Starting off on the right foot.. literally

From Global Lutheran Outreach missionarie Ben Tino (Serving in Zacapa, Guatemala):

I wish everyone a joyous 2021 and hope the transition into the new year went smoothly. In this brief newsletter I will update you on the past two months for me, and inform you on what I look forward to this year!

From December 23rd-January 31st

My update begins a few weeks after I sent out my last newsletter (Dec 11th). Amongst all the Christmas preparations and activities in the church, I found time to participate in a Christmas basketball tournament here in Zacapa (2nd place!), and take a couple trips to Guatemala City for my expired VISA ordeal (still not resolved). On a 3-hr motorcycle ride home from the capital city on Dec. 23rd, I became very sick from a stomach infection, and somehow managed to make it back among several stops to vomit and what not. The infection led to me taking some bad medicine, which greatly affected me Christmas Eve, and most of December 25th. Due to my illness, I spent the 24th-25th by myself and attended no festivities other than church.

      But the new year was received with a bang! I celebrated New Years with my girlfriends family in Puerto Barrios, and ate all the food I could since I had not eaten much from the infection of December 23rd. The following week after January 1st I went out to play basketball one night and ended up breaking my foot, the fifth metatarsal to be exact. So I am now confined to a boot and limited activity for 4-6 weeks! Although living by myself, I am managing to still get around to teach classes, grocery shop, and do other errands, but I pray I heal quickly. No long distance motorcycle rides for me.

What my work looks like for this year

My work in training musicians in the church is coming along nicely. Starting this Sunday (1/31), my students will be leading Sunday music without me at least once a month. This will serve as an opportunity for them to build confidence playing on their own, and will be a gentle transition from having me by their side the whole time. I of course will be present in the church. By the end of this year I hope to have them playing every Sunday without me.

A project I took on this past year during the pandemic was to put together a hymnal for the musicians to use. Here in Zacapa, there are 4 different hymnals/songbooks that I read from, each written differently, some with music some without, totaling over 500 songs. With my knowledge of what has been sung during my two years here, I went through the four hymnals and selected 351 songs that the church in Zacapa should know, and have put together a songbook with basic chords to serve as a tool for the musicians. It is now ready to print! Since this songbook is only for the musicians that read chords/music, I will need at least 7 copies to start, and hopefully more in the future. The cost of each one will be $32.00. As a missionary I live off financial donations from people like you, making this mission work possible. I hope to get at least 7 copies printed in the month of February and could use your support to do so! If you would like to donate $32 towards a new songbook, message me! and I will be sure to include your name in the foreword.

Click here to read the latest newsletter from Ben!

The Last Newsletter

From Global Lutheran Outreach missionaries, Aaron and Yeni Farrow (they served in Valparaiso, Chile) write:

The last 3 months have flown by.  Now we are well on our way into the next stage in life.   In this month’s newsletter, our last newsletter, we will be telling you about our long journey home.  It has been a difficult one as we adapt to our new roles and over come all the logistical obstacles of resituating one’s self to live in another country.  I look forward to sharing it with you.  My hope is that this is not the last bit of my life I get to share with all of you.  There is a long pause before writing this next line because words cannot encapsulate the many thanks I have for you all in your support, prayers, attention, and love that made this mission possible.  The words I deeply appreciate it seem to hollow and weak to express how I truly and humbly feel that you all teamed up to make a vision God gave me more than ten years ago come true.

First, before I give you a review of the long journey, I want to apologize about the amount of time it took me to get this update out.  My hopes had been that I would be visiting churches and communities when I got back and once finished sharing this newsletter.  While we have visited several still there are other communities that Covid has interfered with my ability to schedule.

In conclusion to the introduction this month Ill be sharing with you the amazing and challenging journey home, what God is still doing as a result of our mission, and what are our future plans. Thanks for walking with us.

The Trip Home

We flew home the 16th of September on a two-week journey through the Dominican Republic.  As mentioned before we went to the D.R. so we could get Yenifer’s Passport renewed.  This was ordained because while we were able to also visit Yenifer’s family who were very pleased I returned their daughter to them safely, also baptized Axel and more.

One of the largest preoccupations for me in my evangelism perspective is to teach the idea od remembering your Baptism. The idea that we have been bought and buried in Christ, the grace received through it was and is sufficient.  This is much easier to do when you have someone with whom to remember.

Upon arriving to the Dominican, I began a series of conversations and answering questions about the Gospel and Baptism.  One such conversation was with Pastor Ted Krey who was serving in Santo Domingo. Side note from the one I had with my father-in-law…He said, “We were waiting for someone to come minister to us.” I willing to bet, if I was a gambling man, that there are a lot more people with the same thoughts in their mind waiting for you to come speak to them as well.  So, a few days after arriving we piled everyone in a bus provided arranged through a local Catholic Church.  Thank God for His Church.

It was a beautiful day.  Seven people were baptized there in Santo Domingo and coincidently we even had a friend and witness, the son of a Global Lutheran Outreach Pastor missionary in the South of Chile from Venezuela who is now a seminarian in the D.R.., Joshua Ventura.

The family of Christ grew that day, and while I am a proud father to have held my son and seen it happen, that’s not even the half of it.  Yeni’s town is a mountain community a couple hours in from the coast and Santo Domingo.  Pastor Krey with Joshua Ventura by his side have been in Ocoa over the last 3 months evangelizing and doing Bible studies.  The pictures speak for themselves with children lined up outside the house of my in laws listening and the more recent additional baptisms this last weekend.  Four more people so far.  More to come for sure.

The Future

Hopefully the near future will have me coming to see you after we have defeated the Covid.  As for now I am an Administrative Assistant for a Manufacturing Company and an in home tutor helping kids whose education has been affected by the Pandemic.  Will I be back in active ministry?  God only knows.  I enjoy my work but am very busy doing what I can to rebuild my life with a wife and a new son.   Your contributions have helped a lot as well getting us stable.  Yeni being a foreigner and us having a baby it is obvious that much of the rebuilding process financially I have had to do alone, but I wasn’t alone thanks to you guys and I will be eternally.  I hope to see each of you very soon.

Fundraising Finished!

This is December and the end of your commitment to support our mission. Thanks for all your help in aiding us to achieve our reintegration and cover our years payroll taxes.  Please remember to go up to our site at Global Lutheran Outreach and either reassign your support to another missionary, or cancel your support.  The links are below.  I want to lift up our African ministries as they struggle to find support on their own continent. Blessings from our Global Lutheran Outreach Family to Yours.

 

Click here to read the latest newsletter from the Farrow!