How
I desire to share with you in words what the Lord is doing in our church in
such a way you could feel like you are here with us seeing His marvelous hand
working, experiencing the Holy Spirit for yourselves, as He hovers over this place
with His incredible power! Jesus is touching
so many corporeally and individually as His word is faithfully shared in
different ways and different times, with the adults and with the youth and the children. It is so incredibly exciting!
We haven’t
written in a while simply for lack of extra time… Time we try to preciously spend in the
ministry to His people and to those who will become His! In February we had a beautiful Couples Valentine's
dinner where we shared the movie “Courageous”.
Every man stood up to make the resolution to become more committed
husbands and fathers. It was marvelous! Our friends Ralph and Deb, Randy and Dodie,
and Tom and Debra, Jim and Linda were here from the US to help with the
beautiful decorations setup and were hosts for this special event. It is so beautiful to see the body of Christ
come together as one with the same vision to lead others to Christ.
Every
one of these events seems to make our own body grow deeper in their walk and
love for Jesus and we begin to see the fruit as they themselves become more
committed to serving others. We have had
a series of leadership and teachers meetings as we continued to make our plans
for the work out at CCMS in Laguna del Valle and in the church. The message we share is that the Lord has put
that place Laguna del Valle in our laps as a church to minister to. More of our body became more committed to
serve out at the mission with the right heart.
The message being that God doesn’t need us but we need Him as we are
chosen with the privilege to serve these wonderful families represented by the
children.
The
fruit? It has been absolutely
astounding! Because of your prayers and
your consistent support we have been able to continue to minister to the
spiritual and physical needs of these children and their families. One example of this is the Valdovinos
family. Dani and Pablito are two little
boys that began attending the school because of their older brother Francisco
who got saved during Upward Soccer a few years ago. His little brothers have now been attending
consistently for 3 years with their mother Ana.
Because we have a women’s bible study on Friday’s, Ana was given the
chance to give her life to Jesus. This
in itself is a very powerful thing because since that decision, the Lord has
healed her from physical abuse as a child and unforgiveness towards her
abuser. She changed her lifestyle of
“union libre” with the father of her boys. Her powerful stand has
affected her whole family. How? Her mother, two sisters and brother have come
to Jesus along with all their children!
Her brother has made the decision to marry the woman he was living with
and we will be having a “church wedding” in August! Her mother who is married civilly is trying
to convince her husband also to have a Christian ceremony to celebrate their
marriage. Wow! All of this we is the fruit of the loving
care and attention, in the name of Jesus given to Ana’s children at CCMS. We can also attribute it to the loving hands
of those brothers from Calvary Denver who came to do construction on her home
and the body at Calvary who have so lovingly received this family. What a witness! Ana consistently attends all our events and
is willing to serve with an unconditional heart. You will always see her with her notebook taking
notes of all that she hears during bible study…even if it isn’t an event or
message that directly applies to her! We
love it and so does her Jesus…!
Then
there are Juan Manuel Sr. and Luz del Carmen another powerful testimony of God
saving an entire family…. I have written
about this family often and how the Lord put them in our midst to help them
climb out of extreme poverty. Not by
giving them a handout but by teaching them how to function as a family of
Jesus, through basic life skills. The children
had not been in school consistently really ever until we helped enroll them
this past fall. They have 4 school aged
children who thanks to the Lord were able to be received into a school that is
interested in helping them learn. This
is a very rare thing in this community which has overcrowded classrooms and the
children who can only make the grade if the parents really come behind them
academically. Most of the parents do not
have higher than a 6th grade education themselves so helping their
kids excel is a problem. Many do but
many don’t… Well the Lord is the Lord of the impossible and 4 of the children
are making it to the end of the school year with passing grades. Her second grader Carlitos who has serious
disciplinary problems and had never been in school before, is learning to
read! We praise the Lord for His mighty
power to change! Juan Manuel the
smartest of the 4 has an 89% average! Chuy who has a learning disability due to
the alcoholism of his parents while he was in-vitrio, is now also learning to
recognize letters and numbers. He just
turned 13 this last month. Alejandra the only girl of the family is also growing spiritually and academically. Dad has come to church
now 3 weeks in a row and accepted the Lord!
God is good and will finish the work He has started in each one of us.
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| Remembering our Passover Lamb! |
At
Easter we had a beautiful Passover meal with 80 people in attendance. We were so blessed and surprised that so many
came. Our friend Yael, who is a newly
converted Messianic Jew, helped Bill by speaking the prayers of the Passover
meal in Hebrew as he taught through the ceremony the death and resurrection of
the spotless Lamb. It was beautiful and
very informative for the people in the church.
Then we had our Easter Sunrise Service out at Laguna del Valle in our
newly finished upstairs sanctuary that is now functional because of the efforts
of so many of you…gathering together laying brick by brick, putting on a roof,
tiling a floor, and installing lights . We were able to use it as it all came to completion on the Day
of our Lord’s celebration at our Sunrise Service! It was powerful and we are so blessed to see
the Lord use that place for His glory with so many from the church in
attendance! We then had an Easter
Service at church with a Resurrection Egg activity afterwards for the kids in a
local park. The beauty of that event was
that two families who were there in the park with their kids, were invited to
participate and they stayed for the message and received Jesus! Absolutely beautiful!
