Monthly Archives: March 2015

At the top of our webpage you can see José Gaitan´s aged hands weaving a basket. If you scroll down, you can see half of his smiling face. Señor José was first our neighbor; his son, Pastor Justo, being one of the main reasons we decided to build in Catrigandí. For a while Señor José was my roommate in our home while I built and Colleen was back in the States.. While we were still lighting our way with candles, I came home to find him asleep with the snub of a candle burning ever closer to the block of wood that it sat upon. I was grateful that I decided to come home a day early and decided the time had come for our first solar panel. José marveled and laughed at the switch and the ensuing glow of the bulb. It was so fun to see his reaction (and such an improvement over candles or kerosene) that we´ve made solar lighting a bit of a sideline project, having now installed simple systems for 2 elderly couples and 2 families. José´s grandchildren finished high school this past year, so he, his son, and his daughter-in-law decided to return to their family land in a very remote scattering of farms called “6 nickels” while the children board in town to continue their studies. It is far, but most of the distance can be covered by an equipped 4×4 in the dry season. So I decided to go and take a blessing to the family that has been such a blessing to us.

Perhaps you could spend an evening, an hour, or even 5 minutes in candlelight or lamplight to help your kids understand how most of the world lives. It may be “enlightening”!!! “You, O Lord, keep my lamp burning; my God turns my darkness into light.” Psalm 18:28

Bendiciones!

It is the peak of summer in Panama. Everybody is busy. The dry season allows tractors to cut dirt roads into faraway places. Products come out, like wood and fruits, products go in, like dry goods and anything else you can possibly sell to someone who has just gotten their hands on the most cash they´ll see all year. For certain relatively impoverished communities, this creates a juggernaut challenge of financial stewardship. Compared with their typical monthly income, summer might be something like winning the lottery.

Our most recent excursion took us to Sinaí and Canaan, named after the biblical locations, on the Membrillo River in Darién. The river is beautiful for bathing, but I wouldn´t recommend you drink the water. They wouldn´t drink it either, if they had a choice. Fortunately, they do! These two communities have most of their infrastructure (tanks, tubing, solar panels, etc) from previous projects. Sinaí lacks a water source (you can´t use the river directly because floods will wash anything away) and Canaan lacks a pump (theirs broke due to silting in the well along with inadequate filtration). Through presentations, dialogue, and collaboration, we´ve convinced these communities to raise money through their summer avocado sells to purchase everything needed to get their systems working. This is an awesome achievement for communities that have suffered the repercussions of a paternalistic history of failed projects! It is also an inroad to talk about stewardship, cooperation, and the love that God has for all of us. Have a blessed summer (or winter) wherever you are!!!