As a child, I used to love watching game shows. One of my favorites was Match Game (Insert a year), which aired from 1973-1982. Each year, during the New Year show, it was a big deal to watch the title of the show roll over to the new year. Yes, I remember distinctly the thrill of seeing Match Game ‘75 turn into Match Game ‘76. Today, we’re talking about a sort of missionary equivalent, that I like to call: Matching Funds Game 2018!

Sowers4Pastors isn’t only about feeding centers and educating pastors. They are also actively involved in helping deserving pastors obtain motorcycles and assisting in church construction projects. And, that’s exactly where the Matching Funds Game 2018 comes in!

Most of the pastors in Western Honduras also work in the fields each day from 4:00 in the morning until 2:00 in the afternoon. We’re talking about literal fields, not the metaphorical kind! After putting in hours of hard, physical labor, these men go home to eat a midday meal and get prepared to go out to work as pastors. It is not uncommon for pastors to walk up to fifty miles a week! Fifty miles is a lot for anyone to walk, but we’re not talking about taking a stroll on paved streets. Fifty miles in Honduras means a lot of walking up and down super steep hills, wading through water, etc… And they do this every week!

That’s why Sowers4Pastors has a motorcycle ministry. Deserving pastors must come up with $600 to put toward a motorcycle. Sowers4Pastors provides $1000 to go to the cost of a new Honda motorcycle with semi off-road capacity. Right now, there is a matching fund challenge to assist pastors in getting motorcycles. That means, for every $500 donation, a donor will match it! Make no mistake, it is not easy for a Honduran pastor to come up with $600 to put toward a motorcycle. If a man is willing to do that, it shows how serious he is about being a more effective pastor. Your donation could mean the difference between a pastor helping to plant a church or not.

The second part of the Matching Funds Game 2018 involves church roofs. As you know, Sowers4Pastors seeks to empower, not enable. That’s why churches are required to come up with their own land. They must pour the concrete foundation and put up the walls. Then, Sowers4Pastors can help with the roof. Each roof costs $1000. With the current matching fund, they can now put on a church roof for $500.


As Allen said, “We are not trying to take over the pastor’s job. It’s not our church. They’ve got the sweat equity. They are doing the work. We are just trying to give them a little bigger sword to fight the battle.”

He continued by saying, “If this is something you’ve ever thought of doing, now’s a great time to step up. If you can’t come up with $500, consider making this a project for your small group or Sunday school class.”

It’s probably the most rewarding game you’ll ever play!

 - posted by Christi

You may have noticed that the Sowers4Pastors blog received a little makeover (those of you reading this post by email might want to click over to www.sowers4pastors.blogspot.com, so you can see what we're talking about). It’s all turquoise-y and pretty. There’s also a picture of Allen, Trish, Russell, Iris, R.J., and Abby in the header that is large enough to make Trish squirm with discomfort and long for the former header of anonymous mountains in Western Honduras. The redesign is because Trish wanted to make the blog more cohesive with the soon-to-be-unveiled new website. The reason Trish was working behind-the-scenes on the blog at all was because she was adding a link to the Amazon Smile program (more on that in a minute) - and, in If You Give a Mouse a Cookie fashion, Trish found herself tying the color scheme of the blog and the website together.

Now, more on that Amazon Smile program…

On the pretty, turquoise-y blog featuring a gaggle of smiling Sowerses, you will also see a box at the top of the right-hand margin, which says, “Support Sowers4Pastors Inc.” There’s some more writing and a link to take you to a place to sign up for the Amazon Smile program. It’s easy to find because it is neither turquoise-y, nor particularly pretty. It’s orange and black, like a construction paper jack-o-lantern. But what that little box can do is BEAUTIFUL!

By signing up to participate in the Amazon Smile program, you can designate Sowers4Pastors to receive 0.5% of the price of your eligible Amazon purchases. That 0.5% does not include things like shipping costs, tax, and subscription programs. The products and prices are identical to those on the main Amazon site, so don’t worry about paying inflated fees.

