For several years now, the families of two of our daughters have asked for the money that would have been spent on presents for their families to be used to provide a special Christmas surprise for one of the neediest families in Los Cabos. This year, Pastor Carlos chose a family with a very special story, but didn’t actually fill us in with the details until after our day of shopping and dinner.
 
The family of Luis Martinez Estrada was chosen. They had been in Cabo San Lucas for three years and had attended a church in mainland Mexico, where Luis had left a good job at a well-known hotel chain, to flee the area from fear of the escalating cartel activity (this actually is one of the main reasons for the overflow in our “squatter” areas). After arriving in Los Cabos, they had not connected with or attended a church until a unique “divine appointment.”
 
At the beginning of the time when there were few jobs in Los Cabos due to the Covid-19 shutdown and consequent lack of tourism, Pastor Carlos saw Luis walking along one of the dirt roads in the Colonia of Tierra y Libertad. Luis accepted the offer of a ride and Pastor Carlos asked how his family was doing for food. Pastor Carlos then offered work to Luis on one of the Cristo es el Camino Church’s work projects. From that point on, the church family began to disciple Luis, his wife, Hernestina, and their four children; Cristan, Madelyne, Erik and Maleny. Over time, the family began to grow in the Lord and their lifestyle changed, but Luis still did not have regular employment and the family was, and is, very needy.
 
The family does not speak any English and are not familiar with North American dialect, so we asked for a translator to go with us to help in the many details involved in buying multiple items for a family of six (with a certain dollar amount for each of them). Pastor Carlos was scheduled elsewhere that day, so we asked for his daughter, Paola. Paola was definitely a blessing from God and the nine of us had a great time.
 
As we went through several stores, the family’s need was seen in their choices; shoes, undergarments jeans, skirts for Hernestina, and other very essential items, with only a doll for five-year-old Maleny and a small pencil case for eleven-year-old Erik. Slender Erik actually picked out a belt that could have fit Richard at the first department store we were in because he wanted a belt so badly. We had to assure him that the next store had a children’s department and would have a belt that would fit him.
 
After an afternoon of helping each member of the family spend their part of the money, we headed to one of our favorite restaurants, Campestre (but we didn’t think about the fact that they are closed on Saturdays). Our next reasonable place to take them to dinner was Pollo de Oro, where one of the owners stood at their door informing us they were out of chicken and would be closing in one half hour. Finally, we gave up and ended up at our last ‘sit-down’ but reasonable option, Pizza Nostra. It was quite an eventful day!
 
But now is ‘the rest of the story’―“the amazing God story.” Several days after our shopping trip, Pastor Carlos shared the conversation we had not known about when we were out with the family. Just before he had chosen the family to be our Christmas Family, eleven-year-old Erik looked into his mother’s eyes and asked if they were going to have any presents to open on Christmas. Hernestina carefully told Erik, “yes,” because deep in her heart she was hoping God would provide something for the children. The rest is history; Pastor Carlos chose this precious family without knowing about the conversation between Hernestina and her son, and God showed how much he cares for the “desires of our hearts (Psalm 37:4).”
 
For those of you who have followed our Christmas Family blog through the years, you might recall the fun pictures of the family members picking out their gifts in the stores. This year I ran into a problem. I had so much fun with Paola and the family that I forgot all about taking pictures until we were seated at Nostra Pizza.
 
As one last note―the family picture is in front of their home; corrugated steel and scrap wood on the precipice of the drop-off to the arroyo below. This is one of the poorest homes in Los Cabos, but just look at the joy and happiness on the faces of this family!

We originally came to Cabo San Lucas ten years ago to attend a conference held by Lance Wallnau. Lance, along with others, has taught about the seven mountains―or the seven areas of society that influence a nation―for many years. A vital part of the seven mountain teaching is the biblical mandate for serious believers to prepare themselves and their children for work in what we have traditional called “secular” jobs; in order to be used by God as salt and light in the sector of society God has laid on their hearts.
 
