Dear friends, family and supporters,

Summer is almost here, and with it come many changes. The grass is beginning to grow again, the flowers are blooming and the spring rains have brought new life to the earth. In the area where we live, the corn is beginning to sprout in the fields.

Our summer is also bringing important changes to our family. David Jeremiah, our oldest son, moved to Michigan a few weeks ago, so that he can work this summer and earn money for college. He plans on moving into the dorms at Western Michigan University by the end of August and will be studying aeronautical engineering.

Our second son, Daniel, will be graduating from high school on June 13, and then heading to Portland Bible College the following week to work there this summer, after which he will begin studying a degree in theology in preparation for ministry. Suddenly, our house will be a bit more quiet and empty! We will miss our boys (and Anna will miss her brothers). However, we know that each one of our children must go forward and prepare for their own life calling.

Seasons change and growing up is a part of life. Now that we are talking about seasons, please have a look at some the activities that we have been a part of during this spring season.

Remodeling our auditorium

In the month of April, we had our church auditorium painted and redecorated. It had been several years since the last paint job, and it was in great need of being redone.

We put one of the couples of our church in charge of the decoration, including colors and design. Luis and Jazmin did a wonderful job of coordinating colors, choosing cloth for the ceiling space, and giving the platform a whole new look. We also had the concrete floor repainted. Have a look!

Veggietales in the village of Tlapanaloya

April 30 is Children’s Day in Mexico, and we celebrated by taking our children’s church team to do evangelism in the village of Tlapanaloya, in the state of Mexico, which is a little over an hour driving distance from here. Our team created their own Veggietales costumes of Bob, Larry, Laura and Jimmy. We have some very creative people who worked many long hours to get the costumes ready.

Saturday, April 29, we all headed to the small town of Tlapanaloya to invite the children to the local church for the celebration. Banging of drums, several groups marched around the town passing out invitations and talking with the neighbors.

Our group did a cute sketch with the Veggietales characters, explaining God’s plan for salvation, sang with the children, prayed for them, and then led them in games outside the little church. Once the games were over and the prizes were claimed, dinner was served for everyone on a very long table.

Several new children attended, as well as many who sometimes attend the church. It was a great experience for our team and a blessing for the people of Tlapanaloya.

Children’s Day Picnic

The following day, Sunday, we hosted a church picnic on our property after service for all our children and their families. Each family took their own food and tablecloth or blanket and ate together as a family.

After a time of worship and ministry, I asked all the parents to spend a few moments praying for and ministering to their own children. It was indeed a beautiful thing to see mothers and fathers ministering to the spiritual needs of their families. Our theme came from Joshua 24:15, which says, “…but as for me and my house, we will serve the LORD.”

The Veggietales performed their skit (which wasn’t seen the day before by the majority of our children), and one of our children’s church leaders treated the kids to several hours of her “fair games”, which included a large Jenga-type game, table soccer, bowling, and several others, which are typically found at traditional fairs in Mexico.

Formal Ladies Banquet

We often use the month of May to plan an event for mothers and ladies. On this occasion, Sara organized a formal dinner for the women of our church and several guests. We had Cheli López, a friend and minister from Mexico City, to minister to the women. She did a wonderful job teaching the Word of God.

It took a team of several people and many hours of planning and work, but the event was done with much excellence. I thank God for Sara and the team of ladies that put so much effort into this banquet.

Online Bible School

Online Bible School courses finished this past week, and the final grades were sent out today, June 7. We praise God for around 90 students who participated in Old Testament and New Testament Surveys, as well as our team of six facilitators who graded assignments and maintained contact with each group of students. We will be starting the next semester of classes in August.

Thanks!

I’d like to take this opportunity to thank each of you who prays for us or supports us. We appreciate you very much. I believe that we are a team, and together we work to reach the harvest in Mexico. May the Lord bless you abundantly!

David and Sara Lont

Dear family, friends and supporters,

Greetings in the name of the Lord. It is good know and serve our Lord and God Jesus Christ! Here is a brief update on some of our activities over the last couple of months.

Online Bible Courses

The week of the Advanced School of Ministry in Cuernavaca was also the week that we opened up enrollment for our online Bible School. Classes started on February 8 with four different courses and around 90 students enrolled from three different countries. We are believing the Lord for spiritual growth in all of our students and for new progress during this year as we record courses with some of the teachers of the Advanced School of Ministry Team. Our prayer is that we may reach hundreds of students throughout Latin America and perhaps Spain and other parts of the Spanish-speaking world.

