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Salgado DR Mission Newsletter

Dear mission partners, friends, and brothers and sisters. Grace and peace to you in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. The Summer has now arrived. and with the Summer comes the visits from our short term missionary friends. The first team that came was a special group. The team was from First Baptist of Fall Branch Tennessee and was lead by Pastor Shawn Cutshall. This was this church’s first international mission trip. It was a pleasure to watch and serve with these brothers and sisters. It reminded me of my first mission trip years ago, and it was Pastor Shawn who lead that trip also when he was the Pastor of our sending church. They came and did a great job ministering  and meeting needs of the people here. There are many needs here, but their greatest need is Christ. Continue reading “Salgado DR Mission Newsletter”

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Everything Happens For A Reason

 

I cry out to God Most High, to God who fulfills his purpose for me.- Psalm 57:2

This morning getting ready to go to Santiago, I woke up to a flat tire. I was supposed to be in Santiago by 8, or so I thought. I was tempted to get mad but didn’t. So Tonito and I went to a local “gomero” (tire fixer upper), and waited for someone to get there. I began to think maybe God let me get a flat tire to keep me from getting in an accident, the people here do drive pretty crazy. Maybe I just got a flat tire for no reason at all…but I seriously doubt that. You see, I believe not only in the providence of God, but the absolute sovereignty of God as well. Continue reading “Everything Happens For A Reason”

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Salgado DR Mission Newsletter

Dear mission partners, friends, brothers and sisters in Christ. As many of you know our family is now back in the Dominican Republic. We are very happy to be back “home”  ready and anxious to get back to work for the Lord. Our visit to the states was wonderful, but traveling so much sharing our ministry with others, visiting with family, living out of a suitcase, and working a part time job, we had quite a demanding schedule. Thank the Lord for His provision as He provided us transportation and a place to stay while we were in the States. He has always  provided for us what we need. Continue reading “Salgado DR Mission Newsletter”

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Prayer Requests

We are approaching the end of our visit here in the U.S. and we will be back in the DR before we know it.  Our good friends the Duncan’s have made it back to the DR safely with their new baby daughter on Tuesday. Please keep them in your prayers as they readjust to life in the DR with the new addition to the family. We are very thankful for all the people who have shown us such hospitality and love  everywhere we have been, and for everyone who financially supports this mission. But we are most thankful for the prayers. Continue reading “Prayer Requests”

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Faith comes by hearing

We first would like to say thank you for everyone’s prayers for our family as we traveled. We are back in Ocala, Fl. now. We spent a few weeks on the road sharing with others about our family and ministry, the great needs and challenges we face, and the many things that God is doing in the DR that we are privileged to be a small part of. We met many brothers and sisters in different states and were overwhelmed to find out how many people knew about and have been praying for us. We are so grateful, and in so many ways we are in need of the continued faithful prayers of the saints back home. We are confident that the Lord hears them.  Thank you.

I thank my God always when I remember you in my prayers,- Philemon 1:4 ESV

One of the biggest challenges we face in discipleing adults and training men for leadership is illiteracy. There are a lot of adults in the area we minister to who cannot read. There a several different reasons for this, Continue reading “Faith comes by hearing”

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I guess they were right…

I haven’t blogged in a while. But today’s experience would have been too long as a fb post, but is also definitely a story worth sharing. If not for anything else, to help you pray for us and this country more specifically We have heard the many stories. The protests, the riots, or what they call here the “huelgas”. The word really means “a strike”. There are many days the kids here do not go to school because of them. Class is canceled and the teachers refuse to show up. They happen often and for various reasons. The people get together and protest in such a way as to send the government a message. I have seen the beginnings of one getting back from teaching at night in other towns. I have seen the aftermath of them. Tires and garbage burned in the street. Giant rocks and blocks thrown in the road to keep vehicles from passing through. But they aren’t as bad or as often in our town of Esperanza. At least not that I have seen yet.

Continue reading “I guess they were right…”

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Take down your idols!