We have also attended several Transform Our World Conferences led by Ed Silvoso. These conferences are a gathering of  believers from around the world that are being used by God in amazing, if not miraculous, ways—in their divine assignments, cities, and countries. Ed teaches the principle of “marketplace ministry.” Basically, marketplace ministry is operating in your sphere of influence, similar to how a pastor with a shepherd’s heart would treat the people in his/her care. The more influential the position, the larger the effects of this type of ministry will be. Nonetheless, stories of amazing results reach down to the most menial jobs―such as Namaan’s servant girl who implored her master’s wife to ask him to go to the prophet Elisha to be healed of leprosy (II Kings 5:1-19); or a modern day testimony of the humble lady who made a living pushing an ice cream cart in Phuket, Thailand. She prayed over the ice cream treats every day as she placed them in her cart; and the rest of her story tells of the snowball effect that resulted in amazing miracles because of her faithfulness to the Lord in humble surroundings.
 
Fisherman’s Landing Restaurant
 
This brings us to a Christian brother who is a vibrant example of a marketplace minister, and just happens to be Pastor Carlos Maciel’s brother-in-law. We mentioned Victor Felipe[U1]  briefly in our blog on Neil and Lee Woollocott from January of this year, but the story is still being told. January of 2020 was our first visit to Fisherman’s Landing, where Victor is the Operational Manager of a restaurant that is built on part of the Cabo San Lucas Marina boardwalk. As Victor shared his heart with all of us, it was clear that Victor―who had never been introduced to marketplace ministry—was already ministering to his employees with the heart of God. He encourages each one of his employees individually and helps to train them in excellence. He goes out of his way for them to excel at their positions, as well as doing what he can to enable them to keep working. He prays with them, allows them to share personal problems that might affect their work, and has a God-given gift of encouragement that he faithfully uses to give hope of a better tomorrow to his employees. He creates an environment that most people would want to work in.  Victor’s story doesn’t end here, though.
 
The newest change of circumstances includes the man who owned Fisherman’s Landing, as well as several other restaurants in other cities, just died of cancer this summer. The man’s wife recently came to Cabo San Lucas to meet with Victor. She knows Fisherman’s Landing was the money maker for the family because of Victor, and is now asking him to help her make the family’s other restaurants profitable―the favor of God is definitely upon Victor and he is currently praying with his wife on what he might be able to do.
 
Richard has been stopping to pray with and encourage Victor as he makes his weekly rounds with the men who try to make a living on the boardwalk, but for some time I was burdened with the need for the two of us to pray for cleansing over the Fisherman’s Landing facilities, as well as the location itself. Just recently we were able to schedule this meeting with Victor.
 
This now brings us back to the rest of the story… In January’s blog I mentioned a “very significant word of knowledge” (I Corinthians 12:8) that was shared by one of our group with Victor, and was immediately confirmed by Victor himself. In the natural, there now is a probability of seeing this word and confirmation come to pass, but as Richard and I just recently prayed over the restaurant, the Lord spoke another word of knowledge to my heart as an encouragement to Victor. Please pray for Victor, his wife and daughter, and Fisherman’s Landing; and for the fulfillment of God’s intent and purposes for Victor that He has revealed so far.

Since we first set foot in Los Cabos in 2010, Richard has greatly enjoyed striking up conversations with the many ‘hawkers’ that flood the Marina boardwalk (especially in high season: October 15-April 15).
Richard loves bantering with them because he can usually turn the conversation to his advantage and begin to challenge them about their lifestyles. Since he is patient and persistent, many wear down and begin to talk to him about their choices in life.
 
Along with taking care of things at home, I spend many hours in front of my computer; leaving little time to spend extended amounts of time with Richard at the marina. It has always been fun when we go together but with Richard’s gift mix, this type of ministry is really his forte. This brings us to Richard’s newest outreach; pastoral-type care for the flood of―mainly men―who come from all over Mexico to work in sales in Los Cabos during high season. Many of these men have been deported from the United States, speak English, and came to Los Cabos to make a little more than the average wage elsewhere in Mexico.
 
Richard started going to the marina every Monday or Tuesday so the men would look forward to seeing him―and they do. He wears the same color shirt and shorts so they see him coming.  He carries bi-lingual New Testaments and tracts in a shoulder bag. The results were instantly amazing. The day that I went with him to take the photos for this blog, one recently-deported young man was waiting for Richard to come so that he could ask for prayer for a sister who had recently been diagnosed with Covid. Up and down the marina men were waving ahead of us to say hello to Richard and to talk with him.
 
Richard has had several accounts of how God has moved in the hearts of different men every time he goes. One such story includes a man from a very rough part of town, who was an artist. Thieves had robbed his lean-to and took his meager belongings, including his easel. The man rode a bike to the marina every day in order to sell paintings to the tourists, so Richard designed an easel that folded up and could be carried on the man’s shoulder. Another man, who is interested in ‘spiritual’ things other than a relationship with Jesus Christ, has asked to go to the barrios with Richard on a work project.
 
The name of the elderly lady in the photos is Juanita Bonita and we have prayed over her and rented her water taxis for several years. When we asked this ‘God-fearing’ lady if we could pray for her on the day I was at the marina for the photo shoot, I was led by the Lord to place my hand on her upper abdomen. I really didn’t know why until we were done praying. When I asked her if there was something wrong with her stomach she told us she had three hernias in her upper abdomen and was waiting for surgery. We have not yet heard the report of our prayer session with her.
 
God is so faithful to give His children creative ideas as to how to touch the people in their spheres of influence. Richard’s marina ministry is just one idea of how God would have each of us minister to the world around us—one person at a time. We pray that the Lord will give each of you a personalized plan to touch the many people around you with the love of Jesus Christ. 

Neil and Lee Woollocott first came to Cabos San Lucas in November of 2017 as the result of a friendship that God initiated at the Transform Our World Annual Conference in 2015 (you can check them out from previous blogs). Besides being a mature, seasoned Christian, Neil is a businessman and a visionary. From the first time he set foot in Los Cabos, he began to ask us what our vision for Los Cabos was and what he and Lee could do to aid in that vision.
 
One of the first ministries that Neil introduced us to on their first visit was Transform Cambodia (you can see the mighty way God has used this ministry concept in Cambodia at: https://www.transformcambodia.com/). Richard and I were deeply touched with how Transform Cambodia was literally transforming the lives of the poorest of poor through a powerful relationship with Jesus Christ, along with the education and encouragement to be the future leaders of their country.
 
Upon flying back to Australia, Neil never dropped the vision of how the Cambodia prototype might work in Los Cabos. He maintained his commitment to do all he could in Australia to obtain funding for the beginning of a foundation that would establish and run a similar program in Cabo San Lucas, Mexico. After all, Transform Cambodia was originally started by just two Christian businessmen in Australia, who established, funded, and designed the foundation that continues to fund the multiple centers that now exist in Cambodia, with or without them.
 
Since that first trip to Los Cabos, Neil has faithfully been in contact with Richard and me, including face-to-face telemeetings where we continue to discuss each other’s progress in our respective countries. Not too long ago, during one of our conversations, I happened to mention something that caught Neil’s attention and he asked me to follow up on it. I wasn’t sure it was a ‘God idea,’ but it certainly wouldn’t hurt to explore it. This idea led to the meeting we are reporting on in this blog.
 
On Saturday, October 17, Pastor Carlos and his family invited the families of two of his assistant pastors to meet with Richard and me to present the prototype of Transform Cambodia with the group. Ever since they had heard about the possibility of an affordable Christian school/leadership academy in Los Cabos, their interest had been peaked. Apparently, they had been talking with Pastor Carlos for some time prior to this.
 
I do want you to know that as of the writing of this blog, we have no commitment of funding for this program, but the leg work has begun. Before the end of that night, the group had identified which of them had the contacts and experience to obtain the financial information, as well as to research the legal processes that would be necessary for the initial stage of the vision―down to the last detail. Richard and I were amazed, as well as impressed.
 
We will be tweaking the prototype of Transform Cambodia for our area, but the end result will be children and their families coming to Christ, children receiving a Christ-centered, quality education, and children being nurtured and prepared in order to be future leaders in their city, states and country. As Pastor Carlos, Richard and I thought about the name of this initiative (at Neil’s request), all three of us ruled out Transform Los Cabos because the vision was becoming larger. The start of this ‘academy’ in Cabo San Lucas could possibly be a prototype for all of Mexico―one step at a time. For that reason, Transform Mexico had officially been birthed!

I want to thank all of you who have been praying for Los Cabos during the Covid-19 shutdown. In our August blog, I asked for specific prayer for the lengthy continuation of the extreme shutdown and the resulting requirements in the Municipality of Los Cabos. Unbeknownst to her, a Mexican friend, who watches the world and local news closely,  happened to recently note that it seemed as if our governor had completely changed his dialogue in regards to the prospect of Baja California Sur opening up in time to be prepared for the tourist season―which is our main source of income. In Los Cabos, we don’t have much agricultural activity in our deserts and on our rocks, nor do we have much room for industry. Our friend went on to say that it wasn’t just his words, but his whole attitude that had completely changed. I gave God glory and told her how we had been praying.  Praise God, Who does what only He can do!
 
