Monthly Archives: September 2007

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Dear Brothers and Sisters in our Lord Jesus Christ,

I humbly start this letter echoing the words of the Apostle Paul as he wrote to the Philippian church:

Grace and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. I thank my God every time I remember you. In all my prayers for all of you, I always pray with joy because of your partnership in the gospel from the first day until now, being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus… And this is my prayer: that your love may abound more and more in knowledge and depth of insight, so that you may be able to discern what is best and may be pure and blameless for the day of Christ, filled with the fruit of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ– to the glory and praise of God (Philippians 1:2-6, 9-11)

In the middle of August I finished my third summer working with Students International in the area of art. I’ve shared that the plans were to continue with SI in the pioneering of a new multimedia ministry site. In the middle of the summer I sensed the Lord wanted me to be open to other possibilities. I shared that I was praying about other opportunities with my local pastor and his wife as well as the director and staff pastor of SI here in the Dominican Republic. My focus continued to be in being faithful in the daily work with student teams at the art site through the summer, but was also seeking the Lord’s face as to the decisions I would make at the end of the summer. August 11th was the last day of student teams, which every year is followed by a week of vacation for rest and recuperation for staff. I took three days and two nights to take a personal retreat with Jesus. At the end of that time I felt the confirmation and peace of making the decision of resigning from Students International to enter under the coverage of my local church here, Fraternidad Cristiana Amor a Quisqueya.

I have been active in serving in our congregation here in my time in the Dominican Republic as part of the worship team, mentoring a group of teenage girls, being involved in the activities of the young adults and other various activities. Now being full-time with the church my role continues to be varied, yet primarily defined in the following areas: Director of Integration, Supervisor of Media, Vocal Director of the Worship Ministry, and Leader of a Cell Group. The Integration Ministry is focused on making sure discipleship of new believers occurs by: overseeing the year long process of all new believers who continue to persevere in the church, providing follow-up and information for the monitors of the new believers, planning different activities for new believers so that they might be able to find community in the body of believers, and keeping a running membership of all members and ministries within the local body. As Supervisor of Media I am in charge of the actualization and use of the computer, projector, etc. that is used in each service throughout the week and special events. For the last year and a half I have been involved as part of the worship team (singing backup, leading at a daughter church up in the mountains twice a month for the last year, leading here in our local services every other week for the last three months) and now am starting to work with some of our local members once a week to help them develop their talents vocally and to form a small chorus. Amor a Quisqueya has approximately 300 attendees to Sunday services. Throughout the various sectors of Jarabacoa there are also 11 Cell Groups which meet weekly. I will be taking over the leadership of the group which meets every Tuesday in my house. This includes leading the Bible study weekly, visiting different brothers and sisters and being their immediate contact to the pastoral team, discipling and directly supervising the new believers which pertain to the sector of our Cell Group.

At the end of August I stepped out of my position with Students International with the complete blessing of the leadership and staff. Currently I have finished training for the majority of my new roles, am starting in many of those functions, as well as planning a trip back to the States. I am excited to be with you soon to share even more in person as to what God is doing as we are crying out for Revival in the Dominican Republic.

Thank you for your consideration as to how you would like to consider being part of what God is doing in the Dominican Republic. You are in my heart and prayers.

Grace and peace to you in Christ Jesus our Lord,
Because HE lives,

Elizabeth