The link, for those of you seeing this post by email, is https://smile.amazon.com/ch/82-1025136

In order to benefit Sowers4Pastors, you will need to remember to enter through the designated Amazon Smile site, whenever you go shopping on Amazon. It does not work on the regular website, or on the Amazon app. If you use the regular Amazon website, or are purchasing on your phone using the app, the money won’t get to them.

If 0.5% doesn’t sound worth your time, let me remind you how far Sowers4Pastors can stretch a dollar. They have multiple feeding centers, which are not sponsorship centers. It takes a ridiculously small amount of money to keep those centers in operation. The cost to feed one child is around $2 per year. That means that when you make one $100 purchase on Amazon, you feed a child for three months! That's nothing to sneeze at!

Sign up! It’s an easy way to participate in spreading the Gospel, feeding children, training pastors, and all the other great things Sowers4Pastors does, by ordering things you were already going to purchase from Amazon. So, go ahead! Show me that smile again!

 - posted by Christi

The number of times a Sowers has asked me to write a blog post about money can almost be counted on one finger, rather than one hand. But, today, I’m waving a big, foam finger in the air and encouraging you to read about Sowers4Pastors current needs.

Allen said, “Every week, we post what is going on in Honduras. We don’t always talk about how these things costing money."

I’ll say it. It costs money to maintain the operation of Sowers4Pastors. Here are a few of the more pressing needs:

• There are currently twenty requests from churches in need of a new roof. Time is of the essence, because it is the dry season in Honduras. At least eight of those requests are very viable--coming from churches who are ready to put new roofs on TODAY! The cost is $1000 per roof.

• Last fall, Sowers4Pastors believed they had a significant commitment from a group wishing to help fund motorcycles for pastors. With that commitment, Russell took to the road and talked to pastors who wished to apply to the program - but then that financial commitment didn't come through. Still, Sowers4Pastors helped thirteen pastors get motorcycles in the fall, with help from various other donors who stepped up to assist with this need, and with some money from the general fund. There are currently ten more pastors Sowers4Pastors would really like to assist with $1000 toward the cost of a motorcycle. At the time of this writing, two of those motorcycles are funded. The other eight are not. Allen pointed out, “So often, when we help a pastor get a motorcycle, he takes that motorcycle and plants another church.” Basically, for $1000, you can help a pastor plant a church!

• The group in the U.S. that partners with Sowers4Pastors by providing food for the feeding centers is ready to donate half a shipping container of food! That is not a paltry amount! Sowers4Pastors needs to come up with the shipping and customs costs to make that happen, which will come to around $4000.

• Pastors Training School is significantly underfunded for the year. As you might recall, Pastors Training School is co-funded by three ministries. At this point, none of them have been able to provide the funding necessary to maintain the operation of the school. March and April classes have already taken place. That means down payments had to be made. The campground had to be rented. Books and other supplies had to be purchased. Those were completed, but more funding is needed, for the school to go forward. As Allen said, “Pastors Training School needs some love! Adequate funding is needed to make this school happen.”

• We’re already looking ahead to the next backpack drive. A lot of the future backpacks will be going to kids the ministry has yet to meet! Allen and Trish have been working on lining up backpack-packers for the back-to-school sales this year, anticipating there will be more and more kindergarteners joining the program this coming school year. As additional children sign up, Sowers4Pastors needs to be ready with backpacks and school shoes. Because every child needs shoes that fit properly, it is necessary to have a surplus of shoes in a variety of sizes, and this requires the ministry to maintain an inventory of shoes - which ties up funds! Additionally, half of the kindergarteners currently registered do not have sponsors yet - and we need to find sponsors for them, to keep the program funded! (Click this link for more info on the sponsorship program, and how to sponsor a child through Manna 4 Lempira.)

• Sowers4Pastors must pay for shipping and customs costs each time a shipping container is sent - and approximately eight containers (most of those containing food) are being shipped throughout the year!