In August, just a handful of restaurants and hotels agreed with the Tourist Association to pay the price and go through the training to be certified in order to open. By September, the mid-sized restaurants and some of the smaller hotels were also prepared. At the time of this blog, we are still at only 40 percent occupancy, but the news around town is that Cabo will be able to open by the first of October in time to prepare for our high season. The tourist association reported that 60 percent of our hotel space is already booked for October!
 
Another interesting note from our August request for prayer centers on Pastor Carlos. At the same time that I was being impressed to pray regarding the slip in the morale of the Cristo es el Camino flock from months of shutdown and from a lack of refreshing from corporate worship, Pastor Carlos also picked up the emotional struggle his people were dealing with.
 
They did some rearranging to include more people in one location for all three of their weekly services. With their What’s App connection capability, they not only continued to send photos in order to see each other, but they also began to report as to how many were in attendance, so that Pastor Carlos could make sure they kept within their 40 percent capacity. With more space, they were also able to invite the neighbors around them, as well as make sure the elderly, single adults, or those who were struggling emotionally would have a larger group of fellowship available to them.
 
While churches in Baja California Sur were allowed to start meeting again the first week in September, the Covid-19 guidelines at 40 percent occupancy and stringent procedures remain. Because of this, Pastor Carlos made the decision to continue as they are. The cost and logistics of him opening his churches and ‘missions’ within the guidelines have kept them from going back to ‘church as usual,’ but the expansions they have been able to make have been an answer to prayer and a refreshing for the people.
 
In our August blog, I also reported Cabo Church’s reopening. There was, however, a mix up with the permits that were issued for reopening. Within days of that one service, Pastor Michael received notification from our governor stating that whether churches had a permit or not, they were not allowed to begin meeting. We were finally able to officially open up again on September 6 at 40 percent occupancy, and what a celebration that was!
 
I want to praise God for His graciousness towards us in Los Cabos and His plans for the spiritual awakening of our city. The necessary world-wide shaking, which God has allowed to awaken His church and show the world their desperate need for Him, has not changed His plans for us.
 
I’ve included just a few photos of Los Cabos during the time when the marina only had one security guard and maybe one other person in sight, apart from Richard and I (exercise was considered “essential”). Enjoy the photos, and thank you for the prayers!

It is true that I’ve previously shared pictures of Cristo es el Camino’s church family, spread throughout the barrios due to Covid-19, but I do have new news and a special update for you, along with many new pictures!
 
On June 28, Cabo English Church was allowed to resume Sunday morning service due to the ability to follow the strict safety procedures for Covid-19, but Cristo es el Camino could not commit to being able to follow all the procedures. At that time, churches were still limited to no more than fifty people.
 
Since they were not able to open up any of Cristo es el Camino’s three churches, Pastor Carlos chose twenty leaders who had access to a location where they could lead all three of their weekly services; Sunday evening, Thursday evening mid-week and Prayer meeting on Friday evenings. The twenty church locations were asked to continue sharing pictures of their groups on Cristo es el Camino’s What’s App phone application, so they could see the church family that they could still not have fellowship with.
 
The plan was successful, but as of the third week in July, the faithful began to grow weary of the extended isolation in their homes, along with multiple services without the worship and fellowship that is so much a part of their lives. Pastor Carlos posted an encouraging word via What’s App, but the truth is, not everyone in the flock is normally committed to all three services, let alone when some of their groups are small and may not have one of the more experienced leaders.
 
Please pray for the hearts of our brothers and sisters to be strengthened, as well as for our state’s (Southern Baja California) Governor Mendoza to release the Municipality of Los Cabos from the strict guidelines, which may be necessary for many other cities in Mexico, but not for our isolated, relatively small municipality.

During the Great Depression, a voluntary public relief program, known as the CCC (Civilian Conservation Corps), was formed as a part of Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal. My father used to tell me stories about planting trees in mid-Michigan as a teenager during his time in the CCC. We have had a miniature version of the CCC operating in Los Cabos during the Covid-19 economic crunch. Since we have known him, Pastor Carlos has always come up with some kind of work for men whom he is led to minister to when needed. On the other side of the continent, Richard has always done the same thing. In fact, it was hard for us to even get a building project finished in Michigan because Richard was always hiring men from the City Rescue Mission (Muskegon, MI) or local men that he had known since high school. This is great for ministry but really rough if your previous house is already sold!
 
