November 2022 Newsletter

Rainbow Ministries-Tu Projimo / Getsemani Children’s Home

From Bud & Ruth: Hello to our dear friends. Thank you for your prayers and support. God has been so good to us we cannot began to thank Him!

First of all I would like to give an update on Sofia. You remember we asked for help in paying her tuition, books etc. for a 3 year Nursing program. She and her parents came here to visit us a month or so ago and they told me that she had to wait until January to start classes due to a glitch at the University. I talked with them and told them that they should pray about and think about her attending the program for doctors – at the same university. We had 2 friends who studied there and are very successful doctors today in Mexico. One of them, Carlos, did the very first heart transplant here in this country. They agreed that it would be wise to consider that. Since then, I have received word that after much prayer they felt that would be the best choice for her. So, she is going to start medical school in January instead of Nursing. We had received almost all we needed to pay her way for the three years plus in Nursing school and now we will use it for the doctor's training. The medical school program is for 4 plus years and then one year of internship. We are so excited that we can help her to become a Christian doctor which is sorely needed here in Mexico. Thank you to all who helped her financially.
Sofia is excited also because before our talk she had never considered medical school.

There were over 300 illegals apprehended in Eagle Pass this morning and more crossing the river hourly. I really do not know how the immigration and customs people are handling so many people that have to be taken to a staging area where they are processed and then turned out to all parts of the country. A few hours later, there is another bunch. Eagle pass gets several thousand each month and the population is only 30,000. Each time I go across the border I see several groups walking along the highway. The drug cartels take immense advantage of these people.

After trapping and disposing of 43 skunks last fall, I have not seen or trapped a single one this year. Now we have a rat problem. I have trapped seven rats in the last week in the small building where I keep my chicken feed for my bantams. We have a larger chicken pen where we keep food for the ducks, chickens, geese, quail, and guineas. I will start trapping there next.

Please continue to pray for Ruth. She spends much of the time in bed or in her recliner in the living room.

We are back down to about 25 children. The department of the family came and got five sisters that had only been here a short time and took them back home. They also took two boys about 12 years old back to their homes. One of the boys was my shadow. I am really going to miss him. He is a good kid. Please read John & Paulina's letter below.

Bud & Ruth Bivens
Rainbow Ministries - Tu Projimo
338 N. Monroe St. PMB 359
Eagle Pass, Texas 78852

From John & Paulina: We hope this letter finds you all well and blessed.

This month will be our 1st try at a digital newsletter. We have had a fairly decent response of people willing to receive the newsletter by email and you will probably get a digital copy and a hard copy this month. December we will start eliminating addresses off of the hard copy list. I am severely technologically challenged. It's not that I can't really do it, it's just that after about 20 minutes sitting at the computer I am ready to start throwing things against the wall. I have never been one for office work.

However my brother is a total opposite of myself. He has been very gracious and willing to set up all the digital stuff that we will be using in the future. Years ago we had a website that I turned over to someone to let them take care of because they told me that was just what they'd like to do and would be more than happy to do it. About 8 months later I opened up the website and realized it had not been changed by one sentence or picture. Then after about a 3 hour session of working on the website myself, I was called up to the house by sister Paulina to work on something and went back to the office and realized my session had timed out, and I had lost all the changes I had made. That was the last time I opened up that web page.

My brother is working on a new Web page for the children's Home and Rainbow Ministries. He is also looking into the possibilities of digital donations (which I have no idea how that kind of stuff works). Hopefully in the near future we will be able to get more and better information to you and quicker. I even started an Instagram account and I’ll try to put some information on there each week.

Like dad said our numbers are down to 25 children. During September and October we had several children come and go from the children's home. Some were here for a week, some for a month or so but they have been placed now with family.

Isaac is one of our oldest boys and he grew up with us at the children's home in Piedras Negras. He has now been working with us for about 6 years, and he came to me a couple of months ago and asked me about the possibility of helping them with financial support for the adoption of Alex. Alex, (or Julio as he was formally named after his father) is Blanca's child from a previous relationship. Some of you know the back history of Blanca and Kelly but the short version is Blanca's boyfriend showed up at her house, banging on the door and when her mother opened the door he struck her in the head with a pipe and killed her instantly. He then began to beat to death the 2 young ladies and literally left them for dead. This was in front of his two-year-old son. Kelly has lost her sight, and Blanca is physically and emotionally scarred. During their physical healing God actually gave them spiritual healing as well and they accepted Jesus Christ as their Lord and savior.

Isaac would take them to Monterey to their monthly medical examinations and over the course of several months he and Blanca developed a relationship and were married not long after. Blanca's ex is now imprisoned for probably the rest of his life and Isaac and Blanca are hoping to officially adopt Alex and remove the biological father from any parental rights. This is not a very expensive process. Especially since Blanca and Isaac are married but it is more than they have or that we are able to give them right now. It is nothing at all compared to what an adoption would be in the United States. In fact the adoption in Mexico is free they just need to pay a lawyer to get all the paperwork done to do remove the father's parental rights. They had mentioned to me 45,000 pesos which is roughly 2,400 dollars. If anyone would be interested in helping them please let us know. You could send a donation and mark it designated for Isaac and Blanca adoption.

The children that we have now will probably be what we consider long term. Because of the of the laws in Mexico about adoption the government will not remove parental custody of the children and some of these younger kids will probably be here with us until they turn 18. Some of them have family but the family members are not at all interested in taking care of the children. Despite these challenges, these children are doing very well. It is a huge blessing to me to hear when people come to visit and later tell me how impressed they were with the smiles of the children and how happy the children look.

As much as we love what we do, there is no way that we could be here or do this without all of you. Thank you so much from the bottom of our hearts for your faithful support of this ministry! Your donations both financial and material and also your investment of prayer for us is what allows us to be here and let us do what we do.

Thank you and God bless!

John & Paulina Bivens
Getsemani Children's Home
338 N. Monroe St. PMB 373
Eagle Pass, Texas 78852