• There’s also the daily running of the ministry, travel to the various feeding centers, etc… it all takes money.

Sometimes when a ministry grows quickly, the funding doesn’t quite catch up to the mission. Allen said, “Sometimes we turn down good, or even great, opportunities, in order to be able to say, ‘yes,’ to the best opportunities.” However, the fact is that the best opportunities often require funding.

Donating is easy - you can find the info you need at the "To Donate" button, just under the title photo at the top of this page. Your help is greatly appreciated!

 - posted by Christi

There’s a foster home in Gracias, which is run through Russell’s church. A few weeks ago, Russell had the opportunity to speak to the woman who operates the home. At any given time, about thirty children are housed there until a more permanent home can be found. The foster mom told Russell about a twelve or thirteen-year-old girl who recently came to the home. The girl is completely blind, but her vision loss occurred in the last two or three years. Prior to that, she could see.


Russell joked about his limited medical knowledge, but he immediately suspected cataracts to be the cause of the girl’s blindness. Cataracts are common in Central America--even in children. As Russell mentioned during our phone call, cataracts are easily fixed, if they are treated in time. Without treatment, they can result in total blindness. This young woman is still sensitive to light, which indicates there is still some vision lurking beneath the cataracts.

Last week, Hector, one of the translators who sometimes works with Sowers4Pastors, was on hand. Russell knew Hector also works as a translator for a ministry which partners with an eye clinic in the U.S. Hector arranged for the girl to be seen for an evaluation. $100 was all it took to provide travel costs to an eye clinic. And the verdict?????

Her condition is treatable! A pediatric ophthalmologist will be traveling to Honduras in March. The doctor will be performing a life altering surgery on this girl. The cost will be another $100 for travel expenses.

That’s it! For $200, a girl who seemed destined to go through life in the dark will once again be able to see! It boggles the mind!

Allen came on the line to point out that they come across opportunities like this all the time. Whether it’s the chance to feed kids for pennies a meal, or the chance to fix cleft palates, the opportunities are out there!

To emphasise the point, Allen shared about an eighteen-year-old woman who had a cleft palate. Everywhere she went, she held a hand over her mouth to prevent people from seeing it. The young woman was able to be included in a clinic to repair cleft palates. Along with babies and young children, the eighteen-year-old traveled to a team of skilled surgeons. And the cost? About $50-$100 per patient, for travel costs.

If you’re thinking to yourself, “But that’s Honduras! I never have miraculous opportunities to change lives,” think again! You do have the opportunity. We all do. Every donation made has the power to change lives! Opportunities abound!

Trish adds: We are able to help people when these opportunities arise, because of the generous donors who give to our "General Fund." We love gifts that are specifically earmarked for a certain aspect of the ministry, too, but those "General Fund" gifts mean that we can have the funds on hand, when these time-sensitive opportunities come up! I'm going to add a link to the "How to Donate" information on our blog, at the end of this post, for anyone who feels led to help with this.  

We are so grateful to all of our donors who partner with us to bless the people in the mountains of western Honduras!

Follow this link for instructions on how to donate to our ministry. 




 - posted by Christi and Trish

As with most good changes, switching to this new and improved donation page will cause a few minor inconveniences. Think of them as growing pains. The good thing is that once you’ve made the switch to the new system, you will not need to bother with it again! If you have any questions or problems, as you navigate the new donation site, please call the Foundation office at (407) 730-3364. The folks there will be more than happy to help you with this! Thank you all, SO MUCH, for the part you play in making the these ministries possible!

- posted by Christi

To go directly to
donation information,
follow the arrows!

The Problem:

We deal with a significant number of children with severe, chronic malnutrition in the mountain villages around Gracias. This malnutrition often causes the children to have stunted growth, impaired mental development, and weakened immune systems that make them unable to fight off illnesses. Usually, the problem is not that they don't get enough food, but that the limited diet available doesn't provide them with the vitamins and minerals needed for good health.

The Solution: