeding centers. We had over 800 gifts given, which was a huge blessing, but we have over 1000 children in the centers! Because the Encounter team had the foresight to bring gifts (that were donated by a dollar store in their area), ALL of the children were able to receive gifts!
This team also blessed another single woman with 4 children in our church with an offering to help with her living conditions, as she lives without water and electricity.
Automotive Team
After the Encounter team, we only had one week to get ready for the diagnostic guys that come a few days before the automotive team comes! There is much preparation for Randy in having this team, as he needs to talk to each pastor and get all sorts of automobile information. Because once the team comes, the cars that need work have to be at the mission house and all of the parts have to have been ordered. We are extremely thankful for our co-workers, Ruth and Gilberto Noriega, who came down to help feed these men! The Noriegas were one of the recipients of much needed repairs on their car as well!
We were thankful for a young Guatemalan man named Franck who is a mechanic and teacher, who was excited to spend his days off to work with the men! One of the young musicians that Randy works with also spent his day up at the house doing whatever the men needed done! What a blessing to have these relationships with people who want to be a part of the vision that the Lord has laid on all of our hearts and to serve in any capacity!
The first 3 days we host 2 men that check out all of the cars and then they call stateside for the other guys to order and bring the parts down for the American-made vehicles. For all the other cars, Randy and a Guatemalan mechanic friend of ours do most of the running around for parts here. The Summit Church in Kernersville, North Carolina is the home church for this team and they purchased all of the parts for the 24 vehicles that they worked on! What a blessing to have them partner with us! Please pray that the Lord will bless these men, their families and The Summit Church for their faithfulness to advance the Gospel in this way!