I am not the same person that arrived to Colombia.

New Blog : http://amazonlifeproject.blogspot.com/

I write this in the same airport that I went through to get to Colombia, it has the same bustle of people but I am not the same Sandra that waited anxiously for that plane that would take me to Colombia. I now wait for the plane that will take me to my homeland, Puerto Rico, where I will trade the “Want a “tinto”?” for the “Want coffee? With or without sugar?” I am not the same person that arrived to Colombia.

                When I arrived, I arrived with the team of Wine to Water, and like them I was disoriented in a new country. The only difference was I knew the language and with my role as interpreter I had to adjust fast and try to make them understand the Colombian world in English. During that week we went to San Antonio and Irene; in both communities we served and tried to provide them what we have in abundance and take for granted: clean water. What was done this week I will leave, so that if you have the opportunity, to experiment with your own five senses. Descriptions have a habit of turning monotonous and never make justice to reality. Words have their limits.

                What I will talk about is how the thought transition goes from, “I am going to this place to teach and share the gospel” to “I have been changed by this experience”. When I arrived it was to impart, to give and to share the knowledge of a God that loves. Instead I came back with a deeper conviction of my faith. I saw the Amazon and its imposing majesty; the children and their freely given affection, their disposition of always wanting to help and their shining smile when they receive a bible. This was a scalpel that the Lord used to cut open and show me who he is and who am I. He showed me things that not even I knew were in my heart. And he showed me how to take them out.

                Jesus said that it was better to give than to receive but he did not say that when you give you are changed permanently in the depths of your soul. And yes, I am not the same person that went to Colombia couple of weeks ago, I am different because of the blessings the Lord gave me when I was giving to others. I come back thankful for food, for clothing for clean water and for having the hope that God gives me. That is the most important part. Every day that passed my love for God took a bigger space in my heart and turned more intense. I do not understand why the Lord permitted me, a lowly human, to live this experience but I do know that I am thankful with a bigger capacity to be thankful, that I praise him with a bigger capacity to praise and that now I can serve him with more devotion. I have grown in this trip and I am thankful to the one who permitted me to take it: God.

This is written by Sandra Santigo, she is a student at Liberty University in Lynchburg, VA. She volunteered with Agua y Vida for a couple weeks for the summer 2014.  

Flying

I had just arrived to visit some very good friends and it amazed me the enthusiasm they had to watch the TV, nobody was turning their eyes away from the devise, I asked; what is going on? what am I missing? Everybody knew how little Tv I watch and they did not look surpised with my unknown discovery, but they gave me the answer giving me faces like, !which world do you live on¡ -YuRi and Adriána are live streaming on national Television!

It was American Idol national version in the biggest audience hour. I live in a Country of aproximately 45 million people, almost everybody has a TV at home and during that season, it was the TV show with the higher rating. Just vauge guess, it was about 25 million people that were watching this TV show. That day, their vocal (acapella) band had been selected to continue in the program, the excitement of everybody in the house was inevitable.

The voice (acapella) band of my friend Became more famous with each episode , very well KNOWN, everybody used to speak of the band, there was more followers on social sites every day, likes and comments, every day they were closer to being chosen as the winners.

It was the beginning of a great music career, every musician wants to be recognized, wants his music to be heard , to know that as a musician they exists, this was the time to succeed. And so it happened, the popularity was growing, it was such that they were invited to TV shows, concerts, presentations, and finally, they had made it. This is the country of Juanes, Shakira , Carlos Vives, cumbia and vallenato and they, my two friends had their space and their place in the small hall of fame.

A few days after the euphoria of the media, Adriana, one of the host girls of the TV show came to me and saiod "I want to go to Amazon, I believe God is speaking to me , I would like to go "
For a moment I got speechless . I studied music in college and how hard it is to succeed as a musician, the competition is big, there are many good musicians, access to the media is more difficult , you nee to have contacts, so she already had it, she had succeeded

it was time to take advantage and make an artistic career. On the other hand I remembered when I decided to serve God with what I had learned and decided to surrender my life to serve God in Music and Missions . I could not tell Adriana : forget about going to the Amazon. We had to do something. We continue talking, can you imagine what happened?

I want to share a small letter of Adriana, a member of the vocal (acapella) group.

