The Timothy Project

Not long now until I will be calling the taxi to take me to the airport! As you might guess, I am ready to go! Well, not really physically ready to go. And I have a lot of work yet to do BUT I am certainly mentally and emotionally ready to get away for a while! Please join me in praying I can keep my mind and heart on what I need to be focused on.  Accidents tend to happen when we are not well focused on the present!

Just when we thought the rain had passed, I woke up to a hard rain- right at the morning rush hour and I felt bad for all the people trying to catch the public cars to get to work on time. Let’s pray for some dry weather- too many people are sick with the “gripe” due to all this rain and wind.

We had a good weekend. Services went well, the basketball tournemant got underway in the Hole. We have 7 teams of boys, about 18 years old down to 8 years. It was so cool to see them all lined up for their inauguration!  pray that they will learn important life skills as they play (team work, self discipline, strong personal effort, etc.).  We are praying for a special opportunity there in the Hole- a house that runs along one side of the court is for sale, and there are some folks well known for drug trafficing interested in buying it. We are praying that if it is God’s will, a way will open us for us to buy the house ($600) to use as our church.  Currently, we meet in the community club house.

In Los Santos, we visited one of our regular attendees. She is 15 years old and just had her first baby die after 11 days of life. It was a tough visit- what do you say? We read some scripture and encouraged her with our love and support. I feel bad that I am leaving for a month but Sol has promised to visit her and help her though this tough time. She has not made a profession of faith in Christ.  Pray with us for her and her husband, as well as her uncle’s family with whom they live.  Yesterday we were in the Capital and found a book that deals with just this sort of tragedy. We bought one for her and for Sol. (I wanted her to have some help and guidance in how to console this young lady!) 

I will be doing some visiting with some folks who are struggling spiritually this afternoon and tonight, trying to set them on a positicve course before I leave. Tomorrow we have our study in Villa de Yaque and Navarette and then Thursday we meet with the folks in Guayacanal. Pray for Victor and Sol and the other leaders as they prepare to lead during my absence! Adn pray for clear skies so they won’t have to deal with the mud!

It has been a WET week! It poured off and on all night and into the morning. We had a small group at last night’s bible study. The clouds made the evening seem so dark, and with the threat of rain, people stayed home. But Victor and I were able to visit the family whose house burned last week, giving them the mattresses, sheets and food that the Civil Defense had provided for them. We also presented them with a Bible (they said the one they had burned in the fire.) We continue to pray for them as they seek to build their new home. For now they are living with in-laws.

Several of our folks are sick with the flu, a common occurence during the change of seasons and especially with so much rain.

During a meeting with the Civil Defense director, he invited us to have a 10 minute or so devotion every Sunday as part of their regular schedule- exactly what I had been praying for! Also, I discovered that the interest in the Bible is strong- he has made a new policy that every operation start with a reading from the Bible!  They are overwhelmed right now with work- the rain makes for danger in all of the communities along rivers and streams. The other night, 60 houses in one community were filled to the roofs with water! I hope to continue to work with him to have regular Bible studies with the volunteers. In the meantime, we pray for them as they serve those who are in harms way.

With the medical clinics behind us, what next?

• I just learned this morning that our national convention is sponsering a free conference for women on the prevention of cancer this coming Saturday. It would have been great to promote it last week but I will do all I can to mobuilize out folks. I am going to visit with the director of the Civil Defense to follow-up on our project, share some of the medicine that was left over, and invite him to send people to the conference on Saturday.
• Today we have Bible study in Villa de Yaque and from there we will go down to Navarrette to visit with the community leaders and have Bible study with the folks there. Please keep them in your prayers as we seek to minister to the whole community.
• Tomorrow we have our Bible study with the folks at Las Charcas and Guayacanal. We have quite a bit of follow-up to do with the folks at Guaycanal who accepted the Lord. Also, last Thursday Victor (whose hosue we use for our meetings) informed us his brother is making plans to turn the place back into a bar/dance hall again.  Two things bother us about that: One, that is where we are meeting and hope to establish church and more importantly, it would leave Victor’s family without a home! Pray for God to take control. We have applied to receive a plot of land which would be used to build a church- maybe that would be God’s will, but we still need to find a place for Victor’s family.

