by Jason Hall, Team Leader | Aguacayo, El Salvador

Sometimes the sweetest victories in life occur after the toughest struggles. Today we arrived in Aguacayo ready to complete the well in the morning, and then dedicate it to the school in the early afternoon. Ultimately, things didn’t quite work out that way, but we still praise the Lord for a great day.

The morning started normally at the Living Water International (LWI) house, with a time of praise and worship (singing the same songs we sing in the U.S., but with a decidedly Central American twist!), as well as a powerful devotional, followed by a delicious breakfast. Then we loaded up the work truck with the rest of the equipment we’d need to complete the well (the pump mechanism, additional segments of PVC pipe, and metal rods) and headed for the village.

We made rapid progress in lowering the smaller PVC segments inside the well-bore, but as it turned out, the style of pump that we were installing for Aguacayo is an Afridev pump, and was almost as new to the El Salvador LWI staff as it was to us (it’s only the second one they’ve installed…they previously installed a type of pump called the India Mark II). As is often the case with new designs, there were a few “growing pains” as we tried to get everything working right.

Most of our difficulties had to do with lowering the down-hole pump to the required depth, as well as getting the all-important check valve located at the bottom of the well to seal properly such that water could be pumped to the surface. We worked on it for as long as we could, but ultimately, after a lot of blood, sweat (and maybe some tears), had to postpone the dedication ceremony that we had planned to do in the afternoon.

A little disappointed at not being able to hand the well over this afternoon, our team headed back to the Living Water International house, but the dedicated staff of LWI El Salvador remained at the well site, and with help and cooperation from the some men from the village, kept working until long after sundown in an attempt to finish the well early enough for us to participate in the ceremony before heading to the airport tomorrow.

Ultimately, their persistence paid off, and they finished the well! They called about 8:30 p.m. to tell us that they were pumping water, and that we would be dedicating the well tomorrow morning about 9:30 a.m.! That was great news to our team, on so many levels!  Mainly, because we know that the lives of hundreds of people will be forever changed by the gift of clean water. Secondly, it was a good reminder of how God answers our prayers, because soon after we had gotten back to the LWI house this evening, we walked out to the beach and offered God praise for our imperfect day, and we prayed that our friends at LWI who were still out there working on the well would be successful in their efforts. We committed everything to God, and He provided!

After all the struggles we encountered today, we are looking very forward to a sweet dedication ceremony tomorrow morning. We are very grateful to the LWI staff (and the people of the village) for hanging in there tonight and not giving up. Please continue to pray for our team.

We love you guys!
Jason