DESEMPRE

Thought you might like to read a letter we received from a man named Oscar who heads up DESEMPRE, a group which frequently uses our property for corporations who desire team building. This particular group was one of the largest pharmaceutical companies in Ecuador. They were here for two days, and camped up on the mountain for the night. One of their activities was as a group figure out how to catch a live chicken and then as a group decide what to do with the chicken, eat it, make it a pet or simply let it go (which meant they did not have dinner that night).

Quito, 13th of June, 2008

This letter is to express a special thanks to all the team from Hacienda El Refugio who helped us during our event on June 5th and 6th.

Your help was very important for the success of the training. We wish to recognize thank everyone of the Hacienda facilitators and staff for being extremely helpful and collaborative with us. Thank you for being such a good example of Christian brothers. In a special way we want to thank the extra effort and time given by Lorena, Juan Carlos, Abby, Howard and Mathew.

Every one of clients was impressed by the organization of the training, and amazed by the beauty of the place. You really are doing a great job at keeping the place in its best shape.

Additionally, I want to let you know that during those days three people of the Sanduchitos Pura Vida Team received Jesus Christ as Savior, and 112 people were exposed to at least some Christian thoughts.

It was great to see our both teams working together as one team, and we look forward to continue to organize events that would glorify God and enhance our professionalism.

Best regards,

Oscar M. Aguirre

GERENTE INTERNACIONAL

DESEMPRE S.A.

Wrap Up from Calacali, Ecuador

Have you ever uttered the words, “There is no way I am going to do such and such?” This is exactly how I know God has a sense of humor, because any time I have the audacity to say that phrase, He always finds a way to draw me to do exactly the “such and such”.

Last year, the suggestion was made that I should take over the kitchen here at HER, of which I promptly replied, “Are you kidding me, I can barely take care of my own kitchen!” And then the conviction and prompting of the Holy Spirit started to settle in.

The first of May, I took over the position of Guest House Manager for an interim period. With this position, I oversee the Kitchen and the cooks, the care and cleaning of Casa Grande and the dorms and finally, the coordinating of the interns here at El Refugio. Proving God does have a sense of humor and He can manage to get a job done, using even the most unlikely people.

For starters, thirty days in May we closed the work team kitchen and thanks to our hard working interns we completely emptied, inventoried, cleaned and painted the kitchen. Our goal was to open for our first group the last weekend in May for La Red, a ministry affiliated with Youth World. From that point on there has been no looking back. Since the first of June, we have hosted the Youth World team for lunch, a training day for the Quito Quest interns, and most recently our first work team of the summer. We have only just begun, by the end of summer, we will have welcomed five more work teams and fourteen Quito Quest Groups. Fun, no really, Fun.

Wrap Up from Calacali, Ecuador

Many exciting things have been happening at El Refugio. We have known our Director Bob Spoolstra and his family will be returning to the states June of 2009. Recognizing the team is in transition, a leadership team has been put into place to navigate the next 14 months. As Director of Operations, Howard will be one of the members on the team. Pray for them as they articulate the vision for El Refugio. Our mission is clear:

A training and retreat center which facilitates a deeper relationship
with Jesus Christ, through nature and outdoor adventure

The team has spent the last several weeks expressing how we as individuals and corporately carry out this mission. Now, the challenge is to articulate what our vision will be for the next year, five years etc. and how we proceed from there.

For a little background, the team here at El Refugio either serves on the Operations or the Programming side. In an effort to integrate these two areas, some training has and will continue to take place. Programming started the training with the whole team this week, illustrating how they train the facilitators who serve with us. Juan Carlos Cevallos, our new Program Director has developed a program for young Ecuadorians to come and serve as facilitators at El Refugio for our many retreats and programs. For those of us on the Operations side this was a very beneficial time.

Juan Carlos and Paul Reichert, who is now our Program Developer, explained how they teach the facilitators how to use Experiential Education with the different groups. This starts with Experience, then reflection, generalization and finally application. Basically it is: What – So What – Now What. The idea is the experience should change you. If you step out into the front of a bus and it almost hits you and the next day you do the same, you have not learned anything. However, if the next day you look both ways, the experience has left you a better and wiser person. Which is exactly what our high and low rope elements are designed to achieve when a person participates in each activity, teach the individual something about themselves and hopefully they will grow.

