NIMA Prayer Request:

Morning Glory Christian School is asking for your prayers as a Board of Directors is being formed to serve and advance the ministry. The Board will give much needed support to Lori so that she can focus on her daily activities at the school. The Board will also serve alongside Herb Pinney and relieve him of many of the duties that he has single-handedly juggled for many years. We know that God will bless our efforts to further His Kingdom. The goal is to have the Board in place by January 2014. Please pray for this important development!

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Morning Glory Christmas Catelog

Give a gift that makes a difference! Honor someone you love by giving on their behalf!
You can share Christ’s love with your friends in Guatemala this holiday season… Look inside for great ways to be a part of the ministry at Morning Glory!

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A Legacy of Hope

Lori Nij, Colegio Cristiano Mañana Gloriosa, San Raymundo, Guatemala

Thirteen years ago when I walked into that first run-down classroom of village children at what was to become MORNING GLORY CHRISTIAN SCHOOL, I was astonished by the apathy and hopelessness in the expressions of those children. Most of them lived in the homes around the school, spent their mornings working in the fields, firecracker factories, or in their home, and studied in the afternoons. The children wore ragged clothes and everything about them screamed poverty. Their parents saw no value in education and the only important thing in their lives was the food on the table today. For the first three years of Morning Glory it was a constant battle with the parents to allow the children to come to school and to stay in school, especially the little girls. Culturally in Guatemala the role of a woman is to get married or live with a man and spend her life serving him and her children. You don’t have to have much book learning to gather wood, cook, wash clothes by hand and be an unpaid servant. The woman´s role is so ingrained in culture that it is part of the marriage ceremony. After the traditional service and dinner the women and mother-in-law take the bride into the kitchen and instruct her on her role. Then as a symbol of her station in life, her wedding veil is removed and an apron is placed over her wedding dress. Over and over I would battle with the parents, and in those first years I lost most of the battles. One little girl was especially bright. She was different from the other children in that she had a dream.

She wanted more than anything else to be a teacher. She wanted to read and learn. But her mom and dad saw no value in her dream and they sure weren’t going to pay any money for her to go to school. When I met Vilma she was nine years old and in first grade. She was one of the brightest children in my class. She loved coming to school and loved learning. She would read any book that I could find for her to read and spend every free minute asking me questions about the world.

But there was one drawback. Vilma had to work to pay for her food and contribute to her family welfare. Every morning Vilma would get up really early, carry a wooden box full of tomatoes into the marketplace in San Raymundo, and sell her tomatoes to anyone who would buy them. Many times I would go to the market only to find Vilma sitting on the sidewalk surrounded by tomatoes, doing her homework between customers. After fourth grade, MORNING GLORY CHRISTIAN SCHOOL moved to all morning classes. Many of the other children from the village dropped out of school. The parents simply would not consider the loss of income from the children not working. Vilma’s mom was one of those parents. She wasn´t going to lose the money from the tomatoes nor pay absolutely anything for Vilma to go to school, something she considered completely useless. I argued and argued with her, finally convinced her to let Vilma stay in school if she still brought in the same amount of money selling in the afternoon and if I paid for all the notebooks, uniform and everything Vilma would need. Not only did I agree, but I funded a second box of tomatoes for Vilma to sell. The agreement was she would sell Mom’s tomatoes first and put aside the money she had to take to Mom. She would then sell the second box that I provided for her and the profit from that box was to go into a piggy bank for Vilma´s school expenses. And sell tomatoes she did; not only did she sell tomatoes every afternoon but she maintained some of the highest grades at Morning Glory.

Time came and went and Vilma graduated with honors from Morning Glory. But by now she was selling four boxes of tomatoes every day, two for mom and two for the piggy bank. I talked to the director of the public secondary school and he agreed to give Vilma one of the government scholarships available to pay the parents of working children to allow them to go to school. For three years I followed Vilma through secondary school. We would always buy the tomatoes we used in our home from her to help her out. I was so proud when she graduated with honors from secondary school.

