It has been a few weeks since I have written. We were first in Switzerland for our son Joseph's wedding. It was wonderful! Jessica is  a beautiful addition to our family and we were honored to get to know her family. Jo and Jess will be here with us in Guatemala.

After the wedding we went back to the US for 10 days with all of our family. We have 7 grandchildren now (all under the age of 6) plus Abi and Grace. It was joyful chaos from beginning to end....a privilege that we do not often have.

But back here in Canilla things are moving! The closing date for the hospital property is the 8th of May and I can thankfully report that all $192,000 has been gathered. God is amazing and we stand in awe of His miraculous provision....in just 6 months! Equipment is beginning to come as well. We have a trailer full of hospital beds, tables, nursery equipment, exam tables and medicines waiting to be transported to Guatemala. The x-ray equipment is already here in country and waiting to be transported to Canilla.

The school is growing daily and yesterday we received notification that the University San Pablo has approved our petition to open a branch here in Canilla. We will be getting the professional nursing program up and running as quickly as possible and there are dreams of a medical school here as well. The way that God has been moving in the last few months, nothing would surprise me!

Please continue to pray that we have wisdom to manage all that God has placed in our hands. We are daily reminded that we are owners of nothing but in charge of all that He gives. We need lots of wisdom, discernment, and grace!

"I am the vine; you are the branches. If a man remains in me and I in him, he will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing." John 15:5.



Hospital Adonai is finally starting to come together after it has been a vision for so many years. The plans have been drawn and are in the final stages of approval with the government. In November 2013, the ministry took a step of faith by putting a down payment on a piece of property that we believed was the correct location for the hospital to be built. The final payment ($186,000) is due in May 2014. We have nearly $150,000 (the majority of that coming from DOCS for HOPE) at this point in time - an absolute miracle! We are also praying for financial provision for building materials so that we can begin construction as soon as possible. The total cost for this is estimated to be around $328,000. Phase one will include outpatient clinics, x-ray,  lab, two surgical suites, a delivery suite as well as inpatient capacity of twenty. God is really moving here, and we are more than excited to be part of it and to watch in awe as He brings the pieces together.                        

 

DOCS for Hope are a group of Family Practice doctors from Iowa who have recently committed to AIM and to be part of opening and running the hospital. Starting in January, they have been rotating through Guatemala to get a feel for language, clinics, and the true heart of the ministry. Please pray for them as they continue to come and visit throughout this year! Check out their website at docsforhope.org. They also have a couple of blogs from the doctors who have come down already this year - Epperlyadventures.blogspot.com and McQuillen'sfor hope.blogspot.com - to see their perspective on what God is doing here.

Instituto Adonai opened in February 2014 and is in session now. In this area, God has done so much more than we ever imagined. Aaron and Katie were joined by Greg and Helaine Walton, (a South African missionary couple) who committed to help start the school, and in the process, it has been completely transformed.  It is pretty amazing how God placed the vision in Katie and Aaron and then supplied this couple, who have had 15 years of experience within the Guatemalan educational system, alongside of them to guide and train them. Currently we are running a pre-medicine diploma program that prepares students to enter into medical or professional nursing school. There is also an English school in place that is being run by volunteers—some are just rotating through while others are here to stay.  And we are hopeful as we begin to talk with the University of San Pablo about opening a professional nursing program (the equivalent to RN) here as well. Please pray that God opens those doors as we will very soon need a qualified nursing staff! Education has proven to be such a valuable tool in our region to reach out to the people, so we are excited to see what this new area of ministry will bring.                                   

  Personal Update  We are happy to report that all is well in our family, even in the midst of adjustments to so many changes! Joseph and Jessica will get married in Switzerland in April, something we are all very excited about. The family is planning a trip to the States around that time as well. Everyone is looking forward to this time to come together as a family!

It seems that 2014 swung us into full transition mode. Many have come to visit and learn more about what God is doing here. It has been a gift to get to know so many people with hearts that desire to serve Jesus. So, while we have been essentially waiting on the timing and provision of God, we have been plenty busy! During AIM’s transition, every day looks a little different and things are constantly changing. Please keep us in your prayers as we go through this season of our lives!

