Report from Wo’iyopastake Ministry: Such love and generosity!

Last August when we returned from our ministry trip out to the Pine Ridge Reservation, within 48 hours of our return, a wonderful thing happened!

I was back to serving at Choices Resource Center, the local pro-life crisis pregnancy center here in eastern Tennessee, and I was telling the staff there about our recent trip. I told them all about one of our ministry partners out there, Pastor Matt Hadden and the Chanku Waste (wash-tay) Wellness Center, which has been built entirely by donations and the hard work of believers in Jesus.  The Wellness Center, which many of you have helped to fund, is beginning with dental and vision care, free to the Lakota people, provided by doctors who will come into the Reservation for a week at a time to volunteer their services.

While out there I told Pastor Matt about the work I do at Choices Resource Center and he spoke of how they hoped to eventually move into pregnancy care and parenting classes. When Sarah, the director at Choices, heard this, she immediately said, “The ultrasound machine in the closet right behind you is yours to bring out there!” (They had recently been given a new ultrasound machine but this one still worked fine.) And a few minutes later, I was also given a book case full of materials for the Earn-While-You-Learn Parenting Classes! (Choices still uses the same classes but streams them now.)

The big deal to figure out was how to get these things to Pine Ridge. The ultrasound machine is fragile and needed to be packed well and driven out there, not commercially shipped. For months we explored various possibilities, always coming back to a plan where we would rent a truck and drive it there ourselves. But in the end, God provided more than we could ask or think! Three men from the Shelby Baptist Association came right to the back door of Choices Resource Center on April 19th and we were there to help load everything securely onto their truck! We helped them on their long journey with funds for the transport of this precious cargo, and we all prayed together for the work of Choices Resource Center, for their safe travels and for the work of the Chanku Waste Wellness Center.

Everything has arrived safely out there and the room in the Wellness Center where these items will be utilized is being developed over this summer.

I love how God made connections between what we do here in Tennessee and what we do on the Pine Ridge Reservation! These provisions were made generously and with great love. We at Wo’iyopastake Ministry thank you at Wellspring Church so very much for your many gifts of prayers and funds to bring this about. Lives will be saved, the quality of life will be greatly improved, and the love of Jesus will be shared among the Lakota people because of you.

-Dan & Bonnie Licata