Houses, Vehicles, and Guatever

With the Ecklebargers’ arrival last Monday, our lives have been filled with helping them make their transition to their new country. Once they settled into their temporary living space upstairs, we quickly got to work helping them to find a home. In the meantime, though, we have had lots of fun having them here. The kids are getting along well and we have enjoyed some wonderful times of worship and devotions.

All of the other tasks that they need to accomplish rests on finding a place to live. They cannot purchase a vehicle until they have a NIT number (a tax identification number) and they cannot obtain a NIT number until they have a signed lease showing their address. In addition, they cannot set up a bank account without an address. So, on Tuesday afternoon we met with a real estate agent who took them to see five different home. After a couple of days of prayerful consideration, they settled on a home in Pastores and will be signing a contract tomorrow.

While waiting for the contract to be drawn up, we have stayed busy helping them to purchase furniture, appliances, and necessities for their new place. We were blessed to find a furniture store in Chimaltenango that was having a sale, and they were able to meet most of those needs in that one store. Yesterday, we took them to Guatemala City where we helped them purchase memberships to Pricesmart (a wholesale club) and do some other shopping. The plan is for them to sign their lease tomorrow morning, followed by cleaning, basic repairs, setting up a bank accounts, and getting them signed up for telephone and other utilities. They hope to move into their new home on Friday or Saturday.

Please continue to pray for the Ecklebargers during this transition. It can be overwhelming moving to another country, trying to learn a new language, and adapting to an entirely different culture. There is still a long road ahead, and I am sure they would appreciate your prayers. You can follow their journey from their perspective through Ron’s blog at http://encargapastors.blogspot.com.

Our ability to assist them with their move has been somewhat hampered by the absence of our van. You may recall that I had a run in with a Guatemalan traffic cone (a rock) over a month ago. Well, the repair shop has been holding it ransom for the last three weeks while doing repairs that will take eight days “mas o menus” (Spanish for “more or less”). So, for the last week we have been packing people into our Forerunner. (At one point, we had 12 of us sardined inside.)

On Friday afternoon, just before their shop closed for the weekend and too late for me to make it to Guatemala City to pick it up, they called to tell me it was ready. So, on Monday morning Wanda and I headed in to bring our precious and much needed vehicle home. Imagine my surprise when I arrived and realized that the van was repaired, but missing a part. The gentleman proceeded to tell me that they did not have the part in stock and it would arrive in 20 to 25 days, at which time I would need to bring my van back in for them to complete the repairs. At that point, I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry, so I did neither. That is usually a good choice since neither laughing or crying produces any results. However, we do have our van (for now) and it will be a big help in transporting our 22 current household members around and assisting with the move.

Some other exciting news to share is that we have our first student for our new Encarga pastor training program. Gerardo Hernandez is a friend of our family from here in town. He has quickly become a part of our family and we now consider him a son. He is a fine young man who loves Jesus and works hard as a tour guide in Antigua, but God has been calling him to ministry and has used us to confirm that call. On the night before the Ecklebargers landed to begin that ministry, he accepted the call and agreed to undergo training through Encarga. We hope that he will eventually assist with the expansion of the program into villages. It will be a wonderful asset to have a Guatemalan man of God working with us in this endeavor.

Today Wanda and I took some time to head out to Esquintla to check on Walter. He is the little guy who has bedsores on both feet that were caused by ill-fitting braces. We provided a wheelchair for him so that he could keep his braces off and allow the sores to heal. When we pulled up in front of his house we were thrilled to see him in his chair with no braces. His family has been doing just as we instructed and the healing is progressing more rapidly than I had hoped. He can now continue without bandages as both sores have healed closed with no cavity underneath. I am waiting for them to heal for three more weeks before beginning the process of getting him new braces. We praise God for this process and thank you for your prayers for Walter.

Well, that is all for now. Greetings and love from Guatemala!

Daryl, Wanda, and the Crew