Greetings in the great and matchless Name of our Lord Jesus Christ. Thank you all for your prayers, encouragement and greetings that we have received from many family and friends over Christmas and beyond. We thank God for the opportunity to serve Him here in Costa Rica and Panama and are thankful for all that He has already done in 2012.
On New Years Day we visited one of the missions in Sarapiqui. This was a work planted by Pastor Franklin. David preached from Philippians 3 where Paul wrote
, I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of sharing in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death. What a great God we serve and how He wants to be known by us. We admire the faith of brother Franklin and his wife Yolanda as they have started 18 new preaching points over the last 2 1/2 years and have a great burden for the people in this humble area.
David also traveled to Panama to meet a new church planter, Brother Armando, in the Panama West district. In addition to some training time, David joined Armando and other leaders as they ministered in a women's prison. Several responded to a gospel invitation and David had an opportunity to share and to pray with the ladies that came forward. This was also a special trip as our son Joshua was able go with David as he was still on Christmas break.
In November, David, Pastor Johnny, a district superintendent and Stephen Sickel, the Work and Witness coordinator for Costa Rica and Panama did a two day trip to enter communities where we have no church presence and to begin to pray for God's direction in new church plants. One of these communities is in Miramar.
David went there for two days with a Jesus Film team and they had two showings. Please pray for God to continue to open doors in this community. They were excited that one lady that accepted Christ was visiting from the community of Puntarenas which is another community where we do not have a church presence. She may be our first member there!
We thank God for growing churches and ask you to pray for the Church of Mozotal that is seeking to buy property in San Jose (which is currently a small coffee farm) as they are outgrowing their current facility. We praise the Lord for the beauty of Costa Rica however this also causes high property prices. Pray for Pastor Sirlene and her congregation that our Lord, the owner of the cattle on a 1,000 hills will provide the needed resources. Here is a picture of Pastor Sirlene and the property they are praying over. David was able to visit this site for the first time this month.
In addition to other workshops, pastor visits and travels in Costa Rica, David also had the chance to participate with the youth in Costa Rica. Leaders met together from both districts to plan on how to promote our regional youth conference that takes place once every four years. It is exciting to see the leaders from different districts have the chance to know each other and to work together.
Please pray as the Costa Rica Central and the Costa Rica North District assemblies will both take place on Sunday February 5. Pray that God's will be done in every person in district leadership.
God bless, David, Shelley, Joshua and Kayley
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