Change has almost become routine around here lately—what an oxymoron that is. In a time of such transition, there are many people coming alongside AIM, some visiting while others are here to stay. Rotating through, there are so many different kinds of people with different gifts—from teachers to doctors (namely DOCS for Hope members), engineers to pilots, and everything in between. God is bringing together a very diverse group for this “big picture” vision of school and hospital functioning together and sustaining each other. Everyone is trying to find their roll and many are changing rolls. Honestly, it’s exciting and exhausting all at once. To actually be part of something of God and to know that his hand is on it is extraordinary. That’s what it feels like to be in Guatemala working with AIM right now. God is bringing people together who have vowed to be faithful to him and is putting their promise to the test. Day by day, He is piecing this vision together.

But do you know what is hard about this time? It’s that life is up in the air for almost every single person here. No one has the slightest idea what is going to happen or when it is going to happen. No one knows how or when God is going to provide, how or when he is going to reveal himself and his full plan to us. In many ways, we are truly practicing faith without seeing right now.

 “And without faith it is impossible to please him…(Hebrews11:6a).” So while faith is super hard to live out, Hebrews says it is literally impossible to please God apart from it. And that is what we live our lives for—to please our Creator. So faith has to be a natural extension of that.

Last week on the way home from clinic, we stopped the car in the middle of the road to find our once round tire as flat as a pancake. What an interesting time I knew we were in for when I looked at the four of us and decided in my mind that none of us had probably ever changed a tire in our lives. Out came the car manual, which may as well have been written in Morse code—our Spanish automotive repair vocabulary was surprisingly limited. We awkwardly looked for the jack (conveniently called “el gato” in the manual?), found it, and got to work. Half an hour of sweating later the tire was changed and we were on our way. It was not a particularly smooth or graceful process, but we just kind of figured it out as we went and got it done. For me, that’s kind of how faith is. It’s messy. I don’t really know what I’m doing most of the time—I just tell God that everything is His, pray a lot for discernment and wisdom, and use the Bible as a roadmap. It’s usually not graceful; it’s usually challenging and uncomfortable. But God can use the not-so-graceful—He can use anyone that comes to Him with an open heart.  “But he said to me, ‘My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.’” (2 Corinthians 12:9a).  

In the end, we are just here to serve God the best that we can. We are instruments for Him to use, and gladly so. Please pray that our faith and dependence on God would come more and more naturally to us everyday, that it would be as easy as breathing to put complete trust in Him—a time of dependence on God can mean a time of spiritual growth. So glad that we serve a God who is always faithful!

For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven:
    a time to be born, and a time to die;
    a time to plant, and a time to pluck up what its planted;
    a time to kill, and a time to heal;
    a time to break down, and a time to build up..... Ecclesiastes 3:1-3

So much of the time in our Christian walk, we wait. We do what is before us, but it often seems that we just plod along, persevering through circumstances that are difficult or mundane. But always there is a sense that something will change. We find ourselves in a season of change now....big changes. We see God moving in amazing ways, ways that are so much bigger than anything we could ever imagine. If we just look at our immediate circumstances, we become overwhelmed, thinking "ahh, there is no way God..." But when we surrender and do that which is before us, one step at a time, He is always there, leading, guiding, and giving to us that which we need.

I was talking to a gentleman yesterday about just that and I remembered back to our initial trip to Guatemala when we made the decision to come, sold all of our belongings and packed up a bus to drive through Mexico. Every single day of that trip was packed with difficulties and challenges, which were way out of our "comfort zone." But in each of those times He was there to sustain. The very first day that we left our home in Illinois, as we traveled through Oklahoma, it began to snow. We watched car after car slide down on either side of the road and we watched our son Aaron in the rearview mirror in our truck and attached trailer fishtail all over the road. When he radioed up to us and said, "Dad, I can't do this!", Duane looked at me and said, "Leslie, you drive the bus." Never in my life had I driven a bus - much less in the middle of a snow storm! But somehow - by God's grace, we made it to the hotel. When we turned on the news that night, they announced that we had just driven through the worst snowstorm in Oklahoma history.

