Top five prayer requests for September
1. That our car will keep working until we get to the train station in Boston on the 12th or 13th of September. **ANSWERED POSITIVELY**2. That our house will sell before we fly to Brazil. **ANSWERED POSITIVELY**
3. That the work visa from Brazil will be processed quickly so that we can get there soon.
4. That with our schedules so out of order that we won't neglect our personal time with God. **ANSWERED POSITIVELY**
5. That the girls (and us) will make the most of this period of unsettled life between Canada and Brazil. **ANSWERED POSITIVELY**
We really appreciate your prayers.
Farewell to Canada
Now that the car is fixed and the house is empty, it's time to say goodbye for now to all of our friends in Canada. We head out Saturday, September 3 to go to Maine for about a week, and then we're off to Texas. During the next couple of weeks we probably won't be posting many updates as access to a computer will be limited, but when we do get online, we'll have lots to share I'm sure.
The grand selloff
We've calculated how we think things need to proceed for the next month or so, and in doing so, we realized that we only had one weekend left in Prince Edward Island. When we got home on Thursday night, we decided to have a massive moving sale on Saturday. The sale went very well as we sold almost all of the big things (furniture, etc.) as well as many smaller items. This gave us enough cash to get through the month of September, as our income from Grace Christian School ends August 31. The girls did a great job of manning the tables, and we got a real blessing from having Gloria Wooldridge come and help us sell stuff from an "unattached" position.
A tearful sendoff
On Sunday, August 28, we were given the opportunity to share God's leading in our lives with the people at Long Creek Baptist Church in PEI on their last Sunday morning service in Long Creek. (They are relocating to Cornwall.) It was an interesting service, certainly more like what we're likely to see in Brazil that what we're used to in North America.That evening we said our final goodbyes before heading off to the mission field to our good friends at Grace Baptist Church (our sending church). We were truly touched by their generosity and their kindness. Along with many cards, we received a beautiful picture book of PEI with personal notes from many of our Grace Baptist friends. It was hard to hold back the tears (not that we did). Thank you Grace for everything. We look forward to representing you well in South America.
The Chevy Impala
When we headed to Pennsylvania, we knew we were going to be doing a lot of travelling, so we were excited to find out that we got upgraded from a mid-sized car to a full-sized car at no extra cost. The Impala is simply a whole lot more car than anything we had rented before. Although it doesn't look that much bigger from the outside, it seemed huge on the inside. The car was very comfortable as well. It had a huge trunk, and best of all, it was quite good on gas. We travelled from Bangor to Charlottetown without refuelling and I still had about 1/3 of a tank remaining. It didn't handle as nicely as the Grand Am, but in every other way, it was a superior vehicle to everything else we've driven.Deputation in Pennsylvania
On August 21, we shared what the Lord was doing in our lives with the people at First Grace Brethren Church of Philadelphia. This is the church we attended for two years before we headed off to PEI. We had an absolutely wonderful time with these people. I was impressed that they had made the technological leap to be able to display my powerpoint presentation. After church, a group of us headed out to a Hibachi restaurant where the chefs cook your meal right in front of you. I'm not sure if they are actors first, and then chefs, or the other way around. Anyway, we had a hoot at this restaurant. Following a couple of hours of great chatting, we had to say goodbye to our FGBCP friends and say hello to our Calvary Baptist friends.
Calvary Baptist Church in Bristol, PA is the church we attended for a year after we left Maine. We wern't able to do candidating at the church because the there was a special event in the community that day which the church got involved in, but we were able to spend some quality time with some of the people that were most influential in our lives while we attended that church. We again had a great time of getting caught up on everybody's lives and sharing what God was doing in ours. All in all, it was a great day. But it wasn't quite over yet...we still had to meet with Shannon's sister and her boyfriend. I won't go into that here. You'll have to ask for details about Erin's beau through more private channels. :)
The house still isn't selling :(
Despite many showings, we still haven't been able to sell our home. Everyone who sees it, seems to love it. We have decided to drastically reduce the price of the home to $119,900.00. We originally had it listed for $128,900.00. Although our real estate agent seemed to think that the original price was fair, the market appears to be indicating otherwise. At the new price, we will still be able to pay off all of our debts, we just won't have as much to start over again in Brazil with. However, the Lord has been speaking to me lately by asking me, "Are you trusing Me to provide for you, or are you trusting in your house to provide for you?" Of course, God will provide for our needs in Brazil.
The Pontiac Grand Am
Since we had to rent a vehicle anyway in Sackville, we ended up getting something different again. This time we got a Grand Am, which is the smaller cousin of the Grand Prix (I hadn't realized that Pontiac had two "grand" vehicles.) This car was the most pleasant to drive to date. It had good pickup and very good handling. I found myself quite comfortable in this car as well. One thing I didn't like was the fact that the cruise control buttons stuck out of the bottom of the steering wheel hub so that if you rested your hands on the bottom of the steering wheel, you had to squeeze your fingers between the wheel and these buttons - poor design.More support
Our support level continues to rise. We're officially at $325 per month now and we've had one-time donations of $2500. We've also received $300 from churches that we've spoken at.Main Street to the rescue
*** Please read the previous post "Sackville and the Volvo" first or this won't make much sense. ***On Sunday evening, after I shared with the folks at Main Street Baptist Church about what God was doing in our lives, Pastor Todd prayed for us that we would be taken care of on the mission field, and also that God would take care of our car situation. Within a few minutes of the ending of the service, I was told that Main Street Baptist had arranged for a tow truck to pick up my car. We whisked off to meet the tow truck where we found out that the problem was in the belt area of the engine. The car was not going to be fixed that evening.
