Two Churches, Two Cultures Serving Together 3

A Fruitful Weekend in TJ

Wow! What an outstanding weekend the Lord gave us in TJ!
On Saturday morning I met the Redeemer San Diego church at the border, and we drove into Tijuana together. Redeemer brought 38 eager people down to minister with the Lo Mejor del Trigo church in Rojo Gomez.

Ministry Through Building and Connecting

Our mission was to build a parish home for Pastor Abraham Velazquez and his wife, Martha. That was the main focus of the trip, and the group pulled up their sleeves and got to work once we made it to Rojo Gomez.
One of the highlights of the trip is just seeing people from very different cultures, who speak different languages come together to minister together. I could tell that it really touched the heart of a lot of those that came down.
Redeemer also worked with Pastor Abraham to minister to children from the community. They lead the children in fun activities including crafts, painting and games.
Then Abraham taught the children a gospel story about the prodigal son. The children that came were very engaged, and they enjoyed their time with the group. I’ve included a sample of the time in the video below.
[wpvideo wSITSz0q]

A Home for Abraham and Martha

It was so encouraging to see how hard everyone worked to complete the pastoral home. This home will be a huge blessing to the church, and specifically to Abraham and Martha and their two children Gadiel and Salmai.
It’s important to have someone live next to the church partly due to the need for security. I just talked to one of my friends, Pastor Leo Nevarez about this very need. Leo pastors a church in Rosarito. He told me that a group donated a number of toys for Christmas gifts for the children in the community. They stored the toys in the church, but before they were able to give them to the children some thieves broke into the church and stole 100 toys.
What a bummer for the church and the children!
That is one of the reasons it’s important to have someone live near the church. In this case it also helps out Abraham and his family. They don’t have a car at this time, so it aids them in their commute to work.

A City Set on a Hill

Our prayer is that the church in Rojo Gomez will be a city set on a hill that shines the light of Christ brightly in the community.
Abraham said that since he started serving at the church it has grown from about 30 to over 100. In many of the churches in Mexico there are many women and very few men. They started with three men and now they have more than 11. God is blessing!

Prayer & Praise

Join us in praising the Lord for the good work that he is doing on the border. It makes my heart glad to see people’s lives changed as they minister the gospel of Jesus Christ. I love seeing our friends from Redeemer being affected in a significant way through their interaction with the Mexican people.
Thank you Jesus!
Thank you friends for standing with us in prayer.
We did have two setbacks, which reminds me that we need to intensify our prayer covering.
My car broke down while we were in Tijuana, and it is still there being repaired. One of the vans Redeemer rented was involved in a fender bender coming back into the US. It is a real headache trying to work with the insurance companies. Pray that both of these cars will be fixed soon and without any major expense.
I give thanks that the Lord kept us safe and used us to spread the love of Christ in Mexico.
In HIs Grip, Dave
DiasoLifeOnTheBorder.org