| CCCU / WGM Begins Ministry in El Salvador |
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 David & Debbie Hawk “This will give us a chance to broaden our borders as well as give us new ministry opportunities,” said WGM Central America Regional Director Tim Hawk. David and Debbie Hawk will serve as part of a team sent by the Honduran Holiness Church to Jucuapa, a town of about 37,000 people located on the eastern side of El Salvador. Two large cities are located minutes away from Jucuapa and numerous villages stand between them. Therefore, nearly 300,000 people live in close proximity to this new ministry. Members of the ministry team include Honduran pastors sent as missionaries as well as short-term volunteers from Honduras and the United States. “This is really more than a partnership,” Tim Hawk added. “It is a team effort. We would actually like for our Honduran co-workers to take the lead.” David and Debbie will work closely with Pastor Jose Manuel (Tony) Martinez, a graduate of WGM’s El Sembrador Bible Institute in Honduras, and his wife, Mariana, in an established local church connected to the Honduran Holiness Church. “Our primary focus will be to capture the vision of the local church that is already there and help expand that vision to strengthen that church and plant other churches in the region,” David Hawk said. The ministry team will partner together under the authority of the Honduran Holiness Church and WGM to work on projects such as church planting, at-risk youth ministries, community development, and education. Nearly 40 percent of El Salvador’s population is under age 14 and many are at risk for gang activity and other temptations. The established Salvadoran church is located within a five-hour drive from WGM’s ministries in Honduras, allowing close mentorship between the ministries. The Hawks plan to move to El Salvador by September 2006 after more preparation with the Honduran Holiness Church. “We have never started a ministry like this, and of course, doing it in a place that is unfamiliar to us is a concern,” said David Hawk. They have other concerns, including the unknowns of moving to a new country like finding housing, education for their children, transportation, and many other necessities. “I would say that the most pressing need is prayer,” said David Hawk. “We believe that if there is to be a movement by the Holy Spirit on this nation it will be because God’s people have prayed.” Before this transition, the family had already faced their fair share of challenges. During their ministry in Honduras, Hurricane Mitch struck, displacing nearly 1 million people and causing more than 12,000 deaths. The Hawks were instrumental in relief and reconstruction efforts. For the last five years, the Hawks have lived at Escuela El Sembrador where David served as the director of the school that ministers to nearly 300 young people on a daily basis. Debbie taught the children of missionaries stationed at El Sembrador. The work in El Salvador will be in a more urban setting than the Honduran town where they lived before, but the Hawks remain faithful to their calling. “It will be hard to get used to a new flag; a new national anthem; thick, small tortillas instead of thin, large ones; and many other things,” David Hawk wrote in a recent newsletter. “It will be a faster paced life…but we are confident that God will use us to reach people for Christ.” |