Much to our surprise and delight, Main Street Baptist arranged for our family to spend the night at a local motel. They even managed to scrounge up five brand new toothbrushes and some toothpaste for us all. We visited with some friends we hadn't seen in over twelve years, and then called it a night.
Of course, we hadn't expected to spend the night, so we were completely unprepared for an overnight stay. The thing that was bothering Shannon the most (now that we had toothbrushes) was the fact that we had no change of underwear. Well, we found a solution to that problem. The motel had a washer and dryer and packages of Tide for sale in the vending machine, so we stripped off what we needed washed and wore what we had left, making good use of some towels as well.
In the morning we needed to find a way home, since we learned that the part required to fix the car was not to be found in the Maritimes. It would be Wednesday before the car would be fixed. It took us a while, but we were able to round up a rental car in Moncton. In the mean time, we were able to spend some down time in the church's youth room where Cary taught the girls how to play pool.
All this to say that we really felt cared for by Main Street Baptist. They truly acted like the Good Samaritan with us. They arranged for everything to be taken care of, and then they paid for not only the motel stay, but also for the towing and the auto repairs. We were truly amazed, and we give the glory to God for His provision.
Sackville and the Volvo
There are many wonderful things to list about PEI in the summertime. However, as a small province with more tourists on the Island in the summer than residents, renting a car can be an issue at times. We scheduled two churches in Sackville, New Brunswick for August 7. Since Sackville is less than two hours away, we knew that we'd only need a rental car for one day. However, I could only get a car from 9:00 AM and we needed to be in Sackville before 11:00 AM. We decided to take our own car, a 1989 Volvo 740. We've had this car since 1999 and it has been a very good vehicle for us overall, but over the last few years it has given us reason not to rely on it too much.
I had the car in the repair shop twice in the past month to cure the car of breaking down on the highway. Everything seemed to be fixed, and in fact, we had travelled all around the western end of PEI on Saturday, August 6 with no problems. We decided that it was safe to take our car to Sackville rather than rent one this time.
Everything was going fine. We got to Sackville with no problems, and the morning service at Salem Baptist went well (even though I went off-script a little bit.) We went out for lunch, then strolled Sackville's waterfowl park, eventually ending up back at Salem Baptist just to relax until we were to go to Main Street Baptist for the evening service. Suddenly, things didn't seem to be going well. The car started making strange noises and all of the lights on the dash lit up. I pulled off the road and popped the hood to see that the alternator belt was barely turning the alternator. The car would still move, but I knew we wouldn't get far. So we walked the rest of the way (about a mile) to the church and got there just as the service was starting.
...to be continued...
The Sebring
While on deputation last weekend we again rented a vehicle. Since we needed the extra day to go to the Inn for our anniversary, we tried to save the mission some money by renting a compact. We ended up with a Sebring, which is not a compact car. Actually, I liked this car much better than the PT Cruiser. It fit the three kids in the back quite comfortably, and had plenty of trunk space. The car was by no means powerful, but it didn't seem to need to rev up to 4000 - 5000 rpms to get moving, like the PT Cruiser did. The car looks really nice and it handled very well. My only real complaint about the car is that the seats in front were very low to the ground and I found the driver's seat very uncomfortable. I couldn't adjust it to make things comfortable either. Shannon was quite comfortable in the passenger seat, but I literally ached after an hour or so. With better seating, this is a car I would consider buying. If you find the seats of this car comfortable (as Shannon did) I would recommend this as a good, relatively inexpensive, family car.Fifteen wonderful years
July 28 marked fifteen years since we each said "I do" at First Baptist Church in Mexico, Maine. We celebrated our first fifteen years by spending a romantic night at the Little Shemogue Inn in New Brunswick. It was a lovely night with great food, fine accommodations, and of course, great company.
Visa is in the final stages
On Tuesday, August 2, our official package of information was sent to PACA (Pan American Christian Academy) in Brazil so that they could begin the last stage of the visa process. Our passports are now all in, our official forms are all notarized and consularized. As Mike Epp, the superintendent at PACA says, "Now is the time that you really want to get people to pray." It makes a huge difference who handles the documents, whether they get put on the top or bottom of a stack, etc. as to how quickly the visa will come through. Word from Mike is that the process could take as little as four weeks, but more realistically we're looking at six to eight weeks before everything is completed and we are free to get started in Brazil. Please pray!Support and deputation going well
Last weekend Shannon and I and the girls were blessed to be able to share what the Lord is doing in our lives with the good people at Sheffield Baptist in Halifax and Pleasantville Baptist near Bridgewater.Shannon and I spent five years at Sheffield (1990 to 1995) while all three of our girls were born. We were truly blessed to be among people who care so much for us. We were told that there were still members of that church who have been praying faithfully for us since we left - some told us they pray for us every day! People were surprised to see how big the girls were as Sydney (who turns 10 this month) was born just before we moved away.
Pleasantville was a very special church for Cary as this is the church of his childhood. Cary was saved while attending Pleasantville, and his father even pastored there for a while. This small church made a big impact on Cary's life. It was special for Shannon to be able to meet many of the people Cary has told her about over the years and to see the love they have for him.
Our support continues to stream in. We are officially at 11% of our monthly support level, but a large one-time donation of $2000 US came in this week and the donor indicated that they also want to make regular contributions, so we're eager to see where that will put us. So far, none of the churches have given us any indication as to how much support they will be giving us on a monthly, quarterly, or yearly basis. This is no surprise as these things need to go through missions committees and then get approved by either the church leadership or the congregation. When the churches do make their commitments, we should see the percentage jump a fair amount.