August 2011

Dear Brothers and Sisters in Jesus,

The grace and peace of the Lord be with you.  After flight cancellations and delays, I arrived 23 hours later than scheduled for the 40 year reunion of our Corpus Christi church youth group on July 30th.  It is hard to describe what an impact that time had on our lives as the Spirit of God moved in all of us in incredible ways.  Out of that group came six missionaries going all over the world from Argentina to China to New Guinea.  If fellowship can be so sweet on earth, just think what Heaven will be like!  And this is why we continue to share our faith!  

Osvaldo Casati, Dr. Lelis Mella and Hector Braga at Radio Cultura.  Lelis, an attorney, is involved in the political scene in Argentina, working to produce changes from the inside as she and other visionary Christians work to promote Biblical values at the level of government and Congress. She participated in our radio broadcast in July where we interviewed her on her book, “National Transformation”. She has recently decided to start meeting with us and is very interested in helping out with organize a university student ministry. She herself was converted through such a ministry.

With an election year in Argentina, Julio Galeppi was selected along with Sergio Macagno Garibaldi, a Christian attorney, to work together during recent elections officiating at the polls (keeping the elections honest).

Sergio, like Lelis,  works in the political arena promoting national transformation through Chrisitan influence.  He has been a guest on our radio program a couple of times recently, speaking about justice.  Sergio is working for transparent elections as well as Constitutional reform.

Last year Gabriel Flores Ciani came frequently as our guest speaker on Sundays.  Gabriel, physician and psychoanalyst, and his wife Cecilia, a psychiatrist, are both solid believers whose enthusiasm is contagious.  This year Gabriel started preaching for us on a regular basis, and in July a group of 14 of us from the Puente a la Vida congregation started discipleship classes with them on Saturday afternoons. 

Our theme is Matthew 28:18-20 and we are training our people to go out and share Christ, follow up on new people establishing them in their faith, discipling them.  Our present focus – apart from working with members of our radio audience – is on our immediate neighborhood in downtown Buenos Aires. Here there is a mix of socioeconomic groups ranging from businessmen to taxi drivers who gather on our block, families who lack the means to rent an apartment and so live in the local hotels, to street people and youth on drugs.  With Children’s Day coming up later in August, the congregation is working on reaching out through a special event they are putting together.

Adolfo (a physician) and his wife Alicia have been a valuable part of our congregation this past year. The Pedotas, Christians for many years, came to Puente a la Vida in their search for a Bible church. Before traveling to Europe for six weeks to visit family, Araceli Diaz prepared a small going away party.  Nilda Cantero and Araceli, newer Christians, also came to us through the Puente a la Vida radio broadcast.  Both are very gracious women, and through the Word their lives have been turned around. It’s exciting to see the life-transforming changes in them.

Love and blessings in Christ,