Merry Christmas!!

Here are some of the highlights of our year.

Cassia

We started the year off with a bang as God expanded our family to three. And what a bang it has been! Cassia has brought much joy and many changes to our household. This year has seen her develop from an “adorable lump” to a darling, curious, and above all active little girl. She is now knocking firmly on the door of toddler-hood as she grows ever closer to taking her first unassisted steps.

England

When we started the year, we had only the faintest inkling that God might be moving us overseas. This year we’ve visited the UK office, prayed over the decision, and felt God calling us to serve at least one term in England. Talk about changes! So now we’re in the process of raising the support that we’ll need in order to move and begin serving 1/7th of the way around the globe.

In our last letter, we asked you to pray for wisdom as we worked with the mission to figure out how much support we would need to raise to serve in England. Well, for those of you who don’t have email (or at least we don’t have your email address), we wanted to let you know that the numbers are in, and they’re big.

Serving in England will be much more expensive than serving in Elkhart has been. Furthermore, I will not have the option of consulting part-time as I have been. But God has already begun providing, and we currently have 45% of the support we need to raise before we can move.

Looking back at work

One of Josh’s projects this year has been researching, testing, and evaluating tools that would help protect our missionaries. Many of our missionaries travel in places where people are antagonistic to the gospel. Often, these missionaries need to carry a computer with them in order to minister effectively. Unfortunately, laptops are easy to steal, and they often contain information that could put both missionaries and national believers at risk. (just being associated with Jesus Christ is dangerous in some places.)

So, he finally found a tool that would do the job well at a price the mission could afford. Unfortunately, the price went up 75% during the time he was testing. But we serve a great God, and he intervened on our behalf. After some negotiation, the company was willing to honor the original price. This saved the mission over $4000!

Praise the Lord!

Looking Forward

2008 looks to be an extremely exciting year. In addition to raising the rest of our financial support, we’ll be sorting everything we own into four piles; ship, store, give away, and throw away. We’ll also be selling our car, and looking for renters for our house. Then will come the B I G M O V E and setting up our new lives and new ministry in the “Old World”.

But none of that can happen without the help of people like you. Last time, we asked you to begin praying about whether God wants you to financially support our ministry. This month, we know that we need to raise twice as much support as we currently have before we can leave.

Will you join us in this ministry?

So, where exactly are you going?

In May, we plan to move to the city of Bradford, in northern England. Bradford is an industrial city on the edge of the Pennines, a string of low mountains that run north and south through northern England and southern Scotland. This city was founded on the textile trade, specifically wool, and the signs are everywhere. Huge chimneys dot the skyline, and some of the apartments we looked at were in old mills that have been converted into housing.

The city has a population of about 300,000 which makes it roughly the size of Buffalo, NY, Newark, NJ, or Riverside, CA, and nearly 20% of the population are of Indian, Pakistani, or Bangladeshi descent. In addition to being our home base as we minister throughout the region, Bradford is a mission field all it’s own. We look forward to plugging in to a local church and being a part of what God is doing in this busy city.

Who are you working with?

The HCJB-UK office in Bradford

Bradford is also home to the HCJB-UK office. For over forty years, HCJB-UK has been supporting the work of HCJB Global through both sending and supporting missionaries. In the 1990’s, they began a radio outreach focused on challenging mainstream British culture to consider spiritual things. Since running a radio station in England is cost-prohibitive, HCJB-UK produces radio pieces that are then aired on commercial radio stations. This also allows them to reach an audience that would never tune in to a “Christian” radio station.

What will you be doing?

Josh will be providing technical and computer support to HCJB Global ministries throughout much of the Euro-African hemisphere. This includes the offices in England, Scotland, Spain, and Ghana, as well as ministry partners throughout Europe, western Asia, Africa, and the Middle East. Recently, one of these ministries was off the air for nearly two weeks because there was no one they could trust available to help them with their computers.

In addition, he will continue to serve the mission as the Director of Information Security. In this role, he researches tools and techniques that will protect the mission and individual missionaries from hackers, viruses, and data theft.

