January 14, 2015:
1) Please pray for emotional healing for Jonathan. Due to some troubling signs of trauma, we decided to pull Jonathan out of the the public school just before Christmas break. For years, Jonathan has struggled with the public school environment. (The truth is that it's not been easy for any of the kids!) They have a shame based system here in Spain, with no order in the classroom. Jonathan was very relieved and happy in many ways to be out of that environment, but he has commented on being sad about not being able to continue to learn Valenciano. He will start next week with online school, like his brothers. As we sought counsel before we made our decision, we were told that it may take a year to a year and a half for Jonathan to heal and become "himself" again. So please continue to pray for that.
2) Thank you for praying for our Ladies Night! Our hope is to be able to do them monthly. They have been a great success so far; and we have had several of the ladies who have come for the first time, bring their families to church on Sunday. It's been exciting to see how the Lord is using that. Please pray for leaders to rise up who will be able to plan and lead this Ladies Night. As of right now, I (Michelle) have been the planner; but as always, our goal is to train nationals to lead. Pray for leaders to emerge as we continue this ministry!
3) Please pray for me (Michelle) as I try to balance many new responsibilities this year. With Jonathan beginning in online school, I will have 3 boys home. Although I enjoy working with the boys on school, it's been very time-consuming, as Nathan has needed a LOT of help with all that goes along with his disability. I guess that's to be expected, as he needed a lot of help when he was in a national school as well. Weston, for the most part, is pretty independent; but I'm not yet sure where Jonathan will fall on the spectrum. I have also been asked to become a language coach for Spain. I begin an online course for training in January, so that will be one more thing to balance... in addition to the people I will begin coaching through language training and the responsibilities that come with that. As I have mentioned before, we also have several single girls who will be coming to help us with ministry... 1 long term, and 2 short term. As always, their cultural adjustment and spiritual/emotional health and growth will mainly fall to me... all of which I normally love, but I do know my plate is getting full! Please pray for balance in all of this, as well as wisdom, discernment and strength!
4) Continue to pray for the development of leaders within our small groups. They are going well... and we have seen many visitors from our groups begin to regularly attend church. But we are definitely needing more leaders to step up. Please pray for the Lord to send those people, as well as wisdom as to how to best train and multiply them.
5) Wes continues to preach once or twice a month, depending on the schedule. Please pray for him as he puts together what He feels like the Lord is speaking to him. Please continue to pray for his Spanish, as well. It's gotten so much better (and he does a great job!!), but he would be the first to tell you it's still not the same as preaching in English. It still takes a lot of work.
6) Please pray for the continued growth of our people in Picassent. So many of our people are new believers and very young in their faith. Pray for growth and strength against spiritual attacks.
7) Please pray for our new teammate Heather, who was supposed to be here at the beginning of January. Right before she was to leave for Spain, her mother was unexpectedly hospitalized. It has been an up and down road over the past two weeks, but Heather's mom passed away yesterday morning. Please pray for comfort and peace for Heather and her family. Please also pray for wisdom, discernment and direction as she walks through these next couple days/weeks.
November 13, 2015:
1) Although in general, school is going well for the kids, Jonathan has started to have some anxiety. He often has more than 3 hours a night of homework, and it has become a LOT for him. Right now, there is actually an outcry from parents about the amount of homework given to children in elementary school. Apparently, studies show that Spain has one of the highest amounts of homework, but some of the lowest achievement scores. Anyway, it's been a challenge this month... to the extent that Jonathan has been coming home "sick", only to discover that its actually anxiety. Please pray for strength, peace, and lots of intelligence! :) hehe... I truly cannot imagine learning in 3 languages.
2) Please pray for tomorrow night, Nov 14th. We will host our first Ladies Night at the church! I have been in charge of organizing everything, so I've had quite a full plate the past couple of weeks. Please pray for all the details to come together. Pray for visitors to come, as it is an outreach. Pray for ladies to come to know Him and to be drawn the love and peace offered through Christ! Please also pray for sweet fellowship and a strong unity among our ladies.
3) We are so excited about how the Lord is moving! Last year, we started 3 small groups. This past month, we re-launched after a break during the summer. This year we have launched 5 small groups. Please pray for consistency in the small groups. Pray for the leaders of each group. Pray for all of our new believers to grow in their relationship with the Lord and to develop a passion for sharing their faith. Pray for Wes as he trains the leaders of each of these groups. One of these new groups is completely an outreach group. Pray that people will come and that people will come to know the Lord!
4) Please continue to pray for unity on our team. We are growing and growing! We have so much enjoyed having the Penido family join us this past summer. In January, we will add Heather to our team. She is a single lady who will be beginning/heading up our University work. She will be here for 4 years, with a long term vision in mind for the future. We are excited to have her coming! Shortly after she arrives, our two Hand-On girls arrive. What a blessing to have them all coming around the same time. It's always easier to work together with someone else, so we are excited for Heather to have 2 other girls to work alongside her! Please pray for Heather as she gets everything settled in the States before she comes. Pray for all she needs to do in preparation to come. Her goal is to be a career missionary, just like us; so those preparations are always more complicated than a short-termer. Right now, she is in training at FPO... the same 8 week training in Richmond that we went through. Also pray for her visa to come through quickly. Her papers have been handed in and we are waiting on approval.
October 3, 2015:
1) Thank you all for praying for the start of school for our kids. After 3 weeks of school, all four of them are feeling pretty settled and doing well. We are so thankful that the two younger ones have both been very happy with their teachers. They are both making lots of new friends, and they wake up excited to go to school each morning. THAT feels like a miracle to me. We are SO thankful that they have settled so well. Weston and Nathan are also very much enjoying Liberty Online Academy. Nathan, especially, has done well in the fact that he is not nearly as stressed as before. It was definitely an adjustment at first. It's both of their first time learning in English! Thank you so much for praying. School is going well. (I'm not sure that I have ever said that, across the board, before! PTL!) :)
2) Please continue to pray for our company as many more changes are on their way. As I mentioned last month, we have to cut back by 800 staff and field personnel. Losing that many people on the field will definitely give our face a different look, here on the field. The voluntary retirement packages have all been sent out , and those who received them will have until November 4th to make a decision. After that, we are not sure of the exact steps that will be taken. Regardless, it will mean change. Leadership, supervisors, friends, co-workers... many will go home and leave huge gaps here on the field. Pray for wisdom for the leadership of our company to make wise, God-directed decisions. Pray for those who are having to make immediate changes. Pray for preparation for the changes to come.
3) Please pray for continued unity for our team. Please pray for direction and discernment for Wes as he leads us. Pray for healthy relationships; pray for grace, humbleness, and love to abound; pray that we would each walk close and clean with the Lord.
4) Please pray for our small groups as we are once again relaunching after our break for the summer. We are regrouping and casting vision once again. Pray for the development of leaders, new groups to be started, and for our new believers to grow!
September 7, 2015:
1) Thank you all for praying for our recent move! We are feeling much more settled and beginning to feel at home here. School starts on the 10th, so I'm sure that will help as far as getting into a routine and also getting to know our neighbors. Please pray for the Jonathan and Carolina as they begin this new year with new teachers and new classmates. Please pray for a great first couple days, for new friends for them, and for kind and understanding teachers.
2) Praise the Lord, Weston is doing much better. He is now sleeping normally for the first time in 6 months. He still has a little bit of trouble digesting certain foods, so we still have to be a little bit careful, but he is healing! Please keep praying!
3) Please continue to pray for our team. As I mentioned last month, we have grown by leaps and bounds. We have been by ourselves for our entire time on the field; and now, all of a sudden, we have a very large team! It's been exciting and very encouraging... but we definitely want to be leading in a Christlike manner. The Lord has given us a very big vision for Valencia. Pray for wisdom as to how to best cast that vision and pray for discernment as to how to best implement that vision. It's easy for us to follow that vision, since it was clearly given to us. Now it's extremely important to cast that vision, so that we are all working in the same direction. Please pray for Wes as he leads. Pray for unity for our team. We also give thanks for the team that we have! It has been such a blessing.
4) Unfortunately, as many of you may have heard, last week, David Platt (our new IMB president) made the announcement, “If we are going to balance our budget, we must reduce approximately 600 to 800 of our staff and field personnel.” For many years in a row, our expenditures have consistently been larger than our revenue. The IMB initially had a plan to lower our numbers slowly through attrition, among other things, over the next several years; but it has become apparent that these measures will not be enough. Read the details here. Please pray for wisdom, discernment, and direction for our leadership. Please pray for wisdom, peace, open hearts, and direction for those of us on the field, as these numbers translate to 1 in 6 of us here on the field. Here is a letter from David Platt, which he made available for those who would like a better understanding of the situation. As the first article explains, the IMB will begin this process with a Voluntary Retirement Incentive. It is not yet clear what will happen if we don't reach the 600-800 number through voluntary means. They have said that we will cross that bridge when we come to it. These next 3 months will be very crucial for all of us. We are trusting the Lord to guide our path, trusting that He has a perfect plan for each of us.
5) Please continue to pray for our church in Picassent. We are continuing to work on the growth and maturity of our group, but we are also beginning to cast the vision to reach Alcacer, the unreached pueblo next to us. Pray for wisdom on how to do that, and a passion in our people to share what the Lord has done in their lives.
6) We have been doing lots of outreaches with all of the other church plants in our area. Wes has been going and working along-side each pastor/leader, with the hopes of continuing to build relationships and trust. Please continue to pray for trust, open doors to speak into lives, and for openness to the idea of multiplication.
August 12, 2015:
1) What a whirlwind July and August have been! Thank you for your prayers for our new home. My parents came to help, and we got everything unpacked and in it's place in a matter of a week and a half... not a box left to be unpacked!!!!... curtains hung, pictures in place... it was incredible. My parents were an amazing help. This is definitely a praise!... but along with it went some strange feelings to ponder. :) Although it looks like we have lived here for years, we still don't quite feel like it's home. We've been traveling a lot, so we have not been here much, either. Pray for a peace and a 'settled' feeling for our kids, as this move has been a little hard on them.
2) Thank you for praying for Weston! He is doing much better. It has taken some time to heal that ulcer, but he has been faithful with his limited diet (even while traveling!), and he is feeling much better. We are not yet at 100%, so please keep praying; but, praise the Lord, we are doing SO much better! Thank you for praying!
3) My Grandma (on my dad's side) passed away last week while we were at our annual AGM in Portugal. :( Please pray for my family and especially my Grandpa, as they are adjusting to a new rhythm of life without my Grandma there. My younger sister (who lives in Guam with her husband who is in the Navy) and I were not able to go to the funeral. It was so hard to be so far away during this time! But we are thankful to have the hope of seeing Grandma in heaven once again!
