Fall Newsletter

Dear Friends and Family,

It has been a long time since I wrote an update! As most of you know, Mario and I were able to spend our summer in Wyoming, praise be to God for His kindness! It was a sweet season of getting to introduce Mario to all kinds of “firsts”, including meeting much of my family for the first time, seeing all kinds of wildlife for the first time, and experiencing snow for the first time (among many other things!). How grateful I am for God’s perfect timing. Shocker, He really does know best, even when I think He could hurry up a bit! I am thankful for His patience, especially with me! 

We came home to Honduras in mid-August and have been fairly busy since then. I allowed some time for readjustment, especially for the kids, but they are happy to be back and are sleeping good again, thankfully! We are back into our weekly rhythms with church activities, and Mario has been busy with his “presidential role”/community-related work. Since entering that role, he has worked hard to bring a lot of positive change and growth to La Venta, and the biggest project is currently underway: paving the road from the highway all the way through the village (roughly 2 miles). This is such a huge blessing for our community and I am incredibly proud of the work he is doing, although it does take up a lot of his time! He is faithful in it and has the opportunity to interact with so many different people in various life circumstances, and in the midst of all of it to act as a light to all those he comes in contact with. 

I have been able to jump back into ministry at the church including youth ministry, administration, and the worship team. Outside of church, I have gotten to start discipling a new believer one-on-one (one of our youth girls!!), and I started a book study with some friends. Next week we will also kick off the new “study unit” of INSTE with some of our friends/family/church leadership team. We are thankful to see what God is doing and to get to be a part of it. 

One of my hopes for this next month or so is to get our cafe running again! Thank you to all of you who showed us so much generosity and support; to even think about reopening is only possible thanks to each of you who helped us with the issues we’ve been having with our machine and our cafe space. We’ve been running up against some logistical issues with the things that need to be done to reopen, but I’m hoping they will be resolved soon. 

Overall we are thankful to be home, glad to be back with our community here and all the activities that come with that, and hopeful for what the rest of the year will look like. Thank you for your partnership with us both financially and in prayer. We are extremely grateful. God is good! A specific prayer request we have right now is for one of Mario’s cousins, Wendy. She is a precious friend to me, and has been one of our most valuable companions in ministry, along with her husband, David. A few months ago, she found out that she has pre-cancerous tumors in her uterus, and they have been doing different work and fundraising activities to be able to afford the surgery to remove it. She has had many different symptoms and is in almost-constant pain. It has been an incredibly challenging process, and they have been struggling with discouragement as one thing after another has made the whole situation harder to handle. Thankfully, they love the Lord and have found their hope and strength in Him, but it has been far from easy. We ask for your prayers for them and for their family, as well as for our church as we support them as best we can. If anyone has the desire to contribute financially to lighten their load, please get in touch with me. And if anyone wants to stay updated on the process so as to be praying more specifically, let me know. Thank you for joining us in this. We trust that God will continue to show Himself as good, trustworthy, and present in this process. 

Bendiciones!

Katie and Mario