Looking Back

It’s hard to believe how quickly this year has flown. So much has happened, and we have so much to be thankful for.

We got our visas!

We now have visas good for the entire year of 2009. We didn’t quite make 80% of our financial support goal in October, but the mission felt that we were close enough to apply for our visas before the visa laws change. We can legally move any time after January 3!

Support Progress

Looking back over the last year, it’s amazing to see how far God has brought us. Last December we had just 45% of the funds we need to live in England, and almost none of the funds we need to actually make the move. This year we have 78% of the monthly support we need to live in England and roughly 70% of the funds we’ll need to make the move. God has certainly brought us a long way in the last twelve months, despite all that’s happened economically this year.

Bible credits

HCJB Global requires every missionary to have the equivalent of at least 16 college Bible credits. One of the things that Kristen has been working on this year is meeting this requirement. She’s been taking Bible studies at church for the last three years to make up her missing credits. Despite having to juggle being a mommy and a wife at the same time, Kristen completed the last of her Bible credits in November. Since Josh finished his at college, we’re done!

The Road Ahead

Legally, we could move to Bradford and begin serving there on January 3. Policy-wise, we’ve completed all of the pre-requisites for missionary service. The only thing remaining is finances. Before we can purchase our plane tickets and set a departure date, we need to have pledges of at least 93% of our support goal. And we still need about 25 more financial supporters to get to 100%.

• 5 monthly pledges of $100 (or yearly pledges of $1,200)
• 6 monthly pledges of $75 (or $900/year)
• 7 monthly pledges of $50 (or $600/year)
• 7 monthly pledges of $30 (or $360/year)

In addition, we need between $3,000 and $5,000 in special gifts to help pay for shipping our things, plane tickets, and other moving expenses. Can you help us get to England? Could you help with our monthly support or maybe our moving costs? Do you know someone (or some church) who might? If so, please let us know!

Josh & Kristen

On the Home Front

On the right is a fairly standard British electrical outlet. It’s better than twice the size of the American equivalent, and it also provides 220 Volts at 50Hz. Translation: Almost nothing we own that requires electricity is going to England. Take a look around your house. You’ll be amazed (we were) at how many things you own run on electricity.

Life at home has been busy, busy, busy. There has been lots and lots of sorting, packing, and planning. We’ve given, sold, packed, or thrown out a bunch of stuff already. In fact, we had some friends over the other night, and it turned into a moving sale! We now have a growing list of “sold” things, just waiting to be delivered before we leave the country.

Cassia

Cassia is growing like a weed… a tall, skinny weed (no surprise there). She’ll be 2 years old in January and boy is she active! Her vocabulary seems to grow hourly some days, as she attempts to imitate almost everything we say (nothing like a little parrot to help you think before you speak!).

Snow

Since we’ve already had over six inches of snow at our house, she has also discovered the wonder of “no-ss ow-sigh” (snow outside). She LOVES it. Coming back inside is always a traumatic experience. We’ve discovered that “hot” chocolate can assuage some of the pain of coming inside, but that her “spill-safe” cup leaks chocolate all over the house. So… how about some crackers (and a nice safe highchair) with that chocolate?

"At the Office"

Despite our focus on support raising this year, I’ve still been involved in the day-to-day ministries of HCJB Global. This year I’ve spent a lot of time focused on keeping HCJB Global secure. Hours and hours have been spent doing research in order to help HCJB Global deal with the security requirements that come along with accepting credit card donations. February found me migrating to the mission’s website after an anonymous hacker broke in to the old server. WWW.HCJBGlobal.org, as well as nearly a dozen other websites in various languages, are now on a new and much more secure server. In addition, I’ve been serving on the worldwide Information Technology team, and training other missionaries to use various security tools. It’s been a very busy year.

Josh