LONG TIME OF SILENCE

In my last thing i posted I said that this next call, to be home would be the hardest, It so far is the hardest both hands down so far.
But i really am not doing well keep anything posted so if you really would like to know what's going on with me you caould e mail me at Gods_gracious_gift@msn.com or go to www.thejoybean.spaces.live.com and there are going to be some more recent pictures
Please keep Jesus in your Center as everythig.
Love ya Ivana

Been home and about to leave

Hello all of you I cannot believe it's been one whole month since i've been away from everything that has to do with Harrisburg Discipleship Center (HDC) and Honduras. I have been off the STEP team "06-07" for a month and in Ohio for 27 days...WOW!
I have been very lax since being home but things are starting to pick up so that makes me happy.
Adjusting to home life is still taking place and I don't think I will ever quite get the hang of it again but i will just keep trying.
Since i've been home things have changed even in the 4 weeks i've been here. My older brother Morris graduated from Messiah and is now at home. With him comes his whole posy of friends who come at 10 or 12:30 am, play, sometimes eat, some sleep and the others go home and start over again the next night.
Time keeps moving and I want it to go but backwards because I would love to just be back in Honduras with my host family so many days. I know that God has created our minds to remember the good and forget the hard or hurt times but at least while i was away I only remembered all the good stuff about home but now being here......
Please pray for me because my next mission stop is CANTON. OHIO and wow is that going to be ummmm different.
So home...'there really is not place like home' and God knew that there should be just one place such as that.
Next monday I will be leaving for training for a inner city kids camp and will be there from June 11-August 10. And then from August until God calls my year done i will be at 922 Arlington Ohio.
Please if anyone reads this please pray for me because I believe this will be the hardest mission field that I have bee in so-far.

Around my house in Honduras

Dirt roads.

Long skirts.


No beds.

Sometimes that is what people think when they hear the word missionary but that is not quite what we were going through for any longer than one week.

PRAISE GOD!!!

THIS WAS OUR LIFE IN THE CITY TEGUZ
This is what we saw every day lots of cars, street lights

hotels that are NICE!!! and even kind of expensive for N. Americans.




This is where the people in my living block parked there cars, yes we had cars, buses and lots and lots of taxes. There are horse and buggy but that is very rare in the area where we lived.

This was across the street from my house.

Advertisement is prity much the same too.

Cell Group

During our time in Honduras we all were apart of groups called Cell groups. There were 3 different ones held at my house and I on a normally attended 2, one was led by my brother and one was led by Lamwel (the man in the picture above with me) He is also the mane drummer at the church in the praise and worship band.
He is amazingly blessed in drumming. Unfortunately he is not so blessed in other areas and so the last Saturday that we were in Honduras was his last week being the leader of that cell meeting. He could use your prayers because he is not very sure what is going on in his life. He goes with the people around him, like it says in Proverbs, bad company corrupts good people...once again the word of God proves right.
This was some of the group that was at my house. Ade also came to this one so it was nice because we could help each other understand what was going on. These people were some of our friends who we got to see out side of church and there for saw that when every one responds to the question how are you doing the real answer is not good.
The Honduran culture is very huggy touchy
but even as much as God helped me not be annoyed by being touched a pillow was necessary for this instance. This guy name who is laying on my shoulder is Cesar.
This is my living room and we were having a free Saturday and so we were playing games and eating...something else very important with the Honduras culture. A free Saturday, that is one Saturday out of like 6 that the leader can choose what ever the group does.
There are over 100 different Cell groups with are small more intimant groups of people that get together on Friday or Saturday night to seek the Lords face together. Every week the leaders teach the same lesson at every house and then the have the same night free so some times we combine the groups and do something special but this time we just had a fun fun night with our group.

Note of encouragement

This is from a Pastor who came down to Honduras in the end of Jan. the beginning of Feb. with Mike Holland, to do a week of evangelism with us with a group of 4 other people.
The man with the straw in his mouth is Pastor Kurt, the one who wrote this letter.
Hey STEP girls,

WOW!!! What can I say, I had an incredible time in Honduras with all of you ladies. I took a little bit of time earlier today to check out some of your blog sites and your xanga sites, and I was very impressed by what I read. God has done some incredibly powerful things in each one of your lives. And I want you to know if I were your youth pastor, I would be overjoyed after reading more about each of you and especially after this week and seeing you girls minister the way you did. I am still truly amazed that all of you are only 18, 19, 20, and 22!! You are all mature way beyond your years.