So you see, ministry just keeps moving forward! I appreciate all your interests and prayers on our behalf!

It was incredible to see. Sunday was our 7th day of doing mobile clinics. All we had was a vacant lot and the living room of the house next door. The sun was blistering and yet within 30 minutes, we were seeing patients! A few men put up the tarps, we got our tables and chairs our of my car and set up in the “doctor’s offices.” The pharmacy folks did their thing in the living room and porch of the house next door and our Dominican helpers got the folks registered, weighed and measured! We were able to see 58 patients in about 2 and a half hours.

It was pretty tough watching the sweat just pour off the nurses. We had cold water but still the sun/heat was a killer, but soon after we got going, a rain cloud came and broke the intensity of the heat. It didn’t rain, but it kept us a little cooler.

We enjoyed a last meal with our “boys” from Santo Domingo. Pepin and Jofrey had to get back last night to take exams today! The rest of us enjoyed a day at the beach. It was a wonderful day to take a deep breath, enjoy the beauty of the mountains and the beach. The gang had a great time bargaining for their souvenirs and gifts for loved ones.

We came back to a hearty taco dinner and a birthday cake for Marion. It was a super surprise for her. Even Oreo sang to her! (Actually she just barked because of the excitement but we took it as singing.)  We had a moving good-bye time as we shared appreciation and the group shared some gifts. It is always neat to see how God brings his children together from different “tribes” and despite a language barrier and short time, stirs up so much love in our hearts for one another. 

Tomorrow the folks leave- on three different flights! Please continue to pray for their safe journey.

We are getting done to being almost finished with our medical project. Today we had a super time in the Hole. Victor had things well prepared and had gone out and given tickets to the sickest and neediest people so we did a lot of good doctoring today! We missed Noelia, our Dominican doctor who has worked with us! But we were still able to attend to 100 patients.  The last several days we have worked straight through without stopping for lunch and finishing up in the middle of the afternoon. Today they left my house after a nice meal and devotion time around 5:30pm and I think they were through for the night. Tomorrow we get a later start- we will have our own worship time around 10am and leave around 11 for lunch and then a half day clinic out in Navarrette. It will be our most challenging place in terms of facilities. We will set the pharmacy up in a house and use an empty lot next door to see patients. 

The team has done wonderful with the changes of everyday. They have certainly been mobile and flexible; tomorrow will push them just a bit more but at least it is the last half day and they had a good break this afternoon and a later morning. Pray for them to hang on just a bit more!

The days are a blur. It isn’t that they go so fast but every day is so different and it doesn’t relate to the calendar as much as where we are. Today we were at the Civil Defense headquarters which is  housed in the basement of the government center of Santiago. We did a “half day clinic” (9am-2pm) and saw 173 patients! But more than how many were checked by the medical team, the impact we made in developing a relationship with this remarkable institution is the biggest accomplishment. We continue to pray for the director, Francisco Arías, and all his volunteer staff. Most of his team comes from an urban poor environment and we were able to spend the day getting to know many of them and gave them Bibles. Arías has invited me to teach various seminars and do Bible studies with his volunteers as well. I am SO EXCITED about the possibilities! One important aspect is that these folks tend to be community leaders and secondly, in one place we can reach many different communities because they come from different barrios all over the city.  Please continue to join us in praying Francisco to the Lord and also these many volunteers.

We had our meal at 3:30pm (we had a tour of the Civil Defense institution first) and then just hung out at my house until around 7pm when the group headed back to the hotel. Pray they will get the rest they need- the days are long and difficult as they deal with the heat and the noise.

Tomorrow we are working in The Hole, 9am - 2pm with a late afternoon meal and hopefully early to the hotel. Sunday morning they can sleep a little later before we head for church services in Villa de Yaque and then do a mini-clinic in Ponton de Navarette.  Monday is the day they keep asking about- SHOPPING and beach day!  Pray that they will finish strong these last few days.

