Hello to All,

Greetings to all of you in the name of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ!  We have had some exciting time this month and have been all over!  We all took off for the USA on May 30, and ALL got back here on June 27.  It was a great time together with some friends and family mostly outside of Atlanta.

Thank you for your prayers this past month.  Mandi and I spent a week in Nashville and Spring Hill, TN. in the beginning of June.  We stayed in the home of Harry and Georgetta Stambaugh, who graciously lavished love on us while we attended a training seminar at the headquarters of ACE Ministries.  We worked hard at the seminar for five days and had a great weekend with the Stambaughs, seeing sights and going to the Grand Ole Opry on Saturday night.  We also enjoyed visiting Gateway Church on Sunday morning and getting to see Pastor Charlie and Gina Weir.  What blessing!

On Sunday after lunch with the Weirs, the Stambaughs, and the Petersons, we drove back to Atlanta and got ready to drive down to Orange beach on Monday to spend a week at my parents place there.  We had great times fishing, playing tennis and going to the beach.  Of course we all ate too much and slept too little trying to make every moment count together with my parents and my sister’s family. We all enjoyed being near the coast again and were reminded of how good the Lord has been to our family.  Samuel got a birthday surprise and caught a 36 inch long Kingfish on the morning of his birthday!  He was so excited.

On Fathers’ Day we had lunch together and headed to Mandi´s mom and dad’s home in Marietta.  Unfortunately, I was not able to stay in the US longer so I flew back to Honduras on the following day.  Mandi and the children were extra blessed to spend the next 10 days with her family and got to take a trip to the mountains of North Carolina with them all.  What FUN!!  They flew into Honduras last Friday night.

On the Honduras front, we are excited to receive a team from MPN tomorrow, who will be with us for a week as a part of the “Willing Vessels Service Expedition”.   We are joining with some local high school boys to head south to Jamastran Valley to help renovate a mission school there.  It will be a great time of blessing to all as we have the opportunity to serve the ministry there and allow the Lord to work his good pleasure into our lives.  Please pray for us all as we start out together on Sunday evening.  May the Lord minister to all those we serve and to each life involved.  This is so exciting for us.  We have wanted to combine a team like this for a couple of years and it is now coming to pass for the first time.  God is good.

We also have teacher training coming up in late July, early August.  We are expecting to have 30 or so teachers.  We still have work to do in preparation and ask your prayers over that time .  May it be a time of refreshing and renewal for the teachers attending and may the Lord cause his vision and desires to grow in each one. Thank you for lifting them up.

Thank you for your prayers for our health.  We are both doing better, still believing to the complete healing from the Lord for our bodies.  Praise the Lord that my stomach problems have completely subsided.  We are still wheezing a bit and need a touch in our lungs.

Thank you for your prayers over Besy and Wenceslao Cruz.   Besy gave birth to a boy on June 19.  Joshua Cruz. We were with them this past Saturday and the baby is healthy and beautiful.  They are enjoying the new family member. We took the opportunity to remind them of what the Lord has done to save her life (previous suicide attempt) and restore their marriage, encouraging them that Joshua is a special gift from the Lord who he will use for His glory.  Keep praying for Wenceslao’s salvation.

We love you all and thank you for keeping us in your prayers.  May God be glorified in you.

The Williams Family

Dear Loved Ones,

We are getting our update out a bit early this month (miracle of all miracles). We will be traveling toward the end of the month and wanted to make sure that we kept you up to speed on the Williams’ Clan. The Lord continues to bless us in many ways and we are more thankful for His greatness, awesome power, and care for every detail as we wait upon Him.

On the home front, the kids are excited to get out of school in less than two weeks.  They have worked hard this year and are ready for a break.  They are even more excited to get to spend time with grandparents in June.  Mandi and I will be attending a training seminar in Tennessee in the first week of June and thanks to the blessings of the Lord, our loving family, and Spirit Airlines, the kids will get travel with us. While we are in Tennessee (staying with Harry and Georgetta Stambaugh….Yeah!!!) they will get to visit grandparents and get an extended stay in Atlanta in June.  It will be a blessing to get to soak up all that grandparent love for a few weeks.  This will be the children’s first time to visit the US in the summer time.  Samuel wanted to pack all His warm clothes and coats. When Mandi told him that he wouldn’t need them, he replied, “But I’ll freeze!” He was also the one that said his grandfather doesn’t know how to take care of his trees, because whenever we visit in the winter, they have no leaves.  Boy, are they in for some surprises!  We are thankful for this opportunity and look forward to a little visit with them as well. Please lift us up as we are at the training seminar.  It will be an intense week of training and we will need the strength of the Lord.

