Saint Andrew Events

On November 9, 2023, nine U.S. Presbyterians from six different churches traveled to the village of Tzampoj in Guatemala to install solar power systems in ten homes. After a week of work, the ten families who had been cut off from the local electricity grid had their own independent power sources.

How this mission project came to be is a complex, but interesting, story. It’s interesting because it involves so many people doing great mission work in many different ways.  It’s complicated because there is so much work being done by so many different people and organizations. For me, it began when I was asked to write a grant request for a solar project.

Solar Under the Sun (SUTS) is a ministry that installs solar power systems in poor communities all over the world. They are based at Camp Ferncliff, near Little Rock, Arkansas, where they usually do all of their training. But people in central Texas wanted this training without having to travel to Arkansas. And so a group of us from four different churches applied for a grant from our presbytery to bring the solar training to our camp and conference center, John Knox Ranch. We won the grant and the training took place in January of 2023. At that point we were trained and ready to join a SUTS mission trip.

But before an official SUTS trip came around, we had another request. Rev. Rob Mueller had worked in Guatemala years earlier with a coffee growers cooperative. Coincidentally, one of Rob’s acquaintances from the coffee coop had an urgent need.  In the village of Tzampoj, electricity is supplied by a private company. This company had recently raised electricity rates to the point that many families could no longer afford electric service. Having had experience with community organizing through the coffee coop, the people of the neighborhood organized again to protest the electric rates. Unfortunately, the electric company would not negotiate.

And so, Luis Morales, a former coffee grower and current community organizer, called his friend Rob in Texas and asked if the U.S. churches might be able to help. The timing was perfect. We had just finished solar training. And we had grant money left over from the training to pay for the solar equipment. And so, the trip was organized and the work was completed in just a few months.

But there are even more ministry connections in this story. Another Presbyterian ministry that is active in Guatemala is Living Water for the World. LWW installs public water systems in places without safe water. Several people on this trip had previously worked in Guatemala installing water systems. On our trip we were able to connect with people they had worked with in previous years. And this means we have many more connections for more ministry with both electric power and clean water. But first, we have more work in Tzampoj. Ten families now have independent power, but about fifty more families are interested.

Our next trip is scheduled for July 2024. In the meantime, Luis Morales’ two sons, Diego and Christian, worked closely with us and are already at work building more solar power systems. The work continues…

(Thanks to all involved: Mission Presbytery, Divine Redeemer PC and Saint Andrew PC of San Antonio, Shepherd of the Hills PC and University PC of Austin, Solar Under the Sun, the people of Tzampoj, and so many more.)