Biblically, this is illustrated how Christ spent time with the disciples. If you will peruse through any of the gospels, and notice when Jesus sat the disciples down and “debriefed” with them after an encounter. He did this, so that by the time He ascended into heaven, each disciple was prepared for their individual ministries, to the extent each one died professing their belief in Jesus Christ as their personal Lord and Savior. I challenge you to look through the scriptures and see examples of this concept, What – So What – Now What. As always, we understand and appreciate we could not be serving here without the love and support of so many of you.

As God is our Refuge, Mary, for the Scholl family

Wrap Up from Calacali, Ecuador

While technically, we are in our “slow” season, many things have been happening here at El Refugio, both on the operations and programming side of things.

First, at the end of January we experienced our first Youth World Annual Meetings. The speaker spoke each day from Matthew 5, the Sermon on the Mount. I would encourage you to find a copy of “The Message”; this translation provides an interesting perspective on a timeless message.

Each day we heard reports from the different areas of ministry, which was both encouraging and sobering to hear the events of the last year. I would encourage you to look up www.youthworld.org.ec and browse around the website to learn about the various ministries we serve with here in Quito. One interesting note, our team now has 54 members with a projection of 60 by the end of this year. This number includes full time missionaries, term missionaries and interns. As you can imagine, with that many people, this provides countless opportunities for ministry to happen in diverse ways.

The month of January and first of February were a blur for our operations team. They worked fast and furiously to finish up the PTC (Professional Training Center). As you know they have been working on this project for the last seven months. The goal was to finish it by the Leader Mundial Global Summit. They came really close. In fact many from the team came out and pitched in with sanding, varnishing and painting. By the time the meetings took place, the great room was pretty much done, with only some minor things still needed to be done. The result was that 26 men from 9 different countries came end enjoyed a week of instruction in their very own training center.

Programming has been equally as busy. They started the month of January with a team of young women from Gordon College who came to train in emergency procedures both for themselves and our team here. They also worked on cutting some new trails, down in the cloud forest near our property which will be used by future teams. Last week a group of Ecuadorian leaders from a church in Guayaquil came and trained with our team. Then this week they returned with 30 youth from their church to participate in the full camp activities. Several Saturdays we have had groups out here and today, in fact, we have a Quito Quest group from Northern California doing a work project.

Next week we will celebrate our one year anniversary. Hard to believe a year has passed and yet, at times it feels like we have been here a life time. God is good and eternally faithful. Please realize how much we appreciate each of you and understand we could not be here without your support, spiritually, emotionally and financially. Remember, we love to hear from you and about your lives as well.

As God is our Refuge, Mary for the Scholl Family

Traditions ~ Culture ~ Family

Wrap Up from Calacali, Ecuador January 2007

The three older kids were able to join us for Christmas. Although the time went far too quickly, I can say we enjoyed every minute. We continued many of our regular family traditions and added some new ones. There is an Ecuadorian tradition to hand out “Navidads” to the children. On Christmas day, while the Cline family (fellow missionaries and friends) were driving out to have Christmas dinner with us, they noticed a ton of kids lined on the road for their Navidads. We knew we had a bunch of beanie babies up in storage, left from groups this last summer. So we loaded up both our cars and just started driving. When we saw kids on the road we would stop and give them a beanie baby. One little boy told Howard, “Now Christmas has finally come!” We all agreed this is a tradition we want to continue.

We also had a good time “viewing” things through our kid’s eyes. One humorous Ecuadorian habit is to turn the flashers on their car whenever they need to do something out of the ordinary. Doesn’t matter if what they are doing is illegal, if they have their flashers on, it’s OK. We saw cars on the wrong side of the road backing up, to a car triple park. No worries, though, because they had their flashers on.

On New Years Eve day Howard and the kids were able to climb Guagua Pichincha (15,692 ft). Feeling confident a week later Howard, Nicole and Kevin climbed Iliniza Norte (16,815 ft). The altitude really affected Kevin, when they descended he said that would be enough climbing for him, no thanks he didn’t need to try Cotopaxi (19,388 ft), one of the world’s highest active volcanoes. Maybe next year.

Finally, thought you might enjoy a picture of Nicole and the young man she is going to marry. His name is Jay Kimbler and they will be married on March 28, 2008. Jay is a great guy and we are hopeful for these two and the future God has in store for them. Currently, Jay is employed in Visalia, CA. as a Herd health manager for a club calf operation. They raise cattle for 4H and FFA show animals. Pray for them as they make decisions about their future together.

We appreciate each of you and are constantly reminded how much we rely on you.

As God is our Refuge, Mary for the Scholl Family