Movin' Right Along

Hello, everyone!

The Bolivia team is still truckin' along-- we are all still raising the remainder of our support and the stories that God is knitting within us is INCREDIBLE

At our last meeting on Sunday, November 8th some of our group memebers shared how God has been providing financially for their trip.

The Purgasons (Melissa, Richard and 10-year old Brodie)

The Purgason family faces quite possibly the largest financial burden of the entire group with their support raising process including that of 3 trips to Bolivia (mucho dinero, si?) and they shared with us the cool ways God has provided for them. They hosted one big birthday party for the three of them at their house a couple of months ago where guests were to bring a "gift" of anything that they would like te donate to a yard sale benefiting their mission trips.

Melissa shared with us that the yard sale brought in over $500 and one customer even wrote a check for $100 without buying anything just becuase it would be donated to the misison trips!

Team member Juliana Lara shared with the group that her support letter opened up a conversation about church with her co-worker. The young woman expressed her interest in finding a church home, and Juliana was given an opportunity to invite her co-worker to 12 Stone church!

Juliana told us, "Passing out my support letters was one way to let everyone know that I go to church!" How cool is it that the young lady was in a place where she was looking for a church and the timing of the letter and conversation with Juliana was perfectly planned in God's timing!

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Our team has continued to be stretched and challenged. This past Tuesday (November 10th) we had an evangelism training session with a man named Aaron who works for the organization
Helping Hands that we are going to Bolivia with. This training session was helpful and insightful because Aaron is an expert on the areas we will be visiting during our trip. He informed us about the people and culture and what we can expect to see and hear and experience.

The places we may be visiting/working in:

Cara Cara- The government-given spot for misplaced miners to live...how kind of them: it's a literal garbage dump.

Prison kid's camps- If a father or mother gets arrested in Bolivia, the entire family goes to jail with them. The kids are kept in an orphanage-type place where they get government provided schooling, but no interaction with other children outside of the prison.

Palabra de Vida (translated: Word of Life)- a camp that draws in over 1,000 kids; we will be bringing them a Vacation Bible School for the week

From what he told us, this trip is going to stretch us and take us out of our comfort zones BIG time! Aaron told us,

"Don't be surprised if you guys get straight off the plane, hop on a bus and are sent off for door-to-door evangelism."

Haha! We all were pretty shocked by that proposition, but we undertsand that we must be flexible and ready for whatever the Lord asks of us.

Aaron proceded to tell us that his goal is for us to be prepared for such a scenario! I m so glad that he wants us to have the resources and knowledge for whatever comes our way!

Our team now has a better idea of what to expect on our trip, and it helps us to pray more specifically.

I would like to ask for your continued prayer for:

Our team's bonding. That God would flourish with the relational aspect of our group. He wants us to function as a healthy family unit when we're down there- and we have to attain that now before we try to have it in a foreign country!

Let's pray for God's continued blessing of the financial portion that still remains for our team. God is just waiting to hear us ASK. He wants to give us the money! $$

Our team needs more prayer partners. Please pray for God to bring the willing hearts together to pray over us!

Let's be in prayer for the different areas of ministry we could be a part of down there. Let's ask that God prepare the hearts of those we will encounter.

Thanks for keeping up with these blogs and stay tuned for more updates and prayer requests!

In Christ,

Kristin