You know I wanted to share something with you before I left, but I never really got the chance. So I’ll share it with you all now as an encouragement!!

I came to Honduras not really knowing what to expect and hoping that God could use me in someway to encourage you girls, and to be a source of refreshing to you in the midst of your intense missions work. And honestly I am so used to giving to teenagers in ministry, listening to them, praying with them, and just giving my whole life to serve them, so I was excited to be able to do that with all of you. It seems like I’m always leading someone whether teens or youth leaders or parents, and trying to give of myself in this way. So I guess I really expected God to pour out my life into all of you. But I was completely surprised because I walked away from this week feeling very refreshed, encouraged in my faith, excited to continue doing ministry, with a greater passion for the lost, and just uplifted by God’s spirit.

Seeing your faith in God, each of you expressing your desire to love and serve God, and love people was exciting to me. Hearing the stories of how God brought you to STEP and where He is leading you was inspiring to me. And just worshipping with you and praying with you all brought great joy to my heart. I was completely blessed by this trip, by the people in Honduras, and by your spirits. Thanks for being obedient to God to be a part of STEP, to go to Honduras, and giving up a year of your life to serve God. And thanks for sharing your lives with our team, for allowing Jeff, Meredith, Gene, Mike, and me to be a part of your lives. And thanks for opening your hearts up to us and welcoming us to Honduras for the week. Maybe it’s not supposed to happen this way, but I could tell that God used all of you to impact my life this past week. And I believe that you will all continue to see God do some incredible things through your lives, just as we did this past week in Las Mercedes!!! Keep striving to Honor God in all you do and He will bless you.


So that’s what I wanted to tell you. Otherwise I’m glad to be back home with my wife, Megan!! I was very glad to see her at 2:00 AM in the morning on Saturday. However, I do really miss Honduras, the language, the culture, and the people I had a chance to meet. And I especially miss the warm weather, I would take 80 degrees and sunburn any day over 13 degrees with a wind chill of close to zero!!! And I heard that in Ohio, they had a cold day off of school today because the temperatures were in the negatives and wind chill was really low!!! Yeah, it’s crazy cold here. So be glad you get suffer for Jesus in Honduras!!!

Oh yeah, I also had the chance to share about my trip with our teens in Sunday school yesterday morning. It was really awesome, but it was also difficult showing some of the video from the Crematorio and talking about some of the stories.

If you didn’t notice already, I attached several pictures to this email, so that you could see some of them. Also, if you’d like to see more of my pictures from Honduras you can check them out at this website. If you’d like more pictures, let me know. Or I can just post all of them on the website, and apparently you can even use this website to order the pictures.
http://www.ringo.com/profile/kletner.html
I am hoping to get some of my videos onto the computer and then I’ll post them as well so you can see them. And eventually I’ll copy them and maybe I can send them to you as well.

You’ll have to let me know how things are going. My prayers will be with you this week as well.

Blessings,

Kurt Letner
Youth Pastor
Mechanicsburg Brethren in Christ Church

Letters like this one were great encouragements to us and makes us remember why we are doing what we are doing.

Here is a pictures of the group that came with Kurtfrom left to right it is Pastor Kurt, Gene, Pastor Jeff, Meridith and Pastor Mike Holland.

They were introducing themselves to the church in Kennedy that we attended.

This is our Pastor Marcos from Nicaragua telling the church what a great man of God Pastor Mike Holland and His father.

The mans head that you can see the back of is a man that my team of people visited and invited to church during the week of evangelism. It was so great to see some of the people show up that we had ministered to the days before.

Manuelito project

Ade and Ivana




This was in April some time I'm not sure when it took place but it was not long ago. this is one of the monkies that we painted at the project Manwalito. Isn't it cute. During out time at this ministry we met some really cool and funny people.


This is Lester. He is a pastor at the church that is connected with the Manwalito project.


He is married and has one daughter. We had the privilege of meeting his family.



