Hi, my name is Dorothy. I am raising money for a mission planned this Fall in Guatemala. With the Plant Today Foundation, www.PlantToday.org "Serving The Underserved". Plant Today builds houses for those living under plastic held up by sticks; holds eyeglass clinics for those who have never owned glasses; gives soap and shampoo to those who have never before smelled such things. We supply a food pantry for the hungry and a clothes closet for the poor. We fund an educational project for children and adults in a largely illiterate Guatemalan village.

Here is insight into the people and environment of Guatemala:

Last Sunday, a little boy who attends the Plant Today preschool program gave a church offering equivalent to 50 cents – a lot for a small child in poverty. He included a note with it, explaining his love for the school and his thanks for all it meant to him! How this echoes Jesus watching the poor widow give the equivalent of a penny and saying, “this widow has put in more than all of those who are contributing... For they all contributed out of their abundance, but she out of her poverty has put in everything she had, all she had to live on.” Mark 12:42-44.

Finally, we have Jimena, a beautiful little six-year-old with emotional problems due to an abusive, alcoholic father who beat her mother. Once the beatings began, Jimena stopped talking or would only repeat short phrases. She now talks only to people she knows and is seeing a speech therapist. The entire complex is filled with various family members occupying one tract of land, with each building a room or two as the family expands. Jimena’s rooms are inside the tin sheets to the right.

Jimena’s mother sleeps in bed with her two daughters to protect them. While Jimena’s father is nice when sober, he is abusive when drunk and does not come home many nights. When he does return, he sleeps on the floor.

We are seeing the Guatemalan preschool program do far more than we ever anticipated, reaching an entire community!