A piggy back ride

Good news on the home front. I found out today that we are going to be able to piggy back supplies on a container this summer! Gayle Davidson, Torch team leader and awesome friend, will be shipping a container to Honduras sometime near the end of April / first of May and will be in Tegucigalpa in time for our trip this summer. The container will be loaded in Melbourne, Florida, which is even better news for the Tampa, Sarasota, and Islamorada teams. Those of us north of Florida will have to figure out a way to truck our stuff down to Melbourne in time for the loading. This is great news because now we can send stuff down and will not have to pay for an entire container, but chip in our fair share for Gayle's.

Right now our major focus for supply collection is hygiene products (tooth brushes, tooth paste, soap, etc), toys, stuffed animals, children's shoes and clothes, and over the counter meds like Tylenol, Advil, chewable vitamins, etc. Let me know if you come across anything interesting that you are offered, sometimes my motto, "If its free its for me!" can bring in some very interesting items. As you collect shoes and clothes, pay close attention to the condition of the donations and sort out things that are too worn, stained, or inappropriate. One of Torch's slogans is "NO JUNK FOR JESUS." We want to be able to give quality goods to the people of Honduras.

Airline tickets are definitely on the rise. If you have not bought your ticket yet I hope you are in the process of getting it done. I bought Margaret's ticket this week and the price went up $50 in 24 hours. With the situation in the Middle East right now there is no telling how expensive the tickets will get. As a reminder, please send me your flight information once you have bought your ticket(s), especially if you are going on the Honduras trip. Scheduling buses to be at the airport at the correct times will be important as flights arrive. It looks like we have people flying on all the carriers mentioned in the last blog so finding out how many are on each flight is the puzzle piece we are trying to find now.

Plans for the Costa Rica trip is getting more and more specific as the days advance. We have been in communication with Daniel Chavez, the preacher in Buenos Aires, several times. He now has Skype and we can talk to him on a more consistent basis now. You can't help but get excited listening to him as we discus the plans for the campaign there! Daniel is planning on doing radio and television advertisements for a month leading up to the mission team's arrival. Today we decided to add an additional day to the gospel meeting. We will now be doing a 5 day meeting to take advantage of the time that the Torch team, along with several of the ministers from other congregations throughout Costa Rica, are there working. Our goal is to try to canvas the entire city (about 45,000-60,000) while we are there. Besides the evening tent meeting, we will be doing a 4 day training seminar with a class on church growth for the men taught by Dr. Joe Roberts, a ladies class taught by Keffie Morrow, and a children's class. We will also be doing a 4 day VBS class too along with several service projects.

The Honduras plans are still a work in progress. We are still getting information in about potential work sites for this summer. Mark Connell, Tim Hines, and Marc Tindall have been discussing various work areas and researching needs and ways in which we night be able to help. Tim has found some new places to visit and of course places like Mololoa, Dadakso, the blind school, the special needs orphanage, and others are in the plans. We are gearing up for at least 1 major medical clinic this year, possibly 2. We do know that we will be working in Tegucigalpa and the surrounding area the entire trip this summer. Nathan's team is planning on working their entire trip in Choluteca at Agua Agria installing a hydro-electric system there along with other projects. They will take care of the clothing and shoe distribution there this year so we will be able to focus our energy in the capital city.

Stay tuned, I will be posting again soon. As February comes to a close we find ourselves that much closer to the summer months and our mission trips. For the Costa Rica team we are just barely 100 days away from the trip! Hasta luego, recuerde que servimos a Dios de la fuerza! Reinados de Dios!

TR