Good Friday in Quito

The Great Power of Jesus

(I found this crowd shot on the internet but the rest of the photos are ours.)

Quito, Ecuador, has an enormous, grueling Good Friday file-mile procession, second only to the famous one in Spain.  The prevailing religion in Ecuador is a mix of indigenous superstition and Roman Catholicism that results in their overwhelming desire to earn God’s redemption and ward off evil spirits at the same time.  (The shaman priest influence.)  Thus, their rituals are always extreme and sometimes bizarre to evangelical Christians.

Today Stan, Mary and the NILI students attended a huge procession called The Great Power of Jesus in which a crowd of tens of thousands gathers in the narrow streets of Quito Colonial.  Biblical events leading up to the crucifixion are enacted in the streets complete with Christ figures and roman guards.  In addition, a huge group of cucuruchos joins the procession (they’re the ones in purple).

As penitents, the cucuruchos suffer to show sorrow for their sins and earn their salvation.  They wear barbed wire or strap a cactus to their bare back.  Others carry branches of nettles (a stingy plant) or knotted rope to hit against their skin.  Many strap on large crosses to their back or at least carry a large post on their shoulders.  Most walk barefoot causing blisters and sometimes bleeding.  Small boys participate as well.

It’s an emotional event to watch, and Mary’s thoughts were mixed.  Watching the procession, she got a better feel for what Jesus must have went through, and you can’t watch that as a believer and not be moved.  On the other hand, the participant’s intense suffering saddened her.  They clearly didn’t understand that Christ took on the suffering of the world so that, by His grace, we only have to believe in and receive the gift of salvation.

Our western culture doesn’t want to be confronted with Christ’s suffering.  We acknowledge it but we don’t meditate or dwell on it.  We only want to focus on Easter Sunday.  But obviously, we couldn’t have Easter Sunday without Good Friday.

The Message of the Seven Words

Tonight, our family will attend a Good Friday service called the Message of the Seven Words.  This is a tradition that I’ve come to appreciate.  The service is broken into seven sections; each section focuses on one of the last expressions of Christ such as “Father, forgive them…” and “I thirst,” etc.  A different person gives a short talk on the significance of each phrase.  Christ’s last expressions communicate His side of the story, and it’s a wonderful way focus on the passion of Christ.  A special highlight will be Mary singing “The Wonderful Cross” in Spanish.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

Silent Night, Holy Night.  All is Calm, All is Bright

Noche de paz, noche de amor.  Todo duerme en derredor (Spanish)

Ô nuit de paix, Sainte nuit.  Dans le ciel, L′astre luit (French)

When the earthquake devastated Haiti this year, God sent us a blessing in the form of a Haitian refugee family that fled to Quito:  Pastor Frantz, Luz, Rebecca (4) and Juan Ellie (2).  God spared their lives but they literally had nothing else as their church and home turned into ruble.  Our family has had the great pleasure of helping this precious family get established.  Stan offered the couple free classes in Spanish through our NILI program so they could get jobs quicker.  One of our Missouri churches gave a generous offering to help the family financially.  Recently we had the family over for a Christmas dinner with two other Ecuadorian friends.  After dinner and gift giving, we sang Christmas carols.  We experienced a little touch of heaven as we all sang Silent Night in our mother tongues (English, Spanish and French) at the same time.  What a wonderful reminder that Christ came to save all the nations.  It truly was a beautiful moment.

Another unexpected blessing in our lives this year is our local church.  Last year we prayed that we would find a church home and that Stan would get more preaching opportunities in Spanish.  Boy, did God answer in a big way!  Stan was asked to pastor a local church and he’s been preaching almost every Sunday since!  While our motive was to find a place of service, what we gained was a beautiful, supportive church family.  Together we have gone through months of financial crisis; yet, the church is only stronger because of it.  If you’d like to read more about our journey, go to our family blog at www.hallupdate.blogspot.com.  Two weeks ago, ten people accepted Christ as their Savior and two people were baptized.  It’s fun to watch God work in this local congregation.

