Our Meeting with Our Missions Pastor

We met with our missions pastor on Thursday afternoon and there were no surprises. Our church has a program for missionaries (see Nurture Program under Link on the right-hand side). This program is designed to be a two-year in residence program that helps to prepare missionaries. Going through the program's requirements are necessary before being officially sent by the church (being sent by the church includes resource, prayer and financial support, as well as being part of a group of missionaries that get made mention of for prayer during each weekend church service.

We are members of the church, however, since we have not completed all of the requirements, we will not be sent out by the church at this time. We will continue to work on our program requirements and we can schedule a meeting with the church's mission committee when we visit in the future. During this meeting, we will have the opportunity to explain what we have done from a mission perspective and what we plan on doing in the future. The committee will then decide if they want to support us and to what extent.

Until all of this happens, we will be finding 100% of our own resource, prayer and financial support. Now that I am no longer working, I will be working on a letter to send out to people we know asking them to prayerfully consider supporting us in prayer and/or finances.

One limitation that the church asks us to abide by is that we do not ask fellow members of the church for financial support. This does not mean that those members who know what we are doing cannot donate - it just means that we cannot go ask them. And as such, they will receive a different letter from us.

The reason for this is because it would give the impression that we are supported by the church in what we are doing when in fact we are not at this time.

The Lord is moving us in this direction and it is He who will provide whether it be through the church or through lemonade stand sales - He will get it done.