They just keep coming!

I've decided that I am not very good at this blog thing! I haven't been able to write something each day but we will keep trying. It has been a really busy week. Last Tuesday we picked up our conference team from Bay City, MI and took them to Antigua where we had supper with Robin Garcia and Jaime Garcia. They are two brothers, both with their doctorates, who are on the cutting edge here in Guatemala. Wednesday we returned to Chichicastenango, had lunch then everyone went out on home visits. Later that afternoon, we met with our Associate Degree students for a time of sharing and ministry. Pastor David Ferranti had talked to John several years ago about our need to offer an AD here at ILIO. He purchased the program (on DVD) and the right for us to use it. We just graduated our first class with all 14 that started also finishing. This class has some of the most dynamic Christian leaders in all of Quiche. What a great time we had as the visiting team ministered to each one of the students.

Thursday was clinic day with lots and lots of things going on. One young woman has a breast mass that was biopsied and looks pretty positive that it is cancer. Another mother brought her very malnourished baby in that also has down syndrome. Thanks to Dr. Heidi Bell who is now seeing patients here on Thursdays, she was admitted to the National Hospital. She is 3 months old and only weighs a little over 3 pounds. Please remember these special cases in your prayer. We have been treating a young man with diabetes for the last few months. He was in a bus accident and broke his arm. He had surgery on it about 6 weeks ago or so. He came in on Thursday saying that he had fallen on Sunday. Turns out that he was drunk and fell in the street. He has rebroken the same arm and now also his jaw! It didn't occur to him to go to the hospital to get xrays! He says he has accepted the Lord but is really struggling with drinking. Please remember Jose in your prayers as well.

Friday and Saturday we held our semi-annual conference. The theme was the 5-fold ministries. We had a wonderful time with about 250 in attendance. Many were ministered to and encouraged as they learned how the church should function. Pastor David and his team did a terrific job. They really spent a lot of time in intercessory prayer before and during the conference.

John and Bob took the team back to Antigua on Monday and then spent the rest of the day picking up more boxes of Christmas gifts for our party and running other errands. They got back last night at 8 PM. Very exhausted!

Meanwhile I hosted the first ever Health Care Providers (for our area) meeting at ASELSI. There were 3 doctors, 3 nurses, 1 Medical Assistant plus other people who also work in clinics, etc. It was great to get together and share what we are doing, what supplies we have to share or give away and what our plans are for teams, etc. Looks like we will try to get together every 3 months.

Today I sent John back to bed as he was quite sick all night with a cold and cough. I had to send Benjamin our receptionist home also with a bad cold. The weather is quite cold for November. Tonight it is about 45 degrees. And we don't have central heat! Thank goodness for our electric blanket. Today was therapy day and we evaluated 2 new children for the program. About every week we are putting new children in the program. Sonia was referred to us by a Canadian nurse at the local Methodist hospital. She is 14 years old and is a paraplegic. She lives with her abuelos (grandparents) as her father has died and her mother is living with someone who doesn't want to be responsible for Sonia. At the age of 3 she had a high fever for 20 days and when it subsided she was paralysed from the waist down. Her recent trip to the hospital was due to kidney problems. Thank God they were able to take care of the problem. Sonia does not therapy and also some schooling. Due to her paralysis she has never gone to school and needs to learn to read and write and do math. We will be able to help her with some of this. Just last week I received a bedside commode from another ministry. When I found out that Sonia's elderly grandfather has to carry her outside to the outhouse and that causes her to soil herself sometimes, I brought in the commode and you should have seen their smiles! Now Sonia won't have to be taken out in the rain and cold to use the bathroom. God provides all the things we need.

We will be doing training again for a new class of therapy assistants in January. This is exciting as we need more workers to help with all the new patients!