“When I accepted Jesus Christ, my life was filled with God and with a desire to serve. To this day, I still have that desire. Through my studies I can help others, working not for men but for God because God satisfies my inner being.”
David’s postive attitude and enthusiasm to serve has helped him to become a valuable new member of the ENLACE staff.David Gonzalez is currently studying agronomy engineering at the Roberto Quiñonez National School of Agriculture. Soon after starting there, his life changed completely when some of his classmates invited him to a Bible study on campus. After the study, the gratitude he felt toward God gave him a strong desire to help others in need through his life and his profession. He desired to live out the words of Mother Teresa which had always inspired him, “I am a pencil in the hands of God and he writes with me whatever he wants.”
David submitted 21 resumes to various businesses before being accepted for a job, but there was never a moment in which he lost faith in finding a place where his talents and abilities could be used by God. During his search, David discovered ENLACE and was impressed to see the positive impact that the local churches were having in their communities. It was with ENLACE that David finally found work as a technical expert in agronomy. David agrees with ENLACE’s method of working through the local church, saying, “I think the principal help has to come from the church, following the example of Jesus Christ.”
David is currently one of the three ENLACE agronomists who provide technical advice to local farmers in the communities we serve.Since October of last year, David has been in charge of providing technical assistance to the participants of the Home Garden Projects being implemented in the region of Abelines. He organizes, supervises, and trains farmers to better prepare the soil, plant seeds, care for their crops, and harvest the resulting produce in a way that optimizes the efforts of each participant. His work is part of a larger effort to promote home gardens as a source of nutrition and daily sustenance in one of the poorest and most remote regions of the country where the rate of malnutrition and infant mortality has been very high due to low food quality.
David enjoys teaching others how to take care of their plants in order to multiply the fruits and vegetables they bear. Just as the seed that fell into good soil in the Bible grew a hundredfold, David is using his abilities to help those with little resources plant their seeds in a way that their blessings may be multiplied. David, 24 years old, will soon finish his degree in agronomy engineering, and his story–one of a young man willing to be a pencil in the hands of God–is just beginning.