Who's Who at Sowers4Pastors, a Blogumentary: Episode 3

 Hello, Sowers4Pastors friends and supporters! It is time for episode 3 in our exciting blogumentary series, Who’s Who in S4P. In episode 1 we talked about the Honduran staff who work in administrative/office positions. In episode 2 we introduced the new Honduran staff members. Today, we’re going to focus on gringo staff members!

ALLEN & TRISH 

We can’t very well have a Who’s Who blogumentary without talking about Allen and Trish. They are the original Sowerses in Sowers4Pastors. 

It shouldn’t surprise anyone that Allen became a missionary. He spent eight years of his childhood on the mission field. When he wasn’t on the field, he was in a church that placed a lot of importance on missions. Allen founded Sowers4Pastors twenty-one years ago. He has continually served as president and resident Energizer Bunny. He is uniquely knowledgeable of the things that will work and what won’t work in missions. 

Trish came to the mission field with absolutely no background in missions. She laughingly pointed out that she had never even been on a short-term mission trip. That didn’t prevent her from following God’s direction when she and Allen loaded up their five young children and embarked on the adventure of a lifetime in 2001. Ben joined their family in Honduras, bringing the headcount of children to six. Allen and Trish raised them all to adulthood and they are happily adding to their collection of grandchildren. 

Between Allen and Trish, they are involved in every single aspect of the ministry. Allen is the extroverted go-getter and Trish is the more introverted one dealing with office work. Now that they have both hit sixty, they have started looking for the pathway to retirement. They joke that they haven’t found it yet. But they are hoping to gradually decrease some of their involvement and reduce the number of hours they are working. In the meantime, they will continue working as many hours as it takes to keep things operating smoothly. 

KIM & JONATHAN HALL

Kim and Jonathan Hall moved to Honduras with their three children in December of 2018. Kim is the director of the Manna 4 Lempira sponsorship program. She and Jonathan spend a lot of time in direct contact with the children, their families, the pastors, and the Sunday school staff involved with Manna. 

Trish praised them for helping to deepen the Manna program with their direct relationships. She said, “They are able to catch things that we wouldn't catch as quickly.”

The Halls weren’t strangers to Honduras when they packed up their household and moved to Gracias. They made a number of short-term trips before they were called to full-time mission work. Kim and Jonathan are committed to growing the program and keeping it running to the continued benefit of the people in the communities being served. 

RUSSELL & IRIS

As many of you already know, Russell & Iris are in a time of transition. For many years, it was assumed that Russell would take over the day-to-day running of Sowers4Pastors. But God has had other plans. Russell and Iris have decided to move to the States for a season. This will allow them to obtain US citizenship for their three children. They are working to obtain a visa for Iris. When the paperwork is in order, they will move to Kansas. They will need to live in the States for a number of years in order for Iris to get citizenship. While this isn't the way Allen & Trish had envisioned the future, they are 100% behind the process. 

Russell is phasing out his work with Sowers4Pastors and phasing in his work with the church they will attend in Kansas. The transition has already started and he is working part-time for each ministry. When all of the travel paperwork is in order, he will work full-time in missions with that church, while living in Kansas.

Please pray for Russell & Iris and their three adorable children. It’s an exciting time for them, but excitement usually comes with challenges! 

KIRSTIN

Kirstin, as the first-born child of Allen & Trish, was born into a life of adventure. She officially joined Sowers4Pastors as an adult in January 2020. Kirstin spent much of her childhood in Honduras. As a young adult, she moved back to the States and received a degree in nursing. For many years, she worked as a nurse in Florida. She also served as a surrogate mother-hen and helped two of her younger siblings launch into adulthood in the States. Then she felt called to return to Honduras. 

Kirstin is extremely dedicated to the ministry. She goes out with teams when needed, but her niche is the behind-the-scenes stuff. That’s great because there’s a lot of behind-the-scenes stuff to get done! Her presence has been a tremendous blessing to Sowers4Pastors.

RACHEL & BRANDY

The fact that Rachel & Brandy were able and willing to join Sowers4Pastors full-time is tangible proof that God cares about the details. They were able to disentangle themselves from Brandy’s job as an Air Force pilot. They were also able to arrange for someone to run their ministry of helping young women with lesser resources attend college in Tegucigalpa. The timing could not have been better. Rachel & Brandy joined the ministry shortly after Russell & Iris expressed interest in moving. 

Brandy is enjoying working with the teams and he’s great at it. He’s a lot of fun, but he also takes his work very seriously. Rachel and Brandy are very focused on the spiritual aspects of team visits. The teams have a great time without losing sight of the big picture - the spiritual work of the overall ministry. Brandy’s military background has provided him with a huge number of skills beyond flying planes. He works well with everyone on the staff, and is learning how everything gets done, so he can take more and more off Allen and Trish’s plate!

Rachel inherited Allen’s Energizer Bunny gene. She’s very involved in the ministry even with two very active children. Rachel’s skills as an organizer are legendary within the Sowers family. Trish jokes that her own household took an organizational hit when Rachel grew up and moved out. Rachel is working to organize every aspect of the ministry. Trish said, “It’s not just about stopping things from falling through the cracks. Rachel is closing the cracks!”

As a family ministry, S4P didn’t always worry about organizing each person’s individual tasks. They always described themselves as “kitchen table missionaries,” but the ministry is growing. Now there is a growing staff of people working for Sowers4Pastors. Trish jokingly pointed out they aren’t sitting in marble offices. The ministry is still very frugal, but bringing on staff does bring different organizational requirements. All of this is going on at the same time they are doing cleanup from the darkest days of Covid. 

Trish said, “We can feel that God has His hand on the ministry. He will bring us through all of the changes.” 

 - posted by Christi