4) Praise the LORD! The two churches who came this past month to host an American Football camp did an amazing job. Ten guys came (2 of which were teenagers!) to help share the love of Christ. We had over 20 kids at the camp each day, which is really a great number for a first-time camp! Spaniards can be very un-trusting of new things, so sometimes it takes a few years to build enough trust for people to come. We were so thrilled. They guys did an incredible job loving on the kids, making it fun, and purposefully sharing Christ with the kids who came. We had some kids who were churched, but the majority of the kids were from the local neighborhoods! THAT was a blessing! The other God-thing that came out of this time was that one of the teenage girls who was at the camp was able to go to the States a couple weeks ago. She is being hosted by these two churches. She is being loved on and seeing Jesus in a whole new way with these families she is staying with!!! We were so thankful to have the team come... and are looking forward to deeper partnering relationships with these churches in the future!
5) Please pray for our team here in Valencia. We are SO excited that we actually have a team! :) We have been on our own for our 5 years on the field, and now we are growing by leaps and bounds. As I mentioned before, our new co-workers arrived just before our move. They are a family of 4, and our kids have thrived on having fellowship with other believers. Our new cluster leader and his wife have also just arrived to Valencia. In September we will have a couple coming as interns for a month and a college student arriving for the year from Great Britain. In addition, we have just found out that we will have 2 new teammates arriving in January with the Macedonia program through the SBC. What a blessing! We are not alone! :) Please pray for Wes as he leads our team. In a period of 6 months, we will go from one of the smallest teams in Spain to one of the largest! :) Pray for each team member as they prepare to come, or as they are going through culture shock and transitioning. Please pray for unity on our team. This is so essential for a team to function at it's highest potential. Pray that we will each walk closely and humbly before the Lord. We are excited to see what the Lord has in store here in Valencia!
6) As many of you know, most things come to a halt during the month of August here in Spain. Everyone leaves for vacation. Our English outreach has been put on hold until September, when we will start up again. Small group attendance and church attendance is always low during August. But, during this month, it is our prayer to connect once again with the national leaders of the 5 different churches we are hoping to influence and serve. Pray for those doors to continue to be open. Pray for wisdom and discernment for Wes as he meets with the leaders. Pray for clear communication and unity. Pray for open hearts and a big vision! :)
July 1, 2015:
1) Thank you all for praying for the details of our move. We moved on June 23rd, and we are still settling in. The first night, we could hardly walk around the apartment, for all the boxes everywhere!... but we are slowly getting there! My parents are here, helping us with the kids as well as the move... that's a HUGE praise! :) Please continue to pray for us as we settle in and meet our neighbors.
2) Thankfully, we were able to get Jonathan and Carolina into the neighborhood public school. There are two tracts to choose from: Spanish or Valenciano. It's a little deciving, but the "Spanish tract" simply means that they have 2 classes in Spanish. :) Carolina got into the Spanish tract without any problems, but there were no spaces for Jonathan in Spanish. We have placed him in the Valenciano tract, which is a much smaller class than the other (16 students as opposed to 30!), so we feel that that will be better for him. Jonathan is really motivated to learn Valenciano, and his teacher from this past year thinks he will be fine, so that's a good thing! Praise the Lord, we have already located a tutor to help him with his new classes in Valenciano. Please pray for Jonathan and Carolina both as they transition into a new school with new friends. Pray that they will get very kind, good teachers. Pray also for Weston and Nathan as they will be taking the placement exam for Liberty Online Academy.
3) Please continue to pray for Weston. We are still struggling with health issues with him. You can read below for more details on what has happened with him. At the moment, we are struggling with an ulcer... it will just take time to heal; but until then, he has to be very careful what he eats. After 3 months of this, it's become very "old." At times he feels hopeless that he will ever get better and be able to eat normally again. Thank the Lord, he is doing a little better sleeping now, as long as we are very careful about what he eats. Please continue to pray for healing and encouragement!
4) Please pray for the mission team from NC coming to join us next week! We will be doing an American Football camp with underprivileged kids from the area. It's the first time an American Football camp has been held in the area, so pray for kids to come! Pray for open hearts for those who come. Pray for many opportunities to share Christ; pray for organization and the logistics of all that needs to happen. Pray for health and safe travels for the team, and for the Lord to be glorified most of all. We are so excited to see what the Lord does through this time!
5) Our new teammates have arrived! It's always craziness after a 24 hour non-stop trip with 2 kids and 19 bags, plus carry-ons! :) ... but they made it and have found an apartment. They are expecting their furniture to arrive by the end of the week! They are still looking for a good fit for school for both of their kids. Please pray for them as they transition into a new culture, and for the Lord to guide them as all the details fall into place. Pray for team unity and wisdom as we begin to work together at the tasks the Lord has given us in Valencia!
June 9, 2015:
Somehow, May got away from me, and I didn't post prayer requests for the month. Sorry about that! I think, of all months, we should have been asking for prayer during this particular month! Just a quick update, so that the following prayer requests make more sense: Last month, our landlord informed us that due to circumstances in his life, he needed to move back into this house. The laws here allow him to do that...only under these circumstances... and we were given 2 months to find another place to live.
1) Praise the Lord, after a month of searching, we found a 4 bedroom apartment for us to move into. We are expecting to move on June 23rd. This is one of the worst times of the year to be looking for housing, so there wasn't much available. There was nothing in our area... not a single 4 bedroom... so we are having to move to a complete other part of town. The kids will be having to change schools again. It basically means starting over... new grocery stores, new friends, new way of life. The market was SO brutal that 4 bedrooms that were coming on the market were going within a day of being listed. So... praise the Lord we found one that will meet our needs!! We will be moving from a town house to an apartment, so it will mean a lifestyle change, as well as having to down-size a little bit. All of which is doable... it's just another change for our family. You all know how hard change can be on kids! So, please be in prayer for this. Please also pray for great teachers for the kids for next year. This is hugely important!
2) As I mentioned last time, Weston was struggling with some blood sugar issues. His body seems to have taken care of that, but in the midst of it all, he fell sick with one thing after another... ear infections, strep throat, etc. Throughout all of this, he had an on-going stomach ache. We were not sure if this came from his other illnesses or not, but once all the other things cleared up and the stomach ache remained, we realized something was going on with his stomach itself. After weeks of dr. appointments and lots of pain and sleepless nights, Weston was finally diagnosed with H. Pylori. It's a bacterial infection in the stomach which is extremely difficult to get rid of. He went through 2 weeks of really strong antibiotics, which hurt his stomach even more. Then he came down with thrush, due to the antibiotics... poor kid could never catch a break! After 2 and 1/2 months out of school, he was finally beginning to feel a little bit better. He went to 3 days of school and to church for the first time in a while. But, just as things seemed to be looking up for him, he took a turn for the worse. He is home again with stomach pain. We are thinking that he has an ulcer and that the food he ate when we went out to eat after church aggravated it. He hasn't slept in two nights... literally not at all, throughout the whole night. Please continue to pray for strength for his body. For relief from the pain... and complete, quick healing. Please also pray for grace from the school. He has missed SO much school. We simply need him to pass this year. He had good grades before he fell sick, so we are praying that will carry him through. We have 10 more days of school. Pray he will be able to go back tomorrow!
3) Small groups have gotten off the ground and are going strong! We have some interest to start more small groups in other towns, so pray that those doors continue to open!
4) As I mentioned before, we have seen SO much spiritual warfare going on. My guess is the timing is not coincidental. Our small groups finally get off the ground, and our lives are turned up-side down with Weston being sick as well as having to move. In addition to that, we have 2 missionary families working with Pastor Xoan's church who were denied visas. They had come on their own, not with a specific organization. Something wasn't right with their paperwork, and they were given 2 weeks to leave the country. So please pray hard against the enemy. Pray that we will stand firm. Pray that we will not lose ground as it's so much harder to keep the momentum of ministry going with all the stress of sick kids and having to move and down-size.
5) Our new teammates are due to arrive next week!! Praise the Lord! They will be looking for housing and possibly moving at the same time we will be moving. So pray for all the logistics for all of this, in addition to their transition into a new country, finding a house, finding schools for their kids, etc.
6) Our two interns from NC have arrived and have completed almost half of their time here! They have been so passionate about sharing Christ with the lost, loving all those in their path, and serving in whatever way they can. We have seen 4 people come to know Christ through their work in Valencia and in Picassent! Praise the LORD! Please continue to pray for their ministry as well as their continued adjustment. They have not been left out of the spiritual attacks that seem to be hitting all of us here.
7) We are excited about hosting a mission team from NC in July! We are working on the details for their minstry while they are here. We will be hosting an American football camp and sharing the Gospel in every way possible while they are here! Please pray for their preparation as they get ready to come. Pray for the kids and the families who will be touched by their ministry. Pray for all the details to come together.
April 10, 2015:
1) Praise! We have begun the process of enrolling with Liberty University Online Academy for the two older boys! We have gotten the approval that we need from our company and we have spoken at length with LUOA. The boys are very excited about studying in English AND having the opportunity to learn from a Christian perspective. It will be a first on both fronts. :)
2) Praise! We had our official inauguration of our new building this month. We had 150 people there! It was definitely way more than we anticipated. It was so exciting to see so many people fill up all the chairs and worship together. We had appetizers afterward and had a great time of fellowship. 9 people raised their hands to get saved during the service!! The Lord was definitely moving!
3) Please pray for Weston. We spent last night in the ER, trying to figure out what is going on with him. About a week ago, he began having blood sugar issues out of the blue. At first we thought it was a bug or something, but then I realized that his symptoms were very similar to what I get when my blood sugar gets low. Hypoglycemia is something I've lived with for a long time and it has become pretty simple to control (for me) with my eating habits. With what I know for myself, we were able to get his initial symptoms under control, and we started watching what he ate each day. Last night was the first time they had had soccer practice since all this started. His coach ran them harder than they've run ever before, and Weston began shaking shortly after he arrived home. He was shaking, dizzy, his head hurt... I tried to get it under control with what I knew, but it wasn't working very quickly. When he said his hands and feet were going numb, we decided it was time to head to the ER. He was pale, shaking uncontrollably and could barely walk. When we walked into the ER, they rushed him back. They ran some tests, gave him a sugar water IV... it's a long story. They basically said it had to do with blood sugar and that he was experiencing a hypoglycemic episode, but they could tell us nothing more. All they said was that we need to see a specialist. We took all the test results and sent them to a good friend of ours who is a doctor. Brad helped us out with SO much more information. (Thanks, Brad!!! We are so grateful for you!) With his input, we now have a plan of action, and we understand what's going on much more clearly, but it's been still tough maintaining Weston's blood sugar. The ER doctor said no exercise for two weeks... no P.E., no soccer... nothing. So, during these two weeks, we are hoping to figure things out. It's been pretty scary for Weston. That night in the ER was terrifying for him. To a small extent, I understand that helpless, can't control my body, don't-know-what's-going-on feeling... but, Weston's symptoms were even more severe than what I've experienced. Please pray for us to figure out the the best foods/snacks to maintain his levels. Please pray for peace and healing for Weston. He starts back to school (we've been on Easter break) on Tuesday, and he's pretty scared. Pray for wisdom, discernment and a clear course of action. *4/19 update: Weston still hasn't been back to school. We've still been struggling with blood sugar levels, and he has also come down with a fever and double ear infections. Please pray for healing!!