Ministry in Tlapanaloya

In February, we went as a family to minister in the small town of Tlapanaloya, where Sara and I preached to married couples. Daniel and Anna ministered the praise and worship, while Sara and I taught the group of around 15 to 20 couples. We spoke on “Marital Harmony” using illustrations from music to describe the type of marriage relationship God has designed for us. We enjoyed ministering to this very receptive group and believe the Word of God will produce fruit in these couples and their families.

Visit to McAllen, Texas

Our spiritual mentors, Bill and Gerda Brown, hosted us and the Advanced School of Ministry team in McAllen for a week of planning meetings during the last days of February. We gathered with the team in a conference room to pray, review and plan for next year’s conference. It was a great time of refreshing for us and the team. We now have our plans and theme for the Advanced School of Ministry conference in January, 2018.

Couples coffees

Over the last several months we have been doing a series of meetings for married couples with an emphasis on Biblical teaching on marriage. We have had many new couples join us for these meetings, and several of them have also come to church on Sundays as a result of these meetings. We are concluding this series in April.

Looking to the harvest

As I have been seeking the Lord and studying, I’ve been feeling that the time of a greater harvest for Mexico is coming. We have been working in the local church for many years now, but we also believe that our local church is called to plant other churches. We believe that the time to do this is coming, so we’re working on plans for evangelism and outreach events in an effort to make this happen.

Our first outreach at this time will be in Tlapanaloya, where we will be doing evangelism with children and their parents in a special event for the children. This will be done in cooperation with the local church that we are helping there. After that, we plan on doing other evangelistic events in a community just outside Tulancingo where we hope to soon plant a new church.

Prayer requests

Please continue to pray for us, our family, and the ministry activities we are involved in. Here are some specific requests.

• Please pray for the Lord’s direction as we prepare to work on a new harvest and a new church plant.
• Please pray for our sons, David and Daniel, as they prepare for what the Lord has for their future.
• Please pray for Sara, as she has been experiencing a few health problems.

Thanks so much for your prayers!

P.S. This update and other information is available online at www.desert-streams.org.

Dear family, friends and supporters,

Greetings from Mexico! We are happy to report to you about our recent activities and ministry here in Mexico. Here are a few highlights of what has been going on with us over the last couple of months.

Christmas Dinner and Program

This past December, our church once again put on a small Christmas program and a dinner for the congregation. We rented a large tent that covered the entire parking lot outside, opened up the curtains on the building and used the entire space, both inside and outside, for seating and tables.

We started our service with a few worship songs, after which I gave a short message on the Christmas story. Then it was time for the children to participate.

Our children’s church leaders, Sergio and Andrea, did a good job of organizing a program of songs and small spoken parts, which the children sang and recited. All the parents were so happy to watch their children as they participated in the program. Some of the parents invited other family members to come and see their children perform. The entire children’s church staff worked hard on the scenery and the rehearsals, getting all the details ready.

After the program, we rearranged the auditorium to set up tables both inside and outside for our dinner. Many families participated in the preparation of traditional Mexican Christmas dishes. Thankfully, there was enough food for everyone.

Then, it was time for the piñatas. Colorful piñatas full of treats were suspended in the auditorium, and the children and young people took turns by age group, breaking them open.

Book translation and preparation of material

Also in December, Anna finished the translation of Bill Scheidler’s book. After going through numerous revisions, we sent the book for publishing shortly after Christmas. It was printed and sold at the Advanced School of Ministry conference in Cuernavaca during the third week of January. We congratulate Anna for a job well done.

While Anna worked on the book, I worked on the manuals for the Advanced School of Ministry. We create two versions of this book – one for the teachers and another slightly modified version for the students. The main differences between the two versions is the fact that the student’s version contains blanks for them to fill while listening to the sessions, while the teacher’s version contains the words that go into those blanks, as well as other additional Scripture verses and other information. After more than three months working on these books, we finally sent them for printing the first week of January.

Both the book by Bill Scheidler and the conference manuals turned out very well. Our son, David Jeremiah, designed the cover art for both of them.

Advanced School of Ministry

Soon it was time for the Advanced School of Ministry conference in Cuernavaca. This annual conference for pastors, leaders, and others who serve in local churches all across Mexico, attracted around 1,000 people for almost every state of Mexico and several others for the United States. We had a very good attendance. There were even pastors from Cuba who were able to attend this time. Our theme for this year’s conference was “Ignited in Him”.

Our keynote speaker, Bill Scheidler, did a series of six sessions on topics including the Apostolic Ministry and Ministry Ignited by the Holy Spirit. His book on the apostolic ministry was offered as complementary material and was one of the homework assignments for the students who are working on the bachelor degree program.

