Young Men and Women Becoming Leaders

05 Apr Young Men and Women Becoming Leaders

By Phil Waldron, CEO

I Timothy 4:12 says, ¹² Let no one despise you for your youth, but set the believers an example in speech, in conduct, in love, in faith, in purity.” It has been fifteen years since we as the Waldron family landed here in Santa Rosa de Copán. Over the intervening years it has been inspirational for us to be a part of what God is doing here in this community.

One of the most remarkable and noteworthy indicators of what God is up to is the number of young men and women that are advancing in leadership skills and responsibilities beyond their years. MUR’s programs and our focus on the local church has played no small part in this development. It is, in fact, the essence of our mission strategy. Most of these young men and women were first introduced to the church and to a personal relationship with Jesus as Lord via our DESEO public school values education program. This led them to being a part of our annual Bible camp. In addition, they began attending church and participating in Sunday School, Youth Group, and other church activities.

There are too many stories to share with you of young lives that have been changed, but I would like to mention one young man’s story that exemplifies what I am referring to. The first one is Kerlin Aguilar. Kerlin participated in our first UPWARD basketball league that DESEO conducted. He began attending church as a result according to his own words, “to get to know cute girls.” What he found was a life-changing message that awakened a spiritual yearning within him. He attended Sunday worship, youth group, and some retreats, and as a result of hearing the Gospel message, he decided to give his life to Christ and was baptized. He later participated in our Boot Camp Christian Leadership training series and then our CRESCO, two-year long Bible school. After graduating from high school, he came to work as a DESEO team member going back into schools and teaching the same curriculum that he was taught that ultimately led him to Christ.

Today, Kerlin is engaged to be married to a wonderful Christian young woman. He leads singing in our worship on occasion and he also preaches and teaches adult Bible class. He is a naturally gifted speaker and has tremendous potential.

As I said, there are more examples just like Kerlin, but our space in this newsletter article doesn’t permit me to talk about more than this one. We have a few dozen of young men and young women that have similar stories. What we need though is thousands of these stories. I’m often reminded of Jesus’ words to his Apostles in Matthew 9:37b-38, “The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few; ³⁸ therefore pray earnestly to the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest.”

Our biggest limitation in scaling up our ministries is a lack of financial resources. The programs and ministries that we operate are time-tested and have a proven track record of making a lasting, transformational impact in the lives of both young people and adults.

Please be in prayer about God blessing MUR with the resources that we need to increase our personnel resources here. We are praying that instead of cutting back due to a scarcity of funds He will provide a treasury that is “pressed down, shaken together and running over.”

The old saying, attributed to Edward McKendree Bounds, that Donna and I have said to each other on many occasions is, “Only God can move mountains, but faith and prayer can move God.” We cherish your partnership and covet your prayers.