Kristen will be serving as Domestic Engineer, Personal Discipleship Director (to Cassia), and Better Half (to Joshua). She also looks forward to helping out with personnel issues at the HCJB-UK office.

How do I get involved?

You can be involved in our ministry in a variety of ways. We always need your prayers and your friendship, but right now we especially need people willing financially support our ministry as we prepare to move to England in May.

The story is told that at a meeting of a London missionary society, the question was asked, "Who will go?". To this William Carey responded, "I will go, but you, my brethren, must hold the ropes!" God has called the church to reach the lost as a team.

Would you be one of the people to "hold the rope" for us?

If the Lord is moving you to join our ministry financially, you can give in a variety of ways. To give a monthly, quarterly, annual, or special gift, you can donate online, give by phone at 800-336-2971, or you can send checks payable to HCJB Global at the address below, referencing our account number, 110504.

Gifts are tax deductible.

Everything's New!

New Chapter of Ministry ... In England!

It's hard to believe, but after seven years of service here in Elkhart, God is beginning a new chapter in our ministry, and this chapter will take us to the far side of the Atlantic!

There is currently a great need for technical support for missionaries in Euro-Asia, North Africa/Middle East, and Sub-Saharan Africa. The mission currently has one person (in England) attempting to support all of these offices. These offices are too far away in both time and distance to effectively serve them from the United States.

In order to meet this need, the mission has asked that we move to Bradford, England (see the map) to assist the office there and to travel to the other offices as needed.

After visiting the team in England, and after much prayer and godly counsel, we have decided to accept this position, trusting God to lead us into this new chapter of our lives and our ministry!

We have been called to use our talents so that people around the world can hear the good news of salvation in Jesus Christ. For seven years, that has meant serving here in Elkhart. Now we're excited have the opportunity to follow that calling to England. As my father often says, "It'll be an adventure!"

Next Steps

We'll be bringing you more details about this exciting move in the coming months. Our goal is to move to England in May 2008. This means a thousand decisions large and small as we prepare to move to the other side of the Atlantic. It also means we need to raise a lot of new financial support for our ministry (see "New Goals" for details).

We would really appreciate your prayers as we prepare for this new adventure. We only have a little over 9 months in which to raise our support, make our plans, sell our belongings, and move. It's kind of like the 9 month count-down we had last year, though moving is at least less permanent than having a baby!

New Goals

After years of serving part-time and working part-time, we are excited to begin full-time service. However, before we can leave for the field, we need to raise 100% of our support. This would be a challenge all on it's own, but it's compounded by the expense of living in England.

Currently, we are helping the mission calculate just how much support we would actually need to live over there. As soon as we know, we'll be letting you know. No matter what the number is, it will be much more than we are currently receiving.

With that in mind, we'd like to ask you to prayerfully consider whether God would have you to begin financially supporting our ministry. Every gift makes a difference, and we would like to be your hands and feet helping to take the Gospel to world.

New Baby!

For those of you that only get snail mail letters, we apologize that this is the first that you've seen of our beautiful baby girl. Cassia Grace Gee was born January 5, 2007 at 12:09 pm. She weighed 8lbs 7oz and was 21" long.

It's hard to believe that seven months have flown by already. Cassia is growing fast, and we are attempting to keep up with all the changes she has brought into our lives.

She already has two teeth and is starting to eat mushy foods. She is also trying quite determinedly to learn to crawl. And after months of sleeping through the night, she's decided to start waking up every 2 hours again, which makes for some very tired parents!

New Name

While we've been getting used to being new parents, the mission has been getting used to a new name. HCJB World Radio is now HCJB Global. Our president, David Johnson explains the reason for the change in this way, "We feel as we move into the future and expand the incredible dynamic between media and healthcare, the HCJB World Radio name did not accurately portray this vision. "

As a result, the mission decided to both change it's name, and to divide it's name into two ministry focuses, HCJB Global Voice is our 75-year-old media ministry, and HCJB Global Hands is our 50-year-old healthcare ministry.

First Post

So, I'm finally blogging. It's been one of those "I'll get around to it someday" things for years. And now, here's my first post. And a picture of my beautiful daughter.