Dear Friends and Family,
As you know from our last update, we are a Chicago Cubs family. Unfortunately, the season didn’t go quite as well as hoped, although there’s always next year. Speaking of next year, I am happy to report that we anticipate moving to South Africa on March 9, 2008.
To fill you in on the details, I’d better start at the beginning. We started the fund-raising process in February 2007. At the time, we set as our goal to be fully supported by the end of October 2007. We knew this was an aggressive goal, but as we looked at the tremendous needs in South Africa, we decided we would pray in faith that God would work toward that end.
At the beginning of October, we were about 55% of our necessary support level, with an $1800 per month still to be raised. We had several individuals/groups contact us with their intent to support us on a monthly basis, most notably within the last 2 weeks. Our support level now stands at about 85%, with approximately $600 per month yet to be raised.
We have decided to start making firm plans regarding our move. We received Meredith’s passport just this last week, and we are looking into all the details required, including shipping a container of our belongings, obtaining international health insurance, applying for a VISA, etc… We also have a house to sell, and we have kicked the final preparations for that into high gear; just this week I dropped to part time at Wells Fargo, and as it now stands, January 4th will be my last day. I wanted to mention that both Amber’s and my employers have been extremely helpful and cooperative to accommodate us.
While we still have a portion of our support to be raised, we are trusting the Lord that He will provide for that before March 9th rolls around. Our minds have been running about 120 mph since we made this decision, and we alternate from excited, to overwhelmed, to scared to death. We appreciate all the faithful prayer support and assistance that so many have provided to us.
We want to communicate especially to all those individuals and groups who have taken us on for monthly support how encouraging and challenging your faithfulness is to us. As Paul tells us, we are ambassasdors for Christ, bringing His message to Welkom, SA. In addition to that, we feel strongly that we are your ambassadors as well. You have invested in God’s work through us, and we take that responsibility seriously. We trust that through God’s blessing in our lives, He will cause fruit to abound to your accounts. We sincerely thank you.
Amber just recently found that we could get our tickets each for about $1000 less than we had anticipated, and we should be arriving in Johannesburg on March 10th, the same day a team from Point of Grace church is scheduled to arrive. We will jump right into ministry, as the day we arrive, another team will be in the area focusing directly on a church-planting outreach. We are excited to see what God has in store, and we will attempt to communicate it to you all in a timely fashion. And of course, as we settle in to life in Africa, the Cubs will be just beginning their 2008 curse-breaking championship run.
