The Front Lines

Hello!
Kristin and I are now located in a cute, clean apartment in Yarina, a few minutes from Las Brisas and Teodora Vinder, the two communities where our campaign is currently running. For these last two weeks remaining of the campaign we will be focusing on building sanitary letrines with our families, a real need we´ve noticed. It is important to dig a pit to bury waste, and every home we´ve visited has an above ground letrine. This means the pile of waste sits on the ground, and rats, chickens, and other creatures run through it and eat from it, contributing greatly to the spread of disease and infection. Not to mention the many flies that lay their eggs and travel from letrine to the kitchen and back again.
One of the latest discoveries we made while visiting km 38 for a few days was a vampire bat happily sleeping above Kristin´s bed. David kindly rid us of the nasty looking thing, and I was once again so thankful for my mosquito net. It and I will be inseparable, I´m sure, by the end of this trip.
A while back I wrote about a man who came through our clinic with his intestines in a plastic bag, and said that we were going to look into raising money for the surgery he needs to put them back in. We are still trying to raise the money he needs for the surgery and would like to help him with it as soon as posible. The surgery will cost $500. I know a lot of my friends have been putting up information about this guy on their blogs, too. If you are interested in donating money to help this man, please let me know. He is a member of the SDA church in Las Brisas, and is a fisherman by trade. However, he can´t fish because of the strain it puts on his stomach, so he is doing odd jobs for members of the church in exchange for food and money, earning enough to live, but no more. He has been faithfully attending the meetings, and just yesterday as Kristin and I sat under the tent for Sabbath school, I looked over and saw him eagerly reading his Bible. When you look into his eyes, you can see the pain he´s in, but he keeps going, smiling and remaining true to the Lord. Why else are we here but to help those who can´t help themselves? I was impressed that if we could show him God´s love by meeting this need, his faith will be strengthened in such a tangible way.
I want to thank you all for the many prayers said daily for me and the project here. I believe prayer is powerful, and we are on the front lines. Satan is not happy to see the people here responding in love and gratitude to the Lord for the joy He is bringing to their lives. He is working hard to weaken the efforts here in any way he can. Please continue to pray for the people of Las Brisas and Teodora Vinder, that the Holy Spirit would move on their hearts and use us in whatever capacity He sees fit to bring the precious gospel of love to their thirsty souls.