We spent much of the week on Corn Island. We are planning to spend a lot of time on this island of 10,000 people in the coming months, training leaders and filling in for the pastor who will be in the US studying. (written by Tim Mott)
 We left Bluefields on Wednesday morning on the Express boat that goes to Corn Island from the mainland.
It is a 5 hour boat ride that can get pretty choppy. We arrived sunburnt and ready to spend time on land.
We could come over by airplane in just 20 minutes, but the plane costs $99.00 round trip and limits you to 30 lbs of luggage while the boat costs $20 round trip and does not limit the luggage. As much time as we are planning to spend here on the island, we need to get used to taking the boat.
It seems crazy that it takes so long by boat, since it is only 40 miles. If we could figure out how to walk on water, we would have made it there faster on foot, but that elective was not offered in Seminary.
The water was beautiful, but after a few hours, we had seen enough water. Soon, the island appeared on the horizon and after an hour more, we finally landed. We took a taxi to the Ebenezer Baptist Church and greeted Pastor Eli and his family.
 Pastor Eli is going to the US to study for two years in seminary. Two of the other Baptist churches on the island do not have pastors.
Tim will be coming over at least two times per month to take people through the 10 book leadership training course.
He will also be preaching in the church when he is there, since Pastor Eli is going and there is no pastor to take his place.
It is hard to imagine the fact that in this beautiful place, the church has had plenty of times when it struggled to find a pastor, because it could not afford to pay the required salary or because people do not want to come to this remote location.
 On Thursday, Tim and Pastor Eli went to Pasenic, the local fish factory (in this picture), and had a chance to visit with Mr. Morgan, the owner.
He is buying 4.5 acres of land to build a Christian youth activity center and he is ready to provide significant financial backing.
He related how he left church himself as a young man. In his own words "we need to do something different to get them back."
Today, very few men are found in the churches, only women and children. As we prepared to teach the leadership training classes in the churches here, we found that our students are all women. There was not a man in the group.
 We have suggested to Mr. Morgan that the first thing that we need to do in building the youth center is to develop a strong faith-based men's movement at the core of the project.
If the young people do not see the men interested in spiritual things, then no amount of activities will create interest on the part of the young people.
We will stay in touch with Mr. Morgan and keep praying about this project. This would be a great project for church teams or individuals to help with, and what nicer place to go on a mission trip than Corn Island. There will also be great opportunities to organize sports leagues and sports camps. Anybody want to move here?
On Sunday, Tim preached in the morning worship and we headed back to the mainland to continue to work on Bible studies and cabinets.
Unfortunately, the boat is not going back until Tuesday, so we will had to make the return trip by airplane.
Tim will be making a return trip to Corn Island in 2-3 weeks to visit more about the youth project, if we can arrange the necessary meetings.
On June 4, we will start our leadership training program, and if we are able to get a men's movement started on the Island, then we will spend more time there and invest quite a bit of our time in getting the youth project underway.
The amount of time we spend here will depend on whether the men of the island are ready and willing to exhibit spiritual leadership. There is no point in investing our lives in something that is a merely human endeavor.
We appreciate your prayers and emails.
God bless you,
Tim and Kim |
