December Pastor's Note

We’re leaving on a jet plane… but Lord willing and the creek don’t rise, we do know when we’ll be back again. For many months, we have been hoping, praying, and planning to go visit with Haresh and Hamitha to meet them in person, as well as the children with whom they work. We’re excited to see the work they’ve been doing in Nabarangpur, which has been able to expand thanks to generosity from Trinity and individual donors. We now have tickets, so it’s really real!

A team of five will be going from Trinity, including Mark Facknitz, Rollin Johnson, Jr, Teresa Harris, Rick Comstock, and me. We will leave the day after Christmas, and return on Thursday, January 8th. We are looking forward to seeing what God is doing and how we can partner with Haresh and Hamitha to support these children.

Did you know that Trinity has also been supporting vulnerable children through a mission in Bolivia? For almost a decade, we’ve committed $1000 to Amistad Mission. Mary Lou visited a decade ago, and can attest to the good work they are doing. Amistad began as a locally run mission in Cochabamba, Bolivia’s third-largest city. In 1990, they welcomed the first 30 children to live onsite, providing food, shelter, education, and medical care, all while sharing tangible signs of God’s love. Since then, they have expanded greatly. This year alone, they received 22 new children into Villa Amistad.

In this city of nearly 700,000 people, there are 45 institutions for children. Amistad is unique in many ways. From their founding, they have prioritized keeping sibling groups together, and they are able to unite or reunite large sibling groups under one roof, from infancy through university or technical school. This year, Amistad offered ten full university or technical school scholarships. With this year’s additions, six sibling groups were able to stay together, including two groups of 5 siblings each! Children live in small groups in homes, with a dedicated mama and tia for each house. It’s very nurturing environment.

As we have seen with the children in Nabarangpur, not all of the “orphans” have lost both parents. They may have a living parent who is not able to care for them, for any variety of reasons. Though Amistad has welcomed many children in that situation, they wanted to prioritize supporting families so that they could stay together. To date, over 475 families and more than 1,000 children have benefitted from this child abandonment prevention program. Amistad offers a parenting school, family development plans, tutoring, nutritious meals, counseling, home and school visits, microloans, housing and food assistance, and Christian education. Next year they plan to serve over 100 families across two locations by building healthy homes to keep children with their parents.

Amistad began with 30 children. Haresh and Hamitha have been working with 48, and they now provide housing, food, education, and medical care for ten of them. Whether the Mercy House continues with just 10 children or experiences the kind of growth and expansion that Amistad has seen, each of those children’s lives has been changed. We look forward to seeing for ourselves what a difference this has made for those ten.

We support these missions while we still work to meet the needs of vulnerable children in our community. What a gift it is to be part of such transformative work, across at least three continents! If we count our recent support for Allen Awiti’s vocational education in Kenya, that brings us up to four. Thank you for your faithfulness and generosity that makes all of this possible! Let us celebrate the love of Christ that is born anew, in this season and every day.

Grace and peace,

Stephanie