The
discipleship at the church has also shown incredible fruit in the lives of the
body as the Men continue to grow with the help of Self-Confrontation. The Women are half way through a Joyful Life
bible study in the book of Revelation!
What an incredible transforming study this has been for all of us. Then on Thursday nights we are finishing up
the “Truth Project” on video! Wow! We would highly recommend this resource to
all of you personally or as a group study. It affirms that the Word of God is the only measure by which we can form our standards for living.
Our friends Jim and Linda Mather continue to work with couples and English
speaking men in mentoring-discipleship classes.
What beautiful fruit they bear!
They will be leaving us this week and our hearts with them as we are sad
but thankful for the impact they have had on so many with their unconditional
love and hearts of service to the Body.
Karen Phoenix taught English again this season and all her students
accepted the Lord!
Pastor
Bill has been going through the Minor Prophets on Wednesday night and the
Letters of Paul on Sunday morning. Every
week someone gets saved and we expect to have a baptism before the end of the
month. The worship has been awesome as
we now hear and see the body singing with abandon and as we see many come
forward for prayer afterwards. It has
been a beautiful time!
On May 5 and 6th we hosted our Young Women’s Purity Conference and followed up
with our Women’s Conference on Saturday in the book of “Ruth” a Lady in
Waiting. The Ladies and young girls learned how becoming a Women
of Purity and Conviction will help them to become Women of Virtue and of
Patience. It was beautiful! Half of the ladies were new and many, many of
them made decisions to accept the Lord.
This afternoon, which is Friday, we will be so excited to see what new
woman God will add to our Ladies bible study as an answer to what He did at the
Conference. To Him be the Glory!
Tonight
we continue our Young Women’s bible study as we will take this month to
minister to the young single girls and women separately from the young
men. The girls were so blessed by the
teaching last week and are excited to be challenged and at the same time
spoiled a little bit by this one on one bible study. Please pray for purity of heart, brokenness,
and restoration in those areas of their lives where they will need it.
Tomorrow the
boys will begin a study with Jose Luis Molina and my nephew Benjamin. They will teach on the “Knights Code of
Chivalry”, applying scripture to become the Lord’s gentleman. We are very excited to see what God does
with our young men. He has developed
into His servants and now we can’t wait to see Him transform them more into young
men after God’s own heart.
We are so
blessed by what God is doing in the Youth at the church…we continue to watch
them grow and mature into godly young men and women with a growing heart of
service. The boys were in charge of the
kid’s ministry and in serving the women at the conference. It was awesome to see them do such a great
job with such an outstanding attitude!
We had about 40 kids that came with their mothers so it was a huge
responsibility. The kitchen crew also
did an incredible job serving the ladies a very delicious and elegant
meal. Great job guys!
The Women’s ministry did a beautiful
job in the prep work for the gifts that were given and with all the
adornments. The Ladies at the church are
in a place now in their own spiritual walks that when called upon to pray for
others they did it with faith and with boldness. All the women were touched by the power of
prayer. And of course, those of us who
were serving through the teaching of the Word always receive the added blessing
of digging deep into the Word and end up extra blessed! It is so exciting to watch the body of Christ
fall more in Love with Jesus and with His wonderful Word! To Him be all the Glory, Honor and
Praise!
Well
that about sums up our spring! As you
can see God is so faithful and we are all so blessed by what He continues to
do. Please pray for the ministry to
continue at such an awesome pace spiritually as we have so many more lives to
reach out to! Our family will be
traveling for the month of June and the body needs your prayers as we will be
gone. We know the Lord will be here with
our brothers and sisters in Christ as they continue to serve effectively for
His kingdom. We do desire your prayers
please.
We hope this finds you all absolutely blessed and touched by God’s spirit
in your realm of God’s great planet and we hope to see some of you soon!
PRAYER REQUESTS:
PRAYER REQUESTS:
- For the spiritual growth for the new believer's. pray that they would fall in love with God's Word!
- For the Body at Calvary PV while we are gone in the month of June. Pray that many would rise up to serve.
- Pray for church finances as we head into low season in Puerto Vallarta. Pray that all the church operating expenses will be covered and that the Lord will provide for all Summer Outreach expenses as well.
- Pray for someone who is capaple to help us in the Church office now that Jim and Linda Mather have left for the summer. She was our Church administrator.
- Pray for traveling mercies for our family as we head back to the US for a month to visit our supporting churches.
- Pray for God's will in acquiring a property for a permanent church home here in PV.
- We have so many reasons to thank you, oh Lord! You have done great things here in our midst and we are blessed and honored to be able to be a part of your saving love! Thank you for all the new decisions made for Christ!
- We thank the Lord for faithfully providing the rent and other operating expenses for the church through your children! Please bless them and help them to continue to be faithful in their giving!
- We thank the Lord for the love that He has spread into our body...we really feel those who come into the church feel His strong arm of love shared through the body!
- Thank you for the work you are doing in the kids at CCMS! They come because they are falling in love with Jesus, not looking for what they can get! The material things are a bonus to them but not the motive! We see their lives changing right before our very eyes!
If you would like to support this ministry you can do so by sending your donation to "Global Adventures" Calvary of Albuquerque, Accounting Office, 4001 Osuna Rd NE, Albuquerque, NM 87109 In the memo part of your check write: CCPV Building Fund if you want to support the church ministry, or Bill Martin Personal Support. You can also donate on-line for your convenience at this link:
https://secure.acceptiva.com/?cst=692d6b