I have remembered God's faithfulness in that moment so many times in the last few weeks. That is a little how we feel.....driving through circumstances that we have no experience for, with no knowledge of how to do it. But we feel His presence, His hand upon us, so we press on.... knowing that it is only by His grace that we are able to finish each day. Graham Cook says it this way, "there are no longer good days or bad days....just days of grace." May you feel His grace upon you today as you face whatever comes your way!

“Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be the glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, forever and ever. Amen.” (Ephesians 3:20)

As God is moving here, this verse keeps coming to my mind. He is literally doing more than we imagined. What kind of God is this that we serve, that can surpass our most creative thoughts?

Let me start with updates for the school. While we began with what I can now call a simple idea for an auxiliary nursing school, we currently have four schools rolled into one. The first is, in fact, an auxiliary nursing program. But when God does something, he doesn’t do it half way. Doors have now opened to do a pre-medicine bachelor degree program, a professional nursing school program, and an English school all beginning in February. I’ll go ahead and say it for you: holy cow. Not only this, but He dropped the Walton’s (a South African missionary couple) in our laps that have helped us through the whole thing. They have had much experience with opening schools in Guatemala, so their help has been invaluable. While God lined up everything, the truth is we had to fight hard for this school; praying and fasting, talking to people and meeting with people. But fighting is good. Sometimes, when you decide to respond to God’s call, you have to kick the doors down. And he delights in that.

The plans for the hospital are still progressing. While there are so many variables and unknowns, we are forced to take things day by day. Give us this day our daily bread, right? Isn’t that how Jesus teaches us to pray? So now we are just focusing on the next right thing. Once He provides the funding for the property, we will move. Until then, we wait on his timing and strive to be good stewards of what we have.

“Wait for the Lord; be strong, and let your heart take courage; wait for the Lord!” (Psalm 27:14)

Meanwhile, I’m noticing more than ever the spiritual needs of the people in the places we serve. So many are so separated from God. It really nails down and simplifies the reason we are all here: so that the people of Guatemala might know Jesus. There is just an abundance of spiritual darkness in Chumisa, the village where we do monthly clinics. One known witchdoctor came in for a consult last week, but I could only think of the condition of his heart. I have so many times felt compassion for the people here, particularly for their physical and emotional hardships. But a person’s spiritual life completely surpasses all things. So when I started imagining a life without Jesus, I just felt broken for him. Now that I know Jesus, I know I can’t do my life without Him. And this is what I desire so much for these people that I have come to love. My hope lies in the promise of Isaiah 55:11, “so shall my word be that goes out from my mouth; it shall not return to me empty, but it shall accomplish that which I purpose, and shall succeed in the thing for which I sent it.” God knows exactly what He’s doing, and nothing is too big or small for Him. May we continue to wholly place our trust in Him every single day!

2014...We know that this will be a year of change - and lots of it! And we are excited about what the Lord has in store for us!

We are frantically working to prepare a place for all the visitors coming this year. At the end of the month we will have 25 guests coming from all over and staying for various amounts of time. The "back house" is coming along...just not as quickly as we would like. Things like windows and cabinets have to all be made by hand - can't just run to Home Depot! Duane is usually up and out working by 5am. Once that is even semi-livable, we will move our family back there in order to give guests our home. The doctors who come will get a feel for living here with their small children, learn some Spanish, and hopefully will hear from the Lord!

The school opening has been delayed by government bureaucracy but we are hoping for a resolution today. The teachers have arrived and are helping in clinics and in preparation of the physical structure until the government releases the curriculum to us. Please pray that all the road blocks would be removed quickly! Along with the nursing school, we will begin to teach English classes. When we began to talk about the school, we realized that many people had a desire learn English and at the same time, the Lord sent three young women who have a desire to teach! Amazing how His timing is always perfect!