This is Claudia, the secretary of the church. By the way the church is called Amor y Vida (Love and Life). She was our very first friend at the project and we had many good times just sitting in her office talking and laughing with her. She is taking classes at the University and is in a prity serious relationship from a man at her church. There is no ring on her finger but I'm sure that that is not far from the future. They are both finishing up Classes so that is more of a priority right now but lets wait and see what God will do in the future :)


She is an amazing woman of God who also does missions in her own country. There are different groups of indigenous people in the Mountains of Honduras that she goes and ministers to every once in a while. She had invited us to go with her one time but our schedule was too crammed to fit a visit with her in this trip. Her dream is to go and do more missions not just in her country but around the world.
Oh yeah and she has an amazing voice!!!!!!!

This is Cookie he is the director of the children at the Manualito project in the country. There are 2 different locations for the project, one in the city and one in the country. For a few days Ade and i had the privilege of going out to meet all of the kids in the country one. Right now all of the children are in the one place in the country, because some changes are being made so we didn't meet any of the children until we went out to the country.

Back of the truck

we got to ride in the back of Pastor Pinto´s truck. He is the leader of the p roject Manwalito.

Diffrent kind of ministry

This is the other ministry that Ade and i are working with It is called Project Manwalito. It is a project for kids off the streets. There are 2 huge h ouses where they have the kids who come in the program live. The one that we are working at is now empty because they are re araging things and getting it ready for more kids.
Some of the stuff that they do is ditoxicate children because it is very commen for street people to be on glue. So that is one of the firsts steps. The whole time that are showing the love of God to them and teacing them about the workd of God.
We are now Helping get ready for the new kids who will be coming in to the project by painting the walls. Ade is a great artest and i jsut help where i can but it is fun.
I painted the lion so far i am happy abou that. Not quite finished but getting there. I will keep posting the progress as we get further along in what we are doing.
Here is us we ar the ones who are working together and wow is it such a blessing to have her as a sister in Christ.

AFE

The girls just wanted to say HI or HOlA
These are 3 1st graders from the school Love, Faith and Hpe



Did your Class room look like this??

Below is what the Schoool looked like 2 years ago...
Or how about this??
Mine sure didn´t. Please pray for the children who are going to this school because they are believing that God will provide 60 more desks so everyone will be able to have a chair and not an up side down bucket.



This is the 2nd building. It was just finished 2 weeks ago because churches from the US came down and blessed the people of Honduras with this.





This is one of the ministries that I am working on 3 days a week in the morning. Adriane and I Tuesday-Thursday go out to this school to help teach.




How cute! :)








This is the school at the Dump, the name of it is Amor (Love), Fe (Faith) and Esparaza(hope). The school is made up of kids who at one time worked int the dump, live in the dump, parents work in the dump or just live close to it. The school was started because of a 5 year old girl. This girl was with her father one day and they were taking garbage to dump and she said daddy look at all these kids. We souled pray for them, so they did. The went over to them and prayed for a group of them.









On the way home the little girl was saying Dad you do ministry already, he is a preacher and did other homeless kind of stuff for the people around his community. He was said yes i should do something but really didn´t want to. She would beg him and bugg him about doing something and a few months later he called a friend of his up and began to tell him what he his daughter was bugging him about. His pastor friend was like well why haven´t you started it?? That next week he began making friendships with the people who work and live in the dump.


This is the school now in 2007, churches come down every year and help with building and paying for what they can. This is not what it always looked like but God moves Big and Praise the Lord that i now have an opportunity to bless the kids while being here in Honduras.

Just HI

Hey this is me just playing around in my room after before church. I was filled with so much Joy and had batteries in a camera and so this is what takes place hahah.
HI

When i got home from Church i was cold because we were having a cold front you know like 72 yeek. I didn´t know if i could handle that so i had to put on a jacket and hat.

The dress that i have on was a gift from my host mom, isn`t it cute?? Well i think it is anyways.

I had lots of time on my hand that day....is it obvious???

Me and my friend Marven

Hey Yall...................
This is Marven. Marven is a cool kid who lives in a place called The Mica Project. That project is a Home where boys from the street who have no home or who have run away from home can go and live. It is a Christian organization and it is amazing what God does with the guis from that home.
The day that we took these pictures was Marven´s birthday, he turned 18 Feb. 20 and we were just hanging out. Obviously we were very serious and not having any fun at all. Ha. No he is a really cool kid.