We had some wonderful evenings of worship led by two worship bands, one for the local church in Cuernavaca, and the other from a large church in Mexico City. The entire Advanced School of Ministry team participated in the teaching sessions. Even Gerda Brown, who was not able to attend because of health issues, had a “representative” that read her “Spoons full of sugar”, which she annually gives during the conference. The pastors and leaders took home the 200+ page manual, which many of them will be using to train their own leaders and minister in their own churches.

It is a wonderful blessing for us to be a part of this great team and ministry. Now we are looking forward to our annual planning session, which will be held the end of this month. During this time, we will gather with Bill and Gerda Brown and the entire team to pray and plan next year’s conference.

Prayer requests

Please continue to pray for us, our family, and the ministry activities we are involved in. Here are some specific requests.

• Please pray for the Lord’s hand of blessing and safety on our family. In the midst of much instability in Mexico, we know that the Lord is with us!
• Please pray for Bill and Gerda Brown and their health issues. Please pray for the supernatural strength and vigor of the Lord upon their lives.
• Please pray for our sons, David and Daniel, as they prepare for what the Lord has for their future. David plans on attending college in Michigan and Daniel may possibly go to Bible School in Oregon.

Thanks so much for your prayers!

David and Sara Lont

P.S. This update and other information is available online at www.desert-streams.org.

Women’s Conference in Veracruz

On Thanksgiving Day, Sara and a group of about 20 ladies from our church headed to the city of Veracruz for a women’s conference. Sara was one of the guest speakers for the conference together with Pastor Marjorie Mondragón (from the large church in Cuernavaca) and Pastor Paty Mora, of the local church in Veracruz. Together, the three of them ministered to a group of around 500 women who had gathered from several states in the region for a time of worship, prayer, teaching and other ministry.

Sara gave several conferences and her ministry was very well received. Also, the group of ladies who accompanied her were very blessed and came back with a renewed desire to serve the Lord.

Ministry in Querétaro and Monterrey

Sara and I had the rare opportunity to both be ministering at the same time in different cities. Sara preached in Monterrey while I was on a trip to Querétaro. We hadn’t exactly planned it this way, rather we had planned to be together in Querétaro with Pastor Martín Álvarez. However, our son, David Jeremiah, decided to take an entry exam at a university in Monterrey, and Sara went along with him on that trip, which was on the same weekend during which we were supposed to be ministering together in Querétaro.

Our friends and pastors Humberto and Rome Trejo received David Jeremiah and Sara into their home and asked Sara to minister in their church on Sunday. At the same time, I took Daniel and Anna with me to Querétaro and preached there at the church’s anniversary celebration.

Sara and David Jeremiah spend a few days in the area and were also able to take a short trip to the U.S. border, where they had breakfast with our dear friends and spiritual mentors Bill and Gerda Brown.

Couples Coffees

Over the last couple of months we have been organizing a series of meetings for married couples with the title “Marriage – Design and Life”. Here’s how they work: Each table in our auditorium has a host couple who is in charge of inviting guests and following up on them. Our church provides the cake and coffee, the youth group is in charge of serving, and our leaders of the setup and teardown. The meetings are held the first Saturday of each month with a focus on building a Godly marriage.

Our first meeting went very well. The auditorium was almost full. Jaime and Aracely Marmolejo, pastors from Mexico City, shared a very animated message from the Word about marriage. They did team teaching, each taking turns on different subjects.

Our second meeting was held the first Saturday of December, and on this occasion Sara and I shared about the “Family Garden”, a theme comparing the family and marriage to planting and caring for a garden.

In both meetings we had many new couples, many of which had never gone to a church before. We pray that there may be lasting fruit in their lives and that these events continue to serve to advance the cause of the Kingdom of God.

Book Translation

Our daughter, Anna, recently completed a book translation which will be printed and used at the Advanced School of Ministry conference in January, as one of the homework assignments. The book, written by Bible teacher Bill Scheidler in English many years ago, is about the ministry of the Apostles. Anna worked very hard on the translation during the months of September, October, November, and part of December. I went through her translation and edited it, but found that she did an incredible job, especially considering that this is her first translation and she is only 14 years old! I’ve had a couple of other people read through it to find errors and make corrections, but Anna has done about as well as any translator I’ve worked with!

David Jeremiah designed the book cover, so in many ways it was a family “team” effort. We pray this book will be a blessing for many of the pastors and leaders who attend the conference next month.

Dear friends, family and supporters,

We’d like to take this opportunity to share a little with you about what we’ve been doing during the last couple of months. Besides our regular activities in church, we’ve taken a couple of trips and done ministry in other areas.

