Heart for the World Hope Center in Juarez Mexico

The below is from Pastor Vickey in Juarez who overseas the Heart for the World Hope Center.  Enjoy the Life of God and get envolved and lets Help our neighbors who need the life of God to change the land.

One day at her church in Anapra, Mexico, Pastor Vicky Ponce received a cell phone call from a sister in the church: “There’s gun shots and I’m here on the bus and I don’t know what to do. They took us all off the bus and put us into a bathroom.” Vicky asked her where she was and then said, “Don’t move, I’m going to get you.” With her son-in-law driving, Vicky hurried over there. When they arrived in front of the restroom, Vicky said, “There were lots of police, and even a helicopter –they were shooting downward – two men were killed right then. So I just grabbed the cell phone and called our sister again, and the police were saying, ‘get out of here, get out of here, you can’t be here,’ and I just said, ‘hold on, hold on, I’m coming to get somebody,’ and I called our sister back.” Vicky told her, “The doors of the bathroom are open, get out, get out, I’m here.” And Vicky heard her shout, “They’ve come to get us.” And then about twenty people came out! There was even a man on a bicycle. Everybody got into the vehicle, including the man with his bicycle. Vicky said that once they were all inside, “I just began to talk to them about the love of God, that He is our peace: that the police can’t cover us, the government can’t cover us, but Jesus can cover us.”

This brave Pastor has had a number of very close encounters with the epidemic violence of Juarez – including taking people home from church amidst gunfire, and two very tense situations that ended in her praying for a hit man, and for an extortionist. But none of this has stopped her ministry of 10 years as Pastor of Iglesia Monte Sinai; in fact she has recently seen her church grow in maturity and number of people, both children and adults.

One very exciting piece of news is that Pastor Vicky, who has known the Lord for 20 years, is going to be married on September 17, 2011. At the August 25 service in Anapra when Heart for the World provided school supplies for hundreds of local children, Vicky and brother Beto shared with Pastor Dale about their upcoming marriage: Beto thanked God for helping him find a good wife, and Vicky said that they were going to get married, not so that they could be happy, because they are already happy for what Jesus has done in their lives, but that they wanted their union to be a blessing for the work of God – for other couples, and for the single men.

For a long time their church has hosted a Hope Center feeding program for many children – “showing God’s love and providing for one of their biggest needs, to eat.” Parents of the children being fed have taken notice and started coming to church as well, Vicky reports. And there is such an uncontainable joy in her church during worship. During a healing service this summer, many came from all over with serious wounds, injuries, and illnesses. Pastor Dale demonstrated Jesus’ work on the cross, as Hunter translated. Chong and others from HFTW joined with Vicky’s church in praying for healing during the powerful presence of the Holy Spirit. The people’s faith even amidst the terrible wounds was so strong.

One sister, Mari, has especially been on our hearts at HFTW. Some may remember her story: a man from Vicky’s church had been telling Mari, “You need to seek God,” and she would tell him, “I don’t have time,” and this happened several times. Vicky said that Mari’s husband had already been murdered, and when Mari came home one day, she found out that her 14-year-old son had also been murdered. Vicky said, “Our brother began to ask for us to pray for Mari, and we found out they had also shot her eight times – we just continued to pray for her.”

Mari was wounded in her liver, intestines, gallbladder, gluteus, and both legs. Despite all of that, Mari said from her wheelchair, “Thank God, I’m fine.” It was after the shooting, when she was in the hospital, that Mari came to know Jesus as her Savior when a Pastor shared with her there. After Mari got out of the hospital, she was brought to Pastor Vicky’s church. Vicky said, “Here, God has touched her life with love, and He’s doing a deep work in her heart.”

When she was interviewed, Mari’s hope was this: “to continue to go forward with my Father God and that He won’t let go of me; to get up out of this wheel chair and to be baptized; and that my son will follow after me the same way.” She still has one precious son, Julio, who is 9. Regarding the violence and the fear in Juarez, Mari said: “God really has helped me because I was so afraid. But God came into my heart, and I’m not afraid anymore.”

At the evening service following the river prayer meeting in June, HFTW was able to collect donations for surgery to help fulfill Mari’s hope to walk again: Pastor Vicky reports that in August, they operated on Mari’s foot by inserting a piece of bone in her ankle. “They operated on her Monday night and by Sunday she wanted to be in church. We asked if that was too soon because she had just the operation? She said she had a hunger to be in the house of God, and to come worship God, and to thank him for having supplied for her operation.” When Mari came to church on Sunday, she saw everyone dancing, and she wanted to dance but she couldn’t. “She was so joyful that she started to move around, and her foot started to bleed.” Mari was very worried because a chair got splattered with blood, but Vicky just told her it was “a sign of her love for Jesus.”

In time, Vicky reported, they are going to take out the metal, and Mari has a possibility of being able to walk again – her other foot already moves – and she will also receive therapy.

