Women's Village Fundraising

Hi! My name is Amber Riddell. For those of you who may not know, I am John Hendee’s daughter and I am involved in fundraising efforts for the Women’s Village in Trujillo.
I wanted to get everyone current on what is happening here in the United State’s for the Women’s Village. A presentation has been written up, the brochures are made, the DVD is nearing completion, and the website will be up and running by July. Thanks to different brain storming sessions over the last couple of years with different people, we have some great fundraising ideas, and are always open for more.
Another area I am working in is finding volunteers to be Advocates for the Women’s Village. We are asking that someone seeking to be an advocate is committed and compassionate about the Village, that they will work on finding supporters for the village through their every day contacts, and through setting up one presentation a month.
The presentations are fundraisers, but do not need a huge amount of time to organize. Advocates will receive a presentation guideline, the presentation, a DVD with a video for the Women’s village and PNHI, brochures and interest cards. Presentations can be made to neighborhood groups, bible study groups, mission’s boards, women’s groups, MOPS, and any group of friends that would be interested in these women who need our help. These 45 minute presentations can be set up as a “Tea for Trujillo”. It will be a casual gathering of people to chat, have refreshments and hear about the cause!
At present we are asking for help with daily operation costs knowing that in the future we will be in need of larger village. One great way for donating will be available through the website once it is up and running. We will be asking people if they would like to be a supporter of the village by being a 444 Friend. This means that they can sign up on the website to make monthly donations of $4.44 to the village, 4 compassion, 4 protection, 4 hope.
A mom’s bible study group at Eastlake Church in Chula Vista, CA is having our first big garage sale/bake sale to benefit the Women’s Village. All items being sold were totally donated, and they will have additional donation buckets set out. They have even made a Facebook page link for the sale and big banners. They will have brochures set out for the public to take about the Village. They felt called to do this after a presentation was given to their group.
We need Advocates to give these presentations and “Teas”, so groups and individuals feel touched and called to help these women. If you are interested in finding out how you could help, please contact me at amberorin@hotmail.com.
Remember “The Cause”: Building Women’s Villages that offer hope for women in crisis worldwide, starting in Trujillo, Peru.

Blessings, Amber Riddell

Reaching a city for Jesus!

I hope you sensed my excitement last month as I described to you the experience I had just been involved with. It was truly uplifting and so memorable. As I look back at that event, one of my fondest memories was watching the PNHI Trainers playing soccer in the park. They set aside a morning each month to play together. What a significant time of bonding and teamwork. They had the best time. The sense of camaraderie was so apparent. They enjoyed each other, they laughed, and there were moments of competitive male bluster! Does every Peruvian guy play soccer - and play it well?

I was meeting several of these guys for the first time. Mike would tell me about each one and the effective work he and his wife were already doing in the barrio. All of them were presenting Peace Treaties and baptizing people on a regular basis. In the month of March there were 36 baptisms - and many of them done by the new Trainers.

Right now we have the most Christ-like sense of community we have ever enjoyed at PNHI. It has everything to do with Mike and Danell and the credibility they have established with the team. Everyone is on the same page and understands the mission - to raise up a city of house churches started by humble leaders who in turn raise up other leaders by telling Bible stories and teaching their friends about Jesus.

What we are experiencing in Trujillo is a model I am anxious to share with church missions groups everywhere. John and I are working on approaches to churches, primarily in the West, that will give us open doors to tell the PNHI story, and the even larger story, that it is a new day in cross-cultural missions, and unless we expand our vision and become more holistic in our methods we will be spinning our wheels, accomplishing little to disciple the nations.

We have been working with some truly revolutionary tools, and we are honing them to suit our purposes and our particular effort so that what we are doing becomes truly our own. And the biggest joy is to see Latinos like Jaime and Patty, our Master Trainers who oversee the other Trainers, become so effective in using the tools that they are being looked to by others in Trujillo and beyond as equippers and facilitators of these new and effective methods of reaching communities.

This is why I continue to say that in all my years of ministry, I have not seen a more powerful approach to reaching a city for Jesus. And we have just gotten started.

By the way, John and I would count it a privilege to go anywhere to talk to people about PNHI.

Tim

God’s church multiplying in Trujillo!

Mike and I continue to see real progress when it comes to the work in the barrios. Six of the barrios that we have been working in for the past four years have formed a council. Their function is to continue the vision of Project New Hope, multiplying God’s church in their community. Patty Escobar is in charge of these councils and every two months three council members from each barrio meet together. The purpose is to continue training the leaders in all the tools that Project New Hope uses so they can continue God’s work in these barrios. Of the many positives, the people taking part in the councils are able to see they are not alone. It really lifts everyone up. It’s not just their barrio, and that we all are working together for one purpose and that is to grow the kingdom of God. They share stories, build each other up, get ideas from each other, and most importantly they are becoming a family - Christ’s family. In April, I(Danell) went with Patty to one of these council meetings. Each barrio has between 5-10 council members. They select three of these members to represent their barrio and each barrio gets a turn to host one of these meetings. These meetings start about 9 a.m. and get over about 2 p.m. The barrio that hosts the meeting also buys and prepares all the food for the day. It’s very exciting to witness people changing and becoming leaders and watching God’s church multiplying in Trujillo!

God Bless!

Mike and Danell

Exit Strategy or Expansion Plan?

WHAT'S YOUR EXIT STRATEGY IN PERU?

I've been asked that a few times and I thought now would be a good time to talk about it.

I'm choosing another word to describe what our future is in Peru, and Lord willing, beyond to other countries. I would have to say we don't have an EXIT strategy but we have an EXPANSION plan.

Most of you who would be reading this know about the team challenges we had last year and that we dealt with them. We have rebuilt a good part of our team there and we are moving onward.

If you had asked me 9 months ago where we would be in May of 2010 I don't think I would have been as honestly positive as I am now. In 2009 we were fixing problems. In 2010 we are back on track to realizing our mission as PNHI.

And being back on track we are laying the ground work for EXPANSION to at least 1 and hopefully 2 more cities at the beginning of 2012. We will leave a core team in Trujillo to supervise what is going on there and we will send, Lord willing, 2/3 of our current team to the other locations which will be within 2 hours by car from Trujillo.

We have solidified our team. Our mission is clearer than ever; leading a national team in church planting using Life Winds, Peace Treaties, Oral Bible story telling, and Discipleship. We are working with other missions who are committed to backing us in what we are doing.

We will be announcing later this year where we hope to go as we seek to impact Trujillo and other places in Peru.

God bless
John and Carla