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Hey, I'll admit it, I could really use your help!
We are looking for members of the group we are taking as a family to Honduras December 29th through January 5th. Have you been before and want to go back? Know someone that you think would be good to go? Think you should go but are scared? Now is the time! This really will be a very cool, unique group. This time of year is perfect for a unique visit and some special treats. How about an entire town doing fireworks all within a twenty minute span and you get to see it all? How about special day events with the Milk Project kids off site? How about getting to see everyone from the mission together at once for a special Christmas party? All this and more...it really should be a great trip. But we need more group members to pull off everything we are hoping to do! You can click here for more details, and always just write us to talk through it as well. Also, part of our adventure serving in the US for these many months is finding ways to connect new partners to the mission, both Churches and individuals. Not just financial partners, although that is part of it, but prayer partners, and more groups throughout the rest of the year like we are doing in December. We need your help to make those connections...either with your Church, talking with us about maybe signing up to be a partner yourself, or even helping us by inviting us and hosting a one time fundraiser with your friends/family/life group? We have been keeping busy this first month in the US, acclimating, and doing some visits already, but we have to keep striving to do more to get where we have the vision for the mission going, and we most certainly cannot do that alone. It is amazing how much God is doing in Honduras and so much of that through what He is doing in the USA, and we thank Him and you for that. Keep praying, there is still lots going on in Honduras in the mission and we will update more about that next month, but the work continues and almost busts at the seams sometimes for sure!
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As the road work advances in front of the clinic campus, we have been impressed with the speed at which the work has advanced, and the long hours invested. Each week produces more curiosities to see and experience, along with deep earth shaking of the walls in the buildings. We have chatted a couple times with those working on the project, and also with those in charge (especially after they have knocked out part of our fence that goes around the property...which they promised to fix, over a month ago.) Sometimes getting answers and seeing really what is being planned is not always easy. While it is an inconvenience for all in the area, everyone is quite happy to endure it knowing what a huge step this is long term for the many neighborhoods that will benefit tremendously. One thing we have noticed though, is that when installing the sewer system (with a 10" pipe for the entire area's main line...is that seemingly small or is it just us?) and then determining the road's grade down the hill, is that it likely means for us a major headache with our entry to the property. You can see on this picture the sewer pipe running down the road across from the mission's property, and you can see the wall built for the ditch (and hopefully sidewalk?) running in front of the gate. This also looks to be the level of the road when it will be poured. Looks good right? Keep scrolling  To keep the road level but descending as they have determined, that means that the entrance to the property would require a major change to be usable.  If the road level stays anywhere close to this (which looks worse in person than in this picture, believe it or not, somewhere between two and three feet above the current level), we will be looking at huge financial investment to redo not only our entire gate setup and columns to support it, but huge amounts of fill and then new concrete work to enter and get to the different areas of the property. We thought we might have to throw a little more concrete near the gate...but this slope would require resurfacing a huge portion of the entrance and hills going up to the clinic and down to the man cave. We are to talk to an architect/engineer next week about what options we have (including moving the entire entrance further up the property) that would be the easiest and most cost effective, but this is now a big prayer item, because we will need to move quickly once they get down our way (because closing the back entrance will likely happen shortly after that) to be able to have vehicle access. So pray for good long term solutions, and also for the funding we are going to need to make this happen...and make it happen in a matter of weeks, not months. We have not many any budgets or estimates yet on what it could take...but I am guessing by the time the levels are set and the concrete is poured and gate moved, we could be looking at $5,000, maybe as much as $10,000? All this is good, or will be good long term... it is just more financially challenging than we are ready to tackle right now. Seen below...from the front door of the Milk Project building yesterday...they are close!  I thought maybe there might be more people interested in what the process is going to look like for the mission house remodel. We will run out of funds before we finish, but by the end of June, we are hoping to enclose a hallway and the stairway to the second floor...so that the building will now be one building, and not two separate floors. Here below you can see the layout for that first floor, when we can get the tile floor installed first (going with a mosaic of broken tiles of different colors.) The idea is to break up the bathroom and shower areas, and use double bunk beds instead of triples, with the same stairs we already have elsewhere for access.
