Greetings from Mexico,
In May, I got to take the trip of a lifetime to Culiacan Sinaloa! Culiacan is famous for being the hometown for the #1 drug Lord in the past 20 years, El Chapo (who thankfully is sitting in a New York High Security Jail right now)! But much more important than that, is that Culiacan is the home to a Church Plant that has become a sending hub!
I was able to travel to Sinaloa with three pastor friends to meet my good friend and church planter Hugo Limon! Hugo was an assistant Pastor with us many years ago, and we sent him out back in 2015 to church plant in his hometown of Culiacan! Because Culiacan is a state capital city with over 1 million inhabitants, Pastor Hugo had a plan to plant 4 churches in his city from the very beginning!
My trip to Culiacan was to celebrate the completion of Hugo’s vision after just 6 years! While I was in Culiacan we got to ordain Hugo’s newest church planter Mario and witness the inauguration of Calvary Culiacan West! Hugo has now planted four other churches and we got to visit every one of them during our time there. On these visits, we were blessed to sit with and pray for each pastor, and give them a generous financial gift from our church in Rosarito.
Also on this trip, we were blessed to visit our very first 3rd generation church plant! Now you might be wondering, what is a 3rd generation church plant? A 3rd generation church plant is the church plant from a church plant of a church plant! Here’s how that works. We sent out Pastor Hugo in 2015 to plant Calvary Culiacan North! Hugo then sent out his good friend Pastor Valerio to church plant Calvary Culiacan South in 2018! And Pastor Valerio sent out my new friend Pastor Antonio to church plant Calvary Aguaruto on the Sunday we were there.
I was so blessed to ordain Pastor Antonio on Sunday morning at his sending church CCSouth! And then in the afternoon, I had the honor and privilege of teaching at their first official Sunday service! I was filled with thanksgiving as we drove the 45 minutes out of Culiacan to this small agricultural community of Aguaruto. When I arrived at their new church facility I was blown away! Over 125 people were in attendance at their grand opening service! There was joy, happiness, and excitement everywhere as we got to witness our Almighty God do a miracle and give this brand new church an awe inspiring start!
By the end of our 5 day journey, our missions team had visited all 7 of Hugo’s church plants and future church planters that are still in the Home Bible study phase! It was awe inspiring to see the excitement of the people in their churches. Each church plant has accepted the challenge to not only reach their local community, but to be a church planting hub. Each church has committed to send some of their servant leaders to the church planting course that is given at Pastor Hugo’s original church located in North Culiacan.
A special highlight for me was the opportunity to do a two-hour sit-down Question and Answer time with Hugo’s church planting students! I was amazed when over 40 students showed up for the class! (That’s more than we have in our church planting program in Rosarito!) These students came ready to stump me with very difficult questions about every aspect of the church! But the Lord was with me, and we had a wonderful time learning together.
Precious friends, thank you so much for partnering with us and allowing our church to be a sending hub of church planting. The heart of our church planting program is to send out Pastors that will plant churches that are also sending hubs. And that’s exactly what we’re seeing in the churches in Culiacan!
Finally, I want to thank you for partnering with our family and ministry! It is through your prayers that God meets our spiritual needs, and it’s through your financial partnership that God meets our physical needs. We love you and are thankful for you!
Con mucho amor de Mexico, (with much love from Mexico)
Mike, Sarah, Grace, and Daniel
Prayer Requests!
#1- That God would bless Pastor Hugo’s new church plant (Calvary Culiacan West) and our new 3rd generation church plant! (Calvary Auguaruto)
#2- That God would provide for the financial needs of our family, church, and church plants!
Praise Reports!
#1- Praise God that we got to plant our 29th church in May! Please pray for Calvary Chapel La Mina (the mine) and it’s new pastor Ruben!
#2- Praise God that God continues to bring back people to our church here in Rosarito after the Pandemic!
For our personal support, checks should be made out to Saving Grace World Missions with “Vincent support” in the memo section. For special projects, checks should also be made out to Saving Grace World Missions or SGWM, with the project name in the comments section. Mail directly to Saving Grace World Missions, 17451 Bastanchury Rd., Suite 203, Yorba Linda, CA 92886-1873
For your convenience, you may consider giving through electronic funds transfer or direct deposit. Simply click on this link to directly support our family as your missionaries: https://www.egsnetwork.com/gift2/?giftid=DFA990CC09D942B
Or, you can go to our mission’s website, click on the “become a financial partner” button and fill out the information. Please remember to type in “Vincent” in the “purpose of gift” section.