"What for many is folly, to me it is an experience that undoubtedly will be one of the wonderful surprises of the Lord.
February 8 I fly to the Amazon. Not to mention it was my first plane ride , I must say I was very afraid, for me it was hard to believe that for a moment I would be flying in one of the greatest inventions of man, only by the immense wisdom of God. Yes! I was flying to the Amazon jungle, accompanied by people from around the world who like me for the first time , we would know that place.

My flight was very comfortable but the ascent was very unpleasant, but once being up only the wonder to see how close the clouds were makes one forget your fears. From above I could see the clouds forming shapes that seemed like figures constructed from the ground.
Perfect love cast out fear 1 John 4:18 I saw that perfect love shown in these majestic clouds. Oh! how great is our God , I exclaimed and said , how do some people watching this still believe that we are products of an explosion?

And not to mention the famous Amazon river, which from above looks like a big snake . The famous Amazon river, in person, not in photos , now I understand why everyone wants to come here .
We arrived at the port where there was a traditional method of transportation, motorboat . Being 5:45 pm I began my journey to the base camp , where I will live while this experience. Thirty minutes was the time of the trip down the river . To my right side Peru, to my left Brazil and behind, Colombia . Three countries share a common river, wow!
This is just the beginning , more news will surely come, I remind you that this is one of the many surprises of the Lord.

Blessings

Adryana O."
John 17:3

Now this is eternal life: that they know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent.

Adriana is our first interim in the Amazon this year, we are very happy about the decision and the courage she took to make this decision.

Adriana will be at least three months in the Brazilian Amazon jungle, sharing God's love, teaching music to indigenous children (Tikunas). She will also be sharing with the indigenous community in more different activities.

Yes our Creator calls you, He will send and train you. When was the last time you listened to God's voice!?

                                              Jhonny A Nieto

A chance to think differently

We hope you all had a good time with family and your love ones as you celebrated and remembered the nativity of the savior. Also, we wish you a good end of the year with lots of blessings and new plans in God for the year to come.

In the year 2013 we were able to participate in more than 5 water well projects to provide water to villages in the amazon, but in the village Progreso (in Colombia) we had some difficulties and this made me think about several questions like:

Where does the water we consume come from?

What would happen if the main cities of our country lack water for a week?

How could we save water and help others to have that water ?
Well, there were many questions.

Let's imagine some of our cities without water for a few days.

Lima, Perú has approximately 9 million inhabitants

Sao Pablo, Brasil, approximately 20 million

Bogota, Colombia, almost 9 million

New York,  US 19 million

They are big cities! It would be a state of caos, everybody trying to get the reserves, water bottles, tanks, etc... we prefer not to imagine this.

Less than 1% of water is available for almost 7 billion people. Let's go to a more interesting fact:
Have you ever wondered how much you invest in the water you drink?

Usually when we leave the house to go to work, or to the school, university or to do sports or just to walk, normally we get thirsty and if it is a warm day, we will get thirsty faster. We have to satisfy our thirst and the easiest way is to buy a bottle of water, how much do you pay for it? The average price for a bottle of water is between 1 and 2 dollars, 90% of the total cost of a bottle of water in a store is more about different elements than water: bottle, transportation, distribution, advertisement… “the bottle and the labeling take the biggest portion of the total cost. The price for water itself is between 1 and 2% of the final price, it means that it is "significative"

For this new year we want to offer you an invitation and at the same time a challenge.

If you have access to drinking water and do not have to pay for it, we invite you to save the money you would spend in water and donate it for a water project. Let's do it! We encourage you to participate and to share your experience with us, we will definitely tell you to whom we are going to bring Water & Life

Water and Life & Wine to Water

Part of the team of Water & Life was planning what we would do the rest of the year. We made a pause and began to talk about the everyday of our lives and someone made ​​a comment about a story he had heard.
She was an African American woman who worked at the home of wealthy people , she began to wonder : What is the difference between a poor and a rich, because the rich gets money and the poor get no money?

She noticed that the rich and poor could eat the same, wear the same clothes, same shoes, the beds were very similar. The difference was very little, almost everything was the same; only that makes the difference? It was the question of the day.
She began detailing every movement of her boss and only noticed a small difference. Her boss had a TV at home, but when the family members arrived they payed little attention to it. They spent time in reading books, most of the free time was to read, unlikely her family they spent time watching television, that was the big difference.

This woman forbade her children to watch more than two TV shows a week and instead demanded that every week they had to read two books from the public library and submit them to her with the respective summaries of these books.
The mother told her children "read many books and someday you will be on television".

After hearing this story everyone at the meeting laughed for several minutes and we joked about spending more time reading, then maybe one day we would be on television.

Not even 6 months had passed when a great part of the team of water & life were on camera before one of the most recognized TV channels worldwide. Water and Life explained on camera to CNN all their work in the Amazon in South America.
We had not read many books and soon we were going to be on TV! Thanks to the preparation and hard work of more than 10 years providing this precious liquid. We were sure we were doing what God was asking of us which was to continue our work to provide WATER and most importantly... LIFE.

Surely this was what Benjamin Carson's mother wanted to teach, the child was motivated to change a habit of television for reading. That work, through consistence and perseverance , brought results at some point in our lives.

We invite you to see the CNN special on December the 15th at 8:00 pm or on December 22, on CNN or CNN INTERNATIONAL IN SPANISH .

We leave you with a question. What custom or habit could you change for your benefit and also for others?          https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TJtAaKTq3Pg

Moving Forward

Hi to all,

As I mentioned in the last report, this summer was a time of hard work, we are not done but now we have a short break. The teams that visited us are already back in their cities and different countries, a total of five different organizations represented in several groups were supporting us and surely with the agreement plans we realize that we also support those who come to do the work.

This is the case of Hunger Corp, with which we have defined a working agreement for the next two years. They made the decision to join us in the Amazon and they went back to their homes in Puerto Rico motivating others to work in the Amazon. In Water & Life we recognize and give credit to those who deserve it, the idea of making partnerships and associations are not only to receive support from others but allow and support others to do the work, we know that we can not do everything and so we work together. At the end of the day we all do the same job, that of bringing the message of hope. We all work for the same person, our creator. For more information about Hunger Corp, click here.

 Just last week we had another visit of people willing to work hard, with enthusiasm and with great desire to support Water & Life in the Amazon. After a year and a half of conversing with Wine to Water (Vino para Agua) Doc. Hendley, founder and president, decided to take the challenge of joining an expedition that for sure would be very exciting for both of us. Doc Hendley has been visiting many countries in the world especially in Africa helping to provide clean water and this would be his first visit to Colombia.
In this occasion Wine to Water came accompanied by a video production team to make a documentary of what they have been doing and how Water and Life works in the Amazon. We are all waiting the release of this video that will air internationally before the end of the year and we would like to share with you all. Follow us on facebook Agua & Vida - Water & Life. We are also soon going to have a website, keep updated!

We greatly appreciate Doc Hendley and Wine to Water for this work and financial support to provide more wells in indigenous villages in Colombia.


We also had representation from Incalink International, Lisa Merritt was a great help during the time that Wine to Water was in the Amazon, this was her second visit to the Amazon region and was a great pleasure to have her participation. We are planning and asking for your support in prayer so we can make a working alliance between Water and Life and Incalink.

We can not end this letter without acknowledging the workers that each make Water and Life function, obviously we know that the giver of the strength and ideas as well like contacts, everything comes from our creator God. To Him all the glory and credits.  We also want to thank the endless task of raising this organization and sharing the vision for 12 years, Gonzalo Jimenez has been at the forefront of all this work.

Jhonny Anderson Nieto who for nearly two years has taken the challenge to join us in this mission to bring a message of hope in the Amazon, he has done an excellent job in logistics with the groups and we are very happy for all his support.

Ricardo Rodriguez and his wife Lucy Lancheros have a heart for missions and have been helping to build a work in northern Bogota in a very difficult location God has been supporting them, now they joined together to the work with Water and Life, we believe that it would have been very difficult for us all this summer without them.

Please, support us in prayer that we continue to focus on the vision and so many more can join us on this work, also the financial costs to move around in the Amazon providing water are very high but we believe in the creator's provision.

We also thank the United Methodist Church of Port St. Lucie in Florida for their generous support to Water & Life.We are thankful for you.

Great Blessings

Hello,
We are very pleased to be able to communicate back and bring news.
This time there are many new things to share and beforehand I thank your attention to read.

I want to start sharing the joy and the blessing of the partnership of Water and Life  with Hungercorp. A new non-profit organization that was founded in Puerto Rico with the purpose of bringing tools and resources and help in different parts of the world.
Exactly one year ago this process began though God was preparing the road since more than four years ago when we met Eli Rosa in a missions conference in Ecuador and who has been a friend of the ministry and who made the connection with Hungercorp. We greatly appreciate all the support that they have and we give honor to the creator because we know that He has made all of this possible.