Then I lost track. Vilma dropped off the map; when I asked about her, her mom would only say she was working in Guatemala City. So for five years I neither saw her nor heard anything about her.

Then last Monday morning after the end-of-year parent meeting, I was just kind of sitting there catching my breath. It had been a hard morning. It is never pleasant to have to tell a mom that her child has failed the year. No matter how many times I have warned them, they always seem to think that a miracle will happen at the last moment. Some moms can get pretty angry and tell me what I am going to live and die of. This had been one such morning. Two moms were extremely angry and I had to confront them with their own failure. If they never had time for their children… if they were too busy to make sure that the child did his homework or to even attend the multiple times I had called them to my office, why did they think I could or even would work an eleventh-hour save? Even though three hundred plus moms were happy and grateful, those two angry moms pretty much ruined my morning.

Then Tabi walked in with a beautiful young woman in full Mayan dress. Her face looked familiar but I just couldn’t place her. She looked at me, smiling when she realized that I didn´t recognize her. Then she spoke and it dawned on me. Standing before me was Vilma, the tomato girl. She proudly handed me a folder and said, “Miss Lori, I have come to ask you for a job.” As I opened her folder the tears began to roll down my face. Vilma had graduated with honors from one of the top public teaching schools in Guatemala City as a fully certified preschool teacher. And here she stood before me, confident and all grown up–the little girl who sat outside the market on the sidewalk, surrounded by tomatoes doing her schoolwork.

As she saw my tears, she began to cry. Then Heyson, my director, who had been her fifth grade teacher, began to cry… and pretty soon we were all crying. During those years that she was gone she had spent a year working and saving to pay for her school, three years studying and the last year working and earning enough to build a small room behind her mom’s house to come home to live. She hugged me ever-so-tightly and handed me her diploma and said these words: “This is for you. If it had not been for you, your encouragement, and the opportunity that MORNING GLORY CHRISTIAN SCHOOL gave me I would be like my friends that live around here. Old before my time, mother to a handful of children and living the hopeless life of poverty that they live. Thank you for believing in me, for teaching me to believe in myself, for fighting with my parents, and most of all, thank you for the chance you gave me. I would love to work for you because I dream of teaching little girls like me that there is hope, and with God’s help and lots of hard work they can reach for the stars and make it. I want to pass on the legacy of hope that you gave me.”

“Legacy of Hope.” What beautiful words… meaningful and profound, yet simple. A legacy of Hope is the promise of Morning Glory. Psalm 30 says, “Weeping may remain for a night, but rejoicing comes in the morning… You turned my sadness into dancing. You removed my sackcloth and clothed me with joy.” The darkness of poverty and ignorance lasts but a moment but morning comes with learning and God’s glory dawns bright and joyful.

If you ever doubt that the money you send or the prayers you say are significant, I ask you to remember Vilma, the little girl that sold tomatoes in the market… now a confident, educated teacher and a strong woman of God. If it was just one life saved it would be worth it, but like Vilma are hundreds of others–girls and boys, now young women and young men whose lives have been changed, whose horizons loom bright and hopeful. Lives YOU have touched, lives you have changed. Indeed it is a LEGACY OF HOPE.

Post note: You better believe I will move heaven and earth to find a way to hire this young woman.

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NIMA Notice:

Mary Beeks is taking over as director of Sponsor/Student relationship. Rob will continue to be our chief recruiter. All information requests are to be sent to Mary at: E-mail: mary_e_beeks@yahoo.com, Snail mail: 3848 Walden Way, Dallas, TX 75287

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Have You Seen The Vision?

Shannon Slee, Quincy, Illinois

It isn’t always easy to see the bigger picture, is it? As followers of Jesus, God almost always challenges us to step out in faith even when we can’t see where His path is going to end up.

