Since our church family has been reading through the New Testament together in 2021, we read a chapter a day (in English) and then on Saturdays we have a Zoom call and read together with our church family (in Spanish). This month we are reading the gospel of John, which opens talking about the incarnation of Jesus Christ. Verse 16 reads, “And of his fulness have all we received, and grace for grace.” John reminds us that we have all benefitted from Jesus’ bounty, namely, one gift replacing the previous gift, or helpfully paraphrased, “one blessing after another.” John emphasizes the unrelenting parade of graces that we receive from being called the children of God through faith in Jesus. Like dinner in a five-star restaurant, the wait staff keeps removing the plates and silverware of one course only to replace it with yet another delicious course. It’s just one blessing after another.

Just hours after our last update went out, we received news that our city was moved out of the total lockdown to weekend lockdown, which enabled us to get a special one-time permission to leave our region. (We hadn’t been farther than 20 miles from our apartment for the past year.) We were able to reschedule our tickets from January to visit the camp in Lican Ray in the south of Chile and see our longtime friends, Dan and Liz Thompson and their family. We got to work alongside them, enjoying many laughs and good stories. We doted on their many animals, and Bekah took lots of pictures. We got to swim in the ice-cold lake and even kayak out to see the smoking volcano. We got to stay in a brand-new beautiful little cabin. We got to enjoy all sorts of good food and we rested well every night (it is dead silent and pitch dark at night there, something that Antofagasta is not). We got to spend time with the two other Chilean families that serve on the camp team, and the GMSA missionaries from the area came out to the camp one day as well. One blessing after another.

On March 28, our church is planning an ordination service for Pastor Andrés, the culmination of the past four years he has served and grown here in Antofagasta along with his wife and two sons. We are excited for this official recognition of God’s work in his life and his qualification for ministry. We have been teaching recently about congregational government and biblical qualifications for elders, and we look forward to electing men from the congregation to serve the church as elders. Jesus continues building his church here in Antofagasta. One blessing after another.

This is our March 2021 email update. You can sign up to receive our updates in your inbox here. You can download a printable PDF here.