At this time while you read this report, there will be a group of Hungercorp in the Amazon visiting different villages and drilling two wells for those who need it so much. These 8 people will be in the Amazon region for 10 days and need our support in prayer to fulfill the objectives and to be a great blessing for each village and so they can carry the message of truth and encouragement to the leaders.

This year we also had the help of TLC (Touching Lives for Christ) Florida. ministry that has been a blessing for many years and are still committed to support us in our work in the Amazon region. 9 people in vast majority women accompanied us for two weeks, visiting villages and drilling a well, unfortunately we could not find water, this is the second time that this happens in almost 10 years of work, we could not drill deeper so we had to end the work there. We are doing more studies to be able to filter water in these places where we can find water by drilling, we really hope soon in the future we have the solution.

Was also with us a group of the Christian and Missionary Alliance Church North in Bogota-Colombia. This is the third time that the Church endorses with their presence. 12 people traveled from the capital to join us for nearly a week visiting different churches. We are so excited to see the missions ministry enthusiasm and commitment. We would like to continue having your support.

The group was led by Jeferson Nieto and Natalia Alarcon and now we take advantage of this opportunity to congratulate them on their marriage which took place last week, we wish them well and we hope that in their work as a couple be a blessing for either the ministry, the church and all who have to come to the kingdom through God's work in their marriage.

We still continue with the plans to establish Water and Life as a nonprofit organization and we expect this to become a reality very soon, both in Colombia and in other countries. We will also have a web site, we only need to complete some documents. There is much more going on in the Amazon project and would love to count on with your support in prayer. We will share them Gradually as they develop.

We also would like to ask for help in prayer for Gonzalo Jimenez and Jhonny Nieto who have been at the forefront of all this work in the jungle and will remain so for the rest of the year. We greatly appreciate their work and trust in God's support in their lives in ministry and personal plans.

Getting closer to the end

^{Romans 8:28} And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose..NIV

Almost a year ago I was about to finish my studies in missions and I well remember the joy I felt. This had been a dream since I began to get closer to God in the year 2001. This desire was not fulfilled without having gone through many trials and experiences, it took almost seven years between various activities, service with organizations and four visits to the embassy for a visa, of which I feel no regrets.

While experiencing all of this I thought it was a waste of time, I wanted to satisfy this need to study, feel better prepared and be ready to start the ministry. The reality was different, the creator was leading me to develop a ministry and this was all part of the process. God taught me a lot through that time, and still continues to teach me. I got to know very beautiful people and of great blessings, I visited many places, I was able to be part of organizations that brought much knowledge, experience and this was the way God was using and preparing me for the next stage.

A year ago when it was about to end my studies in the college in Florida, I had a longing, which God had put in my heart, the need to study aviation maintenance with the purpose of using it in the great commission in the Amazon jungle of Colombia, Peru and Brazil. I did not know how everything would happen but trusted God.


I can not say that I already achieved this but at this moment I am grateful to God to know that he has been accompanying me on every step, supplying, giving me the strength and ability to do well in the school.
Now I have completed a little more than 70% of the course, I still have about three more months left to go.
Of the three stages of the program, I'm in the final, which is powerplant, which is very interesting and of quite work. As for finances, I have been able to cover about 50% of the total cost.

This was the first engine we started, 8 months after we began the course.
the pictures is probably not the best but it was an exciting moment.

Unfortunately for me, the university requires that students are up to date with all payments and before starting these last three months of classes I have to make payment of the total cost, which is very difficult for me.
For this reason I will have to withdraw from classes within a few days to be able to solve this situation. I feel so close to the end but yet so far. God has given me peace, and I remain confident in Him.


Finding work as a foreign student has many difficulties and specific requirements, it is not the same as a citizen. I have been looking, applying for so many jobs, and still no one wants to work with my situation. I'm still looking and praying to have a stable job that allows me to work during the summer and gather enough funds to finish the classes the following semester.

I would greatly appreciate your support in prayer for these requests and I hope to communicate as soon as possible to continue sharing what God is doing in my life.

Although a bit difficult to understand the reasons, I know that God is in control of and trust Him with everything.

^{Romans 8:28} And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose..NIV