By Pablo Villagran-
One of the highlights of this Christmas season was the visit this past week of a team from Crest Baptist Church in Creston, Iowa. Director Alejandra Diaz says the entire staff appreciates the love they and others demonstrated for our children this season.
Through the years she has seen how each Christmas is different, with special people thinking of various ways to make this season significant for the kids.
“For us, this is how God moves in different ways, showing us that He is always there,” Alejandra says. “Thank you very much to all the people who make our Christmas special every year and of course to the friends who came this year."
“For several of the children it was their first Christmas with us. We wanted to make it memorable for them, because it was difficult for them to be away from their families and friends. We wanted to show them how special they are.”
This was a particularly special Christmas for three former residents, who went to new adoptive families in Guatemala and celebrated their first holiday with them.
This past year has been filled with other highlights for Dorie’s Promise. Among them were completing two phases of our backyard renovation project, including the installation of a new playset.
We were also blessed to see three of our children complete their first year at the El Shaddai private school, with eight more joining them in January.
As we move into 2013, Alejandra is encouraged by our ability to offer a better quality education to all of our children. She also hopes to see more missionaries next year after a 41 percent increase this year, with visits going up from 216 last year to 369 in 2012.
“We reached more people through our outreach program into the ghetto and the dump,” she notes. “We placed about 40 pilas (water stations) into homes at the dump, installed six cement floors and distributed around 100 water filters.”
During the coming year, Alejandra hopes to enhance training, since staff members are the key to providing care and educational opportunities for our children. And, she wants to continue sending as many mission teams as possible into the ghetto, since that helps build relationships while blessing our community.
One area that needs continued growth is our sponsorship program, which hasn’t reached the level needed to cover our monthly budget.
However, as Alejandra considers the advances we have made in the past few years, she remains confident that God will continue to supply for our needs.
“The most rewarding thing about looking to the past is counting the many lives that God has changed,” she says. “Not only have we touched many children’s lives, many people who have visited us have been transformed.
“We believe that God is moving here every day. We want to bless as many children and people as possible.”
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