York Rick Suzanne 1994 Dom.rep.

8/12/2019 York Rick Suzanne 1994 Dom.rep.

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YORK DOMINICAN MISSION

ForCorrespondence: Forwarding Agents:C/O Lynx Air OR STO Ken &Jan RutledgeP. O. Box 5600 P.O. Box 1264Ft Lauderdale. FL33340 Mattoon. IL61938Home Phone 809) 580-1930 217) 234-3146Fo r Packages:C /O Lynx Air-DR-STO1 9 9 5 W. Commerc ia l B l v d . S u i t e AFt. Lauderdale, FL 3 33 09

NEWS FROM THE DOMINICAN REPUBLICRick and Suzanne York a r e t h r i l l e d t o r e p o r t t h a t November wasa g r e a t month f o r the mission work i n the Dominican Republic . Twoof the highlights were the construction of the church in Esperanzaand t h e b e g i n n i n g o f t h e new c h u r c h work i n Las Canoas . The c h u r c hin Esperanza had been meeting in re nte d b uild in gs and f i n a l l y in

t h e second s t o r y o f one o f t h e member's homes and t h e members hadbeen p r a y i n g with g r e a t f a i t h f o r t h e c o n s t r u c t i o n o f t h e i r c h u r c h .A team from World Miss ion B u i l d e r s l e a d by Ed Thomas and JimBowyer a r r i v e d on November 1 and l e f t on t h e 11th w ith a newbuilding completely b u i l t and dedicated The people in Esperanza,C h r i s t i a n s and n o n - C h r i s t i a n s a r e c a l l i n g it t h e Mirac le Churchbecause it went up so f a s t and looks so goodThe d e d i c a t i o n s e r v i c e was h e l d on Nov. 10th , with over 3^5 i na t t e n d a n c e and 8 b a p t i s m s .Gary Klein, medical missionary to the Dominican Republic andDigno E s p a c i o n a t i o n a l p r e a c h e r have s t a r t e d a new church i n LasCanoas i n t h e southwestern p a r t of th e c o u n t r y . Their f i r s tbaptismal service was held on November 14 with 39 believers beingimmersed i n t h e Lord The c h u r c h has s i n c e had o v e r 20 moreb a p t i s m s and i s c u r r e n t l y a v e r a g i n g o v e r 70 i n a t t e n d a n c e onSundays . S e v e r a l young p e o p l e a t t e n d e d t h e a n n u a l Youth C o n f e r e n c eand several leaders are attending the monthly Leadership Training onferencesC h r i s t i n Youth, irom J o p l i n MO, helped sponsor the 4tha n n u a l Youth C o n f e r e n c e J a n . 20-23 w it h a l m o s t 300 i n a t t e n d a n c e .With a strong emphasis on t r a i n i n g the Dominican youth t oe v a n g e l i z e 90 o f th e D i s c i p l e s h i p groups were l e a d by t h e youth,a s w e r e t h e w o r s h i p s e r v i c e s . Thdi c h u r c h e s i n t h e D o m i n i c a nRepublic have a very strong base of young people and i s capable ofproducing 75-100 preachers and evangelists-.; in the next f ive years.Lord will ing. The use of Dominican-.missionaries i s already beingt e l t i n Panama, where f i v e f u l l t ime workers a r e already leading i nt h e C h r i s t i a n C h u r c h / C h u r c h o t C h r i s t s m i s s i o n work.

SERVING CHRIST IN THE CARIBBEAN SINCE 1972


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RICK AND SUZANNE YORK . M IS SIONARIES

DOMINICAN UPDATEMay 30. 1994

Su Casa Project Is UnderwayOur family is thrilled to announce that the construction of our house/missioncenter is finally underway. We started working in March and we have dug thefoundation, laid the block for the first floor poured the floor and just finished pouring

the ceiling for the first floor. We re really excited by the progress we ve made andsince everything is done by hand, from digging the foundation to mixing the concrete,we ve made very good progress in a short amount of time. I have been buying all ofthe materials and we ve subcontracted out parts of the job that take more expertisethan our regular crew has. Getting materials is sometimes difficult, especially cement.There has been a shortage of cement that was really not a shortage but a slowdownin production in order to drive the prices up, but we ve only lost about 1 hour of workbecause of lack of materials so we re very pleased with that.Our next stage of the construction will begin again in August, Lord willing We willlay the block on the second floor and then pour the second floor roof Our third stagewill begin after that when we will try and finish the first floor so that we can move intothat part of the house. We ll then work on the upstairs finishing as we have fundsavai lable in 995We ve been thrilled by the response of friends and family and supporting churchesin helping us get this far The Lord continues to use His people to get things doneWe re estimating thecost of the block androof for th e secondfloor to be about12,000 and we veenclosed a speciallymarked envelope foryour gift for thatsecond part.Thanks so much for

helping this dreamc ome t rue fo r ou rfamilv and ou rmiss ion work, ofwhich you are apart

I

This Issue; Exciting news ofcontinued growth of the missionwork o f t he Christian Churches inth e Dominican RepublicI

Rick, the great construction foreman???