Mari is very grateful for the operation given to her, and every day she prays for the El Paso HFTW Church, because she had no other way to get the money for the operation. She still has need of some medicine and medical supplies, especially for more colostomy bags. Hopefully, that injury will be repaired as well.

When interviewed this spring, Vicky asked for prayer for hearts to be healed of the pain of destroyed homes – “dads not there, moms not there, or children gone” – and because there’s a great need for love and compassion. She also expressed their hope to reflect the right way of living in the Lord, to help the next generation to learn moral values: “We have to pass down from generation to generation the Word of God, so that the generation to come will be different.”

She said that many of the gun-bearing hit men are very young, even 13 or 14 years old: “Some of them look like they are just carrying around a toy.” Because they are not learning moral values at home, we need to pray for these children “to trade their weapons for the Word of God.” “Here at church,” she said, “we are teaching them values, with children and with families, and we’re also taking it to the streets, we’re going out to share in homes, and in plazas, parks, and we’re showing a different way of life just standing up for the Lord.” She said, “The ministry of our Hope Center’s feeding program has been a great blessing because one of the ways to show love is on the table.”

Vicky’s church is really growing, and Pastor Dale asked Vicky if she believes God is bringing revival here in Juarez. She said, “The eyes of the devil are upon Juarez but the eyes of Jesus are on Juarez, so when the devil oppresses, God’s people rise up to pray, and Jesus comes and blesses – that’s the revival that we are experiencing.” She added, “This time of violence is causing us to turn our eyes to Jesus, to turn our eyes to God. We’re living the Word every day. When the Bible says that the Lord is our Shepherd, that we will lack nothing, and then even if we are walking through the valley of the shadow of death, He will be with us. Even though we are afraid, we are trusting in the Word, and we are just walking amongst the violence, and walking through it, loving God, and trusting him, and giving the word of hope, that even though the world right now is sewing hate, we are sewing love. It’s the only way to go forward, trusting God and having love.”

More info on the work of the outreach into Juarez Mexico.

Our Hope Centers partner with local churches to serve the poorest of the poor through feeding programs. During this time of borderland crisis, Chong and a team of workers travel from El Paso to Juarez as many as five times a week to feed the children at our Hope Centers and share Jesus with them. Heart for the World also donates food boxes that Chong delivers house to house as she shares Jesus, inviting people to church. She asks that we pray that all the children come to know God and love God more every day. We would like to introduce you to each of the five borderland Hope Centers, their pastors, and the exciting things that are happening there:

Rancho Anapra Hope Center

Pastor Jose and his wife Pastor Sandra, who tragically lost their son to random violence, shared that through the feeding program, they are reaching and teaching children that there’s a God who can provide for them, so they don’t need to become involved with crime. The Hope Center feeding program is vital because so many families’ basic needs are not met – they don’t have anything to eat. Their church, Templo Batabara, a church that Heart for the World helped Chong and Pastor Jose to start, is growing fast.

Tarahumara Hope Center

Chong and Pastor Jose also started a feeding program and Bible study for children where they, with Maria and others, minister every Monday to adults and every Friday to over 80 children of the Tarahumara tribe. They have also been praying with young male adults, many of whom struggle with drugs and alcohol. The presence of Jesus is very strong when they minister there, Chong reports. “When we started,” Chong says, “the Tarahumara didn’t know about God, but now they open their hearts to us and most important to God. Before, no one would ask for prayers or sing with us, but now everyone sings and actually worships the Lord and asks us for prayer for their children or themselves.” For months they have been asking to have a baptism, and so there will be a baptism Friday with Pastor Dale! Please pray that everyone in the Tarahumara tribe comes to our Lord Jesus, and for a program for young male adults to train for jobs or go back to school, and for a space for the services, which are presently held outside in the extreme heat.

Anapra Hope Center

At Pastor Vicky’s church, they are experiencing revival at this time of violence. They are able to teach values to the children, and about the Hope Center feeding program, Pastor Vicky shares: “One of the ways to show love is at the table. We can sit down and have a time together to see God’s love providing food in a very difficult time. Some children haven’t eaten in two days. Behind every child there’s a mom and dad – who are watching – and all of sudden they come to church too. The church is growing – God is bringing revival.”

Caleb Hope Center and Las Granjas Hope Center, Tijuana

Chong also travels to these borderland Hope Centers. At the Caleb Church she helps Pastor Ruben with Vacation Bible School for the Caleb Hope Center where 100-150 children attended every day. People from Caleb Church then helped take VBS to the new Hope Center at Las Granjas, a new colonia with the poorest of the poor and some very sick, and many unable to afford to go to school. Many many children at both centers received Jesus in their hearts. On Saturdays, Caleb Church takes food on Saturdays to the Hope Center at Las Granjas, feeding over 100 people. Las Granjas still needs a church building. Leaders are branching out yet even more, to take Bible study to a new place on Fridays at another colonia whose inhabitants are extremely poor. Chong said when they prayed there she saw Jesus everywhere.