Thank you so much for your patience and prayers. I’m looking forward to sharing with you what God has done and look forward to seeing how God is going to work in El Faro.
The Friday I wrote last was when we (the El Faro cohort) were to meet Manuel (a possible mentor for El Faro’s process of adapting the PD strategy) for the first time. Manuel has started PD churches himself and he’s a certified instructor to help guide other churches in their process. He’s done that several times, so this could be a very good thing for El Faro. However, our cohort consists of 3 couples and another single woman and one of those couples had COVID and wasn’t able to attend. Immediately after sending you the prayer request, another couple let me know that their neighbourhood had no electricity and wouldn’t be able to attend unless it was restored. This meant that the first order of business was going to be assessing the situation at the beginning of the meeting and maybe having to postpone it. Five of the eight of us connected and, along with Manuel and his apprentice (on either side of me in the photo), decided to proceed when Rafa (bottom of the photo), our pastor, lost his internet connection!
Fortunately, Rafa was able to reconnect after several minutes and we held the meeting. After Manuel shared about himself and his experience with PD, and after a good Q&A time, the cohort had a first impressions and concerns meeting. That meeting was also very positive with excellent participation and we committed to praying to seek the Lord’s guidance and convening again last Monday to discuss how the Lord was leading us. I was concerned about those not present so, with permission, I recorded the meeting to share with the others. I was hoping to do that in one showing but ended up having to do it twice. I was glad that we all had the same information and time to pray.
Monday all eight of us were able to meet in another excellent meeting. Concerns were discussed as well as the positive observations. It was unanimously decided for Rafa to write and then to call Manuel inviting him to be our mentor, but some other questions needed to be dealt with which led to another meeting of the cohort on Thursday. The decision was made to invite other leaders and potential leaders in El Faro to join in the process, so the Thursday meetings will be the Training with Manuel leading the discussion instead of me. This is a huge step forward as it will be a Mexican working Mexicans (and a Canadian in a support role). I’m very happy about that. Rafa is contacting those on the list the cohort produced. Please pray for God’s leading in those calls and in the decisions that they will make. I’m looking forward to seeing who accepts the challenge on Thursday. The cohort will be part of the Training group and will meet as is necessary, but probably not weekly.
We are located in the capital city of Baja California Sur and Manuel lives in the capital city of Baja California. He’s at the northern extreme and we’re almost at the southern extreme of the Baja Peninsula, so these meetings will continue on Zoom. Manuel will also be calling Rafa between meetings which is another good thing. I’ve been concerned about not seeing a lot of leadership on Rafa’s part, but I’ve been very encouraged in the last several meetings to see him taking a stronger leadership role. Please pray that Manuel will be a leadership mentor to Rafa as well as mentoring the Training group.
Rafa is very busy these days, so I don’t have more to share about my ever-changing role in the church. Please pray with me seeking the Lord’s will about the shape that will take.
These are exciting and challenging days, so I sign-off extremely grateful for your prayers!
Brenda