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Camp Construction Begins June 1One of the dreams that the churches here have had for many years is to have

their own camp/conference center. The dream began to become a reality two yearsago when some land was donated on the southern coast for that type of facility Westarted thinking about the possibilities -and opportunities that having our own facilitywould allow us and we balanced that by realizing that this was going to be a big, bigproject I mentioned the project to Brook Brotzman, Youth Minister at the Lake-LandChristian Church in Mundelein, IL and told him, jokingly, Brook, this is a project foryoul Little did he or I realize how many doors the Lord would open to make thatdream a realityAs we got serious about the project it soon became clear to our leaders herethat the property on the south coast was not in the most strategic location for ourcenter, since about 80% of our churches are in the North Central part of the islandand travelling to the camp on the South coast would involve at least a four hour tripfor most of our church members. We began looking for some property that we couldafford inthe central part of the countryand the Lord opened the door, just fourweeksago and we were able to buy a nice piece of land near the town of Salcedo. With thelocation of the camp nowthe majority of our churches can get to the property in lessthan 45 minutesBrook has been extremely busy contacting and recruiting U.S. church teams tocome this summer and help us get started We are having 10-12 church teamsthis summer, with a total of well over 200 Americans coming for the beginning of thisproject Churches are beginning to catch the vision of this project and we're excitedabout how the Lord will continue to open doors for this project. We're hoping to seethese projects built this summer; Two dormitor ies2. Cafeteria/kitchen (Cafeteria will also serve as the chapel area at first)3. Basketball/volleyball court4. Superintendent s home5. 6 covered study/meeting areas6. Natural amphitheater for group meetings

We are now starting to accept teams for the winter of this year and all of 1995.Let us know your church is interested and we can let you knowwhat part of theproject needs to be worked on. It's a life-changing experience for team members anda blessing for the churches here One of our dreams is to also use the center for ourLeadership Training Seminars so that we can have more in-depth studies.


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Church Construction Projects FinishedIn our last newsletter we told you about 5 construction projects that wereunfinished due to lack of funds. The Lord has again responded to those needs,

through His people, and three of the projects are finished, or almost finished Thefirst phase of the parsonage in Arroyo Hondo, here in Santiago, is finished. Pastor dela Cruz and his wife, Mana, and their family moved in about the last of April. They areright next to the church they minister in and that will be a real blessing for the churchthere. We had a group of students from Lincoln Christian College that came to helpget the last part finished and also brought funds for that project. Thanks LCCflWe had a team here from the Lakeland Christian Church in Mundelein, IL overthe New Year's holiday and they got the walls and roof on the parsonage in SantoDomingo for Santos and Francia Cicilio, co-ministers in the University ChristianChurch. Theywere so excited about getting their home buitt. They had lived forseveral years in a very small house that was just about 15 feet from a major highway

Theywere so eager to move in that they moved before the concrete floor waspoured. We had run out of moneyfor that project but the church in Santo Domingohas now raised the money themselves to pay for the cement and materials to pourth floor.We had begun the parsonage inSabaneta Yasica las t summer with ateam from Teen Mission, USA. We receivedsome additional help rom the VB^t theFirst Christian Church n Naperville^ andwere able to finish the parsonage, almost,just before Christmas. The minister, NegroT6mas, and his wife Ari and their family arereally enjoying thr new home. Thefinishing touches that are still undone arethe plastering of some of the interiorwallsand the bathroom fixtures. One of thechurch members is providing funds for theplastering and we re hoping to get thefixtures this summer. Lord willing.We're hoping to finish the church in San Francisco de Macoris, when a teamcomes from the New Testament Christian Church from Keokuk, Iowa, in June. Thiswill be their third year in a row and, I believe, their fifth trip, to this church in the pastseveral years They have been a blessing for that congregation and our work ingeneral We're also hoping to finish the basketball/volleyball court at the ChristianSchool in Arroyo Hondo, here in Santiago. We still need about 1500for that project.Haitian Ministry Grows

With the continuing serious problems that Haiti is facing, thousands of Haitiansare fleeing across the border to the Dominican Republic, looking forwork and abetter life. Life for them here is very difficult, with long days of cutting sugar cane or

Negro helping In the construction


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digging ditches by hand for very low wages. The latest estimates say that there areover 1 million Haitians living in the Dominican Republic and the churches here arestarting to reach out to them with evangelistic programs. We now have two full timeHaitian ministers, Bro. William Decena and Bro. Arsenio Gimenez. Both of t hem wereborn in the Dominican Republic and so they speak Spanish as well as Creole. Williamis working with two churches in the southem section of the country and Arsenio isworking with a new church in Esperanza. We have a Spanish speaking church inEsperanza and the two churches have,been having some wonderful fellowship, whichis really a testimony to the community because there is not a lot of love lost betweenDominicans and Haitians. We re really expecting this area of ministry to expandrapidly in the next few years, Lord willing.

Family NewsOur family continues to feel bless^ to work here Suzanne and Iw havecelebrated our 20th wedding anniversary by the time you receive this That seemshard to believe and it seems like yesterday that we met in Puerto Rico. We re allgetting excited by the progress on our house and we re looking forward to being ableto move in before Christmas, Lord willing.Suzanne and the girls finished schooLon May 6th because of the nationalelections on May 16th. That was a week ago(as of this writing) and we still don t knowwho won the elections They were very close and there were accusations of fraud sowe ll see who ends up winningPlease take time to write or call us at (809) 580-1930 We d love to hear fromyou. God bless you all

In Christ,ru ~

Rick, Suzanne, Emily and Laurie York

Rick and Suzanne YorkC/0 LynxAir DR-STOP.O. Box 5600Ft. Lauderdale, PL 33340

VIA AEREO Norman Weaverliissi nr ervicesP .O B o x 2 4 2 7K n o x v i l l e TN 3 7 9 0 1 2 4 2 7

mCi f - . iemooni i isf r, d

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R ICK AND SUZANNE YORK. MISSIONARIES

DOMINICAN UPDATE This Issue: Exciting news ofcontinued growth of the missionwork of th e Christian Churches inth e Dominican Republic

Oc to b er 9 9 Volume 2 2 Number 4i

From May 26 until August 12 the rural area near Salcedo, n the center part ofthe Dominican Republic, was the place to bel The Lord watched over all of us as 11U S work teams came to help us get our camp/conference center off the groundWith over 180 Americans helping, we made wonderful progress as we started thislong and expensive project that will bring untold blessings to the church here.Thanks are especially due to Brook and Sandra Brotzman from the Lake-LandChristian Church in Mundelein, IL who led a team of 12 from the church that was hereall summer Special thanks also to Scott and Caryn Smith, along with theirdaughters, Jessica and Brittany. Scott was here as a summer intern from LincolnChristian College. The following churches made this summer extravaganza such agreat success:First Christian Church, Naperville, ILProspect Heights Christian Church, Prospect, ILIllinois Christian Teen ConventionGreenfbrd Christian Church. Greenford, OHAncona Church of Christ, Ancona, ILMt.Washington Church of Christ, Cincinnati, OH

Erie Christian Church, Erie, ILBroadway Christian Church, Mattoon.lLKorean Central Church, Philadelphia, PACentral Christian Church, Streator, ILCentral Christian Church, Rockfbrd, ILNortheast Christian Church, Rockford, ILSince we are going to be on furlough next summer, we're starting to plananother big summer extravaganza with 12-14 work teams the summer of 1996.We're praying, that Lord willing we will be able to use the camp for our Family Campin the fail of 1996. We're also especially excited that an adjoining piece of land hascome up for sale at $6500 and we're hoping to buy tsoon, doubling the width of

about zof our property.

Our First Dorm, With Capacity for 120 Peopiel


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Churches Continue to Grow Record Pace

We continue to thank the Lord for the dedication of our Dominican co workersand their efforts to win the iost Most of our churches are growing but fourcongregations deserve speciai mention in this issue for the impact they are having Intheir community.The Christian Church inArroyo Hondo is ministered by Pastor and Marfa de laCruzand their family Theywere able to move into the parsonage that is right behindthe church just a few months ago and their presence in the community has had adramatic impact on the church. They have had 15 baptisms in the past six weeksand with a new housing development nearby almost finished the church is expectingto average over 100 before the end of the year, Lord willing.Benrto and Rosa Martinez are the ministers of the Christian Church at HuacalitoinSantiago. Theymeet on Sunday momings at the auditorium of the City Hall andhave grown the past six months to average over 100 also They have started theirown property fund and are hoping to be able to buy a piece of property in the next 6-

