Good Stuff is Happening

Every day I am hearing about all the good things that are happening that will support our work this summer. One of the team members from Borger, Texas (there are 6 from there) has secured enough support from the church where she grew up to build a house and may be able to get another church to build another one! The team from Tupelo, Mississippi built a storage building for their church and the elders are going to give the cost savings to benevolence in Honduras. The elders in Fairview Heights, Illinois (my home church) are going to have a special contribution on May 10th and then they have agreed to match the offering from the mission budget.
Please let all of us know what is happening in your group by posting it in the comments or sending me an email so that I can include it in the next newsletter.
Please remember to pray about our upcoming work.
Pray that we will be effective in the work that our God has planned for us. Pray that we will open our eyes to the needs of the people that we are going to serve. Pray that our lives will be changed and that we will be bold in taking the gospel to the people of Honduras and to the people in our own communities.
In Him,
Marc

March News Letter

Spring is here!

Today is March 21, 2005 and that means that we will be in Honduras in a very short 4 months. Planning for this years mission is in full process and I can assure you that you will be busy. We are in for an amazing experience in 2005. Many people have assured me that they will be sponsoring houses – (we still need more so don’t stop asking for house sponsors) Right now we have about 10 house sponsors and our goal will be at least 25. We are also still looking for financial sponsors for the church building. I am going to travel to Tegucigalpa on April 7^th to survey locations for the building but, as of right now it looks like we will be planting the church in an area called Santa Anna. This is an area similar to Valley of Angels. There is a paid minister in the area and we are looking to build the church building in an area where we also plan to build a Mi Esperanza Training Center and a medical clinic. Please pray that all of these things can happen in 2005. Our part will be the church building and other TORCH Teams will be working on the training center and the clinic.

In earlier news letters, I have mentioned that we will be sending people out of Tegucigalpa to work in an area called La Paz. I will be visiting La Paz in April to identify needs and to build our work plan for that area. The Gulfport, MS church sponsors the church in La Paz and we want to travel to the area to build a few homes, host a medical clinic, work with a food ministry, and send out evangelistic teams to teach. I will be writing the details of my visit in the April news letter.

Our Team

There is strength in numbers and our team will be about 150 strong. At first I was a little concerned about our size. I have since become convinced that God has put this team together for a reason. He has supplied a large number of workers because he has a lot of work planned for us to do. I’m excited that we will probably be the largest single short term mission team among Churches of Christ. I haven verified this but, I can’t find any evidence of anything bigger. Our work together will be incredible and our devotionals will be unforgettable. I can’t wait!

Benevolence News

Our team has big, big plans for this summer. These plans are not free and we all need to pray and to work together to make sure that we have the resources that we will need to support the work that we would like to do. It takes about $300 per person to make this happen. Please do not be bashful in telling people about our work and asking them to join in by sponsoring a house, part of the church, the purchase of food, or a day of a medical clinic.

Here is the cost of each of these:

Houses - $800
Church Building (including land) $12,500

Food for a family for a month - $15

Medical Clinic a day that will treat about 500 - $1,000

Please feel free to comment on what you or your group is doing in the area of benevolence.

FYI, you can view my personal web log at marclt.blogspot.com

I am looking forward to Another Great Day in Honduras

Marc

Shipping Container

Great news!

Our team will be partnering with one from Birmingham, Alabama to ship a container full of the goods that we will need to be effective in our mission. Our plan is to ship from New Orleans and our target ship date will be in late April or early May….stay tuned for more on the ship date.

Over the next couple of weeks, we will use this web site to notify you of the targeted items for the container. Right now I can tell you that our desire will probably not include large quantities of clothing. Our warehouse in Tegucigalpa is already fairly full of many clothing items so, we will utilize our container space for other items. The clothing exception would be NEW or near NEW Shoes. We would like to have really nice shoes for the children on the mountain (socks too!). The TORCH shoe store is a great day and fun ministry – we’ll use the shoes for this.

If you have suggestions for container items, let me know. Keep in mind of one thing that we all need to preach on - everything we ship will be given in the name of Jesus and as Matthew 25 says it is just like personally giving to Jesus. We need to remind people of a simple rule – “NO JUNK FOR JESUS”.

Thanks

Marc