Mission Spotlight
As part of our ‘Riverside Story’ blog post series, this post will focus on a mission that Riverside is helping to facilitate here in Birmingham, the UK and around the world; supporting our vision to bring LIFE to every generation in every community. This month we are catching up with Emma & Hector who have been working within street children projects in Guatemala for the past 14 years.
My name is Emma and I have recently returned to the UK after living in Guatemala for the past 14 years. I have been working together with my husband Hector (who is Guatemalan) for most of this time in street children’s projects in Guatemala City and for the last 3 years helping to set up a community project in a rural indigenous community.
The community project ‘La Mano de Dios’ (God’s Hand) is all about sharing God’s love through practical and emotional support in the community. We started off with a homework reinforcement club (with over 100 children attending) and a children’s Bible club and then moved onto a children’s feeding programme where up to 80 children could come for a cooked lunch each day, and a women’s literacy class.
As a family we are going through a challenging time of transition. Due to visa requirements, Hector is unable to come to live here until I am able to show 6 months of payslips as well as other things. I am currently looking for work (I would love to work for a charity with vulnerable/marginalised people as that is still my passion) and our 9 year old daughter is settling into a local primary school. Hector continues to work at ‘La Mano de Dios’ and will do until he is able to come to the UK.
Even though it has been a very challenging time we are clinging onto God’s faithfulness and trusting in His plans as we step into the unknown. He has shown us every step of the way that we can trust Him and we have already seen some amazing answers to prayer.
We were particularly praying for a couple of volunteers to help to keep the project going and God provided a whole other ministry to take it on! It is an American charity that runs various feeding programmes in the surrounding areas and were really happy to take on ours too, providing the cooks, all the food and more (including taking the teenagers to their church youth group)! God responded in a way that was more than we could have asked or imagined. It was such a confirmation that it was right for us to leave and gave such peace knowing that the project was in good hands. This ministry started working with us in May and has allowed the team to focus more on relationships with the children and families rather than on preparing the food.
We ask for your continued prayers at this time for our family and for the project. We are so thankful to you all at Riverside for your support for all these years and during this transition time!
Get Involved
Join us prayering for Emma and Hector as they step into the unknown. If you are a member of Riverside we encourage you to pray together during our Wednesday Prayer Spaces at 8pm. All details can be found on our prayer page.
