God Will Be Glorified Through This Cancer!

For the last year we have been preparing and praying for our call to the mission field in Namibia, Southern Africa. Well over the last few months we have all been praying for my permit to be approved. We have been struggling to figure out why God has yet to allow the home affairs to give us their approval. Well this weekend we got at least one answer to our question.

We found out yesterday that Kristen has breast cancer. I can not tell you how difficult it is to write this, but I can tell you how strong and mighty and loving our God is. He knew all along that this was the road, that we as a family, were heading down and hence at least one reason why He has not allowed us to go to Africa yet.

God is so good, He truly is and now looking back over the last few months we understand all the things that He has been doing to prepare us for this new battle.

In all things to God be the glory and we are to always boast in His goodness. Here are some of the God things that we now see as His hand preparing us for this.

1. The permit and visas not being approved yet. Had we taken our family to Africa and then found out about this, I can only imagine the stress this would have added to our family and many other things I can not imagine we would have gone through..

2. We ran out of funds, yet God supplied me a job, and us a free house to live in that is less than ten minutes from my family.

3. Health insurance!! Well we had a temporary insurance plan that was inexpensive, but had a $10K deductible, as we never imagined anything like this coming at us. But two days before Kristen went to the surgeon, God opened a door for our group health insurance to start. God is AMAZING and always on time!

4. Finally, God allowed Kristen to find the cancer, or the lump, way in advance of it spreading, so even though the measures needed to rid her body of the cancer are great, the chance of beating it is very high!

So we ask you to lift Kristen and our family to the Lord, our Great Physician, in prayer that He will be glorified in her having cancer and the way that He will heal her body in the time that He has chosen. Second, we ask you to give God all the praise for how He has given us the comfort of knowing that He is in charge of this cancer, that He is the ultimate Healer, that He has allowed this to happen to her and us for a reason, and that in this we will give Him all the praise, glory and honor in and through this ordeal because He is God, and He is good, and He loves my wife and our family, and we know that He knows what is best for us even in the worst of situations. And lastly pray that God will show Kristen and us how to best use this for His ultimate glory.

I am studying through prayer now more than ever, and as I was meditating on the Lord's Prayer this morning, God showed me something. He said to pray "give us this day", not tomorrow or next month, or next year, but "give us this day". God show us that you have blessed us with "this day", and that you will provide our every need today, and He and only He knows tomorrow and it is all in His hands. So we are to rest in Him today, we are to glorify Him today, we are to praise Him today, no matter what the circumstance, and not even think about tomorrow until tomorrow becomes "this day".

I am so glad that we have you all behind us to pray for us to encourage us and to love us during the next few months. Please, if you get a chance, send Kristen a word of encouragement, as it will mean so much to her during this time as we follow God's leading in the hands of the doctors that will be working with her.

Our mailing address is:

2071 Will Suitt Road
Creedmoor, NC 27522

Many blessings to you all!

In the hands of a Mighty God,

Update on our Situations

Well, I just noticed that it has been quite a while since my last post. Well there are many reasons for that, but the main one has been access to the Internet. The new mission home that we moved into a couple weeks ago does not have Internet access, so I have not had the late night opportunities to write.

I have also began three weeks ago working again on a farm to help pay our monthly bills until we leave for Africa. I work from 7am to 7pm and that leaves no room for stopping by the church here and getting on the computer.

We still do not have any word on our work permits, so we continue to trust in God's timing and for His provisions for our family and the ministry He has called us to in Namibia. So please continue to pray with us for this to happen soon, but also for our family to understand why God still has us here in the US.

We thank you all for your continued support of our family and for taking us to the Lord in prayer. God is so good and He does hear the prayers of His people, and soon we will be in Namibia serving this great and mighty God for His glory!