August 2022: Lifelong Lessons from Summers at Learn & ServeEditor’s Note: Each month, we mail an article with our contribution statements to the previous month’s donors. This month, we are sharing two articles written by youth leaders that brought their groups to SIFAT this summer. One has attended Learn & Serve for years, while the other had her first experience alongside her students. Both believe in this program and its valuable lessons for youth and adults. Thank you for supporting SIFAT and our programs both here in Alabama and internationally! Click here to download a PDF version. Written by Clinton Wheeler, Youth Minister, Cookeville FUMC (Tenn.) SIFAT has been a part of my life for a long time. I came to my first Learn & Serve Summer Experience when I was in middle school. I remember walking across the bridge one morning and saying to myself, “I don’t ever want this feeling to end.” For the first time, I heard God’s voice telling me that I was called to youth ministry and that this is what he has in store for me. The next night, I accepted Christ as my savior and have been involved with youth and SIFAT ever since.  Each day during our L&S Summer Experience, participants have small group discussions and time with their youth groups to talk about their experiences and explore the week’s theme. July 2022: Serving Breakfast in AtucuchoEditor’s Note: Each month, we mail an article with our contribution statements to the previous month’s donors. Click here to download a PDF version. To read previous updates about SIFAT Doctor in your House/The Golden Bread, click here. Written by Marie Lanier Narváez, Promotions and Marketing Coordinator Slowly, our car creeps up a steep mountain, scraping speed breakers while we reminisce about our first visits to Atucucho, a neighborhood in Quito, Ecuador, where SIFAT has been serving for more than 20 years. As we arrive at our destination, a nondescript concrete building among a row of buildings in various stages of construction, we see a line of people winding down the next hill. Dr. Roberto Contreras, Tom Corson, Peggy Walker and I climb out of the car to choruses of Buenos Dias! as we make our way to the door. We are quickly wrapped up in the arms of Ledy Sanchez, a SIFAT graduate and the driving force behind SIFAT’s work in this area. Ledy guides us into a bustling kitchen, full of ladies cutting vegetables and stirring gigantic, steaming pots. Smiles are abundant, and the smells are vibrant with a breakfast drink in one pot with cinnamon and anise and the beginnings of chicken soup in another. These women prepare meals for about 400 children and 80 elderly every day. Ledy tells us she starts baking fresh bread every morning at 4 a.m. But we do not have time to keep exploring this kitchen, lifting lids and chatting with the ladies, because that line of people needs their breakfast.  Ledy is a SIFAT graduate, who has led our projects in Atucucho, Quito, Ecuador for many years. She is an driving force in her community. June 2022: Rebuilding in BoliviaEditor’s Note: Each month, we mail an article with our contribution statements to the previous month’s donors. Click here to download a PDF version. Written by Tom Corson, Executive Director In our Easter letter, we shared the sad news of a terrible flash flood that destroyed the school in the isolated village of Huiri Lanza in mountains of Bolivia. The parents of the children in this village are working hard to make adobe bricks to rebuild a two-room school for the children. In Bolivia, the government will send a teacher if the community constructs a school building. This village had a teacher that was respected and loved by the village. On the day of this disaster, he sent the children home when he saw the rainstorm approaching. He was straightening the classroom and getting ready to go home himself, when without warning, there was a flash flood in the mountain above them, which sent a huge amount of water cascading down onto the school and surrounding community. It completely washed away the school building, taking the teacher, too. The villagers spent days searching for the body of their teacher, but he was never found, as this village is in a very steep part of the Andes Mountains.
 caption May 2022: SIFAT Graduates Overcome ObstaclesEditor’s Note: Each month, we mail an article with our contribution statements to the previous month’s donors. Click here to download a PDF version. In Nigeria, our SIFAT graduates Pastor Blossom and Aina are building a fence around their mission school, an action required by the government for all schools because of the terrorists who are kidnapping schoolchildren. Through our approved graduates’ projects program, SIFAT sent a grant to help with the fence to enable this Christian school to continue operating. But an anti-Christian group did not want a Christian school in their village. They invented a false story that the land the fence was on was not the school’s property. They sued Pastor Blossom, which stopped the fence building for several weeks until the court ruled it was a falsehood. The attackers got what they wanted—construction was delayed and materials ruined. Without extra funds, Pastor Blossom and Aina could not continue. We believe in self-sufficiency, in working and making a living by doing so. But, there are so many different problems our graduates face before they can succeed. We are constantly amazed that these graduates, who have many obstacles to overcome, have so much determination and perseverance. They often say, “With man it is not possible, but with God all things are possible!” Though it may take longer than originally planned, still it happens! Our graduates keep trying, and with God’s help, they overcome! April 2022: Happy Easter!Editor’s Note: Each month, we mail an article with our contribution statements to the previous month’s donors. Click here to download our Easter 2022 letter. Recently, students in a one-room school on the way to Quesimpuco, high in the Andes of Bolivia, listened intently as the teacher explained the lesson. The school is near a small river, so that they could have water. Their parents had made the mud bricks and built this school. Because they had a building, the government sent a teacher. What joy they had felt when the teacher walked into their village the first time to start classes! Many children in this isolated district lived too far away to walk to school, and this handful of 35 students felt blessed, indeed, to be able to have the opportunity to attend. The teacher and students were all proud of their school! It is the rainy season in Bolivia, and flash floods are not uncommon. On this day, the students tell us that lightning struck the mountain peak nearby, and deep thunder followed. The light in the room darkened as dark clouds rolled in. The wind began to roar past. The teacher told the children, “A bad rainstorm is coming. You must go home quickly! The river could flood our school!” The children lost no time, as they ran home as fast as they could. |
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