June 12, 2005
For a brief video chronicling our work,
Dear Friends,
At the BFI conference this past
week, I was approached by several individuals inquiring when I
plan to send out a newsletter. They were interested to hear a
report about my last two trips to Ache, Indonesia, and wanted
to know how to pray for future trips. These conversations have
inspired me to write this letter today.
As most of you know, the Lord
has opened doors miraculously since the tsunami disaster, to
go into Ache and minister to the physical needs of the people.
We have made two trips so far, with another one planned for
July 19th, and tentatively a fourth trip in October or
November of this year. Donna is planning to join me on the
trip this fall, and we will be joining Mom & Dad for ministry
on the island of Nias, which was also hit quite hard with
earthquakes.
Each of our trips have been different. Jim Goods has traveled
and worked together with me on each trip, and we were joined
by Peter De La Rosa on the second trip.
The first trip we traveled from village to village assisting
Steve Dawson and his SWI team with feeding the victims of the
tsunami. The Lord gave opportunities to speak a word here and
there into hearts as we went.
Our second trip we were asked to deliver some promised
backpacks to 18 orphans at a Muslim school. When we arrived at
the school, we were surprised to find out that there were 256
children, and 48 of them were orphans. The need was so great,
and our resources so small it broke our hearts. We immediately
began to pray and ask the Lord what we could do to help. We
felt impressed to speak to the school principal, and found out
that there were 22 teachers on staff. Jim, Peter and myself
pooled together what money we had brought, and we had enough
to pay the wages for each teacher for two months. A couple of
days later we also were able to purchase some candy for the
children and gave each child a 1000 rupiah bill (approximately
11 cents US). We made the promise to the faculty and children
that we would return with more help as soon as we can. Our
commitment is to supply uniforms, shoes and school books for
each child in the school. In addition to this we have taken on
two more schools where the need is great. We estimate that it
will $20.00 US to outfit one child for a whole school year. We
have committed to assist a total of 532 children in July.
The teachers were moved to tears by our compassion and it
opened the doors for us to witness the love of the Lord to
them. They begged us not to forget about the children.
With your prayers, and financial support to back us up we
gladly go to share what we can with those that have very
little, both materially and spiritually.
We are believing God to supply a minimum of $10,000 US to meet
this need, plus extra funds to cover our travel expenses. The
need is great and time is short, as we leave July 19th.
Anyone wishing to share in this outreach can send donations
to: BFI, 24228 89th PL W, Edmonds WA 98026-9010 Attention:
Ben's Ache Ministry Team
God bless each of you
Ben deQuilettes
Jim Goods
Peter De La Rosa
