Pine Tree Church-Medical, Dental and Eyeglasses Brigade
This last month the Pine Tree church of Christ from Longview, Texas came with a group and worked in a general medicine, dental and eyeglasses brigade.
In total we were able to attend to over 950 people with medical consultations, dental extractions and eyeglasses for those who needed them. The community that we held the brigade in is called El Limón de San Juan de Opoa and later this year we are hoping to establish a church there.
Medical brigades are one method that we use to get to know the leaders of a community as well as other people who are good prospects for evangelistic Bible studies. Dr. Adam Spencer headed up the dental group and always does a great job in pre-trip planning as well as execution.
 Dr. Spencer is pictured here with Jon Stacy who is translating and assisting him in extracting rotten teeth. Laura, our daughter, is pictured here translating for the Pharmacist in the group, Jeri Wilkerson. Usually in these events all of our bilingual staff of missionaries plus other volunteers are pressed into service.
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Boot Camp For University and High School Students
 We held our largest Boot Camp for High School and University students ever during January with 35 participants not including the instructors.
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Dr. Butch Kinzer from the Mayfair Church in Huntsville, AL Leads Survey Group
This past month Dr. Butch Kinzer, who is a member of the Mayfair church of Christ in Huntsville, Alabama came with a small group in order to survey the surgery suite and surgery equipment that is available at the Gracias, Lempira hospital. This hospital is an old colonial town some 45 minutes away from our Santa Rosa de Copán location.
We have been dialoging with the Administration at the Hospital for this whole past year about organizing teams of surgeons to come and do general surgery. At present the Hospital has a 5 to 6 month waiting list for non-emergency surgeries. Dr. Kinzer is hoping to organize groups of surgeons and other medical professionals to come and work for one week at a time to help eliminate some of the hospital's backlog.
Ashley Miller, RN, who is our volunteer Staff nurse and is from the Mayfair Church was excited to be able to shepherd this group around and explore how we might can serve their needs in the name of our Jesus our Lord.
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Another Boot Camp
This past month we held another Boot Camp with 25 participants from 11 congregations from across the western highlands of Honduras. They are pictured here going out to a community called Plan San Jeronimo where we planted a new church last year in order to evangelize from house to house.
 LIFO Seminar
Recently Phil Waldron was certified in the behavioral analysis program known as LIFO or Life Orientation Systems.
This is a methodology of analyzing one's preferred behavioral styles under both favorable and unfavorable conditions. We spent two days with all of our staff and team members here at Team MUR learning about the system and working on team building so that we can be better servants in God's Kingdom.
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A Note from Donna
As of this writing, we are just a day away from our spring break short term mission groups. This year we will host three separate groups that will each impact the lives of people and communities and contribute to our mission to plant churches in every village in western Honduras. We are so thankful for those who willingly give up their vacation time to serve others. You will see photos and hear about results in our next newsletter.
Phil and I often talk about the gratitude we feel for each one of our contributors. It is amazing to see how God takes each person's offering and turns it into something lasting. I hope as you read our newsletters you can see just how incredibly well things are going here. God has brought just the right people together for His purposes. While you may not know the names of each of our team members, we ask that you pray for each one as they labor and serve.
While the mission is able to provide those who work for us a salary that supports their families, thechallenges of ministry are real. We are blessed to co-labor with individuals who do what they do because they see it as an opportunity to serve the Lord and enhance His Kingdom on earth. Thank you for your prayers and your support!
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DESEO Starts 2014 Classes
Our DESEO team kicked off their school year, which coordinates with the public school calendar. Here in Honduras the school year runs from February to November.
 At the end of last year's school year Donna, who is the Director of the DESEO program, and Angie Rivas, who is the Assistant Director, visiting all 14 schools and talked with each of the Principals in order to assess the impact of the program. As a result of those interviews we have implemented improvements in our execution of the program.
 This year we have reduced the total number of children served by the program on a weekly basis from 1,400 to 1,000. We have also combined our team into one single team so that four teachers in one team visit each school instead of two teams of two in separate schools. This provides more time with the children by virtue of having to cover fewer children. Combining the team into one large team has created a much more dynamic teaching experience for the kids as well. The DESEO public school program is still one of the most effective tools we have to turn this generation's heart towards God.
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