4) We are excited to have had our very first week for our 3 new small groups. The first meeting was very introductory and casting clear vision for the purposes of the small groups. They all went well! Pray for the groups to continue to go well. Pray for boldness of the people. Pray for open hearts. Pray for wisdom, strength, and protection for the leaders.
5) Please continue to pray for some of the leadership here in Valencia. We've seen a lot of Spiritual warfare going on trying to discourage and discredit some of our key leaders. Pray for their marriages; pray for their personal walks. Please pray for encouragement, perseverance, protection, strength, and wisdom for our leaders. I guess I would also include our family in that. Satan seems to attack the health of our family in order to discourage and distract us. Not only have we seen these issues with Weston, but we've had an ongoing lice issue with Carolina (her class cannot seem to get rid of them!), and a stomach bug that's making its rounds through our family. Wes and I haven't had a full night sleep in days.
6) We have several interns and some new team members that will be joining us over the next several months. Please pray for all the logistics that need to be done to bring them here. Pray for their transitions. Pray for the ministry that they will be doing once they arrive, and pray for good team dynamics and unity. We are excited to have some others to come work along side us!
March 4, 2015:
1) Thank you all for praying with us throughout this journey of figuring out what's best for school for Weston and Nathan. Wes met with our supervisors last weekend at their team leader meeting, and it looks like we have the go-ahead to pursue online schooling for the two boys. We are still going through the process of getting it approved by all the appropriate channels, so please continue to pray for that! We feel a peace about this move, though, and we think it will be a good thing for both boys.
2) We have worked all month long on our new location. It's been renovated, painted and cleaned! We are now looking for ways to furnish it with the things that we need: chairs for the sanctuary, couches, tables, counter-tops for the "Food Pantry", shelves for the "Clothes Closet", etc. Please join us in praying for provision for these things!
3) We were hoping to have started our small groups this month, but with all of the focus on the new building, we decided to wait. Our prayer is that we will be able to start this month! We have two new leaders in training. Please pray Wes as he trains these leaders. Pray for the people to catch the vision of these small groups and pray for new leaders to be raised up within them.
4) We are still working on recruiting more help for reaching the lost in Valencia! Please pray for the Lord to send workers. We have a great need for singles or a young couple to come focus on the University here. Please join us in praying for more help!
5) Brittney arrived safely and has been helping with our English class. We started a new kids class, and she had 8 there on Monday night! In every class, we share a Bible story or something about the Bible, so we pray we are planting seeds! She is also pursuing language exchanges with kids from the high school down the street, in the hopes of building relationships and sharing Christ. Please pray that the Lord would send people who are open to spiritual things. Pray for boldness and for open doors.
6) Please pray for Noemí, who is Fina's sister-in-law. (Fina is our pastor's wife.) She was just diagnosed with Leukemia this past week. It was completely unexpected, as she hadn't noticed any of the symptoms. It's been very hard on the family, as you can imagine. Please pray for healing and for strength for Noemí as she goes through treatments for the next 6 months... as well as strength and peace for the family. Fina specifically asked me to ask you all to pray for her! Noemí is a believer, and she has a very strong walk with the Lord. We know He will walk through this with her. Please join us in praying for Noemí and her family.
February 3, 2015:
1) We are still in a holding pattern on the school situation. We will hopefully know more by the end of this month. Please pray for doors to open where He wants us to go. Pray for wisdom and discernment for Wes and I. Pray for His will to be clearly known. Please also pray for the boys as they need to finish out this school year in Valenciano.
2) We are very excited to have Brittney on her way next week to come stay with us for 3 months! She will leave Miami on Feb. 9th, and arrive in Spain on Feb. 10. Please lift her up as she travels, and also as she begins to do some ministry here in a new language and a new culture.
3) Praise the LORD! We had 4 people in Picassent baptized this month! Almost all of the people who come on Sunday mornings are brand new believers since the church plant started in June. Please pray for Paco, Toni, Antonia, and Isabel as they continue to learn and grown in their faith.
4) Another praise! Thank you all for praying! We have found and signed the contract for a new building! It used to be an old gym, and it's been empty for over a year. The location is perfect, and it's quite a large space with plenty of room for classrooms and an office for Fernando and Wes. We've been doing major clean-up and renovation over the past week. We are hoping to be in the building as of April 1st.
5) Thanks for praying for our leadership meeting last month. It went super well. We are all on the same page as far as starting small groups and our vision for the goal of multiplication. We all agree that it seems like an overwhelming task that only the Lord can fulfill. That's our prayer... that we will see the LORD work... that we will look back and know that it was Him! It's beyond us. We have begun to train new leaders for these small groups. Pray for these leaders... for wisdom and discernment. Pray also for the Lord to raise up new leaders, as our prayer is that we will GROW!
6) It has been very exciting to see the Lord working in the pueblo of Picassent. He is obviously touching hearts and calling people to Himself. Hearts are being softened, and things are beginning to happen. But we all know that with growth and progress comes adversity. The enemy has been working overtime to destroy and discourage. Please pray against the attacks of the enemy. Pray for protection, for unity, for love, for grace, and strength amongst our little family of believers in Picassent, as well as for the leadership!
January 7, 2015:
1) Thanks for praying for our trip to that education conference in Malaga. It was an incredible experience for us, once again. We always learn so much when we go, and we had so many questions to be answered! The bottom line, after telling our detailed story and fervently listening to all the different perspectives from a number of different people who have had much experience with these things, we feel like the Lord pointing us to a new road for the schooling for the boys. To be honest, I'm not sure how this will play out, so I want to ask you to PRAY for us! We'd like to pursue putting Weston and Nathan in an online school from the States. In order for this to happen, we have to get approval from our company. We also have to find a lawyer and find out what is legal and what is currently acceptable in our region... and then we have tosurvive finish out this school year. :) It's is legal in Spain to put the boys in an online school or to homeschool... technically, the law doesn't state anything prohibiting homeschooling; so in some regions, the courts allow it. But in some regions of Spain, we have heard of families who've been threatened to have their children taken away from them if they were not put into a school recognized by the government. We don't know of anyone here in Valencia who is homeschooling, so we really don't know how the authorities around here view it. We are also still waiting for our 5 year visas to come through, and we don't want to jeopardize those by beginning to ask questions about homeschooling. So... please pray that the doors will open and that they will be CLEARLY open! :)
2) Please continue to pray for local partners in our neighborhood. We are still praying for a church in La Patacona!
3) It looks like we will be having an intern arrive in the beginning of February, praise the Lord! She is coming as part "au pair" and part ministry intern. :) She will be living with us and helping with the kids and with homework, as well as University ministry! We are excited to have her! Please be in prayer for her as she prepares everything!
4) Please continue to pray for our church plant in Picassent. It is still growing, and we are still looking for another location. We've had several possibilities, but all seem too high for the rent. Pray that doors will open for the perfect location with the perfect amount for rent. Also please continue to lift up Fernando as he leads the church. Pray that he will be encouraged and that he will lead with a God-given vision. Please pray for our up-coming leadership meeting on Monday and Tuesday, Jan. 12th and 13th.
5) We are still going with our English class! We have grown a little bit over the past month, and it has become necessary to start a children's group. It is SO hard to teach young children and adults together! :) So... last week, Weston taught his very first English class! We were so proud of him, and he did a great job! We have also seen some of our new visitors also come to church, so that's been exciting. Please pray that His light will shine brightly through this time and that it will draw people to Him!
December 4, 2014:
1) We appreciate your prayers for Weston and Nathan. We are heading to the SHARE education conference tomorrow morning, and will hopefully get some direction and wisdom while we are there! Please pray for that (direction and wisdom) during our time there. We will arrive back home on Monday. We have also all been sick this past week with the stomach flu, and we are still recovering. Please pray for strength and quick recoveries!
2) Please continue to pray for local partners in our neighborhood. We really have a heart to start a church here in La Patacona.
3) Thanks for your prayers for help with the University. We've had several doors open up, but nothing finalized yet, so please continue to pray for this! There is also a possibility that we could get a single girl coming to help us in Jan. or Feb. She understands Spanish and has a heart to help with our kids (which would be an amazing help with schooling!) and our ministry, so we will see what plan the Lord has for that. Pray for His will in the situation, that He would open those doors if it's meant to be. She would be living with us, so we are really praying it will be a good fit for her as well as for us!
4) Continue to pray for our church in Picassent. It has grown a lot during it's first 5 months. We are actually outgrowing our facilities, so pray as Fernando (our national partner) is looking for another place to meet. We have had 7 people come to know Christ over the past two months!!! Praise the Lord! ... and the "small group" that meets on Wed. night had 41 people at it this week! Please pray as we begin to work toward multiplying groups and leaders. And most of all, please pray that people continue to come to know Jesus!
5) Thanks for praying for our English class! We have gotten it started, and it's been a blessing! We mostly have people from the church, but we also have 2 unbelievers who have come, so that is a huge praise! That's why we are there!
6) Thanks for lifting us up as we spoke in that high school English class. We had the chance to share our aspects of our faith during the presentation. It has also opened the door for more communication and partnership with the teacher. We are hoping that we will be able to host a singles/university team who will be able to go into that classroom, share their faith, and build more relationships with those kids!
November 3, 2014:
1) Thanks for your continued prayers for Weston and Nathan in school. Although they are both learning Valenciano little by little, it is still a challenge. We have begun to pursue help from our IMB education consultant and an organization called SHARE who specializes in education for kids who live in other cultures. We are hoping to be able to attend a SHARE conference in December to get a little bit more guidance on these issues. We have to get approval to go... and then also the funding, so please pray that that will go through.
2) Please continue to pray for local partners in our neighborhood. We really have a heart to start a church here in La Patacona.
3) Please continue to pray for interns and help with the University. We need to build our team! If you know anyone who is interested, please let us know. We have put in a request for 4 Hands On volunteers. (See our "Mission Opportunities" page for details.) Pray for volunteers to answer the call.
