July 2019 Newsletter
Greetings to all our dear brothers and sisters in the Lord!
I have so much to write about, that I would like to start off by saying thanks for reading this letter!
I would like to share a short testimony from a brother who recently found Christ at Jesus Impacto de Amor, our third church plant!
Hi my Name is Francisco Lorenzo Alvarez, I am 41 years old and was born in Chiapas in 1978. I came to Tijuana in search of work, leaving my family behind. I worked hard and only seeing my family one month per year for 21 years!
I started suffering with depression. I was hardly eating or sleeping! I did not know what to do! I thought I was going crazy. In middle of my loneliness I felt completely alone and missed my family!
I found my uncle who was living in Tijuana and being a Christian, I started telling him my desperate situation. I was hardly able to speak but I shared everything in my heart through my tears.
They prayed for me and invited me to the church they were attending! That next Sunday they came by and picked me up. All I remember, when church service was over, God had touched my life, I was crying, not because I was sad, but because I felt such peace and joy!
To this day I still feel this peace and joy! Now I have a new family in Christ with great brothers and sisters in Christ! I give Thanks to God for allowing me to hear the Gospel at La Roca!
I see how God has worked all this together. First, I find my uncle and he invites me to church! Then I hear the Gospel of Jesus Christ who turns my life around! When I was going crazy and thinking of taking my life, Christ came and rescued me from my sins!
Please keep me in your prayers as we make plans to bring my family to Tijuana!
We appreciate Francisco sharing with us his story. Let’s keep him in our prayers a s he works to bring his family to be with him in Tijuana. Pray for his family as they make this change!
I hope you remember our recent wedding. Pastor Alex and his new bride Anahi who run our administration. Every Wednesday at 6pm they open a Kid’s Club located right in the middle of the Zona Norte. To get there, you have to go through this long narrow alley that takes you into lots of small houses!
Our teenage girls who come from the Orphanage every Wednesday help them by doing dramas and dances for the kids! What is exciting is that in the process, we have been able to reach a whole family for the Lord!
Thanks to two small boys, named Angel and Alex! Who shares with the whole family what they have learned while making Piñatas together!
We have also purchased many piñatas from them! We use them for our birthday parties, which are many, including all the kids at the Orphanage and throughout our ministry! Keep praying for Angel and Alex and their father named Candido and mother named Veronica and their sister named Maria! Both Alex and Anahi are wearing many hats! So pray for them as through them the Gospel is being heard!
Also, one thing that I am really excited about, the small apartment that was built with the help of CA (Christian Assembly Church) and others, has been opened for service and now 4 senior citizens that are living there! Their names are as follows, Guadalupe, Santos, Cesar and Daniel.
Please keep them in your prayers, for many do not have family to take care of then and La Roca has become their only family! And we are more than privileged to be that loving family!
One sad moment! Alberto Galvan Contreras, one of our seniors, died in the park! He was sixty seven years old. La Roca was his home for over 5 years!
Nobody came to claim the body so we provided his birth certificate and paid for a small $400.00 funeral! Two of our staff and six others from our men’s shelter attended the funeral! They were so grateful for the love and care from La Roca ministries!
Also please pray for the ministry in Sonora. With God’s favor, we will open the second weekend of October! We will be opening our Seminary and children’s breakfast feeding program!
Pray also that we will be able to open our recovery program for men in Sonora at the same time. We realize it’s a lot, but we know that with God all things are possible!
Please pray for pastor Efren and his family. Who travels back and forth at least 5 to 6 times per year to Sonora! He is our mission’s pastor and seminary teacher!
We are also very excited for this great opportunity God is giving us to expand and take the Gospel to all parts of Mexico!
Your faithful support enables us to meet our monthly needs. We also have growing needs as the Lord continues to expand our ministry opportunities. Pray not only for the resources to meet these needs our Lord puts before us, but pray also for our discernment and wisdom to faithfully perform his will and glorify Jesus our Lord in all that we do!
We want to do ministry with excellence and by God’s grace, your prayers and gifts make all this possible!
So again thanks for being part of a family that keeps moving forward. I know no other way, may God continue to give us strength and wisdom to accomplish His task!
I also would like to offer a reminder about the La Roca Quilt drawing this fall. Not only is this handmade quilt an ultimate prize in itself, the monies received are for putting water and solar power on the ranch. We need utilities on the property for the expansion of the ministry!
The ranch is located outside of Tijuana on the southeast side of town. Tijuana is now over 2 million population in the metro area and the growth is fast approaching the La Roca ranch property.
La Roca is committed to relocating the boys from the downtown orphanage to the ranch property, but we need to build out a facility space for the orphanage. Water and power are essential to this and other ranch development.
Another prayer request is concerning the many refugee’s families in Tijuana. There are many single women with children at risk. Please pray with La Roca as we ponder the Lord’s provisioning concerning La Roca’s ministry to this need.