Cousins

Cousin Chloe and Chelsea came over to our house and spent the night one evening. They dressed up in their Mongolian outfits and took pictures. The next day play, they went to the Wizard of Oz display at Crown Center.

Last month's newsletter

For those of you who typically get my newsletter via the post office, apparently many of you did not get last month's letter at all. Others of you received a couple mangled pieces of paper and crushed chopsticks. Still others successfully received a letter and a nice set of Chinese chopsticks. I sincerely apologize, if you were one of those who did not get an intact letter (or your chopsticks). I wish I knew how to make it up to you. Though there are no chopsticks left, you can see our newsletter articles here, or I would be glad to send you a fresh one. Please email me if you would like either an electronic copy or a paper copy sent to you.
Jonathan.

Getting Ready for Company

Finally a break!

Oh wait.... maybe not.

After the busyness of Christmas, our first priority was getting into our home. It had been 6 months since we were in a place of our own, and never in our marriage had we lived someplace with only one family in the house.

Some of you know I lived in a house close to Youthfront with three other men when I was single. For the last couple years it has been rented. When our renter moved out at the end of December, we jumped at the chance to live as a family, while I fix up the house and prepare it to go onto the market. (We will not be staying in the house long term. It’s just a little more than we need or can handle financially.)

Though we are so excited to be living alone for a while, it has been a lot of work and extremely overwhelming since we moved in. In addition to cleaning the house, unpacking, and getting ready for company (the open house and a YMI reunion), we’ve been trying to do multiple time-consuming repairs and upgrades.

A couple weeks ago, something amazing happened. A few days before our open house, Amanda’s father volunteered to bring down a 5 man crew of his workers from Ames to help (he is a builder in the Ames/Des Moines area). In approximately 26 hours, we accomplished what would have taken us weeks of after-hours work.

I don’t know where we would be without people like that. It is such a blessing to have people who support us by praying for us, giving financially, or by using a particular gift or talent to bless us.

Thank you

Daddy's little helper

Abigail was such a helper as we were trying to move into our house. She wanted to be right there in the middle of everything.

A YMI Update

We were so pleased with this past semester at Youthfront Mission Institute. This year my responsibilities are widening as we seek for the program to grow and expand. Here is a sampling of my plans and goals for the next few months.

Staff Recruitment. One of the most important pieces necessary for YMI to remain sustainable is the acquiring of a few staff who are dedicated to the program. We are not looking primarily for administrative staff (though that would be wonderful!). We are hoping for some men and women who are willing to live at Youthfront South, help disciple the students, and lead the trips. These staff will either come out of the current Youthfront ranks or from local colleges.

Student Recruitment. Looking forward to the next YMI session to begin in August 09, we’ll be recruiting at local churches and colleges. If you think about students for whom this program would be good, please shoot me an email.

Seeking more credit. Currently, YMI students can receive 3 hours of undergraduate credit for our program. One of my larger goals is to find ways for students to gain closer to 15 hours of credit for their work.

There are multiple steps to seeing this goal come to fruition. I will be creating more formal pieces of information and syllabi to give to administrators. I plan to meet with them at Southwest Baptist, Mid-America Nazarene, and other smaller Christian Colleges. After getting credit here, we will be more able to get it elsewhere.

Finally. In general, the tasks are many and daunting. Sometimes they fill me with excitement, while other times with fear. Pray that I will faithfully live in the grace given to me for today and trust the results to him.

February Prayer Guide

Support Raising. Over the last year we lost approximately 20% of our regular giving. It’s not uncommon to have support level decreases, but the economy this past year hit some of our largest donors. Pray for us in this process of finding people who have a passion to see students faithfully follow Christ and change the world.
Family. Continue to pray for good time management. It is hard on a family to be so mobile. Pray that our house will sell quickly for a good price, and that we will find a good house to settle in. Pray we will be good parents to our daughter.

Youthfront Mission Institute. As I mentioned in the article above, we are in need of a couple of staff people We are looking for 2-4 people who would be willing to live on sight at Youthfront South, discipling students, facilitating discussions, and leading the overseas experiences. Also, continue to pray for us as we recruit potential students and seek ways for them to receive more credit for their work.

Reorientation. A week ago we had a wonderful get together with all our former students. It was so encouraging to interact with them about how they were re-engaging in the world around them. Continue to pray that they will be active in ministry around them, and that they would be diligent in all their studies. Pray they would be very satisfied in Jesus and that they would continue in the disciplines they have committed themselves to.

Come to our Open House!!

We've missed you! Plus, we know you may have questions about YMI, our family, and our future plans. We are currently living at 2920 W. 48th Terrace in Westwood, KS. Feel free to stop by during either of the times below:

February 7th 7 p.m. - 9 p.m.

February 9th 2 p.m. - 5 p.m.

Hope to see you there!