We're cooped up like everyone else. So what do we do besides regular school? 

Audra and Dan built a humming bird feeder, we've played with making videos, we recorded a song (It Is Well) and we're practicing more music. We're reading a book together called, "Joyfully at Home" about becoming a young woman, preparing for future. We watch Little House on the Prairie at night before bed. We try to walk the cow paths once a day. That takes us along the river and the dogs swim for a while. Our curfew is 2pm, so we're restricted later in the day.

Dan continues to mentor guys online, taking them through "Principles of Bible Study" and a couple others in "OT survey". We're going to kick off another "virtual course" in May. Also trying to keep up relationship with pastors I work with here in Cuenca and in Quito, not to mention back in Nicaragua and Costa Rica.
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So...it's enough to keep us busy! Haha! We are just a little crazy by not being able to get out and see people face to face. They're talking about stricter measures here. If that happens, we may try to leave earlier...maybe beginning of June instead of July. We have to store our belongings and get passports for our four oldest girls first. Dan's sister sent birth certificates that should arrive April 13, then we can see about renewing passports.
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We're just going a day at a time and wait and see.

Let us know what you're doing!

See how God uses relationships to strengthen His church.

Click the PDF file below for a printable copy of this post.

For a PRINTABLE version, please download the PDF below:

Nicaragua has been in violent turmoil for nearly two months. Today marks another milestone as there is a national protest. For the next 24 hours, everything will be closed. Already highways have been restricted. Food has been scarce, foreign businesses are not importing into Nicaragua, people are suffering. There has been an unofficial curfew of 6pm. It is just too dangerous to be out on the streets after that. I was told that the Nicaragua I knew is now very different. It is a dangerous place to be. There are virtually no North Americans left in the country. Most missionaries have evacuated.

It all escalated when Ortega changed the benefits that retirees would receive. That was the proverbial straw that broke the camel's back. People came out in protest and the government responded with excessive force. There have been at least 135 killed in the last two months. The government is accused of using para military groups to attack protesters. Police are accused of not protecting the people.

In a call for change, the people decided to shut down everything. Stores, banks, transportation, businesses are all closed. In a country where many people buy food daily, this is difficult. If the national shut down endures, people will be hungry. 

How does the church respond? 
I talked with pastors Marco & Osman this week. When word came down of the national stoppage, they went to buy provisions for those who may have need. La Gracia (Grace Baptist Church) will have food available for those in their community who were not able to get food. 

In the hour of crisis, the church seeks to point people to Christ!

• Pray for the believers to show Christ in this very difficult time.
• Pray for the peace and restoration in Nicaragua.
• Pray for a resolution to this conflict.

View the video below for further insight of the conflict in Nicaragua:

Click the PDF file below for a print-out version

We have a new and improved way for you to give. You can now give directly through Servant Leaders to the Doyle family!
Central Missionary Clearinghouse handled our finances as we transitioned from our previous ministry. However, in an effort to make things simpler, Servant Leaders can now facilitate donations and remittance. Our goal over the next few months is to have all donations processed through Servant Leaders. Please feel free to contact us with any questions regarding this next step of our transition. 

Download PDF version of update below

Just a quick note to let you know what has been happening.
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Before we arrived back from Nicaragua, we learned that Dan's mom, Debbie Doyle had become very weak. She has been battling breast cancer for nearly 10 years. Her sister, Amy, began caring for her 24/7. Since we returned, we have been spending a lot of time with her. Her pain has been intense and she continues to weaken. Friday, October 13, she went for more tests. Yesterday, Oct. 16, she received the results. The cancer has spread. There is a mass in her right lung and the cancer is in her bones. She also has the beginning of pneumonia. 

We have confidence in our Lord that "In his hand is the life of every living thing and the breath of all mankind." Job 12. 10. What makes us sad is saying "good-bye." We know it is not forever. We have the eternal hope that she will be with Jesus and we will one day be reunited. But our hearts are hurting as we anticipate what the days ahead will bring.

We received this latest update about Mom while we were standing outside of the hospital room of Eirana's dad, Larry Allen. He had an emergency appendectomy a week ago. He continues to battle infection and there is concern about fully functioning kidneys. He looks to be improving, but no word on when he can return home. 

All this while the two of us were to celebrate our 15 year anniversary on a mini vacation and take a short trip to Ecuador and touch base with the people there. We cancelled the trip and will wait for another opportunity. Meanwhile, we are working on acquiring the documents needed to apply for our visas in Ecuador. We have no timeframe for when that will happen. We are focused on our parents at the moment and trusting God to lead each step. 

Thank you in advance for praying, encouraging our family and supporting us in this time.

We made it back to NY August 23! We had a few days to sort through luggage and get a vehicle. God provided an 8 passenger Chevy Traverse! Praise the Lord! We’re bouncing around a bit until we can find a place to settle in for the time we have here.

​We are transitioning from Nicaragua to Ecuador. This means we are transitioning our finances from ABWE to Central Missionary Clearinghouse (CMC). ABWE has been very gracious and helpful. They are willing to work with us in this transition. Their goal is for us to use up the funds in our account. Several people have asked when they should start. We would encourage you to start NOW! Over the next few months we will begin drawing funds from our CMC account until there are no more funds in our ABWE account. We appreciate your understanding and continued partnership with our family. It is an honor to serve the Lord with you supporting us. You can find giving information here: Give to Doyles through CMC

We feel like Abraham sent to a place he did not know...staying in tents! While we're not staying in tents, we are staying a few days here and a few days there. We're doing this so we are not an inconvenience to any one family. We'd love to have a place to settle for the time in the States. Ideally, it would be close to Little Valley, NY so we can be close to Dan's mom. If you have something available in Western NY, would you let us know?

