Wedding

On Saturday Elisa and Paco got married here at the church (the civil service was two weeks ago in Guadalajara). For those of you who haven't seen the (hundreds and hundreds) of pictures on Facebook, here are a few!

Haiti and Panama Missions Trip

As you've probably read, this month we sent 5 young men from the church to Haiti and Panama to minister through soccer. The boys gave short testimonies last week in church and they were greatly affected both by the extreme poverty and need they saw and also by the presence of God in the different churches they visited. Ironically, they found that soccer became less and less their focus as they had opportunities to visit with and minister to many people. Here are some pictures from their time in Haiti.

Soccer ministry: #3 Paco, #4 Vicente, #8 Samy, #5 Carlos, #14 José

Missions trip and concert

Thank you for praying for the 5 guys on the mission trip. They have now left Panama where they participated in street presentations and shared the gospel. They have now arrived in Haiti and will continue to share the gospel alongside playing football. Please keep praying for boldness and strength for each of them.

Elisa and Jacob travelled over night south down to Tepic in Nayarit where they will be playing in a concert this evening, supporting Marcos Witt, the 5-time Latin Grammy award winning Christian singer. They will be singing some songs written by Elisa's cousin. From there Elisa will travel to Guadalajara for her legal ceremony with the church ceremony following in a couple of weeks time. Please pray for her and the family over the coming few weeks as she and Paco finish all the preparations.

Some information and prayer requests

...because that's what the blog is for! I mentioned in a recent post that we've started a rehab/support group for people with addictions and social problems. As an extension of this ministry, which is focused on adults, we are creating a live-in group for children and youth struggling with addictions. We have rented a nearby house and already have 3 members; one is only 16 and has fathered 2 children, in addition to having addiction problems. We ask for your prayers for these young people and for those who will continue to arrive. The person who was in charge of this outreach has had to leave San Pedro unexpectedly, so we are looking for someone to take on this role as leader and counselor. Please be in prayer for this person also; we don't know who it will be yet but we know that God is preparing the right one to minister to these children.

Last weekend municipal elections were held throughout Coahuila. In the run-up to the election, Marcela and Stephen were asked to support a local candidate and participate as PRD members in San Pedro. They were unable to do so but Elisa took the opportunity to become involved, as it has long been a goal to have Christians involved in local government. Her party didn't win the election but she is in place as a party representative and we are hoping that God will use her to help turn the San Pedro government to the Lord.

Soccer playing and mission trip

It's been another busy few days in San Pedro, although a drop in temperature has bought a brief relief from the summer heat of the desert. Yesterday we had our first match on the soccer field on the property. The guys were all given notes of paper as they left with John 3:16 written on them, please pray they would read them and want to learn more.
Today 5 of our guys left on a missions trip. They are heading down to Mexico city on the bus, from where they will fly to Panama and onto Haiti. Their aim is to share the gospel and will also be using soccer to reach out to the people. Please pray again that they would be bold and confident as they seek to spread the good news.

Above: Playing on the soccer field

Below: Praying and sending out the boys on the missions trip