For Old Testament Jews, that meant believing that the one true God they served would one day send them a Savior. For the Magi, it meant worshiping a baby Whose ministry to save the world had only just begun. For Jesus’ disciples after His crucifixion, that looked like trusting in Him even when they hadn’t seen the empty grave or met their resurrected Friend and Lord. In the early church, and even in many countries today, it often means facing persecution and even death with nothing more tangible than the hope of an eternal reward. In my sheltered, cozy life, it means loving and investing in two tiny, helpless humans with the faith that one day they will honor God and glorify His name by serving Him and others in His name. For Lori and others at Morning Glory, I know it means powering through difficult days with the belief that all of their efforts will have incredible payoffs in the lives of the students and their families. It may take months or years or even decades to see the fruit, but time and time again God has come through.

When Herb sent me this picture of the two-room building that will serve the students of the secondary school, my first thought was how rough it looked. But then I remembered that I have seen the vision of Morning Glory as it fits into the mission of the all-powerful God of the universe. In each of the three times I have had the privilege to travel to Guatemala on short-term mission trips, I have seen the incredible progress that has been made in every interval between. Because I have seen this vision, I know that in what seems like the blink of an eye, this run-down building will be cleaned up and fixed up and filled with scores of students, hungry for knowledge and being equipped to contribute to their community and the community of God. I’m so grateful for the inspiration they provide those of us who know and love them. Even if you don’t get to see the results in person, know that our God is one who works all things together for our good and will accomplish the challenge He has begun.

I’m excited to be able to contribute to the realization of the vision this Christmas through a gift from the Morning Glory Christmas Catalog. I will be giving a gift in honor of my parents, whose godly influence played the role in my life that Lori and Morning Glory Christian School play in the lives of hundreds of children and their families in the Llano, San Raymundo, and the surrounding areas in Guatemala. If you’ve seen the vision, I sure hope you’ll consider doing the same.

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NIMA Notice:

Attention Morning Glory short-term mission trip alumni! Dean Pinney is going to be heading up the formation of the Morning Glory “kitchen cabinet,” a group of past visitors who will weigh in, give financial support, and pray for the ongoing development of the ministry in Guatemala. We look forward to your valuable participation!

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Team Work: A Big Job Takes A Big Team

Herb Pinney, Agapé Christian Church, Las Cruces, New Mexico

In 2000 B.C., a trade road from Tibet transported borax ore to the city of Babylon; in 800 A.D., on the silk-road, borax, a very expensive ore, came into Europe, and then Marco Polo brought borax back to Italy to use in very expensive porcelain. The European glass makers used borax to harden glass and make it able to withstand extreme temperatures. Borax was used in gold refining. It was very expensive.

In the 1880s the world’s largest deposit of borax was found in the Panamint Mountains on the west side of Death Valley in the Mojave Desert of California. This ore is very heavy and the new mother lode was 165 miles from the nearest rail head.

Thus begun the race to be able to carry tons of ore over dusty desert trails of sand and rock; all efforts proved unsuccessful until in 1883 a mule skinner named Francis Marion Smith hitched 18 big Missouri mules and two horses to a hardwood wagon that could haul ten tons of borax ore at a time, with water tanks in train behind the ore truck, and began to successfully haul the ore. Each trip took ten days to get the ten tons of valuable rock across the desert trail on to market.

The trip was in temperatures that reached 125 degrees fahrenheit during the day in the summer time; in winter freezing weather and cold winds blew down from the 14,000-foot Sierra Nevada wall of rock just to the west.

During the years of 20-mule team transport, not a single break-down happened on the trips, nor was a single animal lost on the treks. A modern invention replaced the mules in the 1890s; a steam engine named “Dinah” that promptly broke down, and was hauled back to town by the mules Dinah replaced.

Then a railroad spur was laid and borax became plentiful to the world market as laundry and hand soap, marketed as 20-Mule Team Borax; a natural product with no side effects as laundry soap, a successful roach killer, and a hundred other uses in the growing market of ideas in the United States (Shannon makes her cloth diaper detergent with it!).

Then came space travel, and the boron from the rock borax became triethylborne and was JP 7 fuel for the Pratt-Whitney F1 engines and fuel for the NASA Saturn, Apollo, and sky lab projects. God created all that we need for our successful life on this planet, and much of it looks just like a rock scattered alongside the road that we travel everyday.

