God is great!

We are encouraged and excited to see God at work here where there is no true church, but many forms of worship. From Jehovah's Witnesses, and Witchcraft, to the ever prevalent Catholicism with it's idol worship and superstition that has been grafted into the culture and foundation of these people.

Josh and Mike were convicted to start church three weeks ago through prayer and encouragement from another pastor. God blessed this opportunity and brought about 40 people from nearby farms and towns.

We are thrilled to share some of the fruit of two Sundays ago... A lady named Luisa, who works in politics in a nearby town of 70K came to church just out of "curiosity", she said. She was invited by her house maid who was witnessed to on the side of the road by a local pastor and got saved! Luisa was sitting in church (which is actually our living room) and hadn't been here very long when there was an announcement made that we needed a place to have bible study in her town. She offered her house right away. We weren't sure at this point what her motives were, but accepted the invitation. Louis Fernando (Our Colombian pastor/missionary friend who lives here with us) led this bible study Wednesday the 15th, when he read through the Sermon on the Mount. He said he didn't hardly preach at all before Luisa stood up and started talking to the people there. She said "I'm not who you all think I am, I am not the happy person you think I am, I like to drink a lot of liquor, I'm alone, I don't have a husband, my life is garbage. Today I have decided to have Christ enter my life, I will live for Him. My life doesn't have a purpose without God." The other people were surprised at this truth about her, but she used this opportunity to invite them all to give their lives to Christ too, and they did, all 12 or so of them. Louis Fernando said by the time it was over they were all in tears and he was just watching in amazement as the Spirit of God was very strong and was doing all the work.

Luisa is hungry to learn and is asking to be taught! Mike and I (Josh was studying for Sunday and Stacy was taking care of her kiddos :) went to visit her during the week along with Louis Fernando and a couple of the kids. She was encouraged by the love and support and the sense of family she now has. She shared with us that she is an orphan and she is longing for a family. She has children, but both of her parents, one of her uncles and one of her brothers were all murdered, so she is quite lonely. She has lived in fear since she was a child, and has been unable to have restful sleep because of tormenting dreams, voices that talked to her, and noises in her house, along with physical torment, feeling choked or awaken in the night. She has since shared that she is sleeping well, the best in years! Oh the comfort that God brings! What a mighty God we serve, who convicts, convinces, and saves! Glory to God alone!

..."for it is God who works in you both to will and to work for His good pleasure." Phil 2:13

Julie

Moved In!

We are officially living at El Nido as of May 24th. The move has brought us many nice changes with a bigger living space and the ability to live on the property we are trying to work. The initial move was crazy with the house not being quite ready and teams and family coming down a few days after the move. On top of all this my kids caught the flu and it was a rough one. Amidst catching puke and dealing with flies (we had a million) we were blessed by all the work accomplished by the work parties on the farm. We were able to screen our house which helped a lot with all the flies and other critters. This was by far my favorite thing accomplished as I don't care much for sharing my bed with bats and june bugs! Thanks to the help of visiting family and a couple visits to the doctor the kids are all well and back to their spunky selves. Stacy

Still going...

Well, it’s been a little while since we've updated, for at least three reasons…because we haven’t had internet at our house until today, we've been quite busy, and it is very difficult to find a quiet place to finish any task not to mention gather thoughts and write them out.

We have some good news and some bad news to report. The good news is we have a van! Transportation has been a challenge since we've been here, although we have had help from sweet people who have been gracious enough to take us places at times of need. We are very thankful for our latest ‘investment’. It’s a white 18 passenger van, which is about the same size as our standard 12 passenger in the US, just a little ‘cozier‘. It’s a diesel so it is great for fuel economy.

The bad news is, our oldest girl went back to her former life after being with us for about 3 weeks. This was a sad time for us in many ways, but we know that God is sovereign and that she is in His hands. Having her, and losing her has helped us learn some things we wouldn’t have learned without her, and for that we are thankful.

The farm is coming along little by little. We have had some help lately and we are making some progress and getting closer to being able to move in. Everything here is slower and less organized than we are accustomed to, so we are learning to go with the flow and just do what we can. The inside is mostly painted, beds are ordered and hopefully coming by the end of this week or beginning of next week. Josh and Mike have been working on the kitchen in an effort to get the house livable as soon as possible. I would like to say they are installing cabinets and will be laying tile soon, but the construction materials and scheduling are not exactly that simple. There are very few places here that you can just go buy what you need, a shopping trip with a list isn’t exactly what takes place, I think a better description would be a scavenger hunt. At times you might even have to give up what it is you actually need for what you can make work. Even with these challenges they are managing to make progress and are hoping to be finishing up in a few days.

