Angelica will be the first to tell you that she is not the most responsible person in the world. But, she has an incredible gift of gab. She can share her faith and motivate others. It has never been said that I am the most caring person in the world. I don’t always “feel your pain.” What I am good at is getting on task and getting things done. I am good at pushing Angelica’s “crazy” dreams through.

Angelica and I contribute very differently to the ministries in which we are involved. We each do what the other cannot. As “great” as we are, we still need help accomplishing the things we do. Y’all, our friends from home, complete us. I think it was an old GE commercial that said, “We don’t make the things you use, we just make them better.”

Over this past Memorial Day weekend, I thought about all the ways people before us laid the ground work for what we have today; how man did not create this world but has the
power to make it better. If we consider what many people did before us, we can see we are living the benefits of their sacrifices. Angelica and I want people to live the benefits of our sacrifices and we really cannot do that without y’all.

How to Help

I mentioned in our past newsletter that we are facing some problems — problems that were right under our noses — things we let slip through the cracks. Directly in front of the Agriculture project lives a family whose children go to the Susanna Wesley School.  They are one of the poorest families in the area and from time to time, we help them out. Unfortunately, it took a teacher in the school to point out just how bad-off this family is.

The teacher noticed a pattern of learning and health problems. All eight children seem to be showing the same signs in one way or another.  They are not very active in the church; although, they are always around for school activities. Angelica and I wanted to help the family but did not want to just offer funds.

Earlier this year I told Angelica that I wanted to focus more on gardening, really on
planting different things and having cooking classes. At the same time, we were dealing with learning challenges in our own family. I felt like this was a perfect opportunity to put in action some of the things that we had been considering.

We are planning on helping out a little and teaching this family about gardening. Putting in action what we were really already planning. This is something that many families have picked up on and started; we just need to spend a little more time with this family. Also, because of personal experience, we are now more aware of children with learning difficulties. We are looking into ways we can offer the people of the Interior some of the options that children have in Asunción and/or the States.

Paraguayan Fact

Cooking classes have their fringe benefits!