Here in the Dominican Republic, as in most Spanish countries, they have a deep rooted Catholic background. Along with that comes all the superstitious beliefs, and unbiblical practices and stories handed down from generation to generation. Even within the Catholic church, the idols they pray to and make many frames and statues of, vary from country to country. In Cuba for instance they tend to focus more on San Lazaro, in my father’s home country of Mexico it’s  la virgen de Guadalupe, there’s la virgin de Candelaria, and the list goes on. Here it’s la virgin de la Altagracia and of course one of their favorites, the divino niño (the divine child). All the different versions of the virgin Mary in each country come with the stories ( none of which are found in Scripture), of alleged appearances of her in different parts of the world and even in different colors. Sometimes she is black, white, or spanish.

Continue reading “Take down your idols!”

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Family focused

Well, it’s been a while since we have blogged. It has been so hectic since our trip to the U.S., then getting back in the swing of things here in the DR, and now God has blessed us with a house (from a tiny apartment) that has a yard. God works things out. Someone here (who claims to know us and we have no idea who it is) knew someone else, who knew the owner of the house in New York, who decided to rent us the house and even dropped the rent to fit our small budget, because he has “heard good things about our family”. I have never met him or the people who know him! He even said this was a “God thing”, because he would never rent it that cheap and is very picky with who he rents to. I didn’t think we were even looking for another place, but my wife said she had been praying since we got back (the building we live in has no yard and the kids are stuck inside most of the time) and the Lord seemed to just put this place right in our lap.  It is a nice house and has room for the kids to play in the back, which is very cool, but now comes the part I am sure everyone hates….moving. Oh well, not complaining, God has been so very gracious to us it doesn’t even make sense really. Thank you Lord.

Continue reading “Family focused”

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Planning a visit, asking for prayer

Well, it’s Feb.22 and we have purchased our tickets for our trip back home. It will be here before we know it. We will be back in the states from March 28th – May 7th, and we have tons to figure out in that short period of time before we leave. With everything going on here, I am torn between leaving with so much work that still needs to be done, and the joy of spending time with family and friends back home. But this will be far from a vacation. We have churches we need to speak to about what God is doing here. The needs are great and the resources are few. It can be quite overwhelming at times (major understatement). We are asking for prayer, fervent prayer. We are asking that God would open new doors of opportunity for this ministry. We are so very thankful to the Lord for those who have stepped up to support us, they have indeed been faithful in their giving. We are also very thankful for all of the saints back home praying for us and the people of the D.R. Be sure that the very God on high, who dwells in unapproachable light, the very Creator Himself has heard and is hearing your prayers. We could tell you of many times we have requested prayer either through facebook, our newsletters, or this blog, and God has heard those prayers and given an answer to which we see the result here on our end. Let us stop and take a moment to thank God for His faithfulness to His people. Many times, unthankfulness itself can be a hindrance to our prayers, because we ask and ask, and because of our forgetful nature, many times we fail to see the many answered prayers and therefore forget to stop and give thanks. Let’s do that now. Thank you Father for inclining your ear to Your children’s cries and responding, forgive us for our unthankful hearts.

Continue reading “Planning a visit, asking for prayer”

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What’s on my mind

As my wife and I were preparing for our trip to the Haitian border this morning, as we began to share our thoughts, we found ourselves both still affected by and thinking about our visit with the young man who was very near death with his mother at his side yesterday. Those of you who follow us on facebook probably read our post. As usual, we went to Piedra Gorda in the afternoon to hold church service. Before we left, two sisters there asked if we would go with them and pray for a friend of theirs in Guatapanal (the next town over). When we arrived we quickly realized this young man was very ill and dying. His mother said he was not eating or drinking and he was very thin. It reminded me of another very similar vist 4 or 5 years back. It was Pastor Shawn Cutshall, his son Caleb and I, and we were asked by a neighbor if we were missionaries, and then if we would go and pray for a man who was dying. We shared the Gospel with him and his family and prayed with him. He died hours later. I have no doubt that was one of those divine appointments arranged by God. That was on a short term trip. But now we live here, ministering to these people, and now I find myself in a similar situation, with another grieving mother about to lose a son in the prime of his life in the same town. I have seen death first hand. I have seen disease wither somenone to practically nothing. I have been at that bedside begging God to have mercy on a particular individual. I have seen someone take their last breath and then die. For me it does not seem to get any easier. Although there is that hope we have in Christ, and we have the confidence when someone seems to be a genuine, born again, blood bought, child of God,…..but there are the others. The ones we do not know and we enter the situation to intercede in the final moments of a persons life before they take that step into eternity. Those are the hard ones.

Continue reading “What’s on my mind”