Special Report- Orellana Family

Quito, October 2006
Warmest greetings in the grace of the Lord. We present here a brief report of our ministries. Everything has been detailed in our monthly reports sent to the Board and our donors.

Our Family

• Génesis is in the fifth grade and will turn nine in March 2007. She wants to be baptized next year. She participates in our groups.
• Galilea is in second grade. She turned six on September 28. She helps her Mom in our children’s club ministry and in the church.
• Belén turned two on September 30; she is walking and learning her first words. She knows some Christian songs and livens up our family worship time.

Anita

• Her priority is her ministry to our girls at home and local administration.
• She is teaching courses in Christian Education and Crafts in the Baptist Seminary, and also in our pastoral training programs.
• She is involved in our IBU church teaching special conferences to the ladies, serving as their secretary, and also teaching in the Sunday School, she also participates in marital counseling.
• She has a weekly ministry to women and children in our neighborhood.
• She helps some sisters in various churches in biblical counseling.

Joselito

• He continues serving as President and professor of the Ecuadorian Baptist Theological Seminary (STBE). Forty students in Guayaquil graduated with bachelor’s degrees in Theology and Christian Education in December 2005. In Quito, we are offering a Pastoral Training program with seminary level accreditation for high school graduates that desire to continue their formal education.
• He was invited to teach in the Vision International University, beginning in November 2006, in countries outside of Ecuador. In addition to teaching in the Latin-American Christian University (UCL), he continues teaching in the Logos Christian University (Contextual Hermeneutics, Bibliography, and Theology) and also serves as a tutor for theses and projects in the Theology department at the UCL.
• He continues as national counselor for the Evangelical Baptist Youth of Ecuador (JEBE). He was reelected for two more years and has been the plenary speaker for their national congresses for the last tour years. The next congress will be for the entire Latin-American level and will be held in Ecuador.
• He is completing a PhD in Theology and will graduate, Lord willing, in April 2007.
  He finished writing his Exegetical and Pastoral Commentary on Luke (vol. 16 Hispanic World Biblical Commentary) for our Baptist Publication House of El Paso, Texas. It will be in bookstores in March 2007.
• He is serving as associate pastor at the University Baptist Church (IBU), assists with the youth and children’s Sunday Schools, and ministers through music.
• We continue with the ministry of CCBP (www.bibletraining.com) for pastors and leaders around Quito and in the countryside. These pastors do not have any possibility of obtaining other kinds of formal education. Our church sponsors six intensive courses, each lasting one week, every year. The students come from various provinces: Cañar, Guayas, Pichincha and Manabí.

Miscellaneous

This year we have:

• Received five groups from our supporting churches in the USA. They came to work with churches and other ministries (teaching, construction, evangelism, new church planting, medical clinics, Backyard Bible Clubs, logistics support, sister church programs);
• Cooperated as members of the Board of Palm Missionary Ministries in Ecuador;
• Participated in the opening of a new work in Puerto Lopez, Manabí. They now have twenty adult members, their own pastor, and meet in a rented building.
• Offered pastoral training to various leaders in indigenous Quichua churches, both in Calderón and Cañar, through an itinerant ministry;
• Served as conference speakers in various congresses and annual meetings;
• Supported various rural churches that do not have a pastor or who are in the process of ministerial development;
• And purchased a new 4x4 vehicle for our missionary ministry in the countryside.

Prayer Concerns

• Thanksgiving for the generous protection and provision of the Lord.
• For my orphaned nephew and niece: Michelle 13 years old and Andrés 11 years old. They are part of our family now.
• For our spiritual and physical health.
• Pray for a new associate pastor for our church (IBU) and for a new President of the seminary (STBE). Joselito will resign these two responsibilities at the beginning of the new year.
• For the future of our ministry. Apparently, the Lord is showing us that soon we will have to leave our country. We are very disillusioned by many things that are occurring with the church and the Baptist denomination, as well as in the country itself. We are open to go and minister wherever the Lord wants to send us!

Urgent Needs

• To increase our economic support. We have lost some supporters and our support has fallen some 50%. Now we have only 15% of what our mission agency PMM requires. We do not receive any economic support from Ecuador, not from the church nor from the Baptist convention. The small amount I receive as an honorarium from the UCL is very little.
• To obtain visas to the USA for our whole family.
• We are looking for a new place to live in Quito, completely private, not in an apartment-type complex where we are now. We are suffering persecution here because we are Evangelical missionaries. For example, they constantly scratch and hit our old car as well as our new car (it has been scratched and hit and is only a month old), they paint obscenities near our house, they stole Joselito’s bicycle two days ago, they write graffiti on the walls, and they show a hostile and threatening attitude because of what we are, what we have, and what we do.

Principle Goals for 2007

• To travel to the USA to share about our family and ministry.
• To complete Joselito’s doctorate.
• For Anita to begin a Masters degree in Family Counseling.
• Joselito will begin a ministry of Theological Education outside of our country by means of the University and also through the ministry of our supporting churches from the USA.
• Joselito will begin writing his commentary on the book of Acts.
• To develop our English to a higher level [the eternal language of heaven, ha ha!]
• Joselito will have a complete medical check-up.
• To support the rural indigenous ministry in other parts of the country. We have received invitations to support the work in the provinces de Cañar, Tungurahua, and Cayambe.

May the love of God, the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the communion of the Holy Spirit be with all of us. Amen. A hug and rich blessings from the Lord.

Yours in Christ,
Joselito & Anita Orellana.