I give a class for women every Tuesday at our church building. Since we opened the contact center by the university and since the church didn’t ever get a lot of traffic during the week, we don’t have it open daily, but our activities are held there and this weekly class. Two ladies from the block come faithfully along with Mary Torres and sometimes others will come too. We finished our last study and when I asked these two ladies if they wanted to start something new or take a break, both were adamant that they were benefiting from the time together and the talks and wanted to continue. We decided on the book “Praying God’s Word” by Beth Moore. It’s about joining prayer with scripture to gain victory over strongholds. This group is made up of ladies who have a lot of faith in God and a desire to know Him and serve Him better and during this time we encourage one another in that walk.
We are sad to say good- bye to the Mollo family. Ronald, Noemi and their young son will be moving to Argentina where she has family. They were part of the church in Sucre and had moved to Tarija a couple of months before we arrived. It was a huge blessing to have them here and to have someone we knew when we arrived. Ronald helped us a lot in finding apartments and often it has just been the team and the Mollo family on Sundays. They have had a hard time trying to find steady work here and they have had some other struggles too, so they are going where hopefully jobs will be open for them due to family connections. We will miss them and are praying that things work out well for them.
We took a team retreat for two days in October. We haven’t done one since arriving and it was the best ones, I think, we’ve ever had (compared to ones we did in Sucre). Doddy and Beymar went and would watch the kids while the team had a chance to meet a few times for a couple of hours each to talk about things and work on some stuff. In this retreat we focused on knowing our personalities and tendencies better, sharing what each one thought of what the others’ strengths and weakness were and understanding better how we react to conflict and how we can better step into conflict. We had time for devotionals and just being with each other. It was very encouraging and a good step in the direction we want to go as a team and as church leaders. The kids had a blast being out in the country. We were only about 30 minutes outside the city, but they got to explore and chase lightning bugs and just be outside and run. The first night they stayed outside till 10 running around. One of the things I miss about living in the States is there are yards there.
Please continue to pray for the work here; the spiritual battle is real and strong. Thank you for your support, prayers and encouragement. May God richly bless you with insight into His great love and mercies.