Esperanza House
The gardens and three growing seasons and harvests that the equatorial climate in Indonesia produced an abundant harvest of vegetables including two varieties of spinach, pumpkins, eggplant, casava, and chili peppers! The fruit trees around the home also produced crops of mangos, coconuts, jackfruit, and rambutan!
This physical fruit is good, and provides for the needs of the Esperanza House, but even more exciting is the fruit we see in the lives of our girls! Erpi, Ilma, and Yesika Sindi graduated high school with honors last year and are now the Bible school program. They will continue to live at the Esperanza House, and are mentors for new girls. There is an exciting season of discipleship and growing as they live life and grow in faith together.
Another graduation that we are excited to celebrate is that of Vio and Yalni. These young ladies have graduated from the local Bible School with an AA degree (the only degree our local Bible School is able to offer presently). They have both been offered a pastoral staff internship on another island, Java, which includes a scholarship to take online classes at Berea where they can finish their BA degree in pastoral ministry! For these girls from a remote mountain village, this is mind blowing. Just five years ago such opportunities did not exist. Praise the Lord for such a time as this! And pray for these girls as they follow the calling the Lord has put on their lives.
Esperanza House - Spring of 2023
Rifka’s Niece
It is an exciting time at the Esperanza House! In January the spring semester started with new students! One of those is the niece of our foster daughter (Rifka) who lived with us nearly 10yrs ago! Another is from a remote village that has no church yet, but she somehow heard about the opportunity for education and God made a way for her to come to the Esperanza House where she is excited to not just go to school, but to meet Christians and learn about Jesus!
Nova
Other exciting happenings at the Esperanza House is our new House Mom, Nova! She was one of our first students back in 2013! She was an incredible student and even earned a scholarship at a prominent Bible School on another Island. Once she completed her degree she felt God calling her back to us, to serve at the Esperanza House as well as teach at STAT, our local pastor’s training school. She is a vibrant young lady that is pouring so much into our girls, discipling them with an infectious joy and love for the Lord!
Pizza
During our time at the Esperanza House we treated the girls to pizza! For many of them, it was the first time they have ever eaten this strange food, and it was a hit!
Worship & Prayer
We also had the chance to worship with them in the chapel that we helped build on their school campus back in 2014. I was moved to tears as one of the girls shared the Word and her testimony, the girls praised Jesus with all their hearts, and we prayed together.
Gardening
Lastly it is so exciting to see this group of girls working together to grow and harvest fruits and vegetables in their gardens! This helps cut their costs, gives them a sense of ownership and accomplishment while developing valuable life skills outside of the classroom!
Currently there are 18 girls at the Esperanza House and one house mom. They start out going to the Christian high school on our Bible college campus in Palopo. If they desire to continue their education, they can go to the Bible college on campus or we are open to helping them find a way to another college of their choice.
Bugis church planting
In 2010, God placed on our heart to reach the Never Tribe of the Bugis. They are the largest tribe in South Sulawesi with over 6 million people and less that 0.01% are followers of Jesus.
What is our Bugis Church Planting Initiative? It is our desire to place church planters among the Bugis tribes with Business as Missions being the model. Ultimately that means that we find a church planter that starts to travel into a specific town in the Bugis area to evaluate what is a niche’ they could fill. Ultimately we would start a small business for them and provide them with a salary for the first year and taper off the following year as they should have the business well enough established to start subsidizing their salary. They will not build a “Church” because in these areas being most of the time 100% Muslim, a “church” becomes a hinderance to the gospel and can be a target for violence.
A Bugis Church Plant takes somewhere between $15,000 and $20,000 for the two year launch. The need is great in this area.
