July 2005 Adventures

July 2005 Adventures

As we mentioned in June, July 2^nd was the dedication of our 9^th church in the North District, Oga Lata. Nearly 100 people attended the celebration as we “officially” welcomed this new church with song and prayer. Notice the beautiful banner behind the singers – this was made while our Cannon/Duluth team was here in June. The building materials for the church were bought with funds donated by a Cannon member and the brothers of the church provided the labor.

We had a few days to get ready for our next 2 teams. Having teams come is great, but it keeps us on our toes getting building materials for them to work with when they arrive!

Snellville FUMC was scheduled to arrive on Sunday, July 10, but, due to mechanical difficulty, they were delayed by 1 day. This meant we hustled the group from Asuncion directly to Yrybucua to begin work. The team was here for 2 full weeks. They divided into 2 groups, one working at our Agricultural Center, the other helping with Día Feliz (VBS).

The VBS group was busy helping 5 churches in our district, 1 day at each church. In total, they provided projects for over 1,400 kids! That’s a lot of cutting, gluing, and pasting. One of the highlights was for each child to paint their own new t-shirt. Below is a photo of some of the kids with their t-shirts and other art work – as you can see they LOVED it.

You may recall that the Cannon/Duluth team had 1,275 kids in their 4 churches. This means that 2,675 kids, youth, and adults were given the opportunity to enjoy fun time while learning about the stories of Jesus that are in the Bible. What a blessing for all!

Besides working with kids, the VBS group also brought banners for the churches to make. We added the banners from Snellville to the ones the Cannon/Duluth team brought. This made for a beautiful church! The yellow butterfly is from Snellville, the blue cross is from Cannon/Duluth, and the red dove was from a team that came last year.

Día Feliz in Primera Linea

The women of Primera Linea de Ybú Porã

The construction group was also busy. They ran the water lines for the Agricultural Center which allowed us to connect two neighboring homes with spigots. They dug the hole for the septic system as well - here is team member Amanda Bailey in “the hole”. The hole ended up 12’ deep, and was dug primarily by 3 women!

We said good-bye to Snellville on the 23^rd and hello to Dalton FUMC on the 24^th. This group of 5 men went to work immediately at the Agricultural Center. The guys introduced a new way to build the trusses for the roof. Our Paraguayan group quickly learned that this “new” system was going to work just fine and will adopt it for the next building.

Amanda "in the hole"

Dalton group completing roof trusses

Both the Snellville and part of the Dalton team got a chance to visit Iguaçu Falls in Brazil. This is always a treat to experience after working so hard here in Paraguay.

This has been a great winter for us and we thank each team member for contributing to the ministry for the people of Paraguay. In addition to all the construction help, all 9 of our “North District” churches were able to have a Día Feliz (VBS), and all 9 churches had a North American work team visit during a worship service.

The Memorial UMC, Fernandina Beach, FL

Cannon/Duluth Team with many new friends

Cannon UMC, Snellville, GA

Duluth UMC, Duluth, GA

Snellville FUMC, Snellville, GA, with Ed & Linda

Dalton UMC, Dalton, GA, with Ed, Linda, & our cook-Anna

We were left with a lot of great memories and the Paraguayans in the North District will remember this as the winter of “North American brothers”. Thank you all and God Bless.