Monday, December 17, 2012

The 10/20/30 Challenge


In just a few weeks, Seth is scheduled to be teaching four classes for the second semester at Faith Academy—which begins on January 7! We would like to fly out from Chicago on January 4 or 5, so that he will arrive on time to teach. However, in order for that to happen, our monthly financial partnership must be 100% complete, in time to buy those plane tickets. We know God may have His own, different timing for our return, but it is our prayer that we be able to serve the students and the school through a solid beginning to 2nd semester—with their teacher ready to go on day 1!

This brings us to what we are calling our “10-20-30 Challenge”: 10 days, 20 new monthly partners at $30 per month. Can you help us get there? If there are 20 people who can begin or increase their partnership with us at an amount of $30 per month, we will be nearly finished and ready to go! God has continued to bring us new partners, and we know there are more yet to come. We are so close to being ready to leave. Would you consider joining the team to get us back to Manila in time for Seth to teach that first day of class?

In 10 days, it will be Christmas! Within days after that, we need to purchase our tickets, if we are to be in Manila by January 7. We would love to see God bring in the last of our monthly support in this next 10 days! We know that He can do it! We serve a mighty God, who delights in providing for His children. Will you pray about taking us up on this challenge, as God leads you? Will you pray for God to move in the right hearts, so that people will partner with us at the right amounts for them, so that we can return to Manila at just the right time, according to His plan?

Remember, we are looking for 10-20-30: 20 new partners at $30 per month, in the next 10 days. Will you be one of the ones who help us to finalize our team of financial partners? Let us know if you have any questions, or if you want to be one of those 20 partners! You can contact us on Facebook or by email (view our Complete Profile in the top right sidebar for a link to our email address).

Information about our sending mission organization, TEAM, is located in the sidebar of this blog, to the right. 

Update, as of 12/18: We are still looking for 15 new partners at $30 per month. God is moving! We are  excited to see who He brings alongside us in partnership to send us back again as teachers at Faith Academy in Manila.

Update, as of 12/24: We need enough partners to cover $345 in remaining monthly commitments. This boils down to basically 11-12 more new partners at $30 per month. We are getting very close to being able to leave!

Update as of 12/28: We now need only about $250 more in monthly commitments. That would be covered by 8 or 9 new partners at $30 per month (or only 5 more at $50 per month). God is working and we are excited to see him moving so clearly in our monthly financial partnership. Will you be one of the ones who help us complete the final remaining amount?

Thursday, August 23, 2012

A couple months of Furlough ...

I recently realized that it felt like a long time since either Laura or I had posted on this blog, so I decided we needed to start posting on here again.

Laura and I have been back in the USA for a couple of months now, and we have had some great opportunities to spend time with family and friends, including several out-of-state trips. God has really blessed our interactions with those who are near and dear to our hearts over the summer months, and we are feeling refreshed from those times.

At this point, we are in the middle of an intense training process as we prepare for our return to the Philippines in early January. We have really been blessed by the class, and we have been learning some awesome tools that will help us to better share our ministry testimony and stories with people who are interested in and care about what we are doing. The training class ends on Thursday, August 30. If you feel God's leading, please feel free to pray for us as we continue this class, and finish it up in a little over a week.

So, that is a really small nutshell of what we have been up to recently. If you want to hear more details, feel free to email us (or call or facebook us). If you click on our picture up in the top corner of the blog page, you will see a link that allows you to email us.

I'm including a month-old photo of Laura, who is now into her 5th month of pregnancy.