4) Pray for the church plant in Picassent. Pray that it will continue to grow and be a light to the community. Pray that those who come to visit will come to know Christ!
5) Next Monday, we begin teaching English classes (for free) from the church in Picassent. Our hope is that people will come to the class and be exposed to the love of Christ. Our prayer is that this love will compel them to visit on Sunday mornings and begin a relationship with our Savior! Pray for soft and open hearts. Please also pray for Wes and I as we teach. This is our first time teaching an English class.
6) On Thursday, Nov. 6th, we will be speaking at an English class in the "instituto" near Xoan's church. Pray for opportunities to share Christ.
October 2, 2014:
1) UPDATE from below: We have had ongoing conversations with the teachers at the school. We have just found out that Weston does not have to pass Valenciano to go to the public high school. Thank the Lord, that pressure is off! That was quite a stressful thought for all of us. The teachers have petitioned for Weston and Nathan both to be exempt from being graded in their Valenciano class this year. We are still waiting on that answer. For now, they are both continuing in their classes. Weston has a pretty tough teacher. He will probably not pass this year, but she is pushing him hard. We will see how it turns out, but for now, I keep reminding him that it's not a big deal if he fails this class. (How many parents tell their kids that!?!?! haha...) Nathan's teacher is very kind and very helpful with Nathan, so that's been a blessing. His teacher commented just today about Nathan's gift for language. She thinks it is definitely one of his strengths; he is learning quickly. Praise the Lord for that! It will definitely help in the next couple years. :) Please continue to pray for both boys as they continue to learn this new language.
2) Please continue to pray for local partners in our neighborhood. We really have a heart to start a church here in La Patacona.
3) UPDATE from below: The conference in Sevilla went great. It was an encouraging time of building relationships and unifying vision. The weekend definitely accomplished what we were looking for. Wes and the pastors we have partnered with are on the same page, unified in their vision and goals for reaching Valencia for Christ. This is a huge step!
4) Last month, we asked you to pray for interns. Praise the LORD, it looks like there is a possiblity of getting one! :) As always, we never count on it 100% until their feet have landed on our soil, but we are excited about this! Rafa is a Spanish speaking single guy from Miami who has a heart to serve. Pray that all the details will fall into place for him to come. He has a long process to go through, so it will be a while before he can come, but we are hoping for next spring/summer. Please keep praying for more!! We could use a whole team of interns! :)
5) Please continue to pray for the church plant in Picassent. We are working on the children's program and are looking to start that on the 5th of October. I am partnering with Fina, the leader's wife, in teaching the kids weekly. Please pray for me! It will be my first time teaching kids in Spanish. Thankfully, half of them will be my own kids in the beginning. :) haha... see?... the blessings of having 4 kids!!!! :)
September 19, 2014:
1) Thanks for praying for the kids as they began school! All went well. We've been in school for about 3 weeks now! The new issue that we have stumbled upon is that new laws went into effect in July of 2014... just before school started. Our kids are now doing the majority of their classes in Valenciano (the local language spoken here.) We have run into the most trouble (as of right now) with Weston because he is in 6th grade, which is the last grade of their elementary school. After 6th, they move on to their high school, which is finished with 10th grade. From what the teachers are telling us, it looks like Weston has to be able to pass Valenciano (the language class) in order to go on to their high school here. This is his first year taking the class, and he doesn't even speak the language yet!... but he's jumped into a 6th grade level...8 years behind his peers. We are still working out these details, and if this is actually how the law reads. There seems to be a lot of confusion, but it's been hard for Weston because he doesn't understand all of his Spanish academic language yet (it takes 7 years to learn the academic language) let alone Valenciano! His teachers are also concerned that he will begin to lose ground in his current classes because he doesn't yet understand Valenciano. The thing is, we hardly ever even hear the language being spoken. The kids on the street play in Spanish... the kids at recess in the school play in Spanish... our kids are not picking up the language playing and hearing it, like they easily did with Spanish. So, please pray for wisdom, discernment and direction for us for the situation with Weston. It is the same with Nathan, but we have an extra year to figure out the details. It's pretty crucial for Weston right now. His teacher says it's pretty much impossible for him to pass Valenciano this year. Of course, all of our Spaniard friends say that there HAS to be an exception of some kind for kids like Weston, but we we don't know of any yet.
2) Please continue to pray for local partners in our neighborhood. We really have a heart to start a church here in La Patacona.
3) Right now, Wes and some of the key leaders from our area are at a retreat in Seville. Please pray that they will be receptive and open to these new ideas. Pray for unity, and that this would be the start of a new vision for us to partner together to multiply churches and spread the Gospel!
4) Last month, we asked you to pray for interns. Praise the LORD, it looks like there is a possiblity of getting one! :) As always, we never count on it 100% until their feet have landed on our soil, but we are excited about this! Rafa is a Spanish speaking single guy from Miami who has a heart to serve. Pray that all the details will fall into place for him to come. He has a long process to go through, so it will be a while before he can come, but we are hoping for next spring/summer. Please keep praying for more!! We could use a whole team of interns! :)
5) Please continue to pray for the church plant in Picassent. We are working on the children's program and are looking to start that on the 28th of Sept. I am partnering with Fina, the leader's wife, in teaching the kids weekly. Please pray for me! It will be my first time teaching kids in Spanish. Thankfully, half of them will be my own kids in the beginning. :) haha... see?... the blessings of having 4 kids!!!! :)
August 31, 2014:
1) The kids are getting ready to start school in a couple days, so please pray for them as they settle in!
2) Please pray specifically that we will find a believer who would like to partner with us to start a small group in our neighborhood. During one of our visits to a local evangelical church, we met Victor who is from our neighborhood. He jokingly made the comment, "We should start our own church in La Patacona!" since there were 3 families (ours, his and one other) there from our neighborhood (These 3 families are the only believing families that we know of in our entire neighborhood!) It was said jest, but still... out of the abundance of the heart, speaks the mouth, right? ;) We have recently discovered that Victor's family has opened a new cafe in our neighborhood, so his hands are pretty full at the moment. But of course, my thinking is... it's a perfect location!!! :) Pray for direction in this relationship and wisdom and blessing for Victor as he gets his business off the ground. Pray that the Lord will make our path clear as well as put a burden on Victor's heart if he is the one we are supposed to partner with.
3) As mentioned earlier, we have had a good connection with a local pastor who's church is about 40 minutes away. Their church decided to plant two new churches in two different areas of Valencia where there is no evangelical witness. This was so exciting to us, since this is obviously our heartbeat!!!! Xoan is a dynamic pastor with an incredible passion and vision for sharing the Gospel in Valencia. We have helped at different times with both of the different church plants, but have recently committed to helping with the newest one (open just 3 months) in an area called Picassent, about 30 minutes from our home. There is a believer in Picassent who had a local (that used to be a cafe), and he offered it to the church! So, we all meet in a little room in the front, using all the chairs that used to be in the cafe and we worship together. It's very exciting to see... there are several young singles who lead worship (and do a great job!). After worship and the Word, they lift the screen up from the wall... and serve cafe and refreshments from the bar! It's a great little set-up. There's a park across the street, so the kids can run around and play afterward while we fellowship. It's been such a special thing for us over the last little while. Please pray for this new little church as we share Christ in this community. We will start a children's ministry next week, hoping to reach out to some of the kids in the neighborhood who play in the park on Sunday mornings.
4) Pray for interns! We need help reaching the Universities here. It's so crucial to live life with singles, if you are going to reach them, and at the stage of life that we are in... it's a little difficult to have the time. We are praying for the Lord to send 2 spiritually mature, self-motivated, passionate interns who can help us with this!
Last update: June 2014
As we set out on our journey BACK to Spain, here was our list of prayer requests:
1) Please pray for emotional healing for Jonathan. Due to some troubling signs of trauma, we decided to pull Jonathan out of the the public school just before Christmas break. For years, Jonathan has struggled with the public school environment. (The truth is that it's not been easy for any of the kids!) They have a shame based system here in Spain, with no order in the classroom. Jonathan was very relieved and happy in many ways to be out of that environment, but he has commented on being sad about not being able to continue to learn Valenciano. He will start next week with online school, like his brothers. As we sought counsel before we made our decision, we were told that it may take a year to a year and a half for Jonathan to heal and become "himself" again. So please continue to pray for that.
2) Thank you for praying for our Ladies Night! Our hope is to be able to do them monthly. They have been a great success so far; and we have had several of the ladies who have come for the first time, bring their families to church on Sunday. It's been exciting to see how the Lord is using that. Please pray for leaders to rise up who will be able to plan and lead this Ladies Night. As of right now, I (Michelle) have been the planner; but as always, our goal is to train nationals to lead. Pray for leaders to emerge as we continue this ministry!
3) Please pray for me (Michelle) as I try to balance many new responsibilities this year. With Jonathan beginning in online school, I will have 3 boys home. Although I enjoy working with the boys on school, it's been very time-consuming, as Nathan has needed a LOT of help with all that goes along with his disability. I guess that's to be expected, as he needed a lot of help when he was in a national school as well. Weston, for the most part, is pretty independent; but I'm not yet sure where Jonathan will fall on the spectrum. I have also been asked to become a language coach for Spain. I begin an online course for training in January, so that will be one more thing to balance... in addition to the people I will begin coaching through language training and the responsibilities that come with that. As I have mentioned before, we also have several single girls who will be coming to help us with ministry... 1 long term, and 2 short term. As always, their cultural adjustment and spiritual/emotional health and growth will mainly fall to me... all of which I normally love, but I do know my plate is getting full! Please pray for balance in all of this, as well as wisdom, discernment and strength!
4) Continue to pray for the development of leaders within our small groups. They are going well... and we have seen many visitors from our groups begin to regularly attend church. But we are definitely needing more leaders to step up. Please pray for the Lord to send those people, as well as wisdom as to how to best train and multiply them.
5) Wes continues to preach once or twice a month, depending on the schedule. Please pray for him as he puts together what He feels like the Lord is speaking to him. Please continue to pray for his Spanish, as well. It's gotten so much better (and he does a great job!!), but he would be the first to tell you it's still not the same as preaching in English. It still takes a lot of work.
6) Please pray for the continued growth of our people in Picassent. So many of our people are new believers and very young in their faith. Pray for growth and strength against spiritual attacks.
7) Please pray for our new teammate Heather, who was supposed to be here at the beginning of January. Right before she was to leave for Spain, her mother was unexpectedly hospitalized. It has been an up and down road over the past two weeks, but Heather's mom passed away yesterday morning. Please pray for comfort and peace for Heather and her family. Please also pray for wisdom, discernment and direction as she walks through these next couple days/weeks.
