This year a lot that joins our tiny church camp was put on the market. The owner is a Christian and offered us the first chance to buy it. He had many takers as land in that highly secure area near Villavicencio is extremely hard to find. We did not have the money to buy the camp, but the owner gave us some time to raise the money to pay for the lot. He gave us till the end of the year to come up with the money to purchase the lot, with partial payment dates scheduled throughout the year.
At the beginning of the year, the purchase price would have been $12,500. But due to the collapsing value of the American currency, that sum has now reached $15,000. As the year goes on and the value of the dollar drops daily, the cost of purchasing this property goes up nearly every day. The quicker we can pay it off, the sooner we will be able to stop this increase in the cost. At the same time, our agreed period for paying off the lot is rapidly running out.
So far this year, we have been able to make the partial payments on schedule. We have raised and paid the owner $10,000 so far. But in order to pay off what we still need for completing this purchase by the end of they year we need another $5000 in the next two months. This has become both more urgent and more difficult because of the rapidly falling value of the U.S. dollar. Yet we must raise the money to cover this last part of the payment if we are to secure this additional property for our camp ministry.
Most American laugh when I tell them we have a one acre church camp and we regularly have eighty to one hundred people there. It has been very difficult and our camp is often packed with “wall to wall” people. But it is the best we can do. Now we have a chance to more than double the camp property. But we must be able to make this last payment on the camp property soon or we run the risk of losing not only the opportunity.
Please consider a special offering to help us cover the cost of the purchase of this property before we lose out all together. Send your specially designated donation to the Colombian Christian Mission marked for the “Camp lot purchase fund.” We will immediately apply your help towards this goal to the completion of the purchase of this lot. And God will bless you and many Christians here in Colombia through your generosity.