We finished the 9th semester of NILI (Nazarene International Language Institute), which is the Spanish study-abroad program that Stan directs.  We’ve had over 80 students attend this program since it began three years ago.  We praise God for the way He uses this program in so many ways to draw people closer to Him. Stan and Sherri escorted the NILI students on a trip to the Galapagos Islands this November, which was a trip of a lifetime.  Snorkeling with sea lions, sharks, rays, and every kind of fish you can imagine was a “bucket list” moment for both of us.

Mary is 18 and is in her senior year.  She had the female lead in the high school play, sings and plays the flute in school choirs and the band, and is one of the captains on the varsity soccer team.   Pray for her (and us) as she moves back to the States for college this next year.  Landon is 14 and is in 8^th grade.  Playing his guitar, writing songs and creating videos are his chief past times.  He’s also in a drama class at school that he enjoys a lot.

Reflecting on the words of Silent Night, we pray for God’s peace to surround you and yours.  May the “son of God, love’s pure light” challenge our hearts to share His “redeeming grace” to those around us in the coming year.

Happy New Year,

Stan, Sherri, Mary and Landon Hall

P.S.  We will be back in the States next summer, and we are currently scheduling services.  Contact us at stanleyrhall@gmail.com if you’d like to schedule an event with us.

Update on the Carcelen Church

Dear faithful brothers and sisters in Christ,

It is with awe and thanksgiving in my heart that I give you an update concerning what our Lord is doing through the Carcelen Church School project.  As you may remember our project was really overwhelming as we needed to raise close to $40,000 in six months.  This was after supporting the school with $13,000 over the past year.  Beyond this we are praying to be able to pay off a $7,000 loan that we took out during the school year.  

We were able to pay off over half of our debt after three months through a variety of events and through your generous support.  Our second payment of $14,000 is due at the end of December.  I am happy to report that we have almost raised this amount, still lacking only $5,000.  In the past few months many of you have given.  This total is $3,800.  This past Saturday we held our second garage sale.  Items donated included a lot of clothes from several Work and Witness teams and items sacrificially donated from our church family.  These items included a family stove and an expensive Sony video camera.  We rejoice to report that we raised $841.

One of the most encouraging things in my time in ministry has been seeing the response of the Carcelen Church.  As the new pastor of this church, I said all the right things to encourage them that God was bigger than any problem.  I said things like, “We will be faithful and do our part and God will provide the rest.”  I believed these things when I said them.  I believe them more now.  While we have worked hard to raise money to pay off our debt, we have also continued to give to others raising a significant offering for World Missions, helping several families experiencing financial problems, and paying our district obligations of 5% of our offerings.  

We lost of few families in the beginning of this process, but the overwhelming majority have followed our leadership and have worked, given, and prayed week after week for a year and a half with, I confess, more faith than I possessed.  During the past year our church has grown and we now have people attending from nine different countries.  Over and over I have heard people’s encouraging words, “Pastor, don’t worry.  God will provide.  We know he will,” and “God will turn this crisis into a great victory.” 

With this in mind, we are looking forward to the first Sunday in January.  We are planning a huge celebration to acknowledge that God is bigger than any problem.  We are going to sing, eat and hear testimonies.  But more than anything, we are going to mark this day in our memories so that when we face problems in the future, we will not panic or complain or run away, but we will know with all confidence that God is faithful and that we can trust in him, no matter how big the problem.  

I want to thank you again for your prayers and help with this great act of God.  Is it not overwhelming to be part of this?  Please keep us in your prayers as we are near the end of our last payment.  If you’d like to help us, you can do so by clicking on the following:  http://web.nazarene.org/goto/stanhall <http://web.nazarene.org/goto/stanhall>.  I’ll continue to keep you informed of all that the Lord is doing.  Next time I’ll send a photo of our great feast.

Blessings,
Stan

Did you know?

