http://carlosulatecostarica.blogspot.com/p/statistics.html
Sorry for the lack of data in some of the weeks.
Enlargement and remodeling of the auditorium were completed. The church has enough room for Sunday morning services. It really makes a difference in comfort. Two new Sunday School classrooms were set up and finished in the area where the resident family used to live (This family moved back to Nicaragua). I will be posting pictures of the auditorium very soon.
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| Rebeca Ulate in the Babies Class |
Responsibilities are being fulfilled by the different people in charge —Roberto Ulate coordinates the worship services, Norberto Ross coordinates the song leaders, Daniel Delgado is the treasurer, Luis Montero is in charge of facilities, Andrés Delgado leads the Youth Group, Damaris García leads the Ladies on Thursday morning, Roxana Ulate is the Sunday School director. I am still in charge of coordinating the preaching, and the Support Group for Men. Andrés Hernández is now the chairman of the Business Meetings (technically I am now under their direction).
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| Jéssica and Fátima |
By the way, Fátima's husband is Ismael Álvarez, a 34 year old Nicaraguan immigrant. He has developed to become someone who can do the preaching on Sunday morning. God has blessed him with public speaking talents. He is also very faithful and attends all activities. He is part of the group of men the church can count on for leadership and teaching.
God has used the Support Group for Men to provide us with men that we can count on. There are 6 men who have become loyal to the group. They are truly growing spiritually, and they are learning to help other men. When they go to other men, to try to restore them, they have the Scriptures and a powerful testimony of their own, about how much the Lord has turned them around.
We have learned to appreciate the fact that many men are hurting because they are losing or have lost their families. The reason for this loss is common —somewhere they lost their leadership or never developed leadership as a result of not having been faithful to the Lord. Somehow, they hadn't learned to see God as the Father He truly is. If one is not convinced deep in his heart that he is truly a child of God, he needs to find ways to keep his self-esteem high. Usually these ways of keeping his self-esteem high end up hurting others, especially his wife and children, by neglecting them and not learning to love them in a way that meet their needs, or by becoming abusive and difficult to bear with. The wife and the children get tired of such a husband or father, and then he doesn't know what to do to recover their love and respect. This reaction from the family usually worsen his behaviour and attitudes, and then they are bound to become a broken home. In some of the cases we have worked with, the man is already starting a new home with another woman with children, and the pattern is about to be repeated. This is where the Lord is using us to be His instruments to bring hope and healing to men who then can be used to help other men. The Lord has led us to experience the blessings of growing in our sonship, and appreciating His Fatherhood. This is what the Gospel is supposed to produce. This is what salvation is supposed to be. We usually tell men that the Lord wants to save us from ourselves.
What about the women? Well, most of the women in the Thursday morning group have lost their husbands or live with husbands who are not members of the church. So they help one another with prayer and Bible study to be able to cope with their circumstances. They have been doing this longer than the men, so they are ahead of us in their growth and have healed from their wounds. Little by little they have brought other women around. Eunice, Griselda, and Lucy are names I can remember.
May the Lord continue to help us with this ministry. The people at Bammel who are supporting this work can rest assured that the Lord is using them to bring blessings to the lives of many people in Costa Rica.
