Now let me tell you a little more about Hector. About a year and a half ago I had the privilege of baptizing him and his wife, Isabel. Hector and their oldest daughter, Lupita, sew sheets and bedspreads at home using cloth remnants that they buy from factories and fabric stores when the price is right. Isabel sells them door-to-door and on the street, wherever she can find customers.

They are a very united and hardworking family that is just barely getting by economically, complicated by Hector’s physical problems (gout, high blood pressure, etc.). Sometimes he is tempted to augment their meager income by practicing spiritism. Before he accepted Christ, people would pay him incredible sums of money to do “trabajos” (jobs), usually related to having success in business or removing a curse that someone else had placed on them.

Just one good “trabajo”, involving about 30 minutes of his time, would provide two or three times the money they make sewing in one month. What would you do if you were living in poverty, trying to put food on the table, clothe your family and send your kids to school and were faced with a temptation like that to make some “easy” money that would immediately solve your economic needs?

Pray for Hector and Isabel that they will stand firm and continue to “seek first His kingdom and His righteousness” (Matthew 6:33-34), trusting the Lord to provide for their needs. And pray for their safety because the gang that Carlos was in has their headquarters right next door to their house. Gang members have thrown bags of drugs and guns into their backyard and jumped the flimsy wooden fence that to escape from police. Recently the members of one of the churches that supports out ministry provided the money to buy galvinized sheets so that a high, sturdy wall could be built between Hector’s house and the gang hangout.. They are very thankful and determined to be a light for Jesus in their “barrio”.