Although Pastor Carlos told us in April that around 90 percent of his flock were still employed, when work began to get sparse, especially for the less skilled, he started remodeling and redecorating the churches at Valle del Cabo and Lomas del Sol. On the other end of the city, Richard started putting men to work on his continued expansion and improving of the church at Tierra y Libertad.
 
As you look at the pictures, you may notice fresh Fleur-de-lis designs (swirls and flowers) along the walls of the freshly painted churches. Our brothers and sisters in Los Cabos are ecstatic and very proud of the new look for their churches.
 
Due to the increase in rent, the church at Lomas del Sol is no longer using the empty lot that Pastor Carlos has been renting for several years and there is now a fresh, clean wall separating the much smaller church and the empty lot.
 
Richard has been working on building a room over the kitchen at Tierra y Libertad for the person in charge of caring for the property at any given time. He designed it with a ‘front porch’ that overlooks the road in front of the church. It turned out quite spacious for where it is at (Richard spent quite a bit of time planning it). He and the men he ‘hired’ to work with him did some needed upgrades to the original bathroom and put stucco, paint and tile on several walls. Richard has a passion for vocational training for the men in Los Cabos and this project was no different. He even had boys learning to use a drill driver for screws and the older teens and men learning to use a skill saw—along with hours of wise teaching as they worked alongside him.
 
Please do not ever forget that what we are able to do in Los Cabos is because of your prayers and support. Enjoy the pictures and be blessed!

On March 15—the Sunday morning at Cabo Church that turned out to be our last morning service for a season—Richard and I were greeting at the door. Near the end of the already small crowd (as a result of news of the coronavirus in North America) was our precious drummer, who is just one of a special group of younger adult overcomers that we are blessed to have at Cabo Church. As I said goodbye with the usual, traditional Mexican greeting of a hug and a kiss on the cheek, I looked right into his eyes and said, “The darker it gets, the brighter you will shine” (with reference to Daniel 12:3). The Holy Spirit used me to say something that was beyond my understanding at the time. In fact, I discussed why I had said such a thing with the Lord several times during the following week.  Then, the fanning of the fear in the United States hit Los Cabos as our tourist industry shut down—from our most opulent resorts to the taco vender on the streets. Since this affected the majority of our population in the lower income brackets, the gloom quickly spread over our municipality.
 
Never Fear the Dark
 
In response to the growing darkness in Los Cabos, on April 1, the Lord shared a mini-teaching with me for the Body of Christ—Never Fear the Dark.
 
There are no opportunities in life without darkness. Even in a time of peace and tranquility, if we launch out into something new or different, there is no guarantee of success. In this dispensation, we really never know what the future holds. Uncertainty, itself, is a form of darkness. However, we do have multiple scriptures which give us the assurance that God always goes before us, that He is always with us, and that we will always be given the strength to overcome whatever might stand in our way! We will never be left to our own resources. The life of the risen Christ abides in us, we are temples of the Holy Spirit, and nothing ever happens to us that our Heavenly Father has not allowed!
 
Our job on this earth is not to flee from darkness, but as ‘carriers of the light,’ we should rejoice in overcoming evil with good (Romans 12:21). We have been given “authority to tread on serpents and scorpions, and over all the power of the enemy,” (Luke 10:19). Where light is, darkness flees; it has to. When the light is turned on, there is no more darkness. It’s that easy.
 
Darkness does bring a feeling of oppression and the antidote to this sense of doom is the joy of the Lord. Pray for joy over your assigned area (you all have one even if you haven’t thought about it)! Wherever you go, share a big smile (possible under a mask) so that at least they can see the light in your eyes. Whether those around us see our smiles or not, it does not negate the effect. When we release the joy of the Lord in this way, it helps dispel the gloom and doom over people’s lives, whether they are aware of it or not. Joy cuts through darkness like shafts of light and touches their hearts with a glimpse of a better day.
 
