Guatemala celebrating 200 years of independence!

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September 15th marks the bicentennial celebration of independence for Guatemala. Hooray! But with this grand celebration of freedom approaching it seems as if the country is shutting down again, restricting our freedoms.
After 2 months of being stateside I adjusted fairly well to the freedom I was given in regards to pandemic protocol and had forgotten what the situation was like in other countries. In Guatemala, a mask, hand sanitizer, temperature and in some places shoe sanitizing is still a must to enter any store regardless of being vaccinated or not. Here the entire country follows whatever orders the president gives, the current ones being, curfew from 8pm-4am, and everything virtual, including churches. So with that being said our church is back to Facebook live (video) for the next month, or until further orders are given.

New and young music students!
With restrictions and curfews handed out like candy to every business and school, I continue to teach my music classes as usual. Right now I teach about 15 one-on-one music lessons a week at the church, and have weekly rehearsals with the church musicians. The exciting news is that six new students have started lessons with me in the last month! And they all go to the church! And they are all under 15!! Three of them are learning trumpet, two on flute, and one learning the piano. These fresh, young students have been my motivation this past month as I am super eager to get them playing in the church after seeing how quickly they are learning. Please pray that they continue to grow musically and remain connected in the church as they grow older.

In my spare time…
I have come across many broken instruments buried in the church. So I have taken it upon myself to fix these instruments! One guitar and a keyboard have been fixed, and currently I am working on another keyboard as pictured above. Having extra (working) instruments is always a blessing!

I also continue to work on my hymnal project. Thanks to several donations from several people I met during furlough, I have been able to print 12 more hymnals. These hymnals are only for the musicians who play or sing in church, as it serves to unify them into one book with all the same songs, chords, and lyrics. If you would like to make a donation towards a hymnal you can do so by donating $40 with a note saying towards hymnal project. Thanks!

And I am also engaged!
After 2 years of dating I asked my girlfriend, Scarlett, to marry me and she easily said yes. She is from the city of Puerto Barrios, about 3 hrs from Zacapa. We plan to get married early next year, and Scarlett will be joining me on the mission field! Hopefully you will all get to meet her on the next furlough to the states!