The Pacific Borax company had a rich find, and a real problem: how do you transport– in the 1880s–tons of rock over the sands of the Mojave Desert along with a ton of wagons and another three tons of water? Smith had the answer and the skill to make it happen. He was a mule skinner and had the quality team to back up his ability to make them work together as a team. He tried one trip with ten mules and they just could not pull the weight of the load. He doubled his team and became a success. But the success was in the power of each mule only as it was hitched in synergism to 19 others each pulling their weight. Today the New Iberian Mission is very much like the 20-mule team. We each must pull our own weight and feel that we can only be a success as we pull in harness with all the rest of the team.

Each of our Update readers is a very important part of our Morning Glory family outreach to the “Vilmas” of Guatemala. We have a million-dollar campus and more than a quarter of a million dollars in operation needs each year. This is no time for any of us to be Lone Rangers. We are to be a part of the team and each one must pull his and her own weight.

That is why things have worked so well so far; our total staff in Guatemala and all our friends here in the United States are all pulling their weight and doing a great job.

The only problem has been that the job that I have been doing for the last 30 years has gotten way too large for one person to do as a volunteer job along with many other jobs that need done every week. It was kind of like Smith when he tried to pull the load of ore with only ten mules; it was just too large a job, so he had to expand his efforts.

As we moved along with giant steps in Guatemala, I was able to barely keep pace here. A few years ago Shannon Slee came in to help with the Update, taking time off between babies (and for sure, welcome back, dear Shannon!). Clifford Shaw from Billings, Montana, an old ministry friend came along as my prayer partner and personal coach. But the work just kept pilling up. There were rumors of help coming, but it just didn’t show up.

Then two wonderful women from Dallas and a young couple of Millennials from Tennessee came together with me at two different ends of one week in October with a workable plan to do what Smith did when he added the extra ten mules–get more qualified and working help to get the job done.

We have always been totally transparent with you. When there was sin in the camp we told you, and we told you what we were going to do or had already done about it. We asked your help to solve problems that we knew needed handled. This time, it is not sin or a problem in Guatemala, but a need for more help to handle all the work done here in the United States so we can pay for and get more help in Guatemala.

As an example, we have not kept up with the wonderfully expanded sponsored children’s program as it shifted from my direction to being directed by Rob. Children graduated and we did not inform you. Gifts and notes fell through the cracks, and no one wanted that to happen. One of the new members of the board of directors that came on in October as a part of this change up is Mary Beeks. She has been to Guatemala many times and she loves the children. She is taking over the sponsorship program as of December 2013.

I have been busy getting a complete list of sponsored children and sponsors put together for Mary. It may take a while to get it all straightened out, but Mary is the totally responsible one for sponsors and children. This is going to require a lot of help from Rob, who has done a fantastic job of recruiting new sponsors and organizing children for them and making sure that I get the money from the sponsors. Rob will continue as our chief recruiter. This will be a very full-time job going to a part-time non-salaried manger. We are excited that Mary will be on board getting this program fully operable.

Another problem has been conflicting internet postings and a lack of organization between our outreach in the United States and from different ones in Guatemala. As of December 1, all our internet information and crafting and changes will come from a director on the new board and his wife, a non-voting member of the board. Sam and Tiffany Houck will be in charge of communications and will be working with my right-hand man, Daniel, to organize and harmonize all internet projects. All communications will be by e-mail and a hard copy file set-up has also been put in place for copies of all communications about the internet, so there is a full record of all that we are doing and plan to do. Another advantage to the board with Sam, Tiff, and Daniel is that they are Millennials, which brings a youth point of view to the board.

