Mauricio and Dora's Wedding Day!

This is Mauricio's mom, Mauricio, and Dora, on the day of their wedding. They are waiting outside of the courthouse.

Here is Steve with Mauricio and Marlon. Steve found Marlon while door-knocking last December. Since then, almost all of his family has come to know Christ as Savior.

Steve, Mauricio, Dora, and Dora's friend, Vanessa. Steve and Vanessa were the witnesses.

Dora, signing the certificate.

Happily Married! Pray as we help teach this young couple (he's 24, she's 20) learn how to trust in God for a happy marriage. Pray for their two young children also, named Natali and Esteven.

King David is crowned

My sister sends me craft supplies every once in a while. She happened to send very fancy "jewels" recently, which turned out to be perfect for making crowns when we studied about David becoming king. I can't tell you how excited the kids were to make these crowns. If anyone wants to send us something, some craft supplies are always a good idea!

This is Nati, Dora and Mauricio's oldest child.

This is Michele, Marlon's oldest.

This is Cristian, the son of one of our most faithful families, the Cuellars.

Mauricio and Dora

This is Mauricio, and his girlfriend Dora. For those of you that have been following our prayer letters, you will be happy to know that this is Marlon's brother! Marlon has had such a changed life, that his brother has positively been affected.
They were baptized two weeks ago. We are excited that they are getting married within the next few weeks, and are faithfully bringing their children to church. They really want to do what is right and we are enjoying teaching them what we can.
Christine is discipling Dora, and they have completed 7 lessons so far. Steve has completed 6 lessons so far with Mauricio.

September Prayer Letter

Dear Praying Friends,

It is an exciting time to be writing a prayer letter. The Lord has done so much in people’s lives since we last wrote. More people are taking steps to grow in their faith, and God is allowing us to develop various areas of the ministry. On a personal level, our family is very thrilled about some new developments.

In our last letter, we wrote about Marlon Escobar. He was saved in December of last year. Thank you for praying for him. He was baptized two months ago, and is now starting to get more involved in the ministry. Also, his brother Mauricio has been coming to church with his girlfriend Dora. He expressed to us the desire to let God order his life. If the Lord permits Mauricio and Dora, who have two small children, will get married in our church this month. Mauricio also has started discipleship lessons with Steve. Please pray for the continued spiritual growth of these two brothers, and that we would be able to reach more of their family.

About 2 months ago, a young man named Santiago was led to the Lord. He has been studying the discipleship lessons for over a month now, and his spiritual growth has been evident. By God’s grace, Santiago was baptized this past Sunday, and he has expressed a desire to learn how to lead people to Christ. Please pray for his spiritual growth.

It is exciting to see how God is answering prayers in both the men’s and women’s ministries. Every Wednesday evening, the men of the church get together to pray. We thank God that the group of men that get together to pray is steadily growing. This is strengthening the group’s faith since we are seeing answers to prayer on a regular basis. If the Lord permits, it is our desire to start a Bible institute next year, so that these men could be trained further to serve the Lord. Also, Christine has started a Bible study with some of the women of the church. Every first and third Tuesday of every month, Christine teaches the ladies about marriage and motherhood from a Biblical perspective. We pray that the Lord would continue to touch the hearts of the men and women of the church to fulfill God’s will for their lives.

Thank you so much for your faithful prayers and support. One burden that God has placed on our hearts since the beginning has to do with the development of world missions in El Salvador. God has already used El Salvador in a great way when it comes to world missions. We believe that so much more could be done. With the Lord’s help, we are trying to foster a heart for world missions in our church, and believe God will allow us to eventually train and send missionaries. Currently, we are helping to support nine Salvadoran missionary families on a monthly basis. Some live in El Salvador, and some are in Europe and Asia. We are currently helping to support a Salvadoran Baptist church planter in Romania. There is no doubt in our minds that if we continue to be faithful to the Lord, that He will eventually raise up many more missionary families from El Salvador to different parts of the world. Obviously, your faithful prayers and support are going a long way in making this vision a reality.

Finally, we are thankful to God for giving us a new baby. Christine is two months pregnant. Please pray for us as we prepare for this new addition. Rosa is excited about having a new sibling. Her first reaction to the news was: “Are you serious?” Please pray for our little girl as she started Kindergarten in a Christian school three weeks ago. Caleb is growing, and can pretty much say anything he wants to say. God has kept us healthy over the past few months. May the Lord greatly bless you.

July Baptism Celebration

The previous post (July prayer letter) mentioned that Marlon would be baptized soon. He was baptized last Sunday.