November 13, 2015:
1) Although in general, school is going well for the kids, Jonathan has started to have some anxiety. He often has more than 3 hours a night of homework, and it has become a LOT for him. Right now, there is actually an outcry from parents about the amount of homework given to children in elementary school. Apparently, studies show that Spain has one of the highest amounts of homework, but some of the lowest achievement scores. Anyway, it's been a challenge this month... to the extent that Jonathan has been coming home "sick", only to discover that its actually anxiety. Please pray for strength, peace, and lots of intelligence! :) hehe... I truly cannot imagine learning in 3 languages.
2) Please pray for tomorrow night, Nov 14th. We will host our first Ladies Night at the church! I have been in charge of organizing everything, so I've had quite a full plate the past couple of weeks. Please pray for all the details to come together. Pray for visitors to come, as it is an outreach. Pray for ladies to come to know Him and to be drawn the love and peace offered through Christ! Please also pray for sweet fellowship and a strong unity among our ladies.
3) We are so excited about how the Lord is moving! Last year, we started 3 small groups. This past month, we re-launched after a break during the summer. This year we have launched 5 small groups. Please pray for consistency in the small groups. Pray for the leaders of each group. Pray for all of our new believers to grow in their relationship with the Lord and to develop a passion for sharing their faith. Pray for Wes as he trains the leaders of each of these groups. One of these new groups is completely an outreach group. Pray that people will come and that people will come to know the Lord!
4) Please continue to pray for unity on our team. We are growing and growing! We have so much enjoyed having the Penido family join us this past summer. In January, we will add Heather to our team. She is a single lady who will be beginning/heading up our University work. She will be here for 4 years, with a long term vision in mind for the future. We are excited to have her coming! Shortly after she arrives, our two Hand-On girls arrive. What a blessing to have them all coming around the same time. It's always easier to work together with someone else, so we are excited for Heather to have 2 other girls to work alongside her! Please pray for Heather as she gets everything settled in the States before she comes. Pray for all she needs to do in preparation to come. Her goal is to be a career missionary, just like us; so those preparations are always more complicated than a short-termer. Right now, she is in training at FPO... the same 8 week training in Richmond that we went through. Also pray for her visa to come through quickly. Her papers have been handed in and we are waiting on approval.
October 3, 2015:
1) Thank you all for praying for the start of school for our kids. After 3 weeks of school, all four of them are feeling pretty settled and doing well. We are so thankful that the two younger ones have both been very happy with their teachers. They are both making lots of new friends, and they wake up excited to go to school each morning. THAT feels like a miracle to me. We are SO thankful that they have settled so well. Weston and Nathan are also very much enjoying Liberty Online Academy. Nathan, especially, has done well in the fact that he is not nearly as stressed as before. It was definitely an adjustment at first. It's both of their first time learning in English! Thank you so much for praying. School is going well. (I'm not sure that I have ever said that, across the board, before! PTL!) :)
2) Please continue to pray for our company as many more changes are on their way. As I mentioned last month, we have to cut back by 800 staff and field personnel. Losing that many people on the field will definitely give our face a different look, here on the field. The voluntary retirement packages have all been sent out , and those who received them will have until November 4th to make a decision. After that, we are not sure of the exact steps that will be taken. Regardless, it will mean change. Leadership, supervisors, friends, co-workers... many will go home and leave huge gaps here on the field. Pray for wisdom for the leadership of our company to make wise, God-directed decisions. Pray for those who are having to make immediate changes. Pray for preparation for the changes to come.
3) Please pray for continued unity for our team. Please pray for direction and discernment for Wes as he leads us. Pray for healthy relationships; pray for grace, humbleness, and love to abound; pray that we would each walk close and clean with the Lord.
4) Please pray for our small groups as we are once again relaunching after our break for the summer. We are regrouping and casting vision once again. Pray for the development of leaders, new groups to be started, and for our new believers to grow!
September 7, 2015:
1) Thank you all for praying for our recent move! We are feeling much more settled and beginning to feel at home here. School starts on the 10th, so I'm sure that will help as far as getting into a routine and also getting to know our neighbors. Please pray for the Jonathan and Carolina as they begin this new year with new teachers and new classmates. Please pray for a great first couple days, for new friends for them, and for kind and understanding teachers.
2) Praise the Lord, Weston is doing much better. He is now sleeping normally for the first time in 6 months. He still has a little bit of trouble digesting certain foods, so we still have to be a little bit careful, but he is healing! Please keep praying!
3) Please continue to pray for our team. As I mentioned last month, we have grown by leaps and bounds. We have been by ourselves for our entire time on the field; and now, all of a sudden, we have a very large team! It's been exciting and very encouraging... but we definitely want to be leading in a Christlike manner. The Lord has given us a very big vision for Valencia. Pray for wisdom as to how to best cast that vision and pray for discernment as to how to best implement that vision. It's easy for us to follow that vision, since it was clearly given to us. Now it's extremely important to cast that vision, so that we are all working in the same direction. Please pray for Wes as he leads. Pray for unity for our team. We also give thanks for the team that we have! It has been such a blessing.
4) Unfortunately, as many of you may have heard, last week, David Platt (our new IMB president) made the announcement, “If we are going to balance our budget, we must reduce approximately 600 to 800 of our staff and field personnel.” For many years in a row, our expenditures have consistently been larger than our revenue. The IMB initially had a plan to lower our numbers slowly through attrition, among other things, over the next several years; but it has become apparent that these measures will not be enough. Read the details here. Please pray for wisdom, discernment, and direction for our leadership. Please pray for wisdom, peace, open hearts, and direction for those of us on the field, as these numbers translate to 1 in 6 of us here on the field. Here is a letter from David Platt, which he made available for those who would like a better understanding of the situation. As the first article explains, the IMB will begin this process with a Voluntary Retirement Incentive. It is not yet clear what will happen if we don't reach the 600-800 number through voluntary means. They have said that we will cross that bridge when we come to it. These next 3 months will be very crucial for all of us. We are trusting the Lord to guide our path, trusting that He has a perfect plan for each of us.
5) Please continue to pray for our church in Picassent. We are continuing to work on the growth and maturity of our group, but we are also beginning to cast the vision to reach Alcacer, the unreached pueblo next to us. Pray for wisdom on how to do that, and a passion in our people to share what the Lord has done in their lives.
6) We have been doing lots of outreaches with all of the other church plants in our area. Wes has been going and working along-side each pastor/leader, with the hopes of continuing to build relationships and trust. Please continue to pray for trust, open doors to speak into lives, and for openness to the idea of multiplication.
August 12, 2015:
1) What a whirlwind July and August have been! Thank you for your prayers for our new home. My parents came to help, and we got everything unpacked and in it's place in a matter of a week and a half... not a box left to be unpacked!!!!... curtains hung, pictures in place... it was incredible. My parents were an amazing help. This is definitely a praise!... but along with it went some strange feelings to ponder. :) Although it looks like we have lived here for years, we still don't quite feel like it's home. We've been traveling a lot, so we have not been here much, either. Pray for a peace and a 'settled' feeling for our kids, as this move has been a little hard on them.
2) Thank you for praying for Weston! He is doing much better. It has taken some time to heal that ulcer, but he has been faithful with his limited diet (even while traveling!), and he is feeling much better. We are not yet at 100%, so please keep praying; but, praise the Lord, we are doing SO much better! Thank you for praying!
3) My Grandma (on my dad's side) passed away last week while we were at our annual AGM in Portugal. :( Please pray for my family and especially my Grandpa, as they are adjusting to a new rhythm of life without my Grandma there. My younger sister (who lives in Guam with her husband who is in the Navy) and I were not able to go to the funeral. It was so hard to be so far away during this time! But we are thankful to have the hope of seeing Grandma in heaven once again!
4) Praise the LORD! The two churches who came this past month to host an American Football camp did an amazing job. Ten guys came (2 of which were teenagers!) to help share the love of Christ. We had over 20 kids at the camp each day, which is really a great number for a first-time camp! Spaniards can be very un-trusting of new things, so sometimes it takes a few years to build enough trust for people to come. We were so thrilled. They guys did an incredible job loving on the kids, making it fun, and purposefully sharing Christ with the kids who came. We had some kids who were churched, but the majority of the kids were from the local neighborhoods! THAT was a blessing! The other God-thing that came out of this time was that one of the teenage girls who was at the camp was able to go to the States a couple weeks ago. She is being hosted by these two churches. She is being loved on and seeing Jesus in a whole new way with these families she is staying with!!! We were so thankful to have the team come... and are looking forward to deeper partnering relationships with these churches in the future!
5) Please pray for our team here in Valencia. We are SO excited that we actually have a team! :) We have been on our own for our 5 years on the field, and now we are growing by leaps and bounds. As I mentioned before, our new co-workers arrived just before our move. They are a family of 4, and our kids have thrived on having fellowship with other believers. Our new cluster leader and his wife have also just arrived to Valencia. In September we will have a couple coming as interns for a month and a college student arriving for the year from Great Britain. In addition, we have just found out that we will have 2 new teammates arriving in January with the Macedonia program through the SBC. What a blessing! We are not alone! :) Please pray for Wes as he leads our team. In a period of 6 months, we will go from one of the smallest teams in Spain to one of the largest! :) Pray for each team member as they prepare to come, or as they are going through culture shock and transitioning. Please pray for unity on our team. This is so essential for a team to function at it's highest potential. Pray that we will each walk closely and humbly before the Lord. We are excited to see what the Lord has in store here in Valencia!
6) As many of you know, most things come to a halt during the month of August here in Spain. Everyone leaves for vacation. Our English outreach has been put on hold until September, when we will start up again. Small group attendance and church attendance is always low during August. But, during this month, it is our prayer to connect once again with the national leaders of the 5 different churches we are hoping to influence and serve. Pray for those doors to continue to be open. Pray for wisdom and discernment for Wes as he meets with the leaders. Pray for clear communication and unity. Pray for open hearts and a big vision! :)
July 1, 2015:
1) Thank you all for praying for the details of our move. We moved on June 23rd, and we are still settling in. The first night, we could hardly walk around the apartment, for all the boxes everywhere!... but we are slowly getting there! My parents are here, helping us with the kids as well as the move... that's a HUGE praise! :) Please continue to pray for us as we settle in and meet our neighbors.
2) Thankfully, we were able to get Jonathan and Carolina into the neighborhood public school. There are two tracts to choose from: Spanish or Valenciano. It's a little deciving, but the "Spanish tract" simply means that they have 2 classes in Spanish. :) Carolina got into the Spanish tract without any problems, but there were no spaces for Jonathan in Spanish. We have placed him in the Valenciano tract, which is a much smaller class than the other (16 students as opposed to 30!), so we feel that that will be better for him. Jonathan is really motivated to learn Valenciano, and his teacher from this past year thinks he will be fine, so that's a good thing! Praise the Lord, we have already located a tutor to help him with his new classes in Valenciano. Please pray for Jonathan and Carolina both as they transition into a new school with new friends. Pray that they will get very kind, good teachers. Pray also for Weston and Nathan as they will be taking the placement exam for Liberty Online Academy.