After we get the enclosures done, we can then use groups or any special donations that come in for this project to keep going on building out the new interior and getting things installed.
Once everything is done on the first floor, then the work would move to the second floor, removing the bedrooms upstairs, expanding the kitchen, the dining area, and then the couch space, leaving a half bathroom as well on the second floor. We are trying to do this like we do everything with groups, using groups and group or special designated funds to do the work. So far, groups help the mission overall and have not been a drain of finances, but rather helping the other areas of ministry. We might have to invest a bit this year since we have employee commitments to meet (at least to keep them employed through June) and thus some material costs to keep going, but hoping that most of the costs can be absorbed by the groups from 2018 and 2019. If you are wondering why with so much of 2018 left why we won't finish, that is because we had to curtail how much we are planning to do and how long we will be able to do it this year because of the huge reduction of groups we are seeing for this year and thus the funds available and help to continue it. The goal is to be done by June 2019, Lord willing. The benefits will be a more welcoming atmosphere, easier to live with for groups, nicer long term housing, more space for supplies, and more space to spread out for bigger groups. Plus, moving the bedrooms down a floor will cut down on the noise from the street, noise from those that stay up late, and to keep the temperature more pleasant for sleeping.
So how about an update? Here you can see part of the farm in Sampedrana that has been cleared, the hodgepodge triangle-sort-of-shape of cleared, green, polka dot (avocado tree), and coffee. We own further up the mountain, we are just working on getting enough plants grown in our nurseries to then clear more and plant. This will take years to complete, as each acre roughly needs 2,000 plants, and the rough cost from seedling to going into the ground is $1 per plant, and we have well over 10 acres left to plant. As I have written, our main need here other than continuing to develop the property is to improve the road conditions getting there, some widening, some leveling, but mostly improving the road itself for less slipping and sliding. We are going to have to invest at least $3,000 this year on this road to try to get it up to snuff. And one more thing will be building a house on the property and using it for a family to live and be daily caretakers, as well as just a base of operations to do cleaning, pulping, drying, etc.  The farm in Las Botijas was one we took over from another missionary when they left the country. There is one big homestead, and several other pieces of property, several of which have coffee growing on them. We were concerned about getting a proper caretaker for several years, but God had not opened any long term doors until August of 2017, when we moved Rony and his family from Sampedrana, where he had transplanted almost eight years ago to work with Don Escoto on his farm, but was going to lose his job because the farm was being divided and given to his children. There is quite a bit to do here as well in terms of planting more coffee and other improvements on the multiple properties, and that is exciting, but even more exciting is that after a brief time working in Las Botijas, and not having a place to worship, just by worshipping as a family, Rony has turned into a pastor by opening doors to what is already 15 believers and six friends in the community. Seeing how we can help this burgeoning Church will be a bigger priority moving forward.  Oscar with Rony on the farm just East from the farmhouse...planting corn between the coffee will feed his family for several months with corn.  Rony and his family in the Church building that is on the farm property. Finally you can see here below the property in Cantaranas. We have received funds to plant the hill of this property this year with fruit trees, which should provide more long term investment and return for the property such as we already get from the two avocado trees there. The valley Jonathan and the Church are still currently trying to use (you can see they have the greenhouse there) and we will see in the next twelve months about the long term housing on site about maybe developing that even more.  So you can be praying for the workers, and their families, for their safety, for good crops and harvests, and ways in which we can use those harvests more in our local areas, and abroad, to further the work of Christ. Finding buyers abroad especially for the coffee we produce would be a great way not only to help us locally more but have more ties that could help us improve what we produce, but also to reach our goal of being self sustaining and starting to really invest some of what is being done into the other areas of ministry as well. That could be helping hire more clinic staff, planting a new Milk Project, a new Church plant...the options, even limited just to what we are already doing and in areas where we already work, are numerous. May God guide us and direct us through it all!
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