By Hand

Could you imagine building a church or a house with no electric tools?  Each week, we have a crew of about 12 men who are laboring away at the construction of Faith Bible Church . . . by hand.  By hand they have:

• made over 1000 hollow blocks;
• dug 22 “holes” for the footing of 22 cement columns.  Each hole, they removed 100 cubic feet of dirt;
• cut hundreds of rebar;
• bent rebar for footings, foundations, and columns;
• mixed over 200 bags of cement, all by hand.

As of last Friday, all the footings, foundations, and columns have been poured.  Walls are now being constructed and a perimeter cement beam is now being prepared and hopefully finished within four weeks.  Again, all by hand.

At the same time, steel trusses are being made in “town”.  Lord willing, the installation of the trusses and roof will begin in May.  This part of the construction, we have needed to contract out and have someone in town make and install the trusses and roof. 

We ask you all to put your hands together and thank God for His provision and please pray for the salvation of the crew.  Most of the workers are unbelievers and still don’t know Jesus as their Savior.  Every Friday afternoon, we gather the workers together and share the Good News with them.  Over the years, we have had several evangelistic outreaches in the village, which are attended by mostly women.  So, in a way we are excited to have a “men’s” meeting.  However, these men really don’t choose to come to hear the Gospel message, but to finally get their pay for the week.  Please pray that these men will desire to attend the Bible study and hopefully trust in Jesus Christ as their Savior.  Wouldn’t it be great if once the church is built, some of these workers will be sitting inside it every Sunday with us?