Greetings from Southern California!
After departing San Jose del Cabo a day and a half later than planned and some very long days driving, we crossed the border and arrived here late Saturday evening. Thank you so much for all of your prayers and encouragement as we finished up the difficult task of packing up our entire house for storage or to bring with us and the emotional process of saying goodbyes for the time being. We are extremely grateful for Phil's sister, Karen, who helped us so much in caring for our kids so we could complete packing and clearing out our house. Without her help, we would probably still be there working. Thank you as well for your prayers for safety in our travels. We are grateful to have had a fairly uneventful trip up the Baja.
We would appreciate your continued prayers for our children with the continuing transitions as we travel to many different places. It was esepcially difficult for Josh and Abby to say goodbye to their close friends in Mexico. We are also discovering that while Micah and Luke are not as verbal about their struggles, they are finding other ways to demonstrate the stress they are experiencing. Please pray that we would have wisdom in how best to support and help them through all fo these transitions and that we would maintain healthy, God honoring balances during our home assignment.
We are looking forward to seeing many of you while we travel. After visiting a supporting church in the LA area this coming Sunday, we will start the trip across the states that will have us ending up at TEAM's headquarters in the Chicago area around July 11th. From there, we will be making trips East, throughout the Midwest and finally through Texas before heading back to California to set up a home base for the remainder of our home assignment. We are so grateful for one of our supporting churches here in Southern California (FCC of El Centro) who gave our van a complete tune up for the next phase of our journey. What a HUGE blessing!
Please keep our youth leadership team and the adults who will be supervising them at Iglesia Emanuel in your prayers. We know that they are very capable of leading the group and are so proud of them though it was hard to say goodbye. Pray that they would continue to grow and flourish in their faith and reach out to their friends with Christ's love. Please also pray for Manuel who Phil has been meeting with weekly for Bible studies. He is so hungry to learn and filled with many questions. Pray that he will connect well with the man the church leadership decides to have continue meeting with him. The picture is of Phil with Manuel.
Thank you again for all of your love, prayers and encouragement. We could never say enough how much you all mean to us and express fully how your partnership has enabled us to serve in Mexico. Gracias!
By His Grace,
Phil and Pattie
