Simeon turns 6!!!
Categories: Esther, Family Fun, Simeon, Updates
Tags: Ecuador, Ecuador Info, Family Fun, Simeon, Updates
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Potatoes!!!
Last week, we harvested the potatoes that we have been growing to help fund the home and clinic. It was two days of hard work but it was neat to see the product of 6 months of cultivation. We are in process of selling the harvest now and we are estimating that we will have around a $300 profit. Is there anyone who would like to provide a matching gift to help encourage our efforts toward self-sustainability here in Ecuador? If so, please give here:https://www.santiagopartnership.org/give/
Categories: Cayambe, Ministry, self-sustainability, Updates
Tags: Cayambe, Ecuador, Ministry, self-sustainability, The Santiago Partnership, Updates
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Thank you Canada!
This past week our partners from Canada and the Evangelical Covenant Church of Canada came down to partner with us in ministry once again. This year’s project is building offices for the project as well as a an apartment for medical volunteers. A big thanks to to our Canadian friends!!!!
Categories: 501c3, Clinic, Ministry, Travel, Updates
Tags: 501c3, Canada Conference, Churches, Ecuador, Evangelical Covenant Church, FACE, IPEE, Ministry, The Santiago Partnership, Trips, Updates
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A long-awaited Inauguration
Today at our partner church, Iglesia Emanuel, we held our long-awaited Inauguration/Ribbon-Cutting Ceremony for the Medical Clinic. It was quite the event. People came from all over to be involved. Representatives from IPEE’s Administrative Council and Pastoral Council were there and participated in the events. Many people gave speeches with many words of high praise for those who have been a part of this process to bring the clinic to this point. The event even included some distinct Kichwa traditions for these types of Inauguration ceremonies. The time was concluded with a delicious lunch of roasted pork. It was an incredibly emotional and uplifting day to get to this point in which we are celebrating the opening of the medical clinic that we have been planning and working toward for so many years. Praise God from whom all blessings flow!!!
Categories: 501c3, Cayambe, Clinic, Ministry, Reflections, Travel, Updates
Tags: 501c3, Answered prayers, Cayambe, Churches, Ecuador, Evangelical Covenant Church, FACE, Family Fun, IPEE, Ministry, Reflections, The Santiago Partnership, Travel, Trips, Updates
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Celebrating Kim
This past Thursday Kim turned 37. We had fun celebrating her and her birthday. She started off the day with breakfast in bed, included her favorite German Chocolate Cake and then the festivities ended with a date night for Joel and Kim that included Kim’s all time favorite food Suishi. Happy Birthday Kim!
Asamblea 2016
We recently attended IPEE’s Asamblea 2016. The Asamblea is IPEE’s Annual Meeting which is held every year in January at the church’s campgrounds in Santo Domingo. Joel was there representing FACE with his position on the Board of Directors. Kim held the important position of being the Emergency/ First-Aid personnel for the event.
We always love going to the Asembleas because we love being with our friends at the camp but it also provides us the opportunity to connect and reconnect with pastors/church leaders throughout the denomination from all over the country. The theme for this year’s Asamblea was “Levantemos Juntos Las Redes” or “We lift our nets together.”
Categories: Ministry, Santo Domingo, Travel, Updates
Tags: Ecuador, Evangelical Covenant Church, Friends, IPEE, Ministry, Santo Domingo, The Rocha Family, Travel, Trips, Updates
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A Visit from Times Past
We had the unique and wonderful opportunity to meet and host former Covenant Missionary Marlan Enns. Marlan is 94 and was one of the original Covenant missionaries to open the Ecuadorian field. He planted the Covenant’s first church, Iglesia Betel in Ibarra and he also later planted our church, Iglesia El Salvador in Quito. During his time here with us, he was able to preach at both of these churches as well as the Asamblea, the Annual Meeting for the Covenant Church in Ecuador, and led devotions two times and IPEE headquarters. Quite impressive for a 94 year old! It was a pleasure and a tremendous honor for us to be able to spend this time with Marlan and learn from him and hear the countless stories of missionary work a few years back. Thank you Marlan for being a part of Ecuadorian Covenant History.
