Arrowhead Christian Academy Serves in Ecuador

The power of serving others was on display last month. Arrowhead Christian Academy came from California to serve at ER’s Quito Dream Center and work with local ministries.

Thirteen high school students and two adults worked with the Dream Center kids. They performed a skit on the story of Lazarus and shared the gospel afterwards.

The team also did three home projects, including purchasing mattresses and building bunk beds for a Recycling Community family.

For 14-year-old Victory (privacy name), a Dream Center student, this was the first time in her life she has had her own bed. The Arrowhead team was humbled by this and thrilled to play a part in providing something that is so normal in their lives. Thank you Arrowhead Academy!

 

Bridge Church Serves with Passion in South Africa

The Bridge Church of Miramar, FL continues to serve vulnerable people living in Ecuador and South Africa via short-term mission teams. This team poured into the kids at the Fish Hoek Dream Center by helping them with homework, doing crafts, and serving fun food. Carol Swinson shared a blog on how the team engaged with the Dream Center kids and staff:

“Our final day at the Dream Center was full and rewarding. We had three registered nurses on the team this year, so we brought a CPR mannequin to teach the high schoolers basic first aid and CPR.

“Then without skipping a beat, the nurses became chefs and cooked a delicious lunch of curried chicken – Jamaican style. The kids LOVED it and many came back for seconds, licking every morsel from their bowls.”

Thank you Bridge Church for your ongoing compassion.

 

Wheaton Football Team Works Hard, Loves Hard

Volunteers from the Wheaton Football Ministry Partnership (WFMP) team Wheaton College returned for the second year in a row to Ecuador.ER’s Director of Operations, Doug Darr, said the young men were well prepared, demonstrated servant hearts and were a joy to work with.

“They attacked the physical portion of the project with determination and perseverance by digging footers, tying rebar and working concrete for the foundation of a new sanctuary for the Bridge Church at San Carlos.

“They also worked at the Quito Dream Center with the kids; most of whom come from very poor and broken homes and have experienced tremendous trauma and abuse.

“The teammates displayed genuine love and concern for the kids, making meals, doing crafts, playing games and spending time with them.

“The team furthered our work in Ecuador significantly and, most importantly, represented Jesus well and brought glory to His name.” Well done Wheaton.

Scroll below to read about more volunteer teams.

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PA Church Team Impacts Community

Four years ago, a short-term team from Bridge Church, Easton, PA, traveled to Quito, Ecuador to help build a home for a family who gleans its existence from the trash at the Quito Dump. After many hours of work, the home was completed and one family of recyclers had a new outlook on life.

The home construction provided Victor, Tania, daughter Kelly and son David with a well-constructed home. Having a home to call their own provided the family with something we often take for granted – stability and hope for the future.

Last month, a new Bridge team of 11 volunteers made a trip to Quito and visited with the family. It was a sweet reunion and a reminder that volunteer work can result in impactful and sustainable results. It was a joy for the Bridge team to see the family flourishing.

In addition to visiting the family, the Bridge team worked on a retaining wall for another house build ER volunteers will be doing in July. We believe this is the 16th home built for Recycling families, although we’ve started to lose track.

The team also volunteered at ER’s after-school program and with the Quito women’s group. And if that wasn’t enough, the volunteers took at-risk youth to some hot springs and hiking, as well as a field trip to a park.

Pete Emery coordinates volunteer team activities in Ecuador shared his enthusiasm for the Bridge team reaching out to vulnerable people with love and compassion.

“I saw great relationships taking place among the kids and the women on the team,” Emery said. “And one team member’s testimony about fighting terminal cancer and yet growing stronger made a huge impact.”

Many thanks to the Bridge team and all ER volunteers. Through your ongoing compassion and generosity, you are helping people lift themselves out of poverty and into a sustainable futures.

Would you consider investing in the futures of people working to escape generational poverty? Please visit our mobilization page, or email us at mobilization@extremeresponse.org.

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Short-term Team Mobilizes in South Africa

A team from Bridge Church in Miami, Florida recently served with Victory Kids and the Dream Centre. The team’s name is an apt metaphor for its work, for they bridged the sizable gap between South Florida and South Africa by strengthening previous established relationships and building new ones.

Four members of the 12-person team had served with us a year-and-a-half ago, and some of the kids remembered them. Those kids were able to grow their relationships with team members, and by the end of the week, they had eight new friends as well.

The team led a morning club for about 100 kids at Victory Kids. In the afternoons they helped children with homework at the Dream Centre and led a small kids club there. They also did some work projects around VK, including an extension to one of the classrooms, fixing up the playground, and buying and installing new TVs in each classroom. The latter are very important, because when it rains, the kids are stuck inside all day and attention spans tend to wane.

On the last day, we bought Kentucky Fried Chicken for all of the kids and teachers. This was a huge hit – the kids love KFC and it is something they don’t usually get to enjoy.

It was awesome to see this team work. During the debrief at the end of the week, it was great to hear about all of the new relationships they made with the kids and staff. They are already planning a trip for next year.

