MEDELLIN, COLOMBIA (October 19, 2012) – The Evangelical Covenant Church and its ministry partners in Latin America and the Caribbean will better be able to communicate, inspire, and consult one another through a new organization, Holistic Ministries of the Latino Covenant.
The organization was formed at the close of the first-ever meeting of all the partners held October 1-6. The meeting came about at the suggestion of Dave Husby, director of Covenant World Relief, so that each could share about their ministry practices, challenges and opportunities.
Participants included outreach foundations and ministries from Ecuador, Colombia and Mexico. Ministry partners from Haiti were denied visas, but were represented by Covenant missionary Tammi Biggs.
Missionary Gary Sander blogged that “the symbol of the (organization’s) logo will be something related to corn, since corn came from Mexico and is a staple of the societies and countries involved, and will be indicative of the seed planting, fruit bearing, empowerment effecting, God glorifying, community transforming ministries that it represents.”
All of the participants came away from the meeting inspired by their counterparts, said David Mark, Department of World Mission regional coordinator for Latin America and the Caribbean.
“They are incredibly hard workers,” Mark wrote in his newsletter. “In many cases, when finances have (caused) setbacks, these folks have worked sacrificially without pay and under challenging circumstances. They do what they do out of love for God and love for the people God loves. We have evaluated a lot of ministries over the years, and these are among the best we have ever seen.”