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This story and photos available online:

www.pcusa.org/pcnews/2008/08885<http://www.pcusa.org/pcnews/2008/08885

>Every Thursday is Thanksgiving

Farmworkers mobile ministry expands, delivers meals and
hope on Thursdays

>by Emily Enders Odom
>Associate, Mission Communications
>Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.)

ARCADIA, FL - When Santos Vela motors into town each
Thursday in the Espiritu, a 31-foot mobile home which
functions as a church for the Beth-El Farmworker Ministry
[www.beth-el.info], word travels quickly.

Here in DeSoto County, among the poorest in the state of
Florida, Vela's arrival signals a hot meal and hope near
the end of a hard work week for Arcadia's migrant farm
workers. Some of Arcadia's seasonal agricultural workers, a
number of whom live here year-round, have been in Florida
for two generations, servicing primarily the area's citrus
and watermelon growers.

Most of the workers in this city 40 miles east of Sarasota
hail originally from Guatemala, El Salvador, Columbia and
Mexico. Vela, a lay leader and member of the Beth-El
Farmworker Ministry's worshiping congregation at Wimauma,
FL, for the past seventeen years, is a native of Veracruz,
Mexico. He "gave his life to the Lord" upon the birth of
his daughter in 1991.

Although Vela is painfully aware that the future of this
new outreach ministry has been jeopardized by the current
economic crisis, he continues to "look to Jesus" as he
preaches good news to the poor.

"Thursday is a brilliant choice for Santos to go where the
workers are," said the Rev. Ted Land, pastor of the First
Presbyterian Church of Arcadia. "Because they get paid on
Friday, their resources are often pretty scarce by
Thursday. Santos does a meal and is there to do a Bible
Study. On Friday morning, he drives through the 'Avenues,'
where most of the Hispanic agricultural workers live, and
gives away clothes and food."

Land, 62,  who has served in Arcadia for 23 years, was
instrumental in bringing Beth-El's ministry here. The
Wimauma-based ministry - which helps farm workers to
achieve self-sufficiency - had previously expanded into the
town of Immokalee with a mobile outreach ministry in 2006.

"It's been very difficult to attract farm workers to
anything at our church because we are English-speaking
Anglos," Land said. "Although our church has provided a
Thanksgiving meal every year to the whole community free of
charge, which a few farm workers attend, we have never
truly been able to impact that community. That's where
Beth-El came in."

Since 1988, First Church had been sending out volunteers
from among its members to help at other Beth-El ministry
locations, even as Land was hoping for a new site to be
established in DeSoto County. "I've been aggravating every
Beth-El director for twenty years to locate in Arcadia," he
said.

Immediately following Hurricane Charley in 2004, when the
area and its residents sustained extensive damage and loss,
Land escalated his advocacy efforts to bring a farm workers
ministry to Arcadia. Land again stated his case in 2005,
when Dave Moore, Beth-El's current director, came to
address a gathering at First Church. "Dave promised me that
before I retired there would be a Beth-El presence in
Arcadia," Land said. "He has kept that promise."

Now in its sixth month, the new mobile ministry at Arcadia
has begun to attract some 25 regular attendees each week.
Vela, who has participated in Spanish-language lay
leadership training sponsored by the Presbytery of Tampa
Bay [www.presbyteryoftampabay.com], has begun the hard work
of establishing relationships with the people.

Mainly through the efforts of Shirley Roosevelt Sweat and
Bill Stander, both deacons at First Church, Beth-El has
been granted permission to park the Espiritu van in the lot
of the Arcadia All Florida Saddle Club. There Vela conducts
his outreach ministry - when not on the move - and sleeps
every Thursday night.

He has been especially encouraged that as he has
distributed Spanish-language Bibles, requesting of those
who receive a Bible that they promise to read a verse or
passage and share it with him the following week, they
actually do.

"Santos is the perfect person for this call," Land
observed. "Part of the challenge is winning the hearts and
the confidence of the people."

Moore said that because immigration concerns have generated
fear and suspicion among the migrant workers, Vela has
helped to gain their trust by meeting them where they live.
"It is a new chapter in his way of thinking to go forth as
we are commanded to go by Christ to areas outside of our
comfort zone, outside of where we worship and where we
live," said Moore. "Santos has been called to a new
situation as an evangelist."

Moore smiled as he contemplated the potential impact of
"Growing Christ's Church Deep and Wide"
[http://deepandwide.ning.com] - a churchwide initiative
adopted by the 218th General Assembly - through Beth El's
efforts to continue identifying other new ministry sites.

"Not only are we growing the church deep and wide," he
said, "we're growing it 'up and down' as we literally
envision new locations 'up and down' Florida's highways."

Funding is the formidable challenge in continuing the
Arcadia outreach and in undertaking any future expansions.
"Our board reached a difficult decision this month to
suspend our ministry in Arcadia until such time as new
funding sources are identified," Moore said. "I pray that
this story of Santos' passion to share the gospel with the
most marginalized in our culture will inspire an outpouring
of giving, especially at this time of year."

Now that Beth-El's outreach ministry - which has only just
begun to scratch the surface of meeting the great needs of
Arcadia's Hispanic residents - must be placed on hold until
its continued funding is secured, Ted Land doesn't mind
postponing the retirement he had spoken of only years
before.

"I don't see myself riding off into the sunset just yet,"
he said.  "The Lord has had other things in mind."

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