Categories: Ministry, Santo Domingo, Travel, Updates
Tags: Ecuador, Ecuador Info, Evangelical Covenant Church, Friends, IPEE, Ministry, Santo Domingo
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WHAT YOU HAVE BEEN WAITING FOR
The pictures you all have been waiting for you! Here are the updates on how the construction of the Home for At Risk children is going. We are lacking about one week’s work with our contractors. How does it look?
Categories: 501c3, Cayambe, Construction, Home, Ministry, Updates
Tags: 501c3, Cayambe, Ecuador, Ministry, The Santiago Partnership, Updates
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Long Time Coming by Jess Delp
(This is a reflection shared by Jess Delp who volunteered with the Santiago Partnership for two weeks in July 2015)
First off, I want to apologize for the embarrassingly late post. Unfortunately a few things came up that had to take priority over writing this; new schools, new friends, new ambitions. And now we’re on the brink of a new year (hope you have a lovely one!), a time when everyone reflects on the old and nurses hope for the future. So it feels right to finish this blog now, to look back and thank Abba for all the undeserved blessings He’s given me through Ecuador, to thank Him for exposing me for who I was, for showing me how far I was from who He intended me to be. Plus, there’s no homework breathing down my neck now, which is always nice when something like this needs done. But fair warning, this is going to be a long post- for now, I’m going to share one of my college essays with you;
I don’t like granadillas. They are the most malicious and deceptive little fruit I have ever encountered, hiding their acrid, gel-encased seeds until you’ve already pierced the shell and condemned yourself to hours of bitter aftertaste. Eating them takes willpower, pushes you way out of your comfort zone. The first time I had one I was in my cousin’s living room, waiting to catch the plane back home, a place without granadillas. And I didn’t want to leave.
Before Ecuador I was very much your stereotypical, melodramatic seventeen-year-old at ease with her lukewarm life. I was an okay sister, an okay friend, and, worst of all, an okay Christian going through the motions. My faith was threadbare, wavering in the face of even the most insignificant troubles. I mistrusted God so much that I planned to turn from my faith once I began college. Nothing I did carried any worth, and the world revolved around me.
Then my kind parents surprised me with a volunteer trip to Ecuador, a land of snarled jungles and breathtaking mountains (literally breathtaking-those mountains are steep). I had the honor of being privy to its beauty for a time, a beauty not half as remarkable as the people living in it. They are among the boldest, most compassionate people I have ever met. They embraced me, a total stranger, with ardent love, and showed me that the life I desperately wanted was still within reach.
A kind-hearted Ecuadorian, a friend I had known for less than a day, paid for my lunch despite the money already in my hands, leaving me fumbling for words beyond “gracias.” I was called “little sister” by a church-full of loving strangers. I saw poverty there, in the form of an sweet, emaciated twelve-year-old who loved soccer. And I met the people who devoted their lives to helping those like him. Most of them live in a world of chronic poverty, of tarp houses and trials more bitter than the granadillas they sell along the road. In spite of it all, their faith is unwavering. Despite the little they have, they do their utmost to lift each other up. They earnestly follow God, even in the face of the vices we share as human beings.
Their bold lives stressed the paleness of mine, made me so sick of surviving and so ready to pour my life out for my God and finally leave my complacency behind. I’ve never experienced anything like Ecuador before, never felt so convicted, so loved or so challenged that far from home. Simply living alongside them forced me to encounter who I was and to compare myself to the person I wanted to be. I encountered my self-pity after seeing the devastating effects of a landslide on the community of Oyacachi, and saw the Christian I wanted to be reflected in the ever joyous and unshakable faith of its inhabitants. I encountered my pride every time I met another incredible, faithful Ecuadorian christian, humbled knowing that, despite my privileges, they were my superiors. I encountered my insecurities after comparing my hollow life to theirs, and saw how utterly inconsequential mine was.
