Greetings from New Hampshire!
No, we haven’t relocated here yet but more on that in a minute. We’ve enjoyed a great Christmas here with family and we’re looking forward to a little unwinding and recharging over the next week.
As we close out 2014, it’s been fun to think back over the many ways the Lord has blessed us this year.
Some of the highlights:
In January, we officially started the process of building a team of supporters. Since then we’ve raised almost 70% of our one-time expenses fund and almost 50% of our monthly support budget (final numbers haven’t come in yet).
Later that month we celebrated the completion of Falonie’s store in Haiti – the culmination of a project we started the year before. If you haven’t seen it, check out the video our church put together to tell the story (2 mins): http://youtu.be/dF3_R6-dBBI
In June we became a family of five with the arrival of our son Joshua. After a couple days in the NICU for what turned out to be pretty minor stuff, we brought home a beautiful, healthy baby boy. At six months, he is wearing clothes for a nine month old and has a smile that lights up the whole room.
Also in June, I was ordained by Grace Bible Church. What an honor it is to be affirmed by this church and to have their support as we head to Haiti!
In August we traveled to Missouri to preach at Cornerstone Community Church in Harrisonville. While there, we spent the weekend with the Senior Pastor and his family on a 200 acre Christmas Tree Farm. What a joy it is to have such a cool church on our team!
Much of September, October and November was spent on the road meeting with supporters and recruiting for Dallas Seminary. Although this was the most intense Fall of travel we’ve ever had, it was also the smoothest. God was wonderfully gracious to us during this time.
Also in October, we started our 15th year of involvement with ministry Haiti. What a joy the previous 14 years have been!
Looking ahead:
We’re moving closer to a transition point in our support development process. Our hope was to reach 50% by Christmas. The last numbers we saw showed we were getting closer and we should have some updated numbers soon.
After we cross the 50-55% mark, we’ll begin making plans to relocate up here to New England and raise the rest from here. We’d appreciate your continued prayers as we work to build our team.
Some other prayer requests:
Haiti Political Crisis: Over the past couple months, unrest has been growing in Haiti. This lead to the resignation of the Prime Minister this past month. Please pray for calm to return to the streets, for safety for our teammates in Port-au-Prince and for resolution to the issues that are at the source of this most recent political crisis.
STEP Seminary: Pray for a good meeting of the board of STEP in early January and for new construction that will begin on the campus this next month.
Refreshment: The demands of a job, support raising and three kids keep us pretty busy. Pray that the Lord would give us a good time of refreshment here in New Hampshire this weekend and next week. Once we return to Dallas, pray the Lord would help us to continue balancing things well.
