This week has been one of those famous transition weeks for my team. Last Sunday, our church launched a “celebration service” which gives our core group of believers an opportunity to gather in our rented facility for worship. Our home gatherings during the week will continue but in a less “churchy” and more hospitable fashion. Also this week, my teammate Marcus Van Dorn came back to the States to begin his home service. So, if you count the same way I do, that means, we have 50% of our team on the field at the moment. That leaves the Casey and Rotert families to shoulder the work load while Marcus and I are back fundraising. We need your prayers!!!

This last week, I sent out 27 appeals to churches in Iowa seeking their consideration for a financial partnership. I don’t know how, or when, each church will respond, but will you be praying that if they are able to partner with me that God will move them into action? I have been reading a great book by Marva Dawn entitled, Keeping the Sabbath Wholly: Ceasing, Resting, Embracing, Feasting. In it, she encourages us “…about letting our future lie in God’s hands. When we cease striving to be God, we learn a whole new kind of contentment, the delight of the presence of God in our present circumstances. When we give up our silly rebellion against God’s purposes, we discover that he provides the security for which we were searching.”

“The progression from ceasing to resting underscores the basic movement from idolatry to faith. First we discover all the deception and falsehood of the securities offered by the world, and, with repentance, we cease to trust them. This includes especially all of our efforts to make our own way or to save ourselves. Then we learn that God has done all the work of redemption for us and that he continues to work through us. We learn, by faith, to rest in his grace.”

I hope that today is the day that you move along those lines of trust—from ceasing to resting. Our Father is still teaching me these things, and sometimes I marvel at his patience!