We are breaking down several more of Herb’s jobs and are working with some very good people that will take over as spiritual advisors to both the staff in the USA and in Guatemala. One to take over reaching out to megachurches and new churches for financial help, one to take over national and international management in contacting and working with governmental agencies and major corporations; another to take over representing us to Bible Colleges, directing and planning interns, short-term missions and the planning of the same. Dean Pinney, who has been my assistant, is taking over as director of Alumni. We are bringing together under Dean’s expertise all of our past visitors to the campus as an inner group that we will call our “kitchen cabinet.”

The idea of this board is not a group to sit around and vote on things, but a group of working directors who all have important work to do–committed friends of Morning Glory Christian School who will get involved and get the job done.

In short, what I am talking about is teamwork. The synergism of this kind of working board can propel Morning Glory and all the dreams and plans well into the future with far more to accomplish than has been accomplished. This is the kind of teamwork that has brought us to where we are and will take us on to where God intends us to be in the years and decades ahead.

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Enjoying God’s Vision & Provision

Shannon Slee, Quincy, Illinois

Herb asked me to share an update on life in the Slee household since the addition of baby Elliana Mikayla on July 30. Our sweet, happy, healthy girl has been a tremendous source of joy to us even as we have learned to adapt to having two little ones just seventeen months apart. Desmond is crazy about Elliana and showers her with affection…most of the time!

Jordan has been putting in lots of extra hours in order to allow me to stay at home doing this incredibly important ministry of “training these children up in the way they should go.” For him, that has meant taking on side jobs in the evenings when he is home along with working multiple weeks out of town…nearly a thousand miles away at times. Needless to say, with a new baby, that wasn’t easy on any of us, but we made it through and are so very grateful for his commitment to this family! As for me, I believe the biggest development in my life has been a clearer sense of God’s vision and a greater confidence in Hisprovision. As I continue to study His Word and learn from lessons He gives me daily as I serve my family, I believe that that vision for my life is this–to love Him and others wholeheartedly and to raise children who will honor Him and extend His grace to the next generation. As for His provision–needs aren’t always met easily, but I know that when we’ve given our all, we can rest assured that He will see us through to tomorrow and fill in the gaps where we’ve fallen short. That has given me great peace as I’ve missed my husband, struggled through chaotic moments with crying babies, and kept tabs on a lean checking account. I am learning to exemplify the definition of love that Tim Kimmel, in his book, Grace Based Parenting, writes: “Love is the commitment of my will to your needs and best interests, regardless of the cost.” I will admit, as I’m sure Lori would about her many children at Morning Glory, that some days are really, really tough. But the joy that comes from seeing the fruit of our labors of love makes every effort worthwhile and energizes us for each new day!

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NIMA Housekeeping

This past year, the budget for the school and churches in Guatemala to be raised in the First World was $16,000 per month. The budget for report, support, travel, communication, and raising finances in the First World is $1,000 per month. The budget for offices, equipment, and utilities in the USA is basically covered by Agape Christian Church. This past year we, on several occasions, ran a few weeks late. With the increase in students, the budget in Guatemala will have to go up for 2014. I really need for my heavy hitters that made as-needed large gifts to come on a more regular basis until we get the fundraising by the new person or persons on the new board in full operation. Many have made an annual commitment for their sponsored youth and we urgently ask everyone to check and see if their gift giving is up-to-date.

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Boiling Frogs

Lori Nij, Colegio Cristiano Mañana Gloriosa, San Raymundo, Guatemala

There is an old adage… I am not sure where I first heard it. The story goes like this: if you put a frog in a pot of boiling water, the frog will immediately jump out and run away to safety. But put a frog in a pot of cold water and bring it to a slow boil and the frog will stay in the pot until it boils to death, never noting the change in the water temperature. People react to change the same way–rapid change causes us to run away in fear, but slow and gradual change is rarely noted.

Lately many people have asked me to describe my philosophy of education. They look at me kind of weirdly when I answer, “boiling frogs.”

Twelve years ago when I began MORNING GLORY CHRISTIAN SCHOOL I knew where I wanted to go, but the change was so far from the Guatemalan norm that I didn’t even dare try. That first year we registered ninety children for school, but daily attendance was a challenge. If I demanded anything, the parents voted with their feet, removing their children from school. Everything was free; I provided the pencils, the notebooks, the snacks, backpacks, and even bought the first uniforms. Any commitment on the parents’ part was impossible. Even so, I constantly fought with them to leave their children in school and not take them out for any excuse and put them to work. But this was a long way from the concept of parental responsibility and participation that was my goal. Slowly and surely I began to teach, example, and push. Each year I turned the fire up just a notch. First, the parents paid half the price of the uniform and bought half the school supplies. Then we added a small monthly fee. Little by little we added parental responsibilities. In the bimonthly parent meetings I began to talk about parenting and financial accountability. As parents would come into my office to tell me how they didn’t have any money, we would spend time talking about hard work and money management.

Slowly but surely the lessons began to sink in. One morning a mother of six children came to my office with a sob story of how there was no way she could by uniforms for the four children who were still in school. Her husband worked in construction in Guatemala City and what he made just barely covered his daily bus fare and sparse meals for the kids. She wanted her kids to get an education so they wouldn’t end up like her. This family lived in a corn cane, tin roof shack on land her husband had inherited from his family. I began to talk to her and explore her possibilities. I learned she loved to raise animals. I gave her a hundred quetzal bill and told her: “You can choose, buy the uniforms today, or I will give the children permission to come in their normal clothes for the first two months of school and you can invest this money in chickens to raise and sell.” She chose to raise chickens and we had a long talk about the importance of reinvestment and not eating all the profit and the principle. Three months later she came into my office with the money for four uniforms. She had not only raised the chickens but she had butchered them and taken them into Guatemala City to sell in the market to sell and thus increased her profit margin. She took the profit, bought the uniforms and bought two boxes of chickens and the feed to raise the chickens. Once again she butchered the chickens and sold them herself, this time doubling her profit. Fast forward eight years. Her husband no longer works in construction; he drives the pickup that takes her oldest three daughters into the different markets to sell chickens. Her old corn cane shack has been replaced by a house made of cement blocks. She has two large chicken houses and now has her own breeding hens. Her children have long ago graduated and continue to study, financed by her chicken business. She is only one of many examples–mothers raise pigs, have backyard vegetable gardens. I taught one mother to make fried fruit pies to sell; others make tostadas, tamales or numerable other things investing the profits in the education of their children.

In twelve years I have continually turned up the fire of parental responsibility. The parents now cover one-eighth of the cost of each child, three-fourths of the cost of transportation and are fully responsible for uniforms and school supplies. When we had a meeting this last month to talk about the future, they all agreed that if it became necessary they would pick up an even bigger portion of the cost. At the same time I have watched my families prosper, blessed by God. Families that have learned the importance of the tithe, how to budget, how to prioritize spending, and the Miss Lori philosophy of a squirrel hole for emergencies. These are now faithful parents. Families who twelve years ago lived in tin roof shacks now have formal simple homes. Mothers have become grandmothers and we have begun with the second generation. Parents who never dreamed of an education now have children in the university. As those educated children enter the work force, the family economy rises once again.

The long-term goal of MORNING GLORY CHRISTIAN SCHOOL is to better the lives of our students through Christian economic principles and it is working.

However, even though the parents are responding with responsibility, the everyday costs of educating a child at Morning Glory continue to rise. University-trained teachers demand higher salaries; specialized music, computer, and English teachers do not come cheap. Instruments, books and computers add to the educational costs. Each time we raise our educational level, our base costs go up.

Once again, this year we are raising our educational level, adding new textbooks to our teaching curriculum. With this change we will be using the highest level textbooks offered in Guatemala. We are adding a reading book based on stories about Christian values and heroes of the faith. Each story is a lesson about following God. So along with reading skills, our children will be reading material that builds their Christian life. This series of books comes in nine levels, one for each grade level; they are not cheap but we feel that it is an investment that will reap eternal benefits in the lives of our children. This is where you come in. Many of our parents, especially those with multiple children in Morning Glory, are going to struggle to be able to buy these text books. We are offering a delayed payment plan and many have started already making monthly layaway payments for next January. The text book company is giving us a 20% commission that we will use to buy books for our most needy students.