3) Please continue to pray for Weston. We are still struggling with health issues with him. You can read below for more details on what has happened with him. At the moment, we are struggling with an ulcer... it will just take time to heal; but until then, he has to be very careful what he eats. After 3 months of this, it's become very "old." At times he feels hopeless that he will ever get better and be able to eat normally again. Thank the Lord, he is doing a little better sleeping now, as long as we are very careful about what he eats. Please continue to pray for healing and encouragement!
4) Please pray for the mission team from NC coming to join us next week! We will be doing an American Football camp with underprivileged kids from the area. It's the first time an American Football camp has been held in the area, so pray for kids to come! Pray for open hearts for those who come. Pray for many opportunities to share Christ; pray for organization and the logistics of all that needs to happen. Pray for health and safe travels for the team, and for the Lord to be glorified most of all. We are so excited to see what the Lord does through this time!
5) Our new teammates have arrived! It's always craziness after a 24 hour non-stop trip with 2 kids and 19 bags, plus carry-ons! :) ... but they made it and have found an apartment. They are expecting their furniture to arrive by the end of the week! They are still looking for a good fit for school for both of their kids. Please pray for them as they transition into a new culture, and for the Lord to guide them as all the details fall into place. Pray for team unity and wisdom as we begin to work together at the tasks the Lord has given us in Valencia!
June 9, 2015:
Somehow, May got away from me, and I didn't post prayer requests for the month. Sorry about that! I think, of all months, we should have been asking for prayer during this particular month! Just a quick update, so that the following prayer requests make more sense: Last month, our landlord informed us that due to circumstances in his life, he needed to move back into this house. The laws here allow him to do that...only under these circumstances... and we were given 2 months to find another place to live.
1) Praise the Lord, after a month of searching, we found a 4 bedroom apartment for us to move into. We are expecting to move on June 23rd. This is one of the worst times of the year to be looking for housing, so there wasn't much available. There was nothing in our area... not a single 4 bedroom... so we are having to move to a complete other part of town. The kids will be having to change schools again. It basically means starting over... new grocery stores, new friends, new way of life. The market was SO brutal that 4 bedrooms that were coming on the market were going within a day of being listed. So... praise the Lord we found one that will meet our needs!! We will be moving from a town house to an apartment, so it will mean a lifestyle change, as well as having to down-size a little bit. All of which is doable... it's just another change for our family. You all know how hard change can be on kids! So, please be in prayer for this. Please also pray for great teachers for the kids for next year. This is hugely important!
2) As I mentioned last time, Weston was struggling with some blood sugar issues. His body seems to have taken care of that, but in the midst of it all, he fell sick with one thing after another... ear infections, strep throat, etc. Throughout all of this, he had an on-going stomach ache. We were not sure if this came from his other illnesses or not, but once all the other things cleared up and the stomach ache remained, we realized something was going on with his stomach itself. After weeks of dr. appointments and lots of pain and sleepless nights, Weston was finally diagnosed with H. Pylori. It's a bacterial infection in the stomach which is extremely difficult to get rid of. He went through 2 weeks of really strong antibiotics, which hurt his stomach even more. Then he came down with thrush, due to the antibiotics... poor kid could never catch a break! After 2 and 1/2 months out of school, he was finally beginning to feel a little bit better. He went to 3 days of school and to church for the first time in a while. But, just as things seemed to be looking up for him, he took a turn for the worse. He is home again with stomach pain. We are thinking that he has an ulcer and that the food he ate when we went out to eat after church aggravated it. He hasn't slept in two nights... literally not at all, throughout the whole night. Please continue to pray for strength for his body. For relief from the pain... and complete, quick healing. Please also pray for grace from the school. He has missed SO much school. We simply need him to pass this year. He had good grades before he fell sick, so we are praying that will carry him through. We have 10 more days of school. Pray he will be able to go back tomorrow!
3) Small groups have gotten off the ground and are going strong! We have some interest to start more small groups in other towns, so pray that those doors continue to open!
4) As I mentioned before, we have seen SO much spiritual warfare going on. My guess is the timing is not coincidental. Our small groups finally get off the ground, and our lives are turned up-side down with Weston being sick as well as having to move. In addition to that, we have 2 missionary families working with Pastor Xoan's church who were denied visas. They had come on their own, not with a specific organization. Something wasn't right with their paperwork, and they were given 2 weeks to leave the country. So please pray hard against the enemy. Pray that we will stand firm. Pray that we will not lose ground as it's so much harder to keep the momentum of ministry going with all the stress of sick kids and having to move and down-size.
5) Our new teammates are due to arrive next week!! Praise the Lord! They will be looking for housing and possibly moving at the same time we will be moving. So pray for all the logistics for all of this, in addition to their transition into a new country, finding a house, finding schools for their kids, etc.
6) Our two interns from NC have arrived and have completed almost half of their time here! They have been so passionate about sharing Christ with the lost, loving all those in their path, and serving in whatever way they can. We have seen 4 people come to know Christ through their work in Valencia and in Picassent! Praise the LORD! Please continue to pray for their ministry as well as their continued adjustment. They have not been left out of the spiritual attacks that seem to be hitting all of us here.
7) We are excited about hosting a mission team from NC in July! We are working on the details for their minstry while they are here. We will be hosting an American football camp and sharing the Gospel in every way possible while they are here! Please pray for their preparation as they get ready to come. Pray for the kids and the families who will be touched by their ministry. Pray for all the details to come together.
April 10, 2015:
1) Praise! We have begun the process of enrolling with Liberty University Online Academy for the two older boys! We have gotten the approval that we need from our company and we have spoken at length with LUOA. The boys are very excited about studying in English AND having the opportunity to learn from a Christian perspective. It will be a first on both fronts. :)
2) Praise! We had our official inauguration of our new building this month. We had 150 people there! It was definitely way more than we anticipated. It was so exciting to see so many people fill up all the chairs and worship together. We had appetizers afterward and had a great time of fellowship. 9 people raised their hands to get saved during the service!! The Lord was definitely moving!
3) Please pray for Weston. We spent last night in the ER, trying to figure out what is going on with him. About a week ago, he began having blood sugar issues out of the blue. At first we thought it was a bug or something, but then I realized that his symptoms were very similar to what I get when my blood sugar gets low. Hypoglycemia is something I've lived with for a long time and it has become pretty simple to control (for me) with my eating habits. With what I know for myself, we were able to get his initial symptoms under control, and we started watching what he ate each day. Last night was the first time they had had soccer practice since all this started. His coach ran them harder than they've run ever before, and Weston began shaking shortly after he arrived home. He was shaking, dizzy, his head hurt... I tried to get it under control with what I knew, but it wasn't working very quickly. When he said his hands and feet were going numb, we decided it was time to head to the ER. He was pale, shaking uncontrollably and could barely walk. When we walked into the ER, they rushed him back. They ran some tests, gave him a sugar water IV... it's a long story. They basically said it had to do with blood sugar and that he was experiencing a hypoglycemic episode, but they could tell us nothing more. All they said was that we need to see a specialist. We took all the test results and sent them to a good friend of ours who is a doctor. Brad helped us out with SO much more information. (Thanks, Brad!!! We are so grateful for you!) With his input, we now have a plan of action, and we understand what's going on much more clearly, but it's been still tough maintaining Weston's blood sugar. The ER doctor said no exercise for two weeks... no P.E., no soccer... nothing. So, during these two weeks, we are hoping to figure things out. It's been pretty scary for Weston. That night in the ER was terrifying for him. To a small extent, I understand that helpless, can't control my body, don't-know-what's-going-on feeling... but, Weston's symptoms were even more severe than what I've experienced. Please pray for us to figure out the the best foods/snacks to maintain his levels. Please pray for peace and healing for Weston. He starts back to school (we've been on Easter break) on Tuesday, and he's pretty scared. Pray for wisdom, discernment and a clear course of action. *4/19 update: Weston still hasn't been back to school. We've still been struggling with blood sugar levels, and he has also come down with a fever and double ear infections. Please pray for healing!!
4) We are excited to have had our very first week for our 3 new small groups. The first meeting was very introductory and casting clear vision for the purposes of the small groups. They all went well! Pray for the groups to continue to go well. Pray for boldness of the people. Pray for open hearts. Pray for wisdom, strength, and protection for the leaders.
5) Please continue to pray for some of the leadership here in Valencia. We've seen a lot of Spiritual warfare going on trying to discourage and discredit some of our key leaders. Pray for their marriages; pray for their personal walks. Please pray for encouragement, perseverance, protection, strength, and wisdom for our leaders. I guess I would also include our family in that. Satan seems to attack the health of our family in order to discourage and distract us. Not only have we seen these issues with Weston, but we've had an ongoing lice issue with Carolina (her class cannot seem to get rid of them!), and a stomach bug that's making its rounds through our family. Wes and I haven't had a full night sleep in days.
6) We have several interns and some new team members that will be joining us over the next several months. Please pray for all the logistics that need to be done to bring them here. Pray for their transitions. Pray for the ministry that they will be doing once they arrive, and pray for good team dynamics and unity. We are excited to have some others to come work along side us!
March 4, 2015:
1) Thank you all for praying with us throughout this journey of figuring out what's best for school for Weston and Nathan. Wes met with our supervisors last weekend at their team leader meeting, and it looks like we have the go-ahead to pursue online schooling for the two boys. We are still going through the process of getting it approved by all the appropriate channels, so please continue to pray for that! We feel a peace about this move, though, and we think it will be a good thing for both boys.
2) We have worked all month long on our new location. It's been renovated, painted and cleaned! We are now looking for ways to furnish it with the things that we need: chairs for the sanctuary, couches, tables, counter-tops for the "Food Pantry", shelves for the "Clothes Closet", etc. Please join us in praying for provision for these things!
3) We were hoping to have started our small groups this month, but with all of the focus on the new building, we decided to wait. Our prayer is that we will be able to start this month! We have two new leaders in training. Please pray Wes as he trains these leaders. Pray for the people to catch the vision of these small groups and pray for new leaders to be raised up within them.
4) We are still working on recruiting more help for reaching the lost in Valencia! Please pray for the Lord to send workers. We have a great need for singles or a young couple to come focus on the University here. Please join us in praying for more help!
