For centuries, people have set out on journeys with the intention to arrive at a sacred place. A pilgrimage is often undertaken on foot but can also be a metaphor for an inward journey of mind and heart.
In either case, pilgrims expect to encounter something miraculous when they reach their destinations.
As the breeze gets cooler, the nights get longer, and the difficult year of 2020 comes to an end, I am reminded of how hardship can sometimes bring out the worst in us. But it can also bring out the best in us and make us more beautiful and connected. No doubt, we have endured a tough year collectively and individually and on top of things, it is easy to get lost in the hustle and stress amidst the Holidays.
Burger King and beans. That these bookended the life that my family and I shared with others while living in El Salvador may prompt you to think that this post is about the gastronomical changes we experienced while living abroad. To be sure, our eating habits were altered a bit. But this is not a culinary tale. Rather, it is a story about the transformative and lasting impacts of hospitality.
With the onset of the global COVID-19 pandemic, ENLACE began a major pivot in our year’s community development plan and began to provide relief as early as April in Central America. It’s been an incredible effort by hundreds of devoted people. One of our superheroes during this transition has been Dr. Eva Berdugo. Dr. Eva is coordinating all relief and efforts in El Salvador, Guatemala, and Nepal. Not only has she been instrumental in designing and managing day-to-day operations and communications, but she has also helped to provide solid and capable leadership as ENLACE turns now toward recovery.
Meet Joel Kelderman. He is a real estate investor and ENLACE Board Member. Read on to learn how Joel began to work with ENLACE and why he values its work of transformation in the world.
While growing up in a small, Midwestern farming community I vividly remember asking myself often, “Is this as good as it gets?”
“When our focus is on serving others, our differences become
meaningless and our love for each other prospers.” - Jayger McGough
My childhood lessons and experiences have been paramount in setting the direction for my life. I still remember visiting orphanages and homes with kids who had disabilities when I was nine years old. Every weekend for many years, we would drive 30 to 45 minutes each way to spend time with these children, feed them, hold them, deliver donations to them, and give them gifts we had wrapped for them. Seventeen years later I can still picture my mom carrying and pouring love into the babies, especially a baby called Adonai who suffered from microcephaly.
As parents and caregivers to children, we all identify at some point with Elizabeth Stone’s well-known quote, “Making the decision to have a child is momentous. It is to decide forever to have your heart go walking around outside your body."
The first time we send our kids into the wild unknown at any stage--whether it be their first day of kindergarten, a first sleepover or trip to a summer camp, or dropping them off as 9th graders to High School and then saying goodbye at college--our hearts seem to simultaneously expand and contract with something close to physical pain as we contemplate all the potential experiences that they may navigate without us being present.
We know that obstacles will come in many forms, and we desperately hope they will be able to encounter, steer through, and emerge, if not stronger and wiser, at least whole. And when they do undergo painful experiences, the empathetic pain of our heart living outside our bodies is acute indeed.However, as we grow into our parenting, we come to realize very quickly that as much as we wish we could, we cannot fix every bad experience or minimize our children’s suffering. We are faced with our own limits, and we begin to come to terms with the fact that our ability to protect our children from heartaches, setbacks, and struggles can only extend so far.
Getting up before dawn amidst the growing cacophony of doves, pigeons, droning insects and waking roosters, Erika, a young mother of five children living in the rural village of Caluco, El Salvador, would coax a fire to life over an open cooking hearth in her living room.
In 2018, so many generous donors and short-term volunteers all over the world came alongside church and community leaders in El Salvador, Nepal and Guatemala and transformed the lives of thousands of families! We are so grateful and are just bursting to tell you about it!
In 2017, your generous contributions helped us to continue to equip churches to transform lives in El Salvador, Nepal and Guatemala.
2018 marks ENLACE’s 25th Anniversary. What is most significant about this milestone for us is that for 25 years we have had the privilege of walking alongside churches as THEY transform THEIR OWN communities. ENLACE has encouraged and equipped, to be sure. Our staff works tirelessly on a daily basis coaching and supporting hundreds of churches’ efforts. But all of us at ENLACE know that the church and community leaders are the ones who, despite facing incredible challenges and daily struggles, live and breathe sacrificial service. As a result, thousands of impoverished people are experiencing better, safer, and healthier lives of economic and spiritual stability.
To serve God means to serve where God has placed me and to see my circumstances as his direction for me. Many times I think I have orchestrated my own steps but in reality God has done so and his purposes are always many-fold.
I have had the opportunity to travel to El Salvador over the past several years and have experienced how ENLACE purposes to bring economic and spiritual renewal to communities through the presence and work of the local Church. The foundation of which comes through the cultivation of relationships that are based on the love of our neighbor as ourselves.
Hello,
My name is Pastor Israel Pineda and I’d like to thank you for giving. Since my church and community leaders started receiving coaching from ENLACE in 2013, we have seen transformation in our hamlet of El Cocalito through physical improvements like a reduction of intestinal disease when we installed latrines. We have built homes for our neighbors and classrooms for our local school. Perhaps even more importantly, we have seen friendships formed between church members and our neighbors. We have experienced a transformed vision and motivation in our church to focus on serving others. And it’s not only me and my community that have this vision. Your support provides coaching for over 100 pastors throughout El Salvador, Guatemala, and Nepal propelling them to impact their communities by restoring relationships with the whole gospel of Christ’s love.
