Our 2015 Vision Trip made a memorable stop in the small town of Villa Altagracia. Pastor Rodney and Nilsia’s school was referred to us by Pastor Rudy (from Iglesia Bautista Quisqueyana), who officiated at their marriage years before. The school was in a crowded apartment, desks jammed tightly together and some classes held in an outdoor lean-to. A banner proclaiming their vision hung over the doorway, EDUCANDO PARA LA ETERNIDAD (Educating for Eternity). In spite of the circumstances, the children enthusiastically smiled and sang and quoted Scripture to us.

Raquel De Jesus

Raquel began sharing Christ’s compassion for the poor while still a child herself, teaching street children seated on a board between cans. Raquel’s school grew and soon occupied a chicken coop. Heavy cardboard partitions divided the classes. STCH Ministries’ first visit to Raquel’s school was discouraging. Her faith and passion were the only pinpoints of hope. When asked how we could help, Raquel shyly bowed her head, explaining that the rusted tin roof leaked when it rained.

STCH Ministries Family Counseling provides hope and direction for individuals, couples, children, and families when they need help sorting through the challenges of life. Kelly Harris, a therapist serving in Corpus Christi, shares with us how God is granting freedom to a client.

I received a note from a client today who has been working with me for just a few sessions now. She wrote, “As you erased those items (from the whiteboard) and talked, it literally felt like you were erasing them from my life. It felt so freeing!” Of course, I had no idea of the impact of that moment, but He did and in this instance, I received a note to let me know.

What a great reminder that I need not offer anything profound as I work with those I serve. Sometimes it’s the smallest action that God uses to touch and change the hearts of people.

The second reminder is that this is His work, not mine! Praise God for the freedom He wants His people to have in our Lord Jesus Christ!

At the time of this writing, our Family Counseling ministry consists of four counseling hubs with seventeen offices operating, for the most part, out of partner churches in each area. Corpus Christi was the original office hub. Earlier this year, this center added a new counseling location and a new therapist to their roster. Kelly came on part time in February 2018 and began serving one day each week in the satellite offices inside Yorktown Baptist Church and Coastal Oaks Church in Rockport.

The response to having a licensed counselor in these two locations has been impressive. In just six months, Kelly’s agenda filled up and by July she transitioned to a full-time schedule, adding an extra day to each location as well as seeing clients in the main Corpus Christi office. Those extra days soon filled with regular clients and both the Yorktown and Rockport locations now have a waiting list.

STCH Family Counseling therapists are professionally trained and offer counseling that is clinically excellent and distinctively Christian. Counseling services are provided regardless of an individual or family’s ability to pay for them. Donations toward services are accepted and appreciated. Learn more at www.STCHM.org/FC.

Ashley Beck spent her summer as a STCH Ministries International summer intern in the Dominican Republic. She and four others served together from the base located on the grounds of Iglesia Bautista Quisqueyana (IBQ). The young people worked shoulder to shoulder with teams made up of volunteers from 15 different churches and STCH Ministries staff. The teams engaged in medical, construction, and teaching projects across the island nation.

This year, construction projects were the priority. Four new houses were built over a period of three months. Each new home was for a child sponsored through Samuel’s Fund – a sponsorship program that enables orphans and at-risk children to receive an education, participate in spiritual training, and have other needs met. Ashley blogged about her experiences in the Dominican Republic. Through those journal entries, she reveals some of God’s construction projects inside her life – demolishing incorrect thought processes and revealing His plan for her future.

She candidly communicates about the openness of the Dominican nationals to share their lives and culture to bring one more person to a saving faith in Christ. “I have a new place in my heart for Dominicans,” she wrote, “They love and serve unlike any people I’ve ever met.” She witnessed an unfailing commitment to working hard at every task no matter how menial, by workers of every nationality.

Over the course of her tenure, Ashley identified three major lessons she learned:

• • God works His alterations in each of us on His timetable,
  • Our personal hopes are eclipsed by those God has for us,
  • God is bigger than all of our shortcomings.

Ashley credits God with changing her focus from herself to other people. In the beginning, she was alert to what she would get out of her time overseas. What she realized was God works in each volunteer in every group, while at the same time impacting both believers and non-believers in deeply individual ways. For instance, the girl who came on the family mission trip reluctantly is impacted by the joy she identifies on the faces of children in the orphanage as they welcome friends to church services. She has been impacted by “people who live and breathe every day to make sure one more person will join them in the Kingdom (of God).”

The focus of what she hoped for was remodeled as well. While working on a demolition project, she realized she had been inattentive to the purpose God had for the project. “In life,” she muses, “we can become so distracted by what we hope for that we miss the lessons or better gifts from God.”

Overall, Ashely has come to the conclusion each of us needs to accept: God is greater than our failures. As she grappled with her weaknesses, she noticed the hole she had dug herself into, and the temptation was strong to stop striving. God is faithful to speak to our flaws and He sent friends who encouraged her. “They picked my life apart and tried to find Jesus,” she explains, “but He was hidden underneath my selfish desires.”

She is determined now to continue to fill in those frailties with what she calls “the cement of Jesus – made with a mixture of Bible truths and water from the people in your life.” Ashley has committed to begin “digging into the Word rather than into my hole.” And she invites us to join her.

Growing up as a preacher’s kid (PK) has helped prepare Ashley to understand and accept God’s call on her life to a career in international missions. She has begun her senior year of high school with a clear focus and is submitting college applications to schools where she can pursue biblical studies with a minor in missions.

For the many people who knew her, the memory of Rosa Elena lives on.  Dark-skinned, turbaned elegantly, and dressed in flowing white, she often pointed one thumb heavenward.  It was her signature gesture as she deflected all the glory to God. Rosa Elena inspired everyone with her amazing faith and her dedication to the forgotten, yet priceless to God, children of Hatillo—chained by ignorance, generational poverty, and immorality.

Shortly after she opened her heart to Christ, God gave her a passion for these children living in the Hatillo area.  Their location and poverty isolated them without access to education, without knowledge of God’s love, without hope for the future. Rosa Elena began educating 7 children in 1996, and labored faithfully with minimal resources for 10 years.

Joanna Berry (standing left), Rosa Elena (right), and children receiving new school supplies.

When STCH Ministries began to partner with the school in 2007, a former graduated student recounted, “We had to break a crayon in four pieces to share!”  In 2012, STCH Ministries received significant funding for this project.  With the help of partnering churches they replaced the deteriorating wooden buildings with new concrete structures.  The school grew to over 100 students.

Unexpectedly, Rosa Elena’s health began to deteriorate and on September 26, 2016 she passed away.  A crisis developed as the school struggled with decreasing attendance, teacher resignations, and financial stress.  STCH Ministries staff and donors, along with the IBQ church staff and a newly formed board, stepped up their support. New staff was trained, salaries were increased, additional investments were made in uniforms, computers, and other equipment. Gradually the school stabilized and began to grow. Today, the goals for the future of Rosa Elena’s school are excellence with self-sustainability.

Since the time Rosa Elena began to educate children and share the hope of the Gospel, many years have passed and countless children have been impacted.  “La Gloria a Dios,” was Rosa Elena’s refrain, as she pointed with her thumb to the skies.  Two years ago Rosa Elena left our planet to reside in that Glory-land to which she often pointed.