Finding the Balance

Last week was our Assemblies of God national pastors' meetings (Asamblea General) in Costa Rica. What a great time connecting with friends and making new ones. This country is in great hands with excellent pastors and leaders.

Beyond the meetings themselves, the 2 days I spent there really offered a good glimpse into the balance between finishing well here and preparing for our upcoming transition and itineration.

Double Duty Scheduling

As we told pastor friends our plans to leave in August, a number of them wanted to be sure to schedule us to come and preach at their churches before leaving. We also scheduled a couple of kids' ministry classes to teach and a potential final trip into the jungle to minister to the indigenous.

We had submitted our newsletter on one of the first day I was at the meetings. In the newsletters we let pastors know that we're beginning to schedule services from when we're home in August until the end of the year. So I was on my phone responding to requests for itineration services.

We were (are) building 2 different schedules. One for the remainder of our time here and the other for our return to the States. This really offers a good picture of where we are right now. We are committed to the people of Costa Rica and our responsibilities here until the end. We want to finish strong and finish well. And then there's the need to set up our schedule for when we arrive in the States to prepare for Bolivia. It's a balance.

Itineration

We are going to keep going strong here. We love the people and we love what we are able to do. And we look forward to still learning as much as we can these final months here. But I want to take this opportunity to focus more on when we'll be home for itineration.

As I mentioned we are looking to fill up our schedule from when we're home in August until the end of 2016. We can't really schedule further in advance because we still await official approval as appointed missionaries, which would be in October. We believe God is in this and that everything will work with this, but we still leave it in His hands and ask you to pray that His will be done as we go to our interview. If we are approved, we will immediately begin filling our 2017 schedule as well.

There are 3 encounters we would like to schedule:

1. Churches - We would love opportunities to come and share our hearts at churches in Sunday or Wednesday services, children's services, youth services, small groups, men's groups, women's groups, etc. This is true both for already supporting churches and potential supporting churches.
2. Pastors - We would love to connect with pastors and/or missions leadership of churches over coffee. While we love connecting with the whole church body, we understand that sometimes this works better for some pastors for various reasons.
3. Individuals - We have a decent amount of monthly support and one-time donations which has come from family, friends and complete strangers. We would love to connect and share our hearts on a personal level with those who partner with us financially or who would like to consider financial partnership.

We are also asking for prayer and really want to work on building our prayer team more intentionally and strategically so stay tuned for more about how we'll be implementing this aspect of partnership.

Please pray that the details will still come together regarding where we'll be staying, how we'll be traveling, Genevieve's schooling and other technically details.

We're doubly excited I guess. Excited for what's already here (ministry in Costa Rica) and what's to come (the transition to ministry in Bolivia).