Dear Friends and Family,
Here I am at my dining room table writing this newsletter. However, within the next week Mario and I will need to pack up our things and move out as the owner of this house will be returning next weekend. There is a house here in La Venta that we’ve been praying for since April and supposedly the family was going to move out in July… then August… then they were saying October… then December… but they haven’t seemed to budge an inch, so for a while we had no idea where we would be moving to (rentals are scarce here in La Venta), but thankfully this week God opened a door for at least a temporary living situation. It’s a tiny little house with no kitchen or bathroom sink, nor a shower, so showers will have to be done using buckets and washing dishes and all that will need to be done outside where I will also wash our clothes. We are thankful to have a place to go, but hope that the Lord allows us to move into the house we’ve been waiting for, or find a different place to rent that would allow us to develop further our plans for doing in-home ministry such as worship nights or bible studies or game nights with the children and youth of the village. We ask for your prayers for provision in that area.
While on the subject of provision, just this week God provided for us a car! Which is really a huge blessing for us, especially for me as using public transportation here in Honduras is not ideal for anyone, let alone a young white female. Just the trip into the city on the way to get the car made me that much more grateful-- a long ride in a bus to the edge of the city, then a rather dangerous ride in a junky little taxi to the city center, and from there another ride in a van to the area where the car was. What could’ve taken about 45 minutes turned into 2 hours and just in general more dangerous than necessary, so praise God for our new car! FSI financed it, but we’re hoping to be able to raise funds to pay it back. If that is something that you’re interested in helping us with, you can send a check to my dad in Cody with a note specifying that it’s for the car. The address for that is: 1205 Blue Water Court Cody, WY 82414.
Some news since my last update: there was a wedding! Surprise surprise;) On November 19th, Mario and I got married in Camp Monte de Santidad (a very important place for the history of FSI and our involvement here in Honduras). It was a joyful day made even better by the people we were surrounded by. My dad officiated the wedding and one of my very dear friends translated, and both of my sisters were up next to me as two of my bridesmaids. My mom, two of my nephews, and another one of my best friends were also there. And of course all of our community here in Honduras was there to support us and celebrate by our side. It really was a very special day.
Since then, we’ve been working on ministry stuff. A lot of fellowship with our community of youth and adults between dinners and graduation parties (the school year is different here), plus we hosted a big dinner party for Thanksgiving, which was lots of fun! I’m hoping to do more evenings like that to grow community and fellowship and be able to have focused nights of prayer and worship. We’ve also started going to a local soccer field a couple times a week to spend time playing with the village kids. Mario is really passionate about using soccer as a platform to influence the kids here and give them something to do aside from just spending time in the street and falling into the negative patterns that most kids have in their homes and families here. More kids show up every time we go and I’m really enjoying building relationships with each of them.
This upcoming weekend, a men’s soccer team from Cornerstone University in Michigan will be arriving. I absolutely love helping with teams, as does Mario, so we’re really looking forward to our time with them. While they’re here in La Venta over the weekend, we’ll work a bit on the church and the team will lead a few soccer clinics that will be open to anyone in the community. The rest of their time here in Honduras will be spent in Tegucigalpa partnering with another ministry, Point. Point’s focus is helping kids in some of the poorest and most dangerous parts of the city. Please pray for safety for this team, as well as for hearts that are open and sensitive to receive the Good News that is the focus behind every activity that this team will participate in.
To God be the glory for each and every provision, His blessings are abundant! And thank you so much for being a part of the ministry that God is doing through FSI. We couldn’t do it without your support.
Blessings,
Katie Velasquez
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