One Glorious Light in Los Cabos
 
As I shared in my previous blog, Pastor Carlos immediately went into action to organize his churches as soon as the ability to meet together was suspended. They organized the entire church family of between 250 to 300 people by What’s App (which is available in other countries, but given that it is free, it is a mainstay of Mexican communication). Pastor Carlos had already sent out ideas for how the head of the home could establish a ‘family altar’ in their home. You will notice in the photos that some even have a container of tithe envelopes on their altars and a box in which to place the envelopes with money in. These brothers and sisters are not doing this under compulsion; they love the work of the Lord. Pastor Carlos still consistently sends an outline of the message for each Sunday service, with instructions on how to lead their families in worship. You will notice in some of the photos that there appears to be guests in the homes of the lay leaders. They are very careful to include single person households, along with the elderly or anyone else in need of special care. Thursday night is their mid-week service and, again, everyone is sent the teaching for that night’s service in their homes, as well as a list of suggestions as to what to pray for on Friday night’s prayer meeting. Pastor Carlos makes himself available to pray—by phone—to anyone who needs prayer or has a need of food or other items. He told us just this week that to date, there are now 120 homes represented on Cristo es el Camino’s What’s App chat. They have actually grown in confinement!
 
I wanted to send the photos to show you how serious these wonderful brothers and sisters are, even though most of them either have little to no money left and have no guarantee of quick return to employment when they are released to go back to whatever it was they previously lived off of. Their joy and lack of complaining is amazing, and most of them definitely are a glorious light to their surroundings.
 
One last thing—for all of you who prayed for Los Cabos to be protected from looting and crime, our police and military are doing a spectacular job. In fact, there are very few “street people” out in the open, and we have only heard one specific report of an attempted personal robbery, which failed! I’m sure there must be some, but the overall atmosphere is very peaceful. Thank-you so much for praying! 
 
Continue to shine—Light in the darkness!

I want to thank those of your who have expressed concern over our well-being in Los Cabos. We are doing excellent. Mexico has a tendency not to react until our reputation is at stake and then we tend to over-react, so the strict sanctions which closed down much of the city didn’t hit until April 8; with the lesser sanctions starting less than a week earlier. Our city is blessed by being relatively small and isolated from most of Mexico.
 
The sanctions on public meetings−which affected our ability to meet for church services−didn’t officially start until March 29, at which time meetings were immediately limited to 20 in attendance. Cabo Church made the switch to taped services on March 22. After the 20 person sanction, Pastor Carlos quickly started a What’s App chat for his churches, and carefully divided his flock of 250-300 people among his three churches, missions, and home churches. We still somehow ended up with over 200 people at Tierra y Libertad that Sunday at our 6:00 p.m. service. They had had 40 first-time visitors just the week before!
 
Due to the crowd at Tierra y Libertad−by April 5−Pastor Carlos sent instructions to his people on preparing “home altars.” They prepared altars in their homes and posted photos of themselves on the church chat.  They did the same for the Thursday night mid-week services, as well as the Friday night prayer meetings.
 
Pastor Carlos and his people have still been carefully providing for the needs of others; especially with the closing of Cabos Church’s feeding station at Tierra y Libertad. As a ministry, we have also supplied Pastor Carlos with funds for outreach, which we will continue to do as we are able. The mandate to “stay at home except for essentials and only one person in a car” didn’t come out until April 8. However−with so many in need−ministering to others in the barrios will not likely be suspended apart from a direct order from the governor of Baja California Sur.
 
So far, we have not had any major shortages of food and staples in Los Cabos. Fortunately, most of the North American population headed for the United States and Canada as soon as the news of Covid-19 broke out. What we do have is a large percentage of our population with no jobs and little to no money saved (due to the closing of all non-essential work, all tourist activities, many of our hotels, and finally all of our sit-down restaurants). The poorest of our poor usually buy food one day at a time and even one meal at a time. This would include the “day-workers” who are picked up by businesses or locals to work at an extremely low wage, one day at a time. Many of the members of this group are addicted to drugs and alcohol and were roaming around looking for what they could find (legally or illegally) within a week of the economic slowdown.
 
The largest problem we will face−apart from a miracle−will be crime and/or looting (many of our businesses have already placed plywood over their glass and pulled down their metal safety shades. The looting after Hurricane Odile in September of 2014 did help prepare us for this). There will be no government checks issued from our troubled, Mexican government, and our major ‘industry’ is tourism, which was just devastated with the early return of our ‘snow birds’ to North America and the loss of revenue we typically receive from Spring Break.
 
Please Pray
 
As you continue to pray for your countries and the world to conquer the Covid-19 threat, please pray exceptionally hard for the people of Los Cabos, most of whom do not know the Lord and are not ready to enter eternity.
 