Men’s conference in Veracruz

In August, Sara and I traveled together to the city of Veracruz to minister at a men’s conference with Pastor Gamaliel Mora and his wife, Paty. Sara and Paty became good friends when they visited Cuba together last year, and although the invitation was for a men’s conference, Sara went along to spend a little time with Paty.

We had an excelente conference with the men of the local church and several other area churches which were also invited to attend. I ministered several times during the conference, which began Friday night and went all day Saturday.

It was very hot in the church building, which is new and didn’t have air conditioners installed yet. This is the first time in many months that I’ve ministered with such heat and humidity.

After the conference, I stayed to preach in the church on Sunday morning, after which we spent some valuable time with Pastor Gama and his wife. We had some delicious fish for lunch and enjoyed the evening with them.

The following Monday morning Sara and I flew back to Mexico City. We had a great time ministering in Veracruz. Sara will be going back in November to be a speaker at a women’s conference. Hopefully for her, this next time it won’t be so hot!

Advanced School of Ministry in Chicago

We also had the blessing of teaching at the Advanced School of Ministry in the city of Chicago. This was our fifth and final Advanced School of Ministry conference in Chicago. We enjoyed our time with a group of Hispanic pastors and leaders, teaching them the material that we did here in Mexico a few years ago. This conference was held in Southern Chicago at the church known as “El Verbo de Dios”.

On this occasion we were able to take our three teenage children with us to visit with my parents in Michigan. They stayed with their grandparents while Sara and I ministered in the conference. When the conference was over, we drove back to Michigan and spent about a week with the family. It was definitely a blessed time and we made memories we won’t ever forget.

Online Bible School

We began a new four months of online Bible School courses in September. This time we are working on three different courses and have around 80 students enrolled. Although it is quite a bit of work, we believe the investment with these students will reap an eternal harvest.

Preparing material

During this time of the year I begin all the preparation work for the Advanced School of Ministry conference in Cuernavaca. January’s conference will be titled “Ignited in Him”, and we believe God will ignite a fire for Christ and His work within the hearts of the pastors and leaders who will attend the conference.

I am starting to work on the student notebook, Anna is translating a book by our keynote speaker, which will be published for the conference, and David Jeremiah is helping me with the design of mailers. Sara and I will also soon be working on our own sessions for the conference.

Thanks!

We appreciate your prayers and support.

In His love,

David and Sara Lont and family

Greetings!

Hello, friends, family, and supporters.

We would like to share with you a little about our work here in Mexico during the last couple of months.

Discipleship Class

Throughout the Spring of this year we met with a group of about 12 people for a series of discipleship classes. We would meet with them for a couple of hours each Tuesday evening, have a light supper together, teach on the basic Christian disciplines, and pray with them. Our group was very successful, and we finished the three month program without losing any group members. One of the couples even had a baby during this time, but they soon came back to continue the course with us.

Out of this group the Lord has provided a couple to be our children’s church leaders and another couple that is now serving along side our youth leader and his wife. Some of the others are also involved in serving in the church, and two of the newer young Christians in our group made the decision to be baptized. We praise God for the fruit this group has produced.

Online Bible School

Our Online Bible School finished its first publicly offered course in July. With just under 60 students enrolled from around Mexico and beyond, and four course facilitators, this was the largest online course we’ve ever tried to offer. The course went very well with the majority of the students finishing the first part of the Old Testament Survey. We look forward to offering the second part of the Old Testament Survey online starting in September.

We are also working on new material. Our New Testament Survey in making progress, and we’ll probably be offering that course soon, as well. I plan to do videos of more courses in the coming months.

We believe the Online Bible School will be a blessing to many Christian pastors and leaders around Mexico and perhaps other nations in the future.

David’s High School Graduation

In June, our oldest son, David Jeremiah, graduated from Lighthouse Christian Academy High School. We were very blessed to attend his graduation ceremony near Nashville, Tennessee, together with my parents, who traveled there from Michigan. We spent the first couple of days in the Nashville area and then traveled toward Mammoth Caves after the graduation.

David had worked very hard this last year to graduate with honors. After many hours of study and two attempts at the ACT, he finally completed the requirements for the honors program.

Youth Camp

We are just back from a great youth camp with the young people of our church. The group of about 30 spent three days and two nights at a property near Huasca, about 45 minutes from Tulancingo. Sara and I taught Biblical principles of relationships, including the importance of our relationship with the Lord, friendships, relationships with authority figures, and romantic relationships and dating. We had a total of about seven hours of teaching during the three days.

The kids really enjoyed their time at the camp. There was a swimming pool and plenty of room for fun and games. These young people even enjoyed the pool, although the weather around here was quite cool.

