November- December, 202
Dear Fellow Laborer in Christ,
We pray that this letter finds you in good health and blessed by God in this new year. As I sit down to reflect on the past two months, we can see God's hand moving in several areas of our lives. There have been trials and blessings that God has worked through in these few months. We have finished the year with seventy-three percent of our needed support. We have been in ninety churches in the past fifteen months. The Lord has been faithful and good to us through this time of deputation.
In November, we were able to be in the following states: California, Indiana, Virginia, and back in Ohio. We had the privilege of working with our sending church to prepare for our Christmas outreach in our local area. I was able to help prepare for this event by doing several behind-the-scenes jobs. This event is called the Bethlehem Experience; we do it the first two weekends of December. This experience is a forty-five-minute walk through submerged into the life of Christ. This event entails the story of Jesus from the prophets to the resurrection dramatized with a fifteen-minute presentation of the Gospel. This event is the biggest project in our church’s year.
Coming into December, we still had a few meetings close to home as we continued to get ready for the outreach. Unfortunately, Naya and Alya started getting sick on December third. We thought that this was just an upset stomach or a bug. So, we treated this sickness with over-the-counter remedies. The remedies did nothing for this sickness, and it seemed only to worsen. We took the girls to urgent care after two days because the girls were not sleeping or eating. The doctors ran a few tests, and it turned out to be positive for strep. We were told that the strep had gone into their stomach and was having these effects on them. The doctors gave us antibiotics and sent us home. That night, everything had gotten worse. The girls started to have some internal bleeding. We went to the E.R. that night, and after six hours, the doctors checked the girls and said that the bleeding was just from irritation from being sick. We were told that once the antibiotic kicked in, the girls would be able to sleep throughout the night, and they would get back to eating normally. After five days, the girls only got worse, and the girls were not sleeping or eating. We returned to the doctor because we needed to know what was happening with the girls. They hadn't slept for more than an hour a night and hadn't eaten. The doctors asked for specimens to run some more tests to conclude what the girls had. We waited three days and then reached out to the doctor again. We discovered they had lost track of the specimens and would like another sample. Until now, we have spent almost eleven days with the girls not sleeping or eating. They had lost a lot of weight.
By this time, we were frustrated and needed answers. The specimens were gathered again and turned into the lab. My wife and I were searching for God’s face through this because our daughters were the ones affected by this. The results came back, and the girls tested positive for the Shigella bacteria. This bacteria is very uncommon and needs particular antibiotics to combat it. Praise the Lord that the antibiotic worked, and the girls were getting better a day later. This trial tested our faith and our need to rely on God through this challenging time. Praise the Lord, they are back to normal now!
While this was happening, we were still working the outreach at our church on the weekends and attending meetings while the girls stayed back with my mother-in-law. The Bethlehem Experience brought in more than twenty-eight hundred people from our community and the surroundings. There were more than a hundred people saved in these two weekends. I was able to preach the gospel a few times to some of the groups in the Bethlehem Experience. We praise the Lord for this opportunity to be a witness!
At the end of December, we were able to go down to Mexico to spend Christmas and New Years with my wife's side of the family. While we were there, we were able to start looking for a place to rent or buy for when we get ready to move. We saw several options and realistic numbers of what we would pay for rent or to purchase a house. Since Monterrey is the heart of Mexico's industry, businesspeople are purchasing housing for tax deductions on their business, which drives the market price to unbelievable rates. The Lord has connected us with several good people who have started to help us find something in a secure, safe, cost-effective place to live in. We ask that you help us pray as the Lord guides us through the doors He wants us to enter. We know He has a place for us to either rent or own. We place this in His hands!
We were able to take our annual Christmas picture, and we would like to share it with you. We are thankful for your continuous prayers and financial support. We are privileged to have partners like you in the ministry of the Lord! Please stay faithful to Him until He comes back!