This is Marlon and Carla's little boy, Anthony, that has kidney failure. Please keep him your prayers.

July Prayer Letter

Dear Praying Friends,

We greet you from soggy El Salvador. We are in the middle of rainy season as we write to you. The upside of rainy season is the cooler weather we get to enjoy. The downside is that everything stays wet! Everything from our laundry, to our church that does not have a roof over the entire building! But we are also grateful that we are in the city, where the main roads are paved and we can still get around fairly well.

Last Monday, we invited Marlon Escobar and his family to our house for dinner. You may remember Marlon from our last prayer letter. His wife, Carla, was saved a few months back through another ministry in the capitol city. They have two children, Jamy and Anthony. Their little boy Anthony is two years old. He suffers from kidney failure and has had serious health struggles throughout his little life. While this is very sad, we are grateful that this trial is what God has used to bring this family to Him. Please pray for the health of Anthony Escobar.

We had a very nice time at our dinner. We talked about the struggles and joys of parenting, and we also shared testimonies. It looks like Carla will begin discipleship with Christine in the near future, while Marlon just finished the course and is now learning how to soul-win. Our prayer request is that this family will grow in the things of God and see His hand in their lives.

This story gets even better! Marlon and Carla live with many family members, as is quite normal in El Salvador. Besides Marlon’s family, Marlon’s brother has a wife and two children that live under the same roof. Also, Marlon’s parents share the same house. We have the opportunity to minister to this entire family. We are grateful that three other family members have come to church on different occasions. Please pray for us as we try to reach the rest of Marlon’s family.

We wanted to share with you that we had another Youth Activity a few weeks ago. It went well, and we ask you to continue to pray for us as we try to reach the teenagers of El Salvador. There are so many things pulling teenagers away from God, that it is not an easy ministry. But we will not give up, being fueled by your prayers and God’s power.

We are planning another baptismal service in the next few weeks, and we are praying that we will see Marlon get baptized. Also, a lady named Holanda has the need to get baptized. Christine is discipling her and spoke with her about baptism. She feels she “needs more time” and did not want to get baptized last time she had the opportunity. We ask you to pray that Marlon and Holanda will see the need to be baptized. We hope that in our next prayer letter, we can tell you that they have both been baptized!

Thank you again for your prayers for us. Thank you for praying for the people we are ministering to. Please uplift the Escobar family in prayer, and pray for their son’s health. Continue to pray for our Youth Group, that God will give us wisdom in ministering to the teens. Also pray for our upcoming baptismal service, that recent converts will take the next step in their spiritual walk. And as always, please uplift our family in prayer. Please pray God will keep all four of us strong, physically and spiritually.

The Cerna Family

The past month of ministry

We had a visitor this month, he is pictured here with our family. Scott took all of these pictures you are about to see of our ministry over the past month. He took pictures of things that I take for granted, since I see them everyday. I am glad that I get to share these with you.

This sticker is very common to see on front doors. It says "We are missionaries with Christ and Mary." El Salvador is still a very Catholic country.

And here is another proclamation of faithfulness to Mary.

Steve, out soul-winning. Every front door has a "porton" in front of it, which is a door of bars. This door is very important to protect your home from being robbed in a crime-soaked country. It adds a level of security.

In the front of this group, you can see Wiliam and Mareleny. They are some of our faithful members. Wiliam is now discipling another man named Israel.

Juan Carlos, part of our soul winning group from San Miguel, is witnessing to the tortilla lady. In front of her is the big bowl of corn dough that she is frying into corn tortillas. This is probably the most common food here.

Stevito, out soul winning with Uncle Steve. He is a fearless soul winner, and frequently leads more adults to Christ than anyone else in our group.

Our most faithful teenager, Jose Luis. He is also Caleb's best friend :)

The man with his head turned is Israel, who is being discipled by Wiliam.

Our Sunday kids class is rather small, but mighty! These kids have each memorized 10 verses and are getting ready to memorize a second batch of 10 verses. This Sunday we have a party to celebrate their accomplishment.

The lady with the pink shirt is named Tita. She has completed the discipleship lessons, and is now starting to disciple a new convert in the next week with Christine.

A home along the railroad tracks. This property is owned by the government. Since the railroad does not run on these tracks anymore, it has become home to thousands of poor and homeless. They construct homes out of whatever materials they can find.

This is one of those families. Notice the bed springs that the girl has her hand resting on? It is very common to see these acting as a fence around the shacks. This family comes to our church. The children that come are Miguel, Pablo, and Morenita. The mother, pictured in the background, is named Morena.