Be looking for a new format to receive our updates. We are transitioning to Mail Chimp and will be sending e-mails from [email protected]

La Gracia (Grace Baptist Church-Nicaragua) is preparing to build! We have received an offer from Construction for Word Evangelism (CWE) to come and build a simple structure that will allow La Gracia to move out of the tent and into a permanent building. The building will be 64x28 feet. This will give La Gracia solid footing in the community and allow us to have a more permanent impact for the Gospel.

​We need to build the foundation and have it ready for them to build. The cost to build the foundation is $5,300. We have a team coming from Faith Baptist Church-New Port Richey, FL August 5-12, 2017. They will be here to do the work, but we need more funds to complete our phase of the project. If you would like to give toward the La Gracia building, you can send them to our ABWE account and mark it “Church Planting/Evangelism” account # 0134473-006. All designated funds will go directly to this project.

We had many volunteers to disassemble the tents we were using and clear the land to prepare for building. Please pray that the land will get leveled and prepared so we can complete the foundation August 5-12.

We are writing to inform you that there are changes ahead for our family. We have decided that we will resign from ABWE and pursue missions in a new direction. There are many things that influence this decision, and we want to focus on the positive. First, we desire to leave ABWE on good terms. We respect them as an organization, the people in the home office and the missionaries on the field are passionate followers of Jesus. We love and admire them. Second, there is no change in doctrine from us or ABWE. We have no disagreements here.

The Church Plant: The new direction has been born out of very positive developments. We see many positive things for the church plant (La Gracia) here in Nicaragua. La Gracia has two national elders/pastors (Marco Parrales & Osman Alvarez) and two deacons. There is a solid core of mature believers. They have land (They need a building still since they are currently meeting under a tent). The pastors grasp the vision for reaching the area. They have the vision for planting daughter churches and preparing to send missionaries. We hope to have an ongoing relationship with La Gracia and ask that you pray for open doors for this. 

The Advice: We received council from some veteran missionaries a few years ago. They said, “It’s better to leave a church plant too soon than to stay too long.” The tendency is the longer a missionary stays, the more dependency there can be on him.

The motive: Our home church has been encouraging us to go through them as the local church. It is their desire to take on the responsibilities of the local church in sending their own missionaries. They will attempt to grow in their role of encouragement, accountability and partnership in missions. They wish to get back to the most biblical view of missions in assuming this direct responsibility...not simply sending funds, but being partners in the gospel. 

Reproducibility: The goal in ministry & missions is to work from a platform that can be reproduced on the field. Our longterm goal is to see national churches sending missionaries too. But can we expect them to follow the same model we use, such as a mission agency, that requires large overhead? Not in Nicaragua! 

Philosophy: We ultimately believe it is the “responsibility of the local church to take the primary responsibility for the mentoring and mobilization of its members, resulting in a healthy local church, capable of multiplication through the sending out of servant leaders to launch new churches.” — Servant Leaders

Accountability: We are pursuing more involvement, accountability and partnership between us, our supporters and the church on the mission field. In doing so, we formed a Pastoral Oversight Team to be the next layer of accountability for our family. We seek to have total transparency and the POT will serve with us to be a guide, a sounding board, encouragers and partners as we serve as an extension of all our supporters.

Servant Leaders: We were invited to partner with a group called Servant Leaders. SL has a focus of helping the local church grow organically and train up its own leaders to serve and be sent out. The purpose of SL is to provide Resource, Mobilization and Pioneer Partnerships. You can learn more about them through their website: www.servantleaderstraining.com

Going Forward: What does this mean going forward? We have let ABWE know of our intent to resign. We now are working to wrap up everything here in Nicaragua and head back to the States. This means we need to sell everything!

SL, in collaboration with our home church, has asked us to go to Ecuador to join Joe & Heidi DePuy in assisting another church to plant a daughter church. Our home church is 100% on board with this direction! This will be a time of service and growth as we see how SL operates. The long term goal is to take this model to other countries in Latin America. It may mean a return to Nicaragua or somewhere else. It can take 4-6 months to get a visa for Ecuador, so we will be in the US for a while. Please pray for provision for housing and a vehicle again.

We have taken steps to get the process started. We now have a new website, e-mail. There is also a new accounting agency that will receive donations on our behalf. See the attached links:

E-mail: [email protected]
Web: www.doylefamilymissions.com 

Giving: You can go to the “Giving” link on our website to gather all information.
Further explanation: CMC will handle our accounting and the Pastoral Oversight Team will provide oversight for accountability regarding finances, moral issues or various other situations. 

Central Missionary Clearinghouse
P.O. Box 2219228
Houston, Texas 77218-9228

You can see options for giving by going to www.doylefamilymissions.com/giving.html 

We appreciate your continued prayers for our family as we make this transition. We know that we could not continue in this ministry without your faithful support and prayer. THANK YOU so much for your encouragement, love and support! 

This is a decision that we did not come to easily, but was made together with the council of our home church and trusted pastors. This has been as difficult as when we resigned from Gage Chapel as pastor. We will leave behind many friends and it will be confusing for them to understand too. We have cried many tears with our Nica brothers & sisters. Please pray for our daughters as they make another step into the unknown. They will say good-bye to what is normal, comfortable and to the many Nica friends we have here.

Please explore our website to learn more about us, Servant Leaders and what is ahead for us.​

Together in this adventure,
Dan & Eirana