The Church is growing, Lives are being transformed, The Gospel is being preached. Our community is being engaged with the truth of the gospel, and as you walk into the doors of our church every Sunday morning their is a warmth and love that is being brought about through Christ amidst our congregation...

This is the sign you see when you enter the city!

It has been a while since our last update. As always, there is too much to tell... We are blown away by how God is working in our church at this time. As you may already know, Greg and Caro have had to return to the USA for 6-12 months and everything we've always done between Greg and I has been delegated to me for this stage.

That means I've taken the responsibility for handling our national ministry (primarily BTCP) and our local ministry (our church plant) during this stage. This has been a wonderful learning process both for me and Lore. We have really enjoyed the opportunities that it has brought.

BUT the most exciting part has been to see how our church members have stood up and taken ownership. They are growing! And God is CAUSING THE GROWTH!

Examples:

-We have an evangelistic event every month, and this month Lore and I will not participate in any of it except going there! This is huge because we used to have to do everything and the rest of the church just shows up. [Ephesians 4:12]

-Men are beginning to take on leadership roles and leading other men.

-Small groups are becomming places of great transparency, challenge, discipleship and love. (one of the ladies study groups is over 13 women)

-After every church service we see community and fellowship happening as most people stay in the church (as oppossed to returning home immediately).

*Just this past Sunday we almost ran out of chairs at the back of the church!

LA FAMILIA:

Well, by God's grace our family is doing fine. Lore has been the most amazing wife and mother I could ever imagine. She and I are doing homeschool for the kids. We'd never seen it done before so we're learning on the go... but it has truly been wonderful.

Josias is now 5 years old and is going weekly to basketball practice and his music class. His best friend is Jeremias and they like to go play together.

Lila is 2 years old (coming up on 3) and she is into a "princess" stage. Several times a week she dresses herself up, then dresses mommy up while she's cooking and grabs Daddy and Josias to dance...

We're grateful for our family.

How can you pray?

-Please pray for God to protect our family, marriage and church from the schemes of the enemy as He would like nothing more than to "steal, kill and destroy" (John 10:10)

-Pray for our homeschool ventures as we seek to invest both academically and spiritually in our kids through this means.

-Pray for our church and it's continued growth. Especially for evangelism in a community that is very closed to the Gospel. May the Christ-like love within our church become a bright and shining light to a community full of great darkness...

Finally, How can we pray for U ?

Send us an e-mail!

We love you and THANK YOU for being a part of our team! Together we are reaching Argentina for Christ. To Him be the Glory!

The kids on their brand new bikes!

I just wanted to write briefly to let everyone know how you might be able to join our team and church in prayer.

The past month has been a particularly challenging one for our church and especially for our team.

One of the challenges has stemmed from a member of our church. To share with you in very general terms, she has strayed from her relationship with the Lord and our church, (we're not sure if she ever really did know Him), and has now sought to persuade members of the community to think negatively about our church and our faith in Jesus.

We believe that this is spiritual warfare and we would like to invite you to live out Ephesians chapter 6 with us as we put on the "Armor of God."

In addition, The Travis family (our team members) have all been very sick, we have a dear friend visiting us currently from the USA that has also gotten very sick, and in the midst of it all we are currently hosting a short term trip.

We invite you to pray with us (maybe as you read this e-mail) for:

-The Travis Families (and our dear friend's) health

-Unity and steadfastness in our church

-Dependence on the Lord and effectiveness for the short term team visiting us

-The Grothe family to not get sick as well

-Repentance or surrender to Jesus as Savior in the heart of the member of our church who has now strayed.

-Peace, renewal, strength and faithfulness for both the Travis and Grothe family in order to continue leading our church and our families in a sweet relationship with our Savior.

We love you all and thank you so much for faithfully joining our ministry in Argentina through your support and prayer.

In His Grip,

Does the GRACE of God bring PEACE to your life? The apostle Paul begins many of his letters in this way. As we approach Easter, we reflect on the grace that has been freely given to us. We deserve eternal punishment for our sin (Romans 6:23). But He has freely poured out His GRACE on us, by taking our punishment upon Himself. God became a man in Jesus, and He died and rose again for you!

We pray that this Grace and Peace of God would be known in the community where we are serving here in City Bell, Argentina. We are confident that God will continue to use "La Iglesia Bíblica de City Bell" as a tool to make Himself known.

Last week we celebrated our One Year Anniversary as a church. We invite you to watch the video (on You Tube) that we showed the congregation. For many of us it brought tears to our eyes to see how God has been uniting our church family over the past year, and how He edifies His Church.

Our prayer is that He would continue to do so...

YOU TUBE VIDEO:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qDTmCALVOdE

Below are 3 ways you can be praying for us:

1) Marriage and Family. We have been doing family devotional times at the dinner table every night. Pray that we would be daily strengthened and renewed by His Word.

2) Pray for protection for Josías and his school. We have decided to take him to a school nearby that seems to be the best option (out of the options available). The part we don't like is that he is there 7 hours a day. Pray that God might open doors for us to share Jesus with other families as we become friends.

3) Spiritual Warfare. The reality is that there is an enemy who desires to steal, kill and destroy (John 10:10). We have seen some strange things happen since arriving in Argentina that we feel are spiritual in nature (Ephesians 6:12-20). Example: Just one hour before beginning our small group last week Lila fell so hard on the floor that we had to take her immediately to the emergency room to test for a possible fracture. (She's okay now! No fracture!). Pray with us for the full Armor of God!

Send us an e-mail to let us know how we can be praying for you too!

Love to you all (and Happy Easter!),

Kurt, Lore, Josías and Lila

A Photo of our 1 YEAR ANNIVERSARY at the "Iglesia Bíblica de City Bell"