|
News - November 2009
In the past 4 years we have run 9 Discipleship Training School’s, which have gone out to 14 nations. Two of those schools Donna and I had to lead ourselves because we didn’t have trained staff to lead them. Thank God we now have several good DTS leaders, which has really helped to lighten that load. Our fall school was small, but we have been kept busy with King’s Kids camps and hosting DTS outreach teams. We have had 4 DTS schools from other countries come to do their DTS outreaches here. Currently we have a DTS from Cowboys With A Mission, Wyoming. They will be helping us with our Kiddies’ Rodeo here at the base and a Rodeo Bible Camp, which will be held in January at a ranch in Guanacaste. I will tell more about this event in our next letter.
We have also run two Environment & Resource Stewardship Schools thanks to a great bunch of staff and teachers that have come from all over the world to help us. Several of our past students are now working in other countries in resource stewardship. Some are even setting up new schools in the countries where they are serving.
In September I was invited to teach in the DTS in Chaing Mai, Thailand. I left a week early so I could also attend an event put on by Echo Development, who were having their Asian Agricultural Conference in Chaing Mai. There were 155 people at the conference from 18 Southeast Asian countries. All of the missionaries work in agriculture or community development and most of them in closed countries. Thailand is unique in Southeast Asia because they have religious freedom. In most of the countries that surround Thailand, Christians are being persecuted. The last day of the conference several of us took a bus to Northern Thailand where the hill tribe peoples live. The Aka, Pulong, and Karen peoples have all fled into Thailand because of the oppressive military regime of Myanmar. They desperately need help in the area of clean water, sanitation and sustainable agriculture. The very things we teach in the environmental schools, so maybe our next school can go to help these people during their outreach.
Well, back at the base in Costa Rica we are excited about some new ministries our personnel have launched. Every Tuesday, we have a team going to the city to feed and pray with some of the homeless people. Another one of our staff is starting a ministry to reach skateboarders and another staff has started a soccer club ministry to reach kids in our area. We are encouraged by our staff who taken the initiative to begin these ministries. They will need lots of prayer and financial support.
As you may remember a year ago January, we lost a big part of the roof of the main house in a windstorm. Thanks to some financial gifts and a work team from a local church, we now have a new roof, (so no more leaks). While we were at it, we thought we would rebuild the front steps and repair the septic tank, so things are much improved.
Something we would like you to pray with us about is our continuing vehicle problem. As you remember, both the base van and our personal Jeep were stolen. For the last 11 months we have struggled with our transportation using old cars and borrowed vehicles. In May one of our supporters gave us a 2004 Chevy Suburban. We shipped it down here, but we are not able to use it until we pay the import taxes, which are over $10,000. Every vehicle that comes into Costa Rica must pay import taxes whether new or used. We desperately need this vehicle since we are hauling teams around every day, so please pray about helping us get this vehicle released.
We appreciate your prayers and your support!
Serving our Lord,
Terry & Donna Keith
|