In the ministry, we are excited about the summer.  We have several things that will be taking place over the next few months that we ask you to start praying over.  The opportunity to teach more in the church has been a blessing for me, as well as a support to François. We have been co-teaching a series on “Waiting on the Lord.”  Upon our return in June, we will start another one on “Walking with the Lord”.   Next, we have a short term team coming from Mount Paran North on July 4 for 10 days.  From July 6 – 11, we will be holding the “Willing Vessels Service Expedition” which will be a combined team of the 4 men from MPN, 6 High school students from Honduras, Nathan and me.  We are going to be serving in the Jamastran Valley, near Danli, Honduras, in the Church of Christ School.  It is going to be a great opportunity for the young people (and older ones) to see what the Lord can do through them as they make themselves available to Him!  Please pray that the Lord will put a burden on the hearts of the 6 that will participate, as well as encourage them during their preparation.  This is something that we have dreamed of doing for a couple of years now and are so excited about seeing it come to pass. We also have teacher training coming up in late July, early August.  We are expecting to have 30 or so teachers with us from Honduras, Nicaragua, and maybe Costa Rica.  This is will be a special time of working with teachers and home educators to help them catch the vision of training their students in the Character of Christ. We expect to see the Lord’s hand moving in each one.  Thank you for lifting these up.

Mandi and I both need your prayers for a physical touch from the Lord.  Since in the city, the pollution has really affected our respiratory systems.  Mandi is down a few days a month (sometimes more) with allergies and chest congestion and I have had a slight respiratory infection that has lasted over a year.  Most of the time we forget it is there, until it is time to sing or speak to a group of people and then the congestion starts loosening and we go hoarse.  Please pray that the Lord deliver us completely and that His grace and power would keep this from affecting our ability to serve.

We continue to thank you for your prayers for us in regard to our family time management.  The Lord has been teaching us (especially me) to reorder our days and prioritize our time more wisely.  It is amazing how much great stuff can happen each day when the time is given to the Lord.  Most of all, we enjoy the peacefulness of recognizing His presence!

Please continue to pray for Jose and Claudia Taixes. We have not been able to see them in a while.  Our schedules don’t seem to match, but we continue to pray that the Lord will have his way in their lives.

Thank you for your prayers over Byron and Jairo.  The Lord has provided faithfully for them and they have been a blessing in the ministry of the church.  Jairo will be returning to Nicaragua this coming week for his wedding.  Pray that the Lord will bless his matrimony and that he will hear the Lord’s voice clearly as to if they will serve in Nicaragua or in Honduras.

For those of you that remember Bessy and Wenceslao Cruz from Palacios.  Please keep them in your prayers this month.  Bessy is due to give birth to a boy in mid June.  They have three other children, 17, 15, and 10, so this one was a surprise for them.  Pray that this new birth will remind them of the blessing of new life that is only found in Jesus. Keep praying for Wenceslao.  We still believe God for his salvation.

We cannot tell you how thankful we are to have you supporting us each month through prayer!  We pray for you and love each of you dearly.  May the Lord richly bless you, make his face shine upon you and fill you to overflowing!