8 months. They want to build a building that will seat 300-400 people.The last two churches I want to mention are both in Esperanza. One is Spanishspeaking, ministered by Juan Francisco and Milagros Col6n. They had a new buildingbuilt that I mentioned in one of our newsletters last year and the church has been invictory (as we say in Spanish) ever since. Tbey are averaging close to 100 eachSunday and are using Home Bible Studies to win new families to the church. Theirchurch Is a praying church and it is not unusual to find a group of believers at churchan hour before services begin, on their knees, asking for the Lord's blessing. Wewere just able to get Juan a motorcycle, thanks to the generous, anonymous,donation of a friend in the Greenford Christian Church, in Greenfbrd Ohio.Arsenio Jimenez is our Haitian minister at the Christian Church(Haitian) inEsperanza. Despite having a very small place to meet In with a dirt floor and onelight bulb he has built the church, along with the leaders ofthe congregation, to astrong church with 85 members and often more than CX on Sunday evenings, theirmain service. If you want to go to a church that worships the Lord, you need tocome and visit this church. They are in no hurry to get through the sen/ice and gethome. Church is an important part of the believer's life and being in church is ablessing for them and a short church senrice just will not doWe are firmlyconvirrced that the secret to a successful mission work isallowing the National workers to lead When the National workers are leading theirministries they are able to raise up reproducible churches. By that I mean that thenational chur^ can reproduce itself without being totally dependent on themissionaty. We plan on being here for a number of years, perhaps the rest of ourlives, but since we cannot predict the future, we are seeking to help the churchesmature here to point that if the day comes that we are not here, they'll be able tocontip' ^ to grow and multiply.


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New Building in San Francisco de MacorislWe ment io ne d In ou r las t

newslet ter tha t the ChristianChurch In San Francisco d eMacoris was hoping to get theirbuilding finished this summer andthe Lord answered our prayersand the prayers of thecongregation We had anotherteam from the New Tes t amen tChristian Church of Keokuk,Iowa down in June and theyworked extremely hard, along withRafael and Ruth Tirado, ministersof the congregation. We had theinauguration service on August7th with over X} people inattendance. Our special thanks goto Bill and Sue Abegglen of thechurch in Keokuk fo r their loveand sacrifice for the work. Theyhave led at least four trips from Keokuk and helped get this project done

I n au g u ra t io n S e r vi ce onAugu s t 7 t h 1994

It seems hard to bel ieve that we celebrated Emily s 15th birthday party in Julybut it s true In Latin America, a younglady s fifteenth birthday is a Bigoccasion and so we made Emily s partyas nice as we could. We were abl e t ou se the facilities a t th e Church andChristian School here in Santiago.Balloons and streamers were up all overand a lovely cake was served to the 75guestsi As you can see from our familypicture, Emily and Laurie get theirbeauty from Suzanne It is a blessing forus to s e e them involved in th e missionwork and really enjoying their life here.We ask for your prayers as Emilyand Laurie reach the age to decideabout college and what to study andwhere

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We are excited to report that we're making a lot of progress on our new home.We decided to finish the first floor so that we can move into that part by Christmas,Lord willirig We will then try and save money to lay the block for the second floorand the second floor roof. We are plastering the first floor now and putting tile in thebathrooms. We are estimating the block and roof for the second floor will cost about 12,000.We have included an envelope for this project if you can help. We shouldhave the bathrooms finished and the windows and doors in by the t ime you receivethis newsletter, Lord willing

I failed to mention in our last newsletter that we were able to purchase a 1987Nissan pick-up truck for the mission work. It has been such a blessing to have and itwas used and abused all summer with the work teams and the camp constructionproject. It has carried cement, sand, lumber, chairs, people, water, and a variety ofother things. Special thanks go to Scott and Donna PeKon, good friends of ours(andformer co-workers in Puerto Rico) for a very generous gift that helped us buy thet ruck

Travel to the United States is in our plans I will be travelling in October for fourweeks to visit a number of churches and participate in the National MissionaryConvention in Peoria, IL Our whole family will be in the U.S. for three months nextsummer. Lordwilling Itwill have been 4V2 years since we all travelled and itwill begood to see many of you your church would like to have us come and speakabout our work, please let me know as soon as possible. We already have somecommitments so the sooner we know, the better.

Many thanks for your continued prayers and financial support of our work.Please take time to write or call at th e following address:Rick uz nne York0/0 LynxAir DR-STO Box 5600Ft. Lauderdale, PL 33340(809)580-1930As we start our 23rd year on the mission field, we are as excited as ever,perhaps even more so, about the way that the Lord continues to use us and our giftsfor His Kingdom. Your help makes our work possible and our victories really are yourvictories also. Please continue to pray daily for us that we will have strength andwisdom for the coming years. God biess each one of youl

York Rick Suzanne 1994 Dom.rep.

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