A church is a complicated place where we try to keep a balance between the spiritual and the physical sides of life. There is no limit to how much one persons soul is worth but the books have to balance to keep the bills paid. We minister to spiritual needs but we also need to help in the physical ones. Our goal is to get people to Heaven but they also need to be blessed in their daily walk. For God the church is a spiritual hospital while for the government it is a business. Walking the line down the middle is not easy.
Hurricane Relief: In the month of October Hurricane Willa hit the central coast of our State of Nayarit. As it came inland it quickly dropped from a category 5 to a 3. At our homestead we got the wind and rain but no real damage except for the tree limbs and bamboo that were blown down. We were all just thanking God that no major damage was done when the storm hung up on the Sierras 50 miles inland and flooded the rivers. Within 24 hours 180,000 people were flooded out of their homes. In the township of Tuxpan the water rose to 8 feet and everything was lost. Vehicles, electronics, beds and many other articles were destroyed with mud and water (see pictures). The members of our main church in Xalisco donated almost 2,000 lbs. of goods as well as taking hot meals to give out to the people in need. It was just a small token in comparison to the great need that continues to this day.
Women´s Congress: The 10th of November Lucy, along with other pastors in the city organized a one-day women´s conference. They programmed for an attendance of 120 women and over 140 attended. It was an activity that in previous years they had organized but because of health issues and other details there had not been a conference held for the last two years. The testimonies of the people that attended showed that they were blessed by the teachings and the fellowship. The 24 of November we are holding another conference, but this one is a marriage conference. Once again we are programming for between 50-60 couples to attend and both Philip and Lucy will be teaching at the conference.
A story: A growing church is full of stories. Some of them with happy endings while others have sad endings. At the beginning of the year Victor ((not his real name) came to visit one of our churches. His sister was attending and had invited him to come. After coming for some months he invited us to his home and told us the following story. Victor´s mom is a Christian and Victor had attended church since he was about 9 years old. By the time he was 14 he was ministering with the worship team of his small church. Before Victor turned 20 he started living with his girlfriend without getting married. The pastor told him that he could no longer minister in the church until he got married and made things right with God. Victor got mad at his pastor and at God and left the church. We fast-forward 10 years later to this year and we find a young man tattooed and battle scarred. Drugs, easy money, broken relationships had taken their toll. Victor´s new live-in companion, a young lady 18 years old ready to give birth to her second child had a sorry story of her own. Today Victor is married, attending church and struggling to turn his life around. Nothing is easy the second time around and each step is a struggle but as long as he keeps moving forward the victory can be won. There are a lot of Victors out in the world wanting to come home to the Father.
Thank you for your prayers for the ministry and your financial support make you part of what is happening here in Mexico. We bless you in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Philip, Lucy and Vanessa Tolman
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