5) Brittney arrived safely and has been helping with our English class. We started a new kids class, and she had 8 there on Monday night! In every class, we share a Bible story or something about the Bible, so we pray we are planting seeds! She is also pursuing language exchanges with kids from the high school down the street, in the hopes of building relationships and sharing Christ. Please pray that the Lord would send people who are open to spiritual things. Pray for boldness and for open doors.
6) Please pray for Noemí, who is Fina's sister-in-law. (Fina is our pastor's wife.) She was just diagnosed with Leukemia this past week. It was completely unexpected, as she hadn't noticed any of the symptoms. It's been very hard on the family, as you can imagine. Please pray for healing and for strength for Noemí as she goes through treatments for the next 6 months... as well as strength and peace for the family. Fina specifically asked me to ask you all to pray for her! Noemí is a believer, and she has a very strong walk with the Lord. We know He will walk through this with her. Please join us in praying for Noemí and her family.
February 3, 2015:
1) We are still in a holding pattern on the school situation. We will hopefully know more by the end of this month. Please pray for doors to open where He wants us to go. Pray for wisdom and discernment for Wes and I. Pray for His will to be clearly known. Please also pray for the boys as they need to finish out this school year in Valenciano.
2) We are very excited to have Brittney on her way next week to come stay with us for 3 months! She will leave Miami on Feb. 9th, and arrive in Spain on Feb. 10. Please lift her up as she travels, and also as she begins to do some ministry here in a new language and a new culture.
3) Praise the LORD! We had 4 people in Picassent baptized this month! Almost all of the people who come on Sunday mornings are brand new believers since the church plant started in June. Please pray for Paco, Toni, Antonia, and Isabel as they continue to learn and grown in their faith.
4) Another praise! Thank you all for praying! We have found and signed the contract for a new building! It used to be an old gym, and it's been empty for over a year. The location is perfect, and it's quite a large space with plenty of room for classrooms and an office for Fernando and Wes. We've been doing major clean-up and renovation over the past week. We are hoping to be in the building as of April 1st.
5) Thanks for praying for our leadership meeting last month. It went super well. We are all on the same page as far as starting small groups and our vision for the goal of multiplication. We all agree that it seems like an overwhelming task that only the Lord can fulfill. That's our prayer... that we will see the LORD work... that we will look back and know that it was Him! It's beyond us. We have begun to train new leaders for these small groups. Pray for these leaders... for wisdom and discernment. Pray also for the Lord to raise up new leaders, as our prayer is that we will GROW!
6) It has been very exciting to see the Lord working in the pueblo of Picassent. He is obviously touching hearts and calling people to Himself. Hearts are being softened, and things are beginning to happen. But we all know that with growth and progress comes adversity. The enemy has been working overtime to destroy and discourage. Please pray against the attacks of the enemy. Pray for protection, for unity, for love, for grace, and strength amongst our little family of believers in Picassent, as well as for the leadership!
January 7, 2015:
1) Thanks for praying for our trip to that education conference in Malaga. It was an incredible experience for us, once again. We always learn so much when we go, and we had so many questions to be answered! The bottom line, after telling our detailed story and fervently listening to all the different perspectives from a number of different people who have had much experience with these things, we feel like the Lord pointing us to a new road for the schooling for the boys. To be honest, I'm not sure how this will play out, so I want to ask you to PRAY for us! We'd like to pursue putting Weston and Nathan in an online school from the States. In order for this to happen, we have to get approval from our company. We also have to find a lawyer and find out what is legal and what is currently acceptable in our region... and then we have to
2) Please continue to pray for local partners in our neighborhood. We are still praying for a church in La Patacona!
3) It looks like we will be having an intern arrive in the beginning of February, praise the Lord! She is coming as part "au pair" and part ministry intern. :) She will be living with us and helping with the kids and with homework, as well as University ministry! We are excited to have her! Please be in prayer for her as she prepares everything!
4) Please continue to pray for our church plant in Picassent. It is still growing, and we are still looking for another location. We've had several possibilities, but all seem too high for the rent. Pray that doors will open for the perfect location with the perfect amount for rent. Also please continue to lift up Fernando as he leads the church. Pray that he will be encouraged and that he will lead with a God-given vision. Please pray for our up-coming leadership meeting on Monday and Tuesday, Jan. 12th and 13th.
5) We are still going with our English class! We have grown a little bit over the past month, and it has become necessary to start a children's group. It is SO hard to teach young children and adults together! :) So... last week, Weston taught his very first English class! We were so proud of him, and he did a great job! We have also seen some of our new visitors also come to church, so that's been exciting. Please pray that His light will shine brightly through this time and that it will draw people to Him!
December 4, 2014:
1) We appreciate your prayers for Weston and Nathan. We are heading to the SHARE education conference tomorrow morning, and will hopefully get some direction and wisdom while we are there! Please pray for that (direction and wisdom) during our time there. We will arrive back home on Monday. We have also all been sick this past week with the stomach flu, and we are still recovering. Please pray for strength and quick recoveries!
2) Please continue to pray for local partners in our neighborhood. We really have a heart to start a church here in La Patacona.
3) Thanks for your prayers for help with the University. We've had several doors open up, but nothing finalized yet, so please continue to pray for this! There is also a possibility that we could get a single girl coming to help us in Jan. or Feb. She understands Spanish and has a heart to help with our kids (which would be an amazing help with schooling!) and our ministry, so we will see what plan the Lord has for that. Pray for His will in the situation, that He would open those doors if it's meant to be. She would be living with us, so we are really praying it will be a good fit for her as well as for us!
4) Continue to pray for our church in Picassent. It has grown a lot during it's first 5 months. We are actually outgrowing our facilities, so pray as Fernando (our national partner) is looking for another place to meet. We have had 7 people come to know Christ over the past two months!!! Praise the Lord! ... and the "small group" that meets on Wed. night had 41 people at it this week! Please pray as we begin to work toward multiplying groups and leaders. And most of all, please pray that people continue to come to know Jesus!
5) Thanks for praying for our English class! We have gotten it started, and it's been a blessing! We mostly have people from the church, but we also have 2 unbelievers who have come, so that is a huge praise! That's why we are there!
6) Thanks for lifting us up as we spoke in that high school English class. We had the chance to share our aspects of our faith during the presentation. It has also opened the door for more communication and partnership with the teacher. We are hoping that we will be able to host a singles/university team who will be able to go into that classroom, share their faith, and build more relationships with those kids!
November 3, 2014:
1) Thanks for your continued prayers for Weston and Nathan in school. Although they are both learning Valenciano little by little, it is still a challenge. We have begun to pursue help from our IMB education consultant and an organization called SHARE who specializes in education for kids who live in other cultures. We are hoping to be able to attend a SHARE conference in December to get a little bit more guidance on these issues. We have to get approval to go... and then also the funding, so please pray that that will go through.
2) Please continue to pray for local partners in our neighborhood. We really have a heart to start a church here in La Patacona.
3) Please continue to pray for interns and help with the University. We need to build our team! If you know anyone who is interested, please let us know. We have put in a request for 4 Hands On volunteers. (See our "Mission Opportunities" page for details.) Pray for volunteers to answer the call.
4) Pray for the church plant in Picassent. Pray that it will continue to grow and be a light to the community. Pray that those who come to visit will come to know Christ!
5) Next Monday, we begin teaching English classes (for free) from the church in Picassent. Our hope is that people will come to the class and be exposed to the love of Christ. Our prayer is that this love will compel them to visit on Sunday mornings and begin a relationship with our Savior! Pray for soft and open hearts. Please also pray for Wes and I as we teach. This is our first time teaching an English class.
6) On Thursday, Nov. 6th, we will be speaking at an English class in the "instituto" near Xoan's church. Pray for opportunities to share Christ.
October 2, 2014:
1) UPDATE from below: We have had ongoing conversations with the teachers at the school. We have just found out that Weston does not have to pass Valenciano to go to the public high school. Thank the Lord, that pressure is off! That was quite a stressful thought for all of us. The teachers have petitioned for Weston and Nathan both to be exempt from being graded in their Valenciano class this year. We are still waiting on that answer. For now, they are both continuing in their classes. Weston has a pretty tough teacher. He will probably not pass this year, but she is pushing him hard. We will see how it turns out, but for now, I keep reminding him that it's not a big deal if he fails this class. (How many parents tell their kids that!?!?! haha...) Nathan's teacher is very kind and very helpful with Nathan, so that's been a blessing. His teacher commented just today about Nathan's gift for language. She thinks it is definitely one of his strengths; he is learning quickly. Praise the Lord for that! It will definitely help in the next couple years. :) Please continue to pray for both boys as they continue to learn this new language.
2) Please continue to pray for local partners in our neighborhood. We really have a heart to start a church here in La Patacona.
3) UPDATE from below: The conference in Sevilla went great. It was an encouraging time of building relationships and unifying vision. The weekend definitely accomplished what we were looking for. Wes and the pastors we have partnered with are on the same page, unified in their vision and goals for reaching Valencia for Christ. This is a huge step!
4) Last month, we asked you to pray for interns. Praise the LORD, it looks like there is a possiblity of getting one! :) As always, we never count on it 100% until their feet have landed on our soil, but we are excited about this! Rafa is a Spanish speaking single guy from Miami who has a heart to serve. Pray that all the details will fall into place for him to come. He has a long process to go through, so it will be a while before he can come, but we are hoping for next spring/summer. Please keep praying for more!! We could use a whole team of interns! :)
5) Please continue to pray for the church plant in Picassent. We are working on the children's program and are looking to start that on the 5th of October. I am partnering with Fina, the leader's wife, in teaching the kids weekly. Please pray for me! It will be my first time teaching kids in Spanish. Thankfully, half of them will be my own kids in the beginning. :) haha... see?... the blessings of having 4 kids!!!! :)
September 19, 2014:
1) Thanks for praying for the kids as they began school! All went well. We've been in school for about 3 weeks now! The new issue that we have stumbled upon is that new laws went into effect in July of 2014... just before school started. Our kids are now doing the majority of their classes in Valenciano (the local language spoken here.) We have run into the most trouble (as of right now) with Weston because he is in 6th grade, which is the last grade of their elementary school. After 6th, they move on to their high school, which is finished with 10th grade. From what the teachers are telling us, it looks like Weston has to be able to pass Valenciano (the language class) in order to go on to their high school here. This is his first year taking the class, and he doesn't even speak the language yet!... but he's jumped into a 6th grade level...8 years behind his peers. We are still working out these details, and if this is actually how the law reads. There seems to be a lot of confusion, but it's been hard for Weston because he doesn't understand all of his Spanish academic language yet (it takes 7 years to learn the academic language) let alone Valenciano! His teachers are also concerned that he will begin to lose ground in his current classes because he doesn't yet understand Valenciano. The thing is, we hardly ever even hear the language being spoken. The kids on the street play in Spanish... the kids at recess in the school play in Spanish... our kids are not picking up the language playing and hearing it, like they easily did with Spanish. So, please pray for wisdom, discernment and direction for us for the situation with Weston. It is the same with Nathan, but we have an extra year to figure out the details. It's pretty crucial for Weston right now. His teacher says it's pretty much impossible for him to pass Valenciano this year. Of course, all of our Spaniard friends say that there HAS to be an exception of some kind for kids like Weston, but we we don't know of any yet.