Much love to all,

The Williams Family

Dear Loved Ones,

Dear Loved Ones,

Dear Loved Ones,

We are so thankful for the faithfulness of our God.  He has been a strong tower to us in a year of many changes, struggles, and adjustments.  We are thankful for his strength in every moment of question and fluctuating circumstances.  We are thankful for his love and comfort in each trial and in the darkest nights.  We are thankful for his provision when it seems that all will be consumed and He provides before we even realize we have a need. We are thankful that though we live in a world that changes its face at every turn, we serve a God that is the same yesterday, today and forever.  We are thankful that the Lord has blessed us with the life he has given us here in Honduras.  He has given us great opportunities to serve with many of his precious children in this land, binding together to make the name of the Lord known among all the people and to walk with them as they grow in Him.  We are thankful for Godly parents, who have been a source of encouragement and wisdom that is immeasurable We are thankful for the Monterroso’s, here in Honduras, who have loved and encouraged us, through thick and thin, since our adventure in Honduras began.  Though we do not see them much since our move to Tegucigalpa, what we have learned through their lives continues to bless us today.   We are thankful for the Mejia Family, with whom we have only closely worked this past year, but whose trust through dire circumstance has been a testimony to God’s power and grace.  We are thankful for each of you, who are tools in that hand of the Master that he has used to sharpen, protect, refine and preserve us as we serve Him here in Honduras.

Most of all we are thankful that we belong to the King of Kings and Lord of Lords, who is Jesus Christ, the Son of the Living God, and that he shed his blood and died for us, while we were yet sinners, so that we might belong to Him.  May the power that is in His name and His Glory be known in all the earth!

Our single prayer request is that you thank the Lord with us for each person represented above. May His Kingdom come and His will be done in each of their lives and yours.

Love,

Dear Loved Ones.

We truly serve an awesome God and we give him praise for HIS marvelous works.  Most of you received our emails over the past few weeks requesting prayer for Honduras due to the arrival of Hurricane Felix.  It being a class five hurricane headed straight fir the North Coast of Honduras, we were very concerned for the safety and well being of the people there that we know and love.  Praise the Lord that you and many others went to prayer and asked God to be merciful on behalf of Honduras. I have heard four reports back from several of you that the Lord spoke to you to begin to rebuke the wind and the rain as Jesus did with his Disciples.  I am glad to report to you that the Lord responded in a miraculous way.  

The reports were saying that it would be disastrous.  That massive hurricane hit the coast of Nicaragua about 100 miles from Palacios, Honduras where we lived. In a period of about 24 four hours, the hurricane went from a class five to a Tropical Storm, breaking up into many small cells that at best, produced a lot of rain.  When I communicated to a non-believing friend in Palacios, his response was, “God was good to us…. neither the wind, nor the rain touched us.  By the time we expected to get hit here in Tegucigalpa, all we got was some rain, some minor flooding, and then plenty of sunshine!!!  

Though there are areas in Honduras that sustained some damage, we are praising the Lord that we transformed a major storm into a minor incident….To Him be the glory!

On another front, we ask for your continued prayer.  We have been experiencing resistance in the work that the Lord has called us to do.  We continue to walk forward and praise his name, for He that is in us is greater than he that is in the world:

1. Please pray for the following people that are new in the Lord and the enemy would like to destroy, confuse, and turn away from the Lord:  The Taixes Family, Elias, Valerie, Oscar, and Pipo.  
2. Also pray for Pedro, Rolando, Graco, Samuel, and Ernesto along with each of their families as they are working together to start a church and disciple many new believers.
3. Please pray for Francois and Carina Herrera, and their Family.  They are the pastoral Family of the “Iglesia el Deseado de las Naciones”.
4. Please pray for us as we are involved with both churches and each desires us to become more deeply involved in the ministry.  We are finding it difficult (time wise) to be involved with both, and ask the Lord to direct us in His will.
5. Please pray for us as Drew will be traveling over the next two weeks.  He will be in Panama, Costa Rica, and El Salvador, September 13-22.  Please pray for God’s anointing to be upon him in a great way as he will be visiting the schools in those countries to encourage them and serve them in the ministry.
6. Pray for the family as well and they will be without Dad for about 10 days.  We are sure that the Lord is above all.
7. Lastly, please pray for the Christian Educators Convention that we will be holding Oct. 4-5 in Tegucigalpa.  We want to encourage and equip Christian educators in their calling.

 Thank you all for your loving kindness and consistent participation in what the Lord is doing through your prayer and support.  We love you.

Drew, Mandi and Family

Dear Beloved Friends and Family,

It has been too long since we have written.  This summer has been packed full and we are thankful for all that the Lord has done.  