One thing you can say about the mission field is that there are rarely two days alike. Today, after getting our routine down among ourselves, we changed it! We worked with new partners from the Civil Defense and another Baptist church. And instead of our normal lunch break, we took a short break on site and worked straight through to 3. Well, that was the plan but we had a few twists and ended up finishing at 4pm.  But as usual, our lunch/supper was delicious and the team started right in preparing meds for the next day and had their devotion and just as they finished it was time to leave for the worship service in Guayacanal.

Pepin, Jofrey (one of our translators) and Victor led a wonderful time of praise with the folks from the community where we held the clinic Tuesday. Marion shared her testimony and Pepin brought a strong message from God’s word about what it means to be a follower of Jesus.  12 people accepted the Lord! Johnny and his wife Cecilia (who we had prayed for Tuesday were among the group!) and that means that all of Luis Manuel’s household is now made up of believers!  Our bus driver shared how observing the team this week and hearing their testimonies has made him want to study God’s word more! And he had a cool surpise for us. he lives not far from where we were; his family called to say they had enough lemons on the tree out back to make lemonade for the team so he brought us to his house and we met his wife and sons and enjoyed fresh squeezed lemonade! I pray that this family also will come to know the Lord as Saviour, Friend and Lord!

Tomorrow we work at the Civil Defense headquarters which is housed at the government center building close to my house. We plan on seeing 100 patients ), working from 9-2pm (we saw 135 today which makes our total 585). Pray for a calm spirit for all of us. I had a stress attack today as I dealt with some mix-ups on numbers of patients we committed to see which combined with a sicker group of people to treat which obviously took longer to treat. Everything was fine and there really was no need to stress out but I did. Luckily the folks I was working with helped me regain perspective fairly quickly and we finished up very well and just an hour behind time and we were still able to get all we needed to get done before the service tonight done.  Liek I said, there was no need to stress out but sometimes the “Martha” in me just comes out!

On another note, Torria is not feeling well.  I took her back to the hotel after the mini break so she could rest and try to get back to health. Pray she gets a good nights rest and is ready for the morning.

It isn’t about numbers, but there is something about being a minister that impels me to talk about numbers. And of course, numbers represent people. Today we were able to treat at 180+ people. One young girl was really sick- she had a fever over 103 degrees. I was pleased we could send someone to buy the injection she needed and give the Mom an antibiotic to continue giving her. We pray she will go ahead and see a doctor but the little girl walked out of the clinic a different person which made our day!

We were in Los Santos today where we have a pretty well established church. I constantly wonder about our attendance because we aren’t growing numerically as much as I hope for but we do have a growing base of leaders and I pray that one day all the people who hang on the fringes of our ministry will  make a firm commitment to follow Jesus.  As I thought back a few years, this was a community that was wild- we literally had kids climbing up people during some events yet today the crowds were well behaved and we didn’t have any unhappy customers.  I so appreciated seeing the difference in behavior and feeling the joy of seeing progress. It comes in small little bits and we have to rejoice in every little bit!

Here is good news! 

Pastor Pritchard Adams was released tonight at around 8 PM near the entrance
of the University.   His wife was waiting at the University campus and they
are going to spend the night here with us.
We do praise the Lord for sparing his life and for coming back to us safely.
Jules Casseus 

Another wonderful day! We were able to treat over 160 patients today, bringing our two day total to 270 patients. Several people were led to the Lord as they consulted with their nurses.   Lots and lots of people expressed interest in knowing more about God’s plan for their lives and committed to studying His word with us on Thursday’s.

This afternoon a house burned to the ground while we were treating the family that lived there! We were able to have a special prayer for them in their moment of grief.  Please keep them in your prayers as they lost everything. We thank God that the family was at the clinic site and no one got injured in the fire.

We had another special prayer time with Johnny’s family. Please remember them with us as his wife is having a very difficult time.  I am convinced God is calling this family and part of what they are dealing with is an all out assault by evil forces.  Pray that Cecilia can rest peacefully tonight confident in God’s protection.

Thereare lots of seeds to harvest in this area and I am thankful for that and praying for wisdom as we continue to make disciples and raise up a strong church. One of our nurses will be returning in February with her church (Big Pine Key, FL) and will be helping to reap the harvest which is pretty cool!