May/June 2012 “For he that is mighty hath done to me great things; and holy is his name.

May/June 2012

 

“For he that is mighty hath done to me great things; and holy is his name.  Luke 1:49

The month of May began with a great thing for the Iglesia Bíblica Bautista Misericordia -Tepic (IBBM-Tepic). Pastor Nacho had the opportunity to travel to Armenia, Colombia, to participate in a CESI (Training Center for Church Planters) conference for Latin Americans. Nacho has been training diligently and working alongside Humberto, Filiberto, Aarón and José Luis, young men from IBBM, in preparation. This summer, along with several other volunteer IBBM young people, they will be canvassing homes in the projected area, looking for opportunities to share the Good News and praying for an open door for a satellite church. This great thing is an answer to our prayers that IBBM would be a viable, propagative, biblical church.

    

Those growing, energetic IBBM young people are now on summer break from OANSA (AWANA), but they have plenty of plans for summer service. Six of them graduated from the entire OANSA course (at least 8 years of training) this past month, and have now been inducted into the “leaders-in-training” squad.  Each one will be co-leading a group alongside an experienced mentor this coming year as they work to complete requirements to become full-fledged leaders. This year’s five leaders-in-training all exchanged their orange shirts for their official red shirts! It is a great thing to see the maturing fruit of years of prayers, instruction, and example.

Mother’s Day and Father’s Day were also reminders of great things He has done for IBBM-Tepic.

During these past two months, the brothers and sisters of the Huichol village of La Bendición have experienced so many great things it is impossible to share more than a couple of highlights in this short update. The building project of the beautiful multi-purpose church/education center was completed, but not before they made the unanimous decision to personally participate in the mandate of the Great Commission. Seventeen of the enthusiastic believers pooled resources, sacrificed time and “comfort,” and set out in Benjamín’s pickup truck for a 16-hour grueling trip to the most remote Huichol village in the state of Nayarit for the purpose of evangelizing, discipling and encouraging. That’s 13 hours jammed into the pick-up and another 6, hiking the trail. They affirmed, some with real tears of rejoicing for the opportunity, that “Somebody answered the call to share the Good News with us, and out of extreme gratitude, for this great thing, we want to do the same.” Four new believers in Codorniz were baptized.

The Huichol students of the first group of Theology Training by Extension (ETE) were awarded their first-level certificates last month as the very first official activity in their beautiful, new building. Now they are studying level two beginning with the Life of Christ. Not only have they been faithful and diligent in their studies, but also they have applied their education taking this great thing to eager students in more distant villages.

Life for José Lopez was never again the same after he repented of his sin and accepted the gift of salvation. His obsession with sharing the Gospel with the people of his tribe scattered throughout the rugged mountains of Nayarit, in spite of significant persecution and personal loss, has been used of God to accomplish much. The dedication of the church at La Bendición this month is yet another great thing.  See more digital pictures of the celebration here.

“For he that is mighty hath done to me great things; and holy is his name.” Luke 1:49