Happy (belated) Thanksgiving, Dear Friends!
We are so grateful for YOU and your faithful prayers and support over the years... What a
blessing it is to partner with you in serving God here in Lautaro! Here are
some praises and photos from the past few months, and then a few prayer
requests:
Praises -
Over the past months since starting the new leadership team at ICI Lautaro, we’ve had new ministries running and a few special activities, including Youth group and Women meetings:
After a couple
months of hard work, the new kitchen at church has been finished!
We held our
2nd ‘Fiesta de la Luz’ (‘Light Party’) celebrating Jesus being the true Light,
with costumes, dancing singing and games!
Our kiddos
passed their exams to validate the homeschool year!
I (Karissa) was blessed to be to share at a women’s retreat early this month at ICI Oriente in Santiago, and we had a little bit of extended family time!
Our US
passports renewal process was approved! Thank You, Lord! Now we just need to
wait a couple more weeks for the new passports to be sent.
After 10 months at the mechanic,
we finally have our Mitsubishi back!! Thank you so much for your prayers and the
generosity of those who gave to cover this huge need!!
Now a few prayer
requests for the next few weeks -
- Next Monday,
Dec. 4th Gus will have the blessing of sharing about the work in
Lautaro in a Missions-wide zoom call about the churches in the south of Chile. Please
pray that would be a great opportunity for people to learn about what God is
doing in these southern regions in the ICI Movement!
- There is a
new couple coming to church, Blankita and Maicol, who are expecting a baby due this next week. The pregnancy has been complicated so appreciate prayers for
the baby and mom’s health. In addition, Blankita is a believer but had left
church years ago, while Maicol is agnostic, but recently has been open to spiritual
conversations. I’m organizing a meal-train for them after the baby is born to
show them the practical love of the Body of Christ, and we appreciate your
prayers for their spiritual journey as they encounter God’s Love and Truth!
- Saturday, Dec.
23rd will be our Christmas service! Please pray for all of the preps
that are currently underway! The kiddos will do choreography for a couple
songs, and we'll have a Christmas play with kids, teens, and adult actors! The evening will have a very evangelistic
focus, and with so many friends involved in singing, dancing, and acting, we are
praying that their non-believing friends will accept the invitation to attend
and be exposed to the Good News message!
- We are very
excited that there are 23 people from ICI Lautaro going to our mission-wide
Conference (called ‘VIVE’) in January! A group of us have been selling lunches,
snacks, raffle tickets, among other things, in order to raise money to go!
Please pray for this whole group and what God is doing in each family...
- Last but
definitely not least, my sister Monique just got engaged!! So now, more than
ever, we REALLY need to travel to the US next year!! 😉 We are excited to hopefully spend time with family that we haven’t seen in
years and visit our faithful supporters! We would LOVE the opportunity to share
with you in person about what God is doing here in Lautaro! So far, we have
$500 out of the $5,500 that tickets (currently) cost, so we greatly appreciate
the generosity of those who are able to help with these travel expenses!
For anyone
desiring to contribute to these tickets or to join our monthly support team,
here is our support information for tax-deductible contributions:
Online, please use the link below and scroll to “Gustavo Guevara” under the “Fund” tab: https://pushpay.com/g/iamchilenationalworkers?src=hpp&r=monthly
Through regular mail, please make checks payable to “IberoAmerican Ministries”, designate to “Project: Guevara - Chile”,
and send to:
IberoAmerican Ministries
P.O. Box 1493
Monroe, WA 98272
The past few
months, we have really identified with the lyrics of “Gratitude” by Brandon Lake:
“All my words fall short; I’ve got
nothing new. How could I express all my gratitude?
I could sing these songs as I often
do, but every song must end, and You never do.
So I throw up my hands and praise You
again and again,
‘Cause all that I have is a
Hallelujah, hallelujah,
And I know it’s not much, but I’ve
nothing else fit for a King,
Except for a heart singing
Hallelujah, Hallelujah...”
May our
gratitude for what Jesus has done for us lead to live a life of worship,
surrender and service to God, by serving others as well... He has blessed us
soooo much and we are compelled to bless others with His Love! Thank YOU for
being a channel of God’s love and provision in our lives...
With immense
gratitude,
Gus, Karissa
& Kiddos