We had a great month of June.  As we were preparing for the team to come from Mount Paran North, one of our main projects had a wrench thrown in it and we had to change directions.  Instead of renovating a building for a training center, we went to Guaimaca, Honduras and helped a small Christian school there build new desks for their students and build a swing set in their play area.  Our trip was full of adventure, with many opportunities to be flexible and trust in the Lord.  An oil seal blew on the van, our accommodations were rented to someone else at the last minute, and our schedule got moved around a bit, but the Lord did mighty things in each case.  Instead of the team riding in our old van, they got to ride in a new van with AC, in stead of staying in an empty home offered to us, we got to stay at a mission compound that also had AC.  With each challenge and opportunity for the team to get discouraged, we were excited to see an attitude of thankfulness to the Lord in each one.  God answered each time of thankfulness with a special blessing.  We are so thankful for the work and testimony left in Guaimaca.  We have received several calls of gratitude from the staff and parents.  We have also seen fruit from the encouragement that was planted there.  God’s love was lived out among them.

We are also thankful for the ministry that the team was to our family.  They literally transformed a bare white house into a colorful home.  They were able to paint the inside of our home, bring new drapes, help us purchase ceiling fans, and repaint the whole front wall of our lot.   We were blessed most by the heart with which each person worked.  Each gave their all and we pray that they were as blessed as we were.  We especially enjoyed the time of fellowship that the Lord gave us with them.  God touched each one of our hearts to complete part of his work in us.  Our God is so awesome.

July has been another full month.  There has been a lot of extra work to get prepared for the coming school year that starts August 20, and also prepare for a teacher’s training seminar that we held this past week (July 30- August 3).   We are thankful for the chance to be an encouragement to many people who are giving their lives in service to the King of Kings.  We receive many calls from teachers and administrators who are confused, burned out, or are just in need of someone to walk with them through their struggle.  We are thankful for the opportunity to point them back to the source of all wisdom and give them loving support in Christ.   We also had 27 teachers and administrators in training this past week.  There were 2 from Panama, 2 from El Salvador, 6 from Guatemala, and 17 from Honduras. What a joy it is to see the Lord planting and renewing His vision and plan in each heart.  We hope and believe that the Lord is preparing each one for what he is going to do in each school, winning Central America for Christ through the ministry to each child.  It was also great for Mandi and I to build new relationships that will be ongoing as we travel to each on of their locations to minister, supervise and encourage.

Thank you for your prayers for the Friday night group.  God has increased our opportunities to share the gospel and encourage them to follow Jesus.  God is really doing an exciting work in Jose and Claudia.  The mild interest they have had in the Word has turned into a great hunger.  They have both been reading the Word more and more, falling in love with Him.  They have also been hungry for fellowship with us and other believers. We have spent a few Sunday afternoons with them, and after visiting our church, have expressed an interest in attending with us on a regular basis.  We are thankful for the Lord’s faithfulness to draw them unto Himself!

God is so Awesome and we consider it a great privilege to be a part of his family with you.  Please join us in prayer over the nest month:

1.      Please continue to pray for the schools getting ready to start again this month.  Pray that the Lord would increase their vision, influence and wisdom.  May we be prepared to serve them as needed and be ready for any good work that the Lord prepares.

2.      Please pray for Maritzol Moreno.  She will get her entrance exams back this week from the university.  This will decide when she comes to live with us. May the Lord have his will, setting her apart and preparing her for his plan and purpose.  May the Lord give us wisdom and may we be an encouragement in her life in Christ.  

3.      Your prayers for Jose, Claudia, Pedro, Jessica, Valerie, Elias, Jose, David, Oscar, Luz,  Elica, Susan, Jorge, and Juan are being answered!  Let us keep praying that the Word would become real in their hearts and bear the fruit which God intended.  May their hunger continue to grow and their lives be transformed.  This is so exciting!!

4.      Lift up Nathan, Samuel, and Gabriela as they start in their new school August 20.  May they be humble in heart and attentive to the Word of the Lord each day.  May their teachers be anointed by the Lord to be witnesses to each student both in word and in action.

5.      Please pray for the Borjas family.  They are old friends who are going through some family and marital struggles.  Marilu has been following Jesus, but Marcos needs to have His heart softened to the Lord and repent.  Please pray as we feel and urgency for His salvation.

6.      Please pray for the Mejia family.  They have been such a blessing to us and we are thankful to work side by side with them in the ministry of A.C.E. Central America.  

We love you and thank you for your prayers.  Each of you is precious to us.