It is so great to see a work team catch a vision for a trip and then keep coming back and building relationships. This happened with a team to Ecuador who started coming in 2012 to work on a the church of ER’s Jose and Teresa Jimenez.

The resulting long-term relationship has led others to call the team either crazy or inspired! Phase one of the project is to build a temporary two-story building for holding services and having classrooms for teaching. The team from Bridge Church in Miramar (Miami), Florida has come back every year to add their efforts to the project while in their absence the local congregation continues what they can.

The goal is to build a larger meeting room (possibly starting next year) which will hold 1,200 or more people and can be used for joint services of the smaller churches in the area. This church is located in a poor community near to the airport which is a developing area.

Over the years the two church consider themselves extensions of the other. Most of the team members have come over several years and plan to return and continue the endearing relationships established with the congregation.

Interested in sending a team to Ecuador, South Africa or the Philippines? Click here to learn how ER mobilizes people and teams.

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From Green Home to Dream Home

(Aug. 25, 2015)

Every day, Miguel and Jane, their daughter Patricia, their sons Luis, Edison, Miguel and Jefferson, plus two more extend family members, squeezed into their tiny home that featured green paneling near the entrance. Built with scavenged boards, the dilapidated house was all they had.

In some countries, the little structure would have been condemned and the family would be out on the street – homeless. But for these nine family members, the home meant survival. They were living like canned sardines, but at least they had a home. Unfortunately, what the home couldn’t provide was hope for the future. They were stuck in a perpetual cycle of poverty.

You see the Guachi family are “miners”, a term used to describe people who scratch out a living by wading into mounds of steaming garbage at the Zambiza Dump to remove recyclables like metal, glass, cardboard and plastics. The work is dirty and dangerous. It pays pennies per pound of recyclables – barely enough for the family to eat.

The outlook for the Guachi family was grim. But they had one chance to change everything. They knew ER volunteers had built homes for 12 other dump families. They asked to be considered for the program. After years of hoping, praying and waiting, they received the news that would change their lives. They would receive the next house, to be built in July 2015.

As part of the program, the Guachi family would work alongside Extreme Response volunteers and contribute their sweat equity. By helping build the home, the family’s confidence and sense of personal investment would grow.

Team Omaha Comes To Serve

Building homes for dump families would not be possible without ER volunteers and donors. They come from around the world for a week or two to help people they have never met. We call these volunteers Extreme Teams.

One Extreme Team in particular has been a huge blessing to the dump families. “Team Omaha” is compromised of volunteers from multiple churches in Omaha. The team steadfastly journeys to Quito year after year to change the lives of people living in desperate conditions. In addition to constructing homes, the team provides appliances, furniture, bedding and more.

The Guachi family home project began by tearing down the little green house. The family had to sleep in an old tent and makeshift hut during the new home construction. Seeing their home destroyed must have been both exciting and scary.

Not including the preliminary prep (foundation, utilities), the home was built in about one week. The 22 members of Team Omaha worked alongside family members, building both a home and relationships.

As far as construction projects go, this project was ER’s largest build yet. The home has five bedrooms, a bathroom, living room, dining room and kitchen. With the inclusion of other family members, 13 people moved into the house.  (Plus, an uncle and brother also live in huts next to the house.)

Move-In Day: The Guachi Family is Overwhelmed

On the final day of the project, the family left so the team could finish and set up the house.

“I am sure their minds were full of wonder and joy,” said Paul Fernane, Americas Teams Coordinator. “The move-in day was crazy, busy and full of emotion. The team dashed around painting, finishing the electrical and plumbing, hanging curtains, making the beds, adding sheets, pillow and comforters, filling dressers with clothes and hanging special items on the walls.”

The team team carried the furnishings along a slippery narrow dirt path to the home. The bathroom was outfitted with towels, a medicine cabinet and a shower curtain. The kitchen received a stove, dishes, pots and pans, a blender and other kitchen utilities. The refrigerator and kitchen cabinets were filled with food. A bowl of fruit was placed on the dining room table as the centerpiece. Living room furniture was put in place.

Fernane shared the family’s introduction to their new home: “When they toured the home, their smiles were precious, especially the kids, as they opened the doors and saw the furnishings, clothing and food. They expressed extreme joy and gratitude. It was an awesome time of thanksgiving by both the family and the team. Tears and words of thanks went on for some time, before ER’s Zambiza Program Coordinator, Jose Jimenez, and everyone dedicated the home.”

For the Guachi family, life will never be the same. Hopelessness has been tossed to the curb. Now they have a safe, secure and spacious home, plus hope for the future.

Team Omaha wasn’t done with its service to at-risk families. The hearty volunteers also reached out to the women, children and men at the Zabmbiza Dump, Quito Family Resource Center.

ER has worked with dump families since 1997. We’ve met hundreds of people desperate to exit poverty. Most won’t make it because the crushing cycle of a lack of income, education and opportunity leaves them hopeless.

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