Did you know that every Friday, Sherri writes and emails a prayer mailing for the North Andean Field (which includes prayer requests for the missionaries and the ministries in Ecuador, Colombia and Venezuela).  If you would like to receive this weekly prayer mailing, please click on the "Email Us" link on the right of this screen, and let us know.

Living Abroad and Politics

Recently Ecuador had a political situation that was splashed all over the news, Facebook, etc.  We requested prayer for safety of our family, and we received a lot of emails and calls asking about the situation.  Some people wanted more information than we were willing to give.

Why?  North Americans living abroad, and especially missionaries, are visitors and we must respect the political situation of our host country no matter our personal opinion.  In fact, we are to be careful NOT to express our personal opinion or to be involved in anything political.  We also have to carefully choose our words especially avoiding certain trigger words.

Today the political climate in the US encourages its citizens to voice your opinion openly, firmly and sometimes loudly!  So some people don't understand our "neutrality."  However, if we want to live peacefully as a resident visitor in another land, we must keep our personal biases to ourselves.

Now you know the rest of the story!

God has performed a miracle!

For many months, we have been praying for God to work a miracle for the Carcelen School Project.  This weekend, He did!  Because of political issues in Ecuador we almost decided not to do the garage sale.   However, things were calm on Friday, and this Saturday had been set aside on many calendars for a long time, so we went ahead with the event.  A large part of the church helped, bringing clothes, furniture, food and other items.  Missionary families, professors of NILI, and others donated.  We were also able to sell items from the school which we currently do not need.

Two donations particularly impacted me.  We have a very poor, older lady in the church that everyone simply calls ‘grandma.’  She bought some new children’s undergarments and gave them to the church to sell.  Very humbly she said, “This is all I have.  Would it be okay to donate this?”  “Of course,” we said.  We all thought of the parable of the gift of the widow’s mite.

On Friday night I got a call from a Haitian Nazarene minister who came to Ecuador after the earthquake.  He’s been attending our church since January with his wife and two small children.  The roof fell and destroyed their house during the earthquake.  All of their neighbors were killed, but the Lord spared him and his family.  He is starting over here in Ecuador because “there is nothing left in Haiti.  Everything is destroyed.”  We’ve offered them free Spanish classes through NILI to help with their adjustment.  We’re hoping that he will be able to start a new Haitian Church with a considerable Haitian population in the north part of Quito.  Anyway, Frantz called me Friday night around nine.  He was on his way to work as a security guard—the only work he can find.  It takes him an hour and a half one way by bus to get to work to make $14 a night.  He told me that he went to the church that night and donated an oil based painting that he had brought from Haiti.  I didn’t understand until I saw it the next morning.  It’s quite nice and in a beautiful frame.  I’ve been in their apartment.  They sleep on mattresses on a concrete floor and have one small table and two plastic chairs.  Yet, they gave the church the one item of value they had so that the church could sell it.  A price of $50 was put on the picture, so I quickly bought it.  I don’t really know what to do with it other than be amazed and reminded of their sacrifice.

Pastor Salomon, assistant pastor, preached Sunday morning.  In a truly inspiring sermon, he challenged the church that what we need today more than ever is strong, sacrificial Christian leadership, both in Ecuador and in the Carcelen Church.   On Saturday we were able to pay the first half of the liquidation to the professors from the school.  That amount was close to $17,000.  He mentioned that we were half way there, and that we only needed to work hard 90 more days in order to put the school debt behind us.  Then he announced that beyond anyone’s expectation, the garage sale raised more than $2,000.  A spontaneous applause broke out with many people saying, “How did we do that?  How did that happen?”  More than this, he told us that there was a whole room full of stuff that didn’t sell so that we’re going to do this again in December before our other big payment.   Everyone is saying that our church is like the boy with five small loves and two fish.  We’re giving what we can and the Lord is providing the rest with food left over, or in our case, resources left over to sell.