That day he was telling us about his life and what God has brought him through and how Amazing God is. He was living with his mom when he was born because his dad left her when she was pregnant to be with another woman. When he was young like 6 or so he had to live with his Father because his mom couldn't´t take care of him any more. His Father beat him and so did his step mother. For years he was living in this kind of abuse and couldn´t handle it any m ore so he ran away an found his mom. Still she couldn't take care of him so he found a house and was there for some time and ended up just a year ago this Feb in the Micah House. He has a very strong gift of evangelism and worship on his life. He writes music, sings and plays the g-tar. You can keep him in his prayers because God is still healing him but wow Look what the lord has done.

One of the girls on my team Lisa is working at the Micah house. She is teaching a 6th grader all of his classes right now...in Spanish.

Dump

This is the street I live on. the chick in the pict is Ade, she lives on my street too. Not quite what you all are used to seeing as a street but it´s home




















This is Jonnie, the man responsable for the Ministry in the dump. On the left is Tim one of our leaders of Step








this is from DEC. 17

Last Wednesday the five of us went to the dump to talk to the man in charge and to see the ministry of this man. His name is Jonny; he is a pastor and is an amazing man.

This is how the whole thing got started: Five years ago his daughter went with him to the dump to get rid of some medical trash from a mission team, and she said, “Hey, Dad! Look at these people! Can we pray with some of them?” So they did and on their way home she asked if he would start a ministry with the kids there. He said he would but then didn't. She would ask him every so often about starting something and eventually he said OK and did it.

He began going to the dump and becoming friends with families and eventually started teaching some of the kids under trees down the hill. Now there is a school of about 60 kids up to 6th grade. Every day he goes up into the dump and gives out water (clean water). They drink water out of a lake that people wash in, wash their clothes in, and whatever else you do in water. Then they drink that same water, so handing out clean water is a very effective ministry.I really liked doing it, but I am now sick and that's not good at all. Oh, the smell! It is overwhelming! I thought within the first minute I was going to throw up about five or six times. I have never been as grateful as I was once we left the dump because a lot of people don't leave--ever. That is their “normal”; they are born there and they die there, normally around the age of 20 because of all the disease and stuff.

The up date of December

Feliz Año Nuevo 2007

On November 10, 2006 a group of five girls (Kara Smucker, Carolyn McKalips, Ivana DuBose, Lisa Coss, and Adriane Horst) arrived in Honduras as the 06-07 STEP team for BIC. STEP is a short-term mission program run through the Brethren in Christ Church (Hermanos en Cristo).

For the first two days we all stayed en la casa de Tim and Lori Zimmerman, BIC Missionaries who are the directors of STEP. All we did there was sleep and eat, and sleep, and sleep and eat! But that soon changed because after church the first Sunday that we were here we were sent home with our host families from the church.

For some of us that was a poco scary, but no para mi. I was very excited about starting my life with a Honduran family.

My Family (Los Maldonados)

My family here is just that--my family. I am not just a guest in their house or an outsider. I am a part of the family, and I’ve felt that since the first day.
The members of my family are: Momma Tuta. She is a retired teacher of 32 años and is just like most retired people in the States--she usually stays busy. She is a cell group leader of some adults her age, and is thinking about helping begin a school at the church. Sounds like retirement--right?


Carlos, my only brother, who is 28, is a 4th grade

teacher

He’s the kind of teacher that all parents want their children to have…y por eso there is solo one 4th grade class in his school. This year he is also going to obtain his title of “Lawyer. “


Zully








Zully is my youngest sister. The day I came to live with them was her 15th birthday. She is in the 9th grade and attends the same school where Carlos teaches. She is becoming a leader in the church. Right now she is a Sunday school helper and a co-leader in a cell group.

Right before Navidad she got her hair and bangs cut and ever since then she has been loca--like just boosts of energy when no one else has any! But she’s cool.

Angela, my older sister, whom I’ve grown to love sooo much, is 26 and has one more year of classes before she graduates with her Masters in Human Resources. In her spare time she also runs a secondhand women’s clothing tienda out of our front patio with Momma Tuta.

