Well we've had a busy last month! Summer is always a busy time up here, trying to fit every event in before it gets cold again. Unfortunately it's been a super cold summer!
We've been to Birthday parties, Sage has united with old (but young!) friends...
Sage's favorite thing of course is spending lots of time with Grandpa and Grandma :) (The feeling may be mutual...)
We've gone camping twice, been to a family reunion......
....spoke at several churches, Joel has met with pastors, there's been a bridal shower, a wedding....
....the big announcement that we're expecting baby #2 in January (!!!) so I've had doctors appointments....Sage's 4th birthday party is this Saturday......really we've been quite busy! Joel has been working a lot of hours for some construction companies, so long in fact that he takes off one day a week just so we can visit with people.
We have phones now, Joel: 715-548-1784 and Jes: 715-548-1774. There's still lots of people we want to see so we'll be contacting people and/or you can contact us!
We've come up with budget for our next year in Flint. Like I mentioned in an earlier post we'd still like to ask for help with our living expenses. Joel will be discipling with Dave and this will be his main focus but of course we have to live too so he'll be looking for a part time job so he has time for ministry as well. We don't need as much. If we could raise enough support to cover our actual living expenses such as rent and utilities, that should be all we need. We are going to live very simply. We're going to get the smallest house we can find to save on utilities, we'll only have one car, and we're going to be as frugal as possible. You won't see us spending a bunch of money on entertainment or eating out. We'll have a garden if we can. We also want you to know our donations only go to necessities. We bought a car with the money we had from selling our car before we left. We also used that money to buy a computer after ours was stolen. We'll use the money Joel is making this summer to move and furnish our house. If you are giving us money we want you to know exactly how it is being used so feel free to ask about our finances at any time. We've figured out our expenses as best we can and we've come up with a monthly budget of $880.00 for rent and utilities. This is what we're asking for help with. Our other expenses such as food, personal items and gas come to about $1,000.00. So Joel will have the goal of making this amount with a part time job.
Something important we've learned about ministry while in Belize is that the best gift you can give someone, the best way to really help anyone, is to give them the gift of time. Joel wants to be able to give this gift to those around him and whatever his ministry looks like there.
And that's as far as our plans go! We will have to sign a year lease so we're planning to stay at least a year and after that only God knows!
If you are a supporter we would like to encourage you to let us know if you plan to continue supporting us. We realize it may seem better to support an overseas missionary but really we are going to be doing the exact same thing here as we did in Belize. Our main focus is discipleship with the purpose of encouragement and bringing people to a closer relationship with God and also to support the church we will be part of. This is needed in all nations, including and maybe even especially ours!
Thank you all so much for keeping us with us and supporting us!
As far as churches this next Sunday Joel will be speaking at Menominee Grace and the next Sunday at Stephenson Assembly of God. Hopefully see some of you there!
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