Dear Loved Ones,

Greeting from our rainy Altagracia.

Many of you have been wondering about the whereabout of Nzunga & Kihomi. We are in Altagracia, a small village/town about 30-45 minutes’ drive from Santo Domingo, the capital city of the Dominican Republic. Our house is about 5 minutes’ drive from the FINCA, the mission land where we will be building the church and eventually develop a youth camp.

We are in the full swing of activities. Meetings that go beyond 9, 10 PM. Visits of sick & shuts in. Yesterday, in our nightly meeting we put in place a new structure that will help develop the new church. The young pastor Benny was named Senior pastor seconded by his wife, a Palmer Seminary Master of Theology student, and 2 Haitian leaders.

Nzunga & Kihomi will be teaching every Tuesday and Friday while sharing the duties on Sundays. Also Kihomi will help develop some development projects to help members strengthen their financial economy.

The big challenge in this society is how to help people with no legal status in Dominican Republic. Here is the case that has been keeping us awake since we arrived. A young Haitian lady member of our New Creation Baptist Church has been shut in.

Why? She has a mass preventing her to urinate normally. She uses a Catheter but needs a surgical operation, but no hospital will take her in because she is illegal in the country and because of lack of funds.

Yesterday in our meeting we decided to call The Good Samaritan Hospital in La Romana about 4 hours away if they can take her in and we will volunteer to drive her over.

Thank you for praying for our emotional strength.

Yours in DR

Nzunga & Kihomi

Dear Supporters,

When this was written they had been back in the DR for 8 days.  The Energizer Bunny has nothing on them.   What passion of the Lord and his people.

The building of the New Creation Baptist church has been delayed due to the torrential rain and the lack of an engineer.  Evidently there is a building boom going on and finding an engineer is difficult.  The DR has building codes just like here.  Please pray for the rains to stop and for an engineer to become available.

As always, thank you for your support.

Yours,

Dennis Shewell and the MPT team

deshewell@gmail.com