Angela is a leader of a sector of cell groups and a Sunday school teacher. She used to be a part of the praise team, but not right now. But she does preach. You go girl!

Every Domingo after church we go to la casa of our grandparents and eat lunch with them--aunts, uncles and cousins. They have accepted me as a part of the family too. Gracias a Dios.

Over these past two months I’ve grown to really love my family and pray that some day they will have the chance to meet my family in the States.
The Church ( La Iglesia)

The church that we attend down here is a BIC church Hermanos en Cristo (Brothers in Christ). The pastor is Marcos and God has blessed him with a great church. We love being a part of the Latin Body of Christ. It’s so nice. There are four services cada Sunday at 9:00, 2:00, 4:00 y 6:00, and then on Tue. Wed. y Thurs. nights there are prayer meetings.

There is no established youth group that we are a part of but there are cell groups that I mentioned earlier. They are mostly designated by age so we are with youth every week, but not like we know it in the States.

this is the new church

A great difference that is evident because there is not a huge division between the adults and youth is that there are many young leaders highly respected. Down here age really doesn’t separate you from anything.

For the past four years they have been building a new church building that is big enough to hold all of the people in one service. We’ve had two services there and we are praying that the money will come in to finish it enough that we can begin having services there on regular basis while we are still in Honduras.


Clase de Español

For the past two months of our lives here we STEP chicas have been having Spanish class Mon.-Fri. (with most Wednesday mornings off) from 8-12:00 at Amanda’s home with Lilia and Karla coming every day to teach us español.

Amanda was Kara’s teacher, Lilia was Adriane y Carolyn’s teacher, and Karla was the teacher for Lisa and me. Today, January 5, was our last day and it was un poco sad because after spending that much time with the same people you get close. They have seen us on good and bad days and even after all that they still love us. They were like extended family to me and now I’m not sure the next time we will be able to see them.



FUN, FUN, FUN!

Things that we have been able to do for fun since we’ve been here are…

Pacto con Cristo (Covenant with Christ). That is a weekend of very intense ministry time with 100 people from the church that happens mas o menos every year.
God did some amazing things in our lives during that time. He humbled me big time while, on the last day, all of the leaders washed our feet, like Jesus did for His disciples. I understand Peter when he didn’t want Jesus to do that for him. It is the most uncomfortable thing that has happened to me yet. But God got me to a different level of understanding His Love for me.

Copan is a city in Honduras that is famous for the Maya Indian ruins. We had the opportunity to go there for two days, and WOW! was that nice. We ate so much food that by the end of that trip eating was a chore not a pleasure and definitely not a necessity.

NOW AND NEAR FUTURE

We are going to the campo (very rural area) for the next week to do four-day Vacation Bible School programs for the BIC churches there. Please pray for that. When I say rural I’m not kidding! The first place we are going to we have to walk for an hour before we get to the town because there is no road.

We are going to be leaving the country two days after we get back from that trip to renew our visas in Costa Rica. When we return we will begin working with the school for the children who live and work in the dump.
Message from Beth Wolsey: Pray for Ivana and her prayer requests, and get that financial help in the mail! If you want to contact her or look at more pictures try her
E-mail: Gods_gracious_gift@msn.com or Blog: http://www.gozoenhonduras.blogspot.com/.
Mail: Please follow these guidelines for sending packages to Honduras--padded envelopes work well or boxes no larger than ½ gallon orange juice container; letters and packages must be addressed to:
Tim & Lori Zimmerman
Ivana DuBose
Apartado 15005 CP 11105
Tegucigalpa, Honduras
Central America











PLEASE PRAY: The prayers the of righteous are highly effective

-Ade has been diagnosed as a pre-diabetic. She is 18 and not very happy about that.

-the ministry time we have in the campo

-that our Spanish will continue to improve

-that pride and jealousy do not have a place in the team

-that we can all prioritize our lives according to the Word of God…Him first!

-Tim and Lori are going through some things here and they also have a 3-yr.-old niece who has a brain tumor surrounding her brain.

-for safety

-that the relationships that we cultivate here are pleasing to God and that we are the women of God that we need to be

-that we don’t lose sight of why we are here--it’s not about boys or a vacation but to be the light of the world and to do good works so that our Father in heaven can get the glory.