Guatemala 2 -- This is Sunday night, and since tomorrow starts the heavy teaching schedule, I figured I'd get another update on here before my time gets squeezed too much. Click on the pix to make them larger.

The church shown here is our "central church" in Jalapa. The two-story affair on the corner is the pastor's residence, which is also serving as church offices and a meeting place for the district and regional pastors' groups. The church is the pinkish part on down the road from the house with the sort of swept-wing thing that rises on the far end. The sky here is cloudy, but the light is good, since this was scheduled to be a 5:00 service. Notice that I said, "scheduled to be." It was well after 5:30 before we got started.

We got a pretty good surprise tonight. When the pastor got up to preach, he instructed a certain group of people to assemble in one section of the church. I was totally puzzled. Turns out that the Jalapa church is releasing a group of 49 people to go start a church in another part of town, a neighborhood called "Las Panorámicas de Jumay" and it will become our 4th church in this small city. Here are the 36 that were present tonight, lined up in front of the altar.

The pastor gave a short message before having them come up, and there was also time for the national church president, the regional leader, and the district leader to make their comments. Interestingly, we missionaries were left out, except that we were invited to the platform as witnesses. This is THEIR church!

This photo captures the moment when the national church president actually pronounced the changeover for these people from the central church to their own congregation.

Members of the local church board and the leaders who had spoken had a time of prayer and went up and down the line laying hands on the various people.

Lee Rickenbach praying for José Alberto Rivas, a retired pastor who is living in that neighborhood and will be part of the church. He says he won't be pastoring, but will probably be helping out some.

Afterwards they had bread, coffee, and tamales. Sorry, those of you who would like food pix, but I was busy eating and didn't get a photo! The tamales were good, though. And like I told someone tonight, in less than two days here I've already about had it all: Tamale, chuchito, and tortillas. About all I lack now is a Tiky, my favorite soft drink here.