All three of our children (David, Daniel, and Anna) participated in the camp. That left Sara and I with a little extra time together, which we enjoyed.

New Children’s Facility

We are happy to report that we now have a new facility for our children’s church ministry. Located just a couple of properties from our church, it is a very convenient location as opposed to our previous facility which was several blocks away. In less than two minutes we can walk from one building to the other.

We inaugurated the building in June and now the kids are enjoying this new ministry area. Besides moving to a new location, we have started a new season of ministry for the children with new leaders. Sergio and Andrea have taken the leadership of the children’s church ministry, and Sara is now getting more involved in the supervision of this area.

Prayer Requests

We would like to ask you to pray for the following:

• For our youth leaders, Ricardo and his wife Tania.
• For our children’s church leaders, Sergio and his wife Andrea
• For our trip to Veracruz August 12-15, where I will be teaching at a men’s retreat
• For wisdom for David Jeremiah, as he decides where to study

Thanks!

We appreciate your prayers and support.

In His love,

David and Sara Lont and family

You may know that we have been working on putting together an online Bible School program. This program is designed to allow students in any location to study Bible classes in an online group setting. The program includes video presentations, written notes, quizzes, forums, and other tools to help the students learn the material.

After doing several test runs with our local congregation, we have now officially opened the classes on a broader level. We currently have about 60 students, most of whom are from Mexico, with a few hispanics living in the U.S.  Several of our students are pastors, worship leaders and youth leaders. I am teaching “Old Testament Survey” online with the help of several “facilitators” who help grade student work.

We hope to continue expanding the program and reach out to more students, perhaps someday throughout Latin America or even beyond, with a broad range of Bible courses. We pray that these courses will equip our students to do the work of the ministry.

April 30 is known as “Children’s Day” in Mexico. As a church, we did a couple of special events for Children’s Day this year.

First of all, we began a mission in a poor community up on the hills above Tulancingo several months ago. One of our leaders, Gabriel, and his wife, Silvana, are in charge of this outreach. They organized a game day for all the children of the area, with activities such as rallies, a movie theater in a tent with a Christian cartoon, marble games, and several others.  Our church also gave away kites and other toys to the children.

After the kids played, we had a few minutes of worship, and then I spoke briefly to them and the parents who were present about the need to open their hearts to Jesus Christ.

After the message, all were invited to eat together. A team of ladies had prepared food for everyone.

The following Sunday, we had our church’s local celebration of Children’s Day with pizzas, race cars, and inflatables.

Lk. 18:16 But Jesus called the children to him and said, Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of God belongs to such as these. (NIV)

We are investing in the lives of children, because the kingdom of God belongs to such as these. Our church is working on a new children’s facility which is only three buildings from the building where we hold are services for the adults, and soon we will have children’s services in the new children’s center. There are many young couples with children in our church, and some of the kids do not attend children’s church, since our current children’s building is several block away. We look forward to soon having a better place for them to worship, learn about God’s Word, and give their lives to the Lord.

During the month of April, we had several opportunities to minister, including an invitation to preach in the “Spring of Life” church in Pachuca. We had met the pastor a few years ago, while ministering in another church. He and his wife expressed an interest in the Advanced School of Ministry seminars in Cuernavaca, and they have been attending for the past two years.

It was the church’s twenty-first anniversary celebration, and I was the guest speaker for the Sunday service. After the service, we all ate a meal together in the church’s dining area. Pastor Onésimo Torres and his wife were very hospitable and we enjoyed being with them and their church.

 

We had a very interesting ministry visit to Real del Monte, the village where Sara was born. Pastor Cirilo invited me to preach to their young church on Sunday evening, March 20, for a special service in which they were celebrating the second year anniversary of their worship team. A couple of months before this, we had visited him and his wife to invite them to the Advanced School of Ministry conference in Cuernavaca. At that time, they had told us that they were meeting outside of town on a rustic property that used to be a chicken farm. We headed to the service believing we would probably be meeting outside under a tent or in a barn or something similar. What a surprise when we arrived and found a beautifully finished church building!

Pastor Cirilo was very touched by the teaching at the Advanced School of Ministry conference and felt the Lord speaking to his heart about their church building. When he returned, he got the people together, raised money, and had the old chicken farm completely remodeled and converted into a nice church building in just over a month.

The night was filled with music, both modern praise and worship songs as well as some of the old classic Mexican praise songs. Two traditional Mariachi groups also participated in the service, which was almost full to capacity. I preached about the importance of praise and worship, and then the congregation praised and sang for another hour. After the five-hour service, we all had a late fellowship dinner together. It was a real blessing to see the unity and great atmosphere in this little church in Real del Monte.