2) Please continue to pray for local partners in our neighborhood. We really have a heart to start a church here in La Patacona.
3) Right now, Wes and some of the key leaders from our area are at a retreat in Seville. Please pray that they will be receptive and open to these new ideas. Pray for unity, and that this would be the start of a new vision for us to partner together to multiply churches and spread the Gospel!
4) Last month, we asked you to pray for interns. Praise the LORD, it looks like there is a possiblity of getting one! :) As always, we never count on it 100% until their feet have landed on our soil, but we are excited about this! Rafa is a Spanish speaking single guy from Miami who has a heart to serve. Pray that all the details will fall into place for him to come. He has a long process to go through, so it will be a while before he can come, but we are hoping for next spring/summer. Please keep praying for more!! We could use a whole team of interns! :)
5) Please continue to pray for the church plant in Picassent. We are working on the children's program and are looking to start that on the 28th of Sept. I am partnering with Fina, the leader's wife, in teaching the kids weekly. Please pray for me! It will be my first time teaching kids in Spanish. Thankfully, half of them will be my own kids in the beginning. :) haha... see?... the blessings of having 4 kids!!!! :)
August 31, 2014:
1) The kids are getting ready to start school in a couple days, so please pray for them as they settle in!
2) Please pray specifically that we will find a believer who would like to partner with us to start a small group in our neighborhood. During one of our visits to a local evangelical church, we met Victor who is from our neighborhood. He jokingly made the comment, "We should start our own church in La Patacona!" since there were 3 families (ours, his and one other) there from our neighborhood (These 3 families are the only believing families that we know of in our entire neighborhood!) It was said jest, but still... out of the abundance of the heart, speaks the mouth, right? ;) We have recently discovered that Victor's family has opened a new cafe in our neighborhood, so his hands are pretty full at the moment. But of course, my thinking is... it's a perfect location!!! :) Pray for direction in this relationship and wisdom and blessing for Victor as he gets his business off the ground. Pray that the Lord will make our path clear as well as put a burden on Victor's heart if he is the one we are supposed to partner with.
3) As mentioned earlier, we have had a good connection with a local pastor who's church is about 40 minutes away. Their church decided to plant two new churches in two different areas of Valencia where there is no evangelical witness. This was so exciting to us, since this is obviously our heartbeat!!!! Xoan is a dynamic pastor with an incredible passion and vision for sharing the Gospel in Valencia. We have helped at different times with both of the different church plants, but have recently committed to helping with the newest one (open just 3 months) in an area called Picassent, about 30 minutes from our home. There is a believer in Picassent who had a local (that used to be a cafe), and he offered it to the church! So, we all meet in a little room in the front, using all the chairs that used to be in the cafe and we worship together. It's very exciting to see... there are several young singles who lead worship (and do a great job!). After worship and the Word, they lift the screen up from the wall... and serve cafe and refreshments from the bar! It's a great little set-up. There's a park across the street, so the kids can run around and play afterward while we fellowship. It's been such a special thing for us over the last little while. Please pray for this new little church as we share Christ in this community. We will start a children's ministry next week, hoping to reach out to some of the kids in the neighborhood who play in the park on Sunday mornings.
4) Pray for interns! We need help reaching the Universities here. It's so crucial to live life with singles, if you are going to reach them, and at the stage of life that we are in... it's a little difficult to have the time. We are praying for the Lord to send 2 spiritually mature, self-motivated, passionate interns who can help us with this!
Last update: June 2014
As we set out on our journey BACK to Spain, here was our list of prayer requests:
1) Good weather on Thursday so that our flights don't get canceled or delayed(Perfect weather, not a single problem!)
2) That our financing will go through so that we will have a vehicle ready when we arrive to Madrid. (there were special funds given so that we could get a vehicle that would meet Nathan's needs, but we are still in the 'buying' process.) (The van was ready and waiting for us... and it is AMAZING. They found an incredible deal... definitely a provision from the Lord. I think we are overwhelmed by His goodness in this!)
3) Good health for all throughout this whole transition ( So far, so good...Please keep praying for this!)
4) That the kids would SLEEP on this overnight flight. :) (Some slept more than others, but they all did great. Each seat had it's own TV screen with video games and movies to choose from, so they were well entertained! They kept saying, "This is the best plane EVER!" I think Wes and I agreed. ;) )
5) That all of our luggage gets there safely with nothing stolen or damaged. (We have 16 bags, not including our carry-ons!!) :) (We were delayed getting off the plane because we had to wait for a wheel chair for Nathan, and by the time we got to the conveyor belt, our bags were the only ones left. We could not believe that absolutely every single one of our bags arrived safely! I haven't unpacked all of them... we are only living out of 2 for the next couple weeks, but everything looks pretty good from a quick glance!)
6) That we will quickly find the perfect place that the Lord has prepared for us...that it would be clear and quick! (with a garage that will fit our vehicle... it may be a challenge) The Lord has completely provided an amazing home for us... with all the little things we were praying for. When I think about all the details, I'm amazed at His love for us. This was really the ONLY place that met all those little tiny "wants"...like a school being within walking distance, a little multi-tienda nearby so I can walk and get food when Wes is out of town, a garage that fits our van, a pedestrian area for the kids to play in, an end unit so we only have to worry about being loud for neighbors on one side... etc, etc. He has been so gracious to us.
7) That the Lord would prepare a place at the school wherever He would have the kids... for friends, teachers, etc. (This is the most pressing prayer right now. We have found out that there are two spots open in our neighborhood public school... Weston and Carolina have places. But, there are no openings for Nathan or Jonathan. We have to go to the town hall and find out what to do next. They may send the two boys to another school in a neighboring town, or they could just make an exception and allow them to go to this school. Our desire would be to have them all together at the same school, but we know that the Lord has His plan. Please pray for God to open those doors, if that's where He wants the kids!) In the end, we had no choice but to put the kids in the two different schools. Strangely, they found a spot for Nathan in the end, so we had 3 that could go to once school and Jonathan was left on his own. Carolina and Jonathan wanted to stay together, so we ended up putting the younger two in the neighboring town and Weston and Nathan together at the neighborhood school. It was so hard at first, but we knew we had been praying for the right place for the kids. Through practical circumstances, two schools seemed to be our answer. It obviously didn't make sense at first, but we are so grateful now. It never would have been our first choice, but both sets of kids are doing great in their schools. Jonathan especially. In the school he is in, there are only 15 in his class... and this has been so good for him. He was so timid and shy and overwhelmed in Cáceres. He has finally begun to feel confident and secure in this small setting. What a blessing in disguise this was! So thankful that the Lord knows what's best! :)
8) That the Lord would make it clear where Nathan needs to be for school. Our goal right now is a public special needs school that specializes in Cerebral Palsy. We are still praying for the Lord to show us where He wants Nathan to be. As I mentioned above, we ended up putting Nathan in the neighborhood school, because the other "special" schools said he was too advanced to be placed with them. It was nerve-wracking after our last experience, but Nathan has done so well! His teacher is really firm, but very kind and very patient with Nathan. Normally, ever 2 years, the classes get a new teacher, but for some reason, Nathan will have this same teacher for the next 2 years a well! What a blessing, because he already knows his struggles and works with him so well. Thank the Lord we won't have to go through the craziness of dealing with a new teacher! What an added blessing that we never even thought to ask for! :)
9) Pray for our language to come back quickly! :) We haven't really spoken fluently in 7 months! Pray also for the kids to transition back in the language easily. Carolina has lost most of her Spanish. The Lord has definitely been gracious in this area, too. I was worried I would lose everything I'd learned during our 6 month STAS, but I found that I jumped right back into my Spanish when we got back here. I think I was so caught up in learning the grammar and "passing" at a certain level so we could keep our jobs :) that it sometimes hindered me. Now that that "test" is behind us, the goal is simply to communicate, and it feels so much easier! The kids will really put their Spanish to the test when they get back into school. Carolina will have a lot to catch up on, but we are praying it will come back quickly.
10) Pray for an easy and quick hook up for all of our utilities... including internet! :) Well, internet has been hooked up!!! The first time we did this, it took 3 months to get it installed! So... Wes was much more proactive this time, and he also knew the tricks of the trade, so thank the Lord we got internet set up within our first week of being here! Now the big thing is : We still have no gas for hot water or for the stove... or for heat upstairs! Please pray this will get hooked up quickly! This took almost 2 months to get fixed! It was crazy. Even after the gas got turned on, the hot water heater acted up and sometimes we would wake up and be able to take warm showers... and sometimes not! haha... what craziness. From day to day, we never knew. They never could pin point exactly what was wrong, but we haven't had an issue in two months... so we are grateful!
11) The quick arrival of our things from storage. (Once we find a place, they say it could be a couple days to a week before our stuff arrives.) Update: This took a little longer than we expected, but we are thankful to have all of our stuff... and most of it arrived un harmed! :)
12) The preparation of the hearts of those people around us... that God would provide good friends and good neighbors who have open hearts to Him, and that we would be bold to share right from the start. Wow... I have to blog about this one, but He has been so faithful to provide friends right from the start. Now, it hasn't been that long, but He has provided a great couple who has helped us along the way!
13) Pray for us as we begin to set the vision for our new team/ministry ... not only in Valencia, but for the entire Coastal Region. (Wes has been asked to be team leader for the area covering from the boarder of France all the way down through the providence of Valencia... almost half the coast. This will include Barcelona AND Valencia.)
14) Pray for wisdom, discernment, and direction as we begin to partner with nationals... pray for blessing, unity and fruit. :) Update: We are still building relationships, but the Lord has opened some great doors with one of the National pastors. He wants to host an American football camp as an outreach sometime in the spring and has asked us if we could bring a team over from the States to help. He also has a summer camp that they run, and he has asked Wes to teach a small segment on the basics of American football. :) Those things are always exciting! Wes has also agreed to help train the youth leaders that this pastor has at his church. Please pray for a continued good relationship that will open doors in the future.
15) This all feels like a God-sized task, so pray that we will keep our eyes on Him as we walk through it all... that we wouldn't lose sight of how powerful and GREAT our God is!
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