I want to thank you for your prayers and help with the Carcelen School Project.  I’ll continue to keep you informed of all that the Lord is doing to help us.
Amazed,
Stan

Carcelén School Project

Acts 2:44-45 (NIV)
 All the believers were together and had everything in common.
Selling their possessions and goods, they gave to anyone as he had need.

The purpose of this letter is to recruit 100 friends who will help with a crisis situation here in Ecuador.  Let me briefly explain the rather complicated, sensitive and urgent mission challenge that is affecting our local efforts to reach people for Jesus Christ.

The Situation

This past June the Carcelén Nazarene Church here in Quito had to close the operation of its school called CEN (which stands for Nazarene Education Center). This school was an important ministry tool to educate and reach local children in this part of Quito. The principle reasons were:

• CEN started the school year in debt from a poor enrollment the previous year.
•  CEN’s enrollment was about down 40% from previous years because of newly implemented governmental financial incentives, which had the result of encouraging parents to put their children in public schools.
• Despite careful administration of CEN and drastic cuts, the 2009-2010 school year ran $20,000 in debt.  This was paid for with church funds and loans.
•  Finally, the government passed a law that mandated that all teachers’ salaries be doubled.  This law closed all possibilities of continuing with the school.

I was brought into the situation in an advisory role a year ago in August when I came back from furlough.  The previous pastor resigned the church a few months later.  In January I was appointed to give leadership to the church to help them transition through this crisis. 

The decision to close the school was especially complicated because Ecuadorian law requires that we pay all teachers a severance pay based on their years of service.  This total is $38,000.  Money was never set aside to anticipate this.  Thus, the church was in a situation where it could not afford to run the school, but also could not afford to close it.  Given the doubling of the cost to run the school, it was decided that we could not continue and would seek money to pay the liquidations/severances.  This was due on June 30.  Obviously we did not have this money at that time.  After some rather intense negotiations, the faculty agreed to accept their severance in two payments, the first at the end of September and the second at the end of December. 

The Church’s Response

There are considerable legal consequences associated with not paying the debt which not only affect this local Nazarene church, but the reputation of the Church of the Nazarene in Ecuador and its ability to minister here.  In addition, the church could lose its property and assets if taken to court for non-payment.  For this reason, we have pursued every means possible to raise the money.  These efforts include:

• The local church gives 75% of its income toward the debt.  The rest provides for utilities and other necessities.
• The Church of the Nazarene here in Ecuador has sold several pieces of property and others are for sale.
• We regularly sell lunches after church events.  This raises about $60 a week.

There are other fund raising events planned including a garage sale in a few weeks, but this is a large debt, especially in the economy of a developing nation where the average wage is $250 a month. 

Request

With this explanation, I am praying for and seeking 100 friends who will give $150 toward this project.  Will you be one?  By doing this, you will help us get out of debt and help us focus on our principle purpose of reaching lost men, women and children and making Christlike disciples. 

The church’s goal is to first pay off the faculty liquidation/severances.  Second the church needs to pay back a $7,000 loan, which was taken out during the past school year.  We are praying that we can be debt free by the end of 2010. 

How to Help

To make it easy to give to this project, I have set up an online payment system. You can go to http://web.nazarene.org/goto/stanhall.  Once here, click on the box that says, “Make a Donation.”  From here, follow the directions.  If you want to write a check, make it out to “General Treasurer” and send it to:  Church of the Nazarene, Global Ministry Center, 17001 Prairie Star Parkway, Lenexa, KS 66220.  In the memo section write, “Work of Stan Hall.”  Your donation is tax deductible.  For Nazarenes, this project qualifies as a 10% giving project. 

Seeking 100 people to give $150 seemed to us like a reasonable way of spreading out this debt over a number of people.  Obviously, a gift of any size is appreciated.  Also, if you know a friend who would be interested in this project, please send this email to them.

Thank you so much for your love and help in the global work of God, your friendship, and your very best financial investment.  I will keep you informed on how our Lord used you to provide a miracle for these Ecuadorian saints.

Blessings from one rescued by Jesus Christ,

Stan Hall