The hospital plans have been submitted to the government. There are 4 stages of approval that we must pass.... 1 down, and 3 to go. Nothing happens within government offices for pretty much the entire month of December but things are up and running again, so we are hoping that the process will speed up. One never knows with the government however - here or anywhere. So we wait, trusting again that His timing is perfect.

Amid all the change, clinics continue to be busy. Many of the men have left to work on the coast so women struggle alone to care for and provide food for their children. They come with their sick little ones or their complicated pregnancies. Those who need to go to the hospital in Quiche will not go now because they cannot without their husbands approval. Who will care for the other children? And how will they pay for the trip there? So we place each one into the hands of the only One who can ultimately heal and save, and we trust....

So trust seems to be the recurring theme as we enter into this new year. I am sure that it is the same in your life as well. We trust in His provision - financially, spiritually...in all ways.
Isaiah 26:3 says "You will keep him in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on You, because he trusts in You." May your mind (and ours) be securely fixed upon Him!

I am writing to update you on the changes that we as a family first and as a ministry as well, will be facing in the next year. As you may remember, Duane had a vision many years ago about us having a hospital here in Canilla. It was something that was way too big and out of the question so we just “put it on the shelf.” However in the last year, God has begun to move people into place who desire to come alongside of us to fulfill this dream. We have always said that in order to have a hospital here, we would need nursing staff (other than just me and Katie) and physicians. Katie’s dream of a nursing school is coming to pass and will open in January of 2014. By January of 2015, we will have a nursing staff able to care for inpatients. In February of this year, we were “randomly” contacted by a group of physicians (all family practice) who have committed to staffing this hospital. They have a practice in Iowa in which they all rotate throughout the year for 3 month cycles so that 2 can be “on the field” while the others care for their US practice and fund those on the mission field. They are planning to come full time by….January of 2015. Don and Lori – our long time friends who have come to help us each year for many years – have made a 3 year commitment as well….starting in January of 2015. Don is a PA and Lori is a CPA who helps us keep everything in order! And finally, we were again, “randomly” contacted by a physician who is Guatemalan, and currently finishing his residency in family practice in Spain. He and his wife have a heart to serve the poor here in this area. And they will be ready to start in…..January of 2015! None of these people knew about the others nor did we solicit help from them – this was all totally God moving on their hearts, synchronizing timing as only He can!

Now, our dilemma is where to put everyone not only to practice, but to live? Our original thought was to just build a small hospital in our front yard. But that seems short sighted as there would be no room for expansion. And we have been advised by those who have walked this road before us that having the hospital and community housing on the same property does not work well. So, after weeks of prayer, discussion, and more prayer, we finally have a plan that we all agree on and have peace about.

We have put a down payment on a property not immediately next to ours but within about 500 feet from ours. It is big enough for expansion and we feel that it will be a perfect distance from the “home base.” We are trusting (and this is a HUGE LEAP of faith) that within the 3 months that the government is saying it will take to get through paperwork, it will be paid for. We will then begin construction of the first phase of the hospital. We hope to begin with a facility that will have the capability to house up to 20 patients. It will include 2 operating rooms so that we can do C-sections if necessary as we anticipate that much of what we will do is assist with births. We will also be able to help those children who are so sick with pneumonias and dehydration (the number 1 and 2 killers of children in this country).  

I must confess that we are completely overwhelmed but at the same time so completely in awe of what God is doing! For so long we have prayed for a place where the people we love so much would be cared for with love and compassion; a place where they can not only receive medical help but spiritual help as well. Our floor plan for the hospital includes a prayer room - front and center. And one of the only things that the doctors have requested is a full time pastor on staff – someone who will always be there to minister to hearts. 

Again, this is a huge step of faith for us. We do not have money for a project as big as this. But we know that He is the God of the impossible. A friend of our recently said, “Our God is a gentleman. When He invites us somewhere, He always pays.” So we trust that He will provide all that we need!

Please pray for us – that we have wisdom to do all that He has asked with integrity and wisdom. Pray that we maintain our focus on Him, loving Him, worshipping Him, knowing that He is in control of our lives.