It hasn’t all been work, work, work however. Sunday a friend took us to the Rosario Islands off the coast of Cartagena for the day. We were taken by private boat, to a private house where our biggest concern was trying to avoid a sunburn. We had great day of relaxing and swimming with our families. It was truly a gift from God, we were very thankful, refreshed, and...sunburned!

I will try to post pictures soon. I have misplaced the cord to the camera among other things. Lets just say living out of suitcases leaves much to be desired! But, considering 1John 2:17 what can we say? These desires are only flesh and not to be given too much consideration. All in all, things are going well and everyone is doing good! We’ll try to update more now that we have easier access to internet.

Thankful

God is still at work and continues to provide all of our needs. We were all greatly encouraged when our new church family and a few others came and helped us clean the house and yard. They made lunch over an open fire, completely gutted, scrubbed, and hosed down the inside of the house, cleaned and burned in the yard, removed a roof from one of the coops, and helped us get some things moved and organized. At times, the task seems overwhelming and it is difficult to see the potential, but God is giving us strength to overcome, and sending us help when we need it. We were uplifted also by some friends and family that are living here in Colombia who came to spend a couple nights with us. It was a sweet time of fellowship, and was refreshing to have some English speaking friends to talk to who could also help us with our Spanish.

The new girls are doing better every day. They seem to be getting used to structure and seem to be enjoying their new found luxuries of running water, three meals a day, and several changes of clothes, which God graciously provided this week through a family from New Jersey. It is so exciting to watch God work and provide while using so many different people to do it. We are consistently reminded that this is His project, He is orchestrating it, and we are just a small part of the big picture.

Getting Settled

We are here in Turbaco staying at a farm that was graciously offered to us until we can get settled at our own place, which is only about 2 miles away. We are finally settling into a routine and getting used to the time change. Thank you all for your prayers, God is listening! We have gotten two of the girls we have been praying for, and the transition has been pretty smooth. The language barrier is still an issue, but we are managing to communicate good enough. There is little time to study but we have some prospects of teachers that may be willing to come here to help in that area. Our kids are adjusting quite well. The food, climate, new additions, and constant commotion seem to have a larger effect on us adults than the children.

Monday we are hoping to get started back with school, at least with the older kids. We learned this week that we will be teaching the new girls in addition to our own which will be a challenge. We may mostly be teaching them English for now. God is good though and has provided a helper who will be coming 5 days a week to help with cooking, cleaning and laundry.

Right now it looks like we will be able to begin cleaning on our property by the 15th of this month. We walked there a couple days ago and realized that it needs more work than we originally thought. The main house needs to be gutted and thoroughly cleaned. The cabinets and closets are either rotted or have mold and the bats do not seem interested in moving out. Some of the doors need to be replaced and the patio will have to be removed. It seemed a bit overwhelming, but since then, the church we will be attending has offered to come help get things cleaned up! Oh the gifts that God gives us. I wish there was time to tell you all the daily gifts we receive from our Loving Father. We do not have transportation, we haven’t had a phone until yesterday, we cannot communicate well, and we don’t know where or how to get what we need. We are completely dependant on God to supply our needs and this He has done. Whenever we need something, God brings help, not because we call on men, but because we call on God, He hears us when we ask and He answers our prayers. At times it feels a little reckless, almost foolish, but God always shows up with answers when we need them and thus, encourages our faith. Often we can see how He even went before us and prepared our way ahead of time. What a mighty God we serve!

We don’t have internet at our house, so updates will be sparse. Please continue to pray for God’s work to be done among us and for Him to bring the children, helpers and disciples that He has for us. We love and miss you all!

Leave Date!

Colombia Grace Foundation is officially scheduled to leave March 27th for Colombia. Please pray for us during this time of transition. We will update you all on our progress as we are able. Glory to God!

Getting Ready!!!!

We wanted to update everyone on our progress. We are in the process of cleaning out our houses and packing to leave for Colombia. Yep, that's right we are in the process of leaving for Colombia. We are planning on leaving La Pine March 14th or 15th and will be drive down to LA. Once there we will leave and fly to Colombia. Please pray for us as we tie up loose ends here and as we are flying with 8 kids. We will update everyone on our progress as soon as we are able.