The Kunkel Family: June 2024

Wednesday, June 19, 2024

Father's Day 2024

Father's day always brings up a lot of emotions in me since I lost my father when I was just four. But more so this year since we are about to send off two of our boys.

Levi just got married and he is moving to Kansas City this week were he will go to school and work. It is hard to believe that we have a son who is married. But we are happy for him and Alanna and excited for what the future holds for them!

Jake leaves next week to join the Space Force. He will spend 2 months in Texas in Basic Training and then Mississippi for his Techincal Training. Please pray for him.

We had a special Father's Day celebration Sunday evening with all the kids. I took a moment to reflect on how good God has been to me and our family. His faithfulness despite my failures overwhelm me.

Happy Father's Day to all the dads out there. Let's strive together to be the best Fathers possible to impact, disciple, raise up the next generation to know, love and follow Jesus!

New Life Network Annual Meetings

Red Nueva Vida (New Life Network) Retreat

Part of Ben's time in Guatemala was spent in meetings with Red Nueva Vida. We meet every year in a different country to share, celebrate, plan, pray and strategize for the following year.

We started our time visiting and seeing the ministry in Guatemala. There are currently two churches and two generations of disciples and churches. There will hopefully be a third generation soon. The first service was an international service celebrating the work being done globally through New Life Network. Here are some pictures of that special time:

Disicpleship before service

Servicio Global

Our friend Yeison from Colombia was ordained as Pastor

Time and service in Santa Lucia the first daughter church in Guatemala.

We had meetings Monday through Wednesday in which we learned and shared together. Here are some of the pics from that time. We started by sharing prayer requests and praying for each other.

Praying for our first missionary being sent by Guatemala to help start a new work in Honduras.

Here are some of the things we celebrated as a network during last year of ministry:

We planted 1 daughter church in Santa Lucia Milpas Altas
National Convention Colombia 2023
New Churches in Growth Cycle
Refine creative work method
Villa Mella Church (new group)
Finances to hire full time coordinators for Columbia, Chile, and Dominican Republic
Coordinator for USA, Guatemala and Europe in place
Discipleship DNA in 2 churches
We have made 3 mission trips
Completed local leadership training course
Contact with new Pastor Elido entering the network
We started prayer time with pastors
New church starting
Built relationships with pastors
Spiritual Retreats
Recorded and edited videos for Church Planting Certificate for Institute New Life Network
We opened 2 new regions (Plantar CRNVC, Huasco-north, Chile Chico-South)
Recorded Certificate for Pastoral Care lessons in New Life Institute
We opened 2 Discipleship groups
Introduced the network to 4 Pastors/Leaders

We set goals for the coming year as well. One big goal as a network is moving into at least one new country. Please pray for these efforts!

We of course took some time to have fun together. One evening we went to Antigua and our last day together we went to Lake Aititlan.

Tuesday, June 18, 2024

Trip to Guatemala

We had a great trip to Guatemala. The primary reason for trip was for Levi and Alanna's wedding. The trip also served a few other purposes. One was a way for us to hopefully close this chapter of our lives by visiting friends and places we have missed greatly. The other purpose for Ben at least was our annual meetings for New Life Network. Every year we meet together to pray, celebrate, plan and strategize for the coming year of ministry.

Here are some pictures with our visits with friends. See next blog to see pictures and info from New Like Network Retreat.