We ask that those of you who would like to buy a Christmas gift for a/your sponsored child consider buying the text book package. We budget twenty dollars from your monthly fee for books and if you choose to add another thirty it will completely cover the fifty dollar cost for books for the next year. The reading books, if cared for correctly, can be passed from child to child so it is basically a one-time expense.

We have prayerfully considered this decision and we feel it is necessary to continue to challenge our students and teachers to reach for excellence. Hopefully the frogs won’t jump out of the water.

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Teacher Proposal

Tiffany Houck, Nashville, Tennessee

Greetings to the faithful followers and supporters of Morning Glory Christian School! I hope this letter finds you well. We would love to share with you something new that is currently in the works!

As many of you know, Morning Glory has been struggling with funding for the general maintainence of the school and the ever-increasing amount of students. In addition to that constant struggle, there are also a great deal of new projects and ideas that have already been well thought-out, planned, and organized for the addition and betterment of curriculum that are currently on standby, just waiting to be implemented. The project is simply growing quicker than it can support itself.

One area of the budget that is not being met is that of the teachers’ salaries. Lori has been stretching the funds to their limit as well as pulling out of her own salary to make ends just barely meet. Not paying the teachers is obviously not an option… so allow me to further explain why greater budget €exibility within the teacher salary realm is more than vital to the very reason Morning Glory exists.

The education that Morning Glory offers its students gives them opportunities that they would otherwise not have been able to have; that is obvious. Further, the children are brought up in a system that sets them apart… a system that intertwines with Judeo-Christian principles not through force but through simple, factual,and logical proverbial teachings that equip the students to grow into responsible adults developed in their God-given abilities.

We strive to see our students truly learn, understand, and apply Christian principles to their lives and daily activities. We want them to see God’s hand in creation and understand His perfect plan for their lives. To do this we need good, hardworking, and well-rounded teachers. This brings us to the point of this letter.

Guatemala’s public education system accepts mediocrity; Morning Glory Christian School does not. In order to continue and expand, we cannot expect our teachers to resist conforming to the mediocrity they were raised in unless we encourage and motivate them correctly, and of course, pay them on time, allowing enough €flexibility in the budget for future benefits or perhaps the opportunity to expand their personal education in university and/or beyond.

A new program is being put together for teacher sponsorship. It will be similar to sponsoring a child, except Morning Glory supporters would have the opportunity to sponsor a teacher and follow them in their educational success and as they directly affect the lives of the students. Individual short biographies about the Morning Glory teachers’ goals and perhaps why they became interested in teaching within the fields they are in will be available, just as the student sponsor program is designed.

Currently the teachers receive the same salary as the public school teachers in the area. As I’m sure you all know, the level of education in these institutions is very poor and not much is expected out of the teachers. Most teachers work at a primary school in the morning from 7:30am-12:30pm and work at a secondary school in the afternoon from 1:00-5:00pm.

Teachers at Morning Glory are held to a higher standard. We expect and in most cases receive a much greater commitment and quality of teaching from our teachers than the local public schools do from theirs. We want to do more and our teachers can do more, but it is wrong to ask someone who is working so hard and giving so much to give more and still have to continue working a second job elsewhere with even less resources to provide for their own families’ needs.

Secondly, some of our teachers need more education themselves. As Guatemalan educational regulations change daily and we ourselves seek to take our education to the next level, it is pertinent that our teachers have the opportunity to attend university and further themselves, benefiting not only them but the very mission you support. Our goal is to be able to raise salary enough so that they have the option of quitting their other jobs and focus on their work with us and further their own education in the process. We do not wish to simply pay them more. We want them to be encouraged and motivated and to know they have a group of people out there who pray for them and want to see them succeed and are willing to not only fund but mentor and minister to them as well. We want to show our teachers the same care and love we show our students, being as they are a very important part of the mission.