Thank you, Bethel!

Today we had the great pleasure of presenting to Bethel United Methodist Church in Hymera, Indiana. This small congregation was very warm and welcoming. We feel like we already have the beginnings of a great relationship. We will be so excited to share news from the field with them over the next few years. Bill gave a message about missions and I shared about Tanzania. The church took up a love offering and also will be adopting us as missionaries! They have also committed to pray for us....and they certainly have some prayer warriors among them. How thankful we are for the events of the day. Getting to go out to lunch afterward with the pastor, his wife, and several other church members was a special blessing on our day. When CMF challenged us to plan our support raising strategy, both Bill and I wanted to seek out smaller churches to partner with us. Even though our large home church has been one of the biggest blessings of our life, we know that great relationships could be made with small churches and that a lot of missionaries bypass the churches in more rural areas and tend to visit large churches near metro areas. They are missing out! This photo is of our display table. Many of the women loved looking at the beadwork and baskets and were excited to learn about micro-enterprise programs. God is so good to us and we thank Him for our new friends in Hymera!

Passports

Today we went to the courthouse to apply for passports for the kiddos. The clerk thanked us profusely for being prepared. Each child had to have an application, copy of their birth certificate, two passport photos, and two checks. The kids stood in front of the window one at a time for the clerk to match them against the photos. They were so well behaved that we are starting to think we could actually make it through airport security without too much drama!

Bye Bye Playset

One of the many things to go...the playset. It didn't go far, however. In fact, it only went next door! It is one of the Rainbow playset systems - built great, but very heavy. So Bill and Dan Wilson (new owner of the playset) came up with the great idea of using Dan's four wheeler to pull it next door. All of us women laughed at their idea, but it worked! Heidi was a little upset to see our backyard empty, but knowing that the playset will be with her best friends next door eased her sadness. Also, the Wilsons are gracious enough to let the kids go over and play on it whenever they want. Heidi asked us, "What do the playsets in Africa look like?" Our answer, "Honey, they look just like trees!" :)

Another Presentation

We did our "Tanzania presentation" to the missions committee of Hazelwood Christian Church tonight. Hazelwood is a small town in our county. We attended services there this past Sunday and were really blown away by their hospitality. The missions committee seemed very interested in our mission and asked some great questions. This was our second presentation to a church...our first being at our home church, Plainfield Christian.