We have just wrapped up our summer short term mission group season and could not be more pleased.  Many wonderful things were accomplished in the name of Jesus and many new doors have been opened.  We are so thankful to those who came, sacrificing their time, money, and energy giving to those in need. It also blesses Phil and I, our children, and our other team members when people chose to come and serve alongside us here in western Honduras. 

     I already have numerous groups scheduled for next summer.  Our season actually begins in February but the bulk of our groups come during the months of May, June, and July.  We are really excited about the fact that our calendar is already getting full and are thrilled as we think of all that will be accomplished next year.

     If you and your church, family, or youth group are interested, now would be the time to contact me directly to get your space reserved.  My personal email address is waldrondonna@me.com or you can call and leave a message on our stateside line (706-534-7060) with your name and number so that I can call you back to discuss a potential trip.

     Please continue to pray for our appointment in Tampa, FL with little Cindy Mendez on September 7th.  We should know then if they are able to assist her as they have proposed.  We will then have to get another visa, find a family to care for her for five months, and get her back to Tampa at the appointed time for the procedures.

     The Park Plaza church of Christ sent a team of seven people to work for two weeks in our on-going Let's Start Talking outreach ministry. We continue to have success with this ministry and are developing relationships with dozens of readers in the program that would probably have never come into our network of friends in the community if it were not for LST.

Several of these readers in the program are visiting our church services and many more are growing to know who we are as Christians and what we are all about. One of the readers, Miriam, is a very devout Catholic, who is married to a Doctor that works, among other things, with people who are HIV positive and/or have AIDS. Through her association with LST, which is held in our church building, she has come to know of some of the benevolent works that we are doing in the outlying villages with mobile medical clinics. In addition, we are very open to all socio-economic classes becoming Christians and consequently members of our congregation.

     Miriam said, "most Christian churches around here are not interested in poor people only middle and upper middle class people. In fact, I told my priest, those people are "living it out", we could learn something from them".  While we cannot vouch for the veracity of her comments we were grateful that she has been able to see us as Jesus' people, living out the Gospel in more than just words in her local community.

Santa Rosa Church Closes on New Building Lot   

     This month Mission UpReach was able to assist in combining the efforts of US donors with the efforts of the local church of Christ in Santa Rosa to successfully close on a new building lot.

     Wayne Kellis, an Elder at Campus View church of Christ, spearheaded an effort to raise a little more than half of the funds required to pay cash for the building lot while the local church successfully sold the small building that they had been meeting in for the remainder of the funds. This was no small accomplishment in what will be a long process of constructing a building suitable for the growth that the local congregation is experiencing.

     The total price for the building lot was $96,700 US including closing cost.  The overall master plan for constructing  a building that will serve the needs of the church over the next fifty years is to construct a concrete structure similar to the concept plan shown here in this picture. You can see that the design begins with a basement structure and will allow for successive phases of construction that can easily add additional floors providing space for the various ministries for the church.  

     Phase 1, set to begin sometime in the future when fund raising has been completed, will be a basement structure that will initially serve as auditorium and class room space. All of the foundations, beginning in Phase I, will be sized in order to support the successive phases of construction that will add several more floors above as time and growth dictate.

     Eventually, if God continues to provide growth in the local church and the various ministries in which she is involved there will be an underground parking garage (parking on the street is a huge problem in SRC), an auditorium which will seat 500 people, classroom space sufficient to house a first class Sunday school, a Christian school (still just a dream in our hearts and minds), office space, and classroom space for regional leadership training.

     Right now we want to take time to be thankful to God for having provided the funds to pay cash for this well situated lot in a central part of Santa Rosa.  Our faith is affirmed once again in viewing how God, through generous donors faced with the uncertainties of the economic future, have poured out this blessing on the church here in Santa Rosa. 

TERRY REEVES, FHU, HU & OTHERS HOLD VBS

     Terry Reeves, a dorm supervisor, at Freed Hardeman University, in west Tennessee, came with a group of students made up of FHU and Harding University students along with some others to hold four days of VBS in two of our public schools. These schools are two of the public schools that we are working in with our DESO program on a weekly basis.

     There were dramatized Bible lessons along with children's songs that lifted up the name of Jesus in addition to other activities that provided the opportunity for these kids (in a public school setting) to learn about the Bible and Jesus.

Grand Central Church Holds Eyeglasses Brigade in Public Schools 

  The Wilkesboro, NC church of Christ combined with the Burnt Hickory, Marietta, GA church of Christ came to hold a four day eyeglasses campaign this month. They began by visiting two army bases, the 120 Brigade in Santa Rosa and the 7th Battalion in Cucuyagua. All of the soldiers that needed eyeglasses were attended to.

They then went to Florida, Copán for two days, which is the site of one of our new church plants. In Florida they served 700 people. Just look at these pictures of two very happy "customers".