We have been waiting for the start of the promised harvest of souls to come in for more than nine years. Please pray for the ability of our churches and various ministries to minister to the spiritual needs of large numbers of new converts. The Lord has been assuring my heart for quite a long time that He has an amazing plan for handling the outpouring of His glory and the resulting harvest in Los Cabos, but it will take a God-sized plan to do it!
 
Also, please pray for jobs and financial provision for the people of Los Cabos—especially for our brothers and sisters in Christ, many who have now been without work and/or income for several weeks.
 
Finally, please pray the safety of our city from increased criminal activity or looting.
 
Thank-you for your faithfulness to what God is doing in Los Cabos and may peace and God’s blessings surround you!

Originally, we hadn’t planned to share our newest Avanza sin Tranza update (the values program we have been working with for over three years) until after the training that was scheduled for March 30-31, but the coronavirus burst onto the scene and our dates for the training for 80 teachers and educators in the Municipality of Los Cabos has been postponed. Nevertheless, it was officially scheduled!
 
In our last blog, I covered the Monday morning at the Political Ceremony where our friend, Captain Juan Zamorano, head of all our security forces in Los Cabos, was honored by the city. This was worth blogging about, but there was another, very important breakthrough not reported in that blog. Almost a year and a half ago, Captain Zamorano expressed the need for a mandatory values training program for his police officers, and thanks to the investment of one of our faithful supporters, we were able to offer the initial training for the area’s police officers—free of charge to the city (Avanza sin Tranza has been embraced by multiple municipalities in Mexico, but someone must pay the cost of the program and that is a problem in Mexico). After that initial conversation with the Captain about Avanza sin Tranza, we had a complete change of government, his responsibilities on Monday mornings changed, and nothing more was said for more than a year.
 
But God Once Again Intervened
 
On the Monday morning when the new police vehicles were handed over to Captain Zamorano, Richard and I arrived just in time for the ceremony; most of the participants were already in place and we ended up standing at the far end of the plaza. When the Captain saw us he stepped out of the crowd to tell us how excited he was with the new vehicles. When he finished, I asked him if he still had a need for values training for his officers and he immediately answered, “Yes.” Then, Richard asked what would be the best way for us to help him make this happen and his answer was for Daniel Valles to make an appointment with his assistant. We were able to make immediate contact with Daniel. Daniel was able to immediately secure an appointment with the Captain, and a visit to our area the following week was scheduled.
 
On the following Monday morning, Richard and I had already finished “prayer walking” the area and were on our way out of the plaza when, much to our surprise, Captain Juan was still standing in the plaza. We were able to have a wonderful talk with him; including having the time to ask about the topics he had asked us to pray for when we first talked to him. One of those prayer requests had been answered and he said our prayers must have worked. We told him that Daniel had an appointment with him two days later and that the Director of Education, Juan Mesa, was working with us to get the program for the school system. The Captain smiled sweetly and said, “We’ll see what we can do.”
 
We said goodbye to Captain Juan, and as we turned around to go, Director Juan Mesa was right in front of us (remember, there were only a few people in the entire plaza by then). We told Director Juan that Daniel was flying in to talk to Captain Juan and asked Director Juan if he would like to see Daniel again since he would be in town the following Wednesday. Director Juan had us call his assistant and both of these precious men were scheduled within a couple hours of each other with Daniel Valles.
 
The Happy Almost Ending
 
Richard, Daniel, and I were excited when we headed to San Jose del Cabo the following Wednesday. Our appointment with Captain Juan was first. Daniel told him that our ministry was paying for fifteen people to be trained as trainers. The Captain smiled and said he wanted fifty law enforcement officers trained and that he was going to pay for the other 35. Now that was exceedingly, abundantly above all we could have asked for or thought! We rushed over to the office in charge of making Daniel an official ‘vendor’ of the Municipality of Los Cabos and, within a week, Daniel had shipped all of the necessary paperwork to us to bring back to the city. He was instantly approved.
 
After all that, we still had our appointment with Director Juan. We were greeted at the door to his office with one of the Avanza sin Tranza decals we had given him.  It was proudly displayed on the front door of the Department of Education. Director Juan sat down across from us and questioned Daniel about several things, but we soon found out that he already knew he was ready to schedule the training when he sat down that day. The training was scheduled for March 30-31, but you already know the rest of the story—we are postponed for the time being.
 
Both of these directors are ready for action when we are cleared of COVID-19. Please pray for protection and wisdom for both of them, as well as for their families, and—of course—keep praying for the implementation of Avanza sin Tranza.