AEC Churches Lead Mission Trip to Puerto Rico
Our Metro, Beacon Light, Coastal Shores, and Cedars of Lebanon churches recently took a mission trip to Guayama, Puerto Rico. The trip was led by Pastors Tyler, Sanders, Smith, and Kinlock. There were 24 individuals who joined the trip.
The purpose of the trip was to serve in communities where there is a need while reaching the unchurched to teach them about the loving savior we have in Jesus Christ. They focused on four main aspects: construction, health, community service, and evangelism, which includes a children's program.
Reflections from Pastor Trevor Kinlock, pastor of Metropolitan Church.
For this trip, our building team replaced the roof of one of the Guayama community residents, as the roof had been badly damaged from the hurricanes. The homeowner is a lady who has cancer and couldn't repair the roof on her own. The neighbors saw the roof and were so impressed that we were doing this work. Another single parent mother approached us and we're now replacing her roof (even though we've left, we're working with contractors to replace it this week). We always try to bless a local Adventist school as well, so we went to the Tres Angeles K-12 Adventist school and installed power into their library and purchased 10 laptops for their students to use in the library/computer lab.
Our medical team provided health care services to the local community. One of our doctors, Dr. Jonelle Samuels, is an OBGYN and provided gynecological services to many of the women in the community. Our community services team was led by Pastor Novella Smith and focused on taking food, clothes, and back to school supplies to poor neighborhoods in Guayama. The residents were all extremely grateful.
Finally, working in tandem with the local Adventist pastor, Pastor Ricardo Pena, we ran a week-long evangelistic meeting led by our own Pastor and Evangelist Jajuan Sanders. Pastor Sanders preached biblical, Christ-centered messages and made nightly appeals for baptism. We baptized 5 precious souls there in the Caribbean sea after our final Sabbath service!! One of the individuals who was baptized was a young man by the name of Jose who had made many mistakes in life and served time in prison. One night Pastor Sanders preached about Saul and how he became Paul, reminding the crowd that despite your past, God can still use you to do great things in your future. It was on this night that Jose took his stand and gave his life to the Lord!
Reflections from Natasha Iheme, Mission Director
Serving as a missionary teaches you to trust God more. Things may not always go the way you expect, but God showed me that they will always go the way He expects for His Glory. Natasha Iheme
On August 19th, the Metropolitan Church where they would highlight the events of the mission trip.