Acknowledging those characteristics was difficult for me, harder than swallowing granadilla seeds. Ever since I’ve been fighting those traits in me, and, though I still stumble and fall, I think I’m drawing closer to being the “Jess” God wants me to be, and doing my best to draw others close to the Father who adores them, just as the Ecuadorian church did for me. Nothing can stop me from seeking out God and His plan for me now, for finding the next granadilla He has in store for me—I want another so badly.
He worked through so many people during my time in Ecuador, so many passionate, God-loving Christians. I can’t begin to tell you how grateful I am for them and the lessons they taught me-for reminding me of the power of prayer, the essential nature of hope, for serving as role models. I don’t mean to idealize or generalize the nature of the people I met-they’re all human, and I’m sure they’ve all struggled with vices or doubts or misgivings at some point. But they go on anyway, fighting for the beloved children of Ecuador in the face of poverty, doing what they can to stay in God’s will. Someday I hope to rejoin them, if that’s God’s will for me, to have a servant’s heart as full as theirs. I can never thank them enough for showing me what a reckless, ardent life of faith looks like.
I think about Ecuador every day now, thanking the Lord for the person He’s challenged me to become through my time there. Admittedly I’m still nowhere close to being her, but I’m getting there bit by bit, day by day, year by year. I hope to come even closer in the upcoming one, and give Him as much glory as I can-we’ll call it my New Year’s resolution. In fact I’d like to ask anyone reading this to hold me accountable to that, to feel free to give me a heads up if you see me straying. On that note, I’ll do all I can to support your resolutions (especially since you’ve read this much of my post), what ever area of your life it may be in. As for me, I want to re-devote myself to Abba, I want to chase after Him, give Him my life. He arrested my heart through Ecuador, and I don’t want it back.
Simeon quote of the day:
“How many minutes until you come back?”
Categories: Ministry, Reflections, Updates
Tags: Ecuador, Ecuador Info, Ministry, Reflections, The Santiago Partnership
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Puzzle Therapy
As the holiday season comes to a close, I wanted to reflect on a holiday tradition that I enjoy and provide a little insight as to why this tradition is special to me. My (Joel’s) family has always enjoyed fixing puzzles over the holidays. My mom was the primary source of inspiration and elbow grease to put them together each year. I am finishing the puzzle you see pictured here. Though the bird is a Kingfisher, it kind of looks like a bluebird that my mom so loved as she took care of bluebirds in her back yard many of these recent years. This puzzle was nice for me to be able to reflect on our times together fixing puzzles. I wish we could still do that.
As I got to thinking about things working on this puzzle, I wondered why I enjoy fixing puzzles so much. Maybe it is for the reason that I’ve already stated that it is an important family tradition and time of bonding and now a time in which I can remember the holidays spent together in the past. This could very well be much of it. However, maybe there is something more or at least maybe something else.
I got to thinking about things and my personality. First of all for those who don’t know me quite as well… I am your classic Type-A, work-a-holic, perfectionist. Now, I’m working on that work-a-holic, perfectionist stuff but safe to say I am still a work in progress. Anyway, let’s say that I really enjoy accomplishing things and seeing things through to “perfection.” As I get old and grayer (instead of wiser), I am realizing that there is very little that you can actually accomplish fully and to perfection, especially in ministry. It is the case for life in general but especially in ministry there is so much that needs to be resolved; situations that need to be fixed. And it seems that a lot of those situations or problems may never be resolved during my lifetime and that’s just the way it is. That’s why God’s grace is so wonderful. Things can be left imperfect in this imperfect world because He is perfect and his grace is sufficient.
So back to puzzle. Maybe puzzles are my “puzzle therapy.” It helps me quench, in such a little way, my desire to see something completed, put together, fixed. It’s not much but I can make a “perfect” puzzle that makes me feel good that I accomplished something. I know this is just feeding my personality and my needs in how I am but is that such a bad thing when it is just a puzzle and a hobby nonetheless. Maybe I should be prescribing “puzzle therapy” to others.
Categories: Family Fun, Ministry, Reflections, Updates
Tags: Family Fun, Ministry, Reflections, Updates
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