iWin Leadership Training

The Grace Community Church from Montrose, CO brought a family team to work in the mountains of a Quichua community called, Castillo (Castle).  Castillo is a daughter church plant of Guaranda, Ecuador Church of the Nazarene, where Pastors Andres and Marcia pastor 300 Compassion International children, 80 adults, and 40 youth on a weekly basis. 

     The Castillo church is brand new but you would not have known it by the welcoming arms and many words of encouragement the team received on the first night.  Over and over the community people thanked them for coming to build a church with them and for their children.  One of the mother's shared with tearful eyes, on the last day, "Thank you for coming and building, and giving our children a chance in life." The children will receive a hot meal and classes at least once a week and then on Sunday's they will come with their parents for teaching and a snack. 

     Everyday started with a circle prayer with the team and the community future church people.  The progress of the building went rapidly and by the end of the week the building had walls and a roof to provide protection from the rain during the Sunday afternoon church service and typical lunch, which included guinea pig. Even though it rained, at times the team was without water to mix concrete so they would have to go to the little creek and bucket out water into barrels.

The property of the Castillo church was donated by the community and had been passed down from generations before.  The children from the school would spend their recess time, asking the team members to speak English to them and of course waiting to receive an American snack.  

        The team held afternoon activities for the children, even with frequent rain.  During one afternoon, they were playing with the parachute and ended up making an umbrella out of the parachute and sang songs and told Bible Stories under the parachute until the rain stopped.  The last afternoon Pastor Andres presented the colors of Salvation as the children made their own bracelets and all 80 children asked Jesus into their hearts! 

      One of the youth shared on the last night, that he felt that this week was special in that he used this time to draw closer to the Lord! 
  








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