Powering Up then Heading Out

We're going into an exciting and crazy busy week as July flies into August. Sunday night kicked off an annual week-long event that we get to be involved in this year. Power Up Clubs, led by teens in our church, meet in front yards of host homes all over the city. There are 78 clubs that meet either in the morning or 1 of 2 evening slots each day. So each team of young people puts on 3 clubs a day. They "camp out" at the church and have a full schedule of preparing and leading the clubs, then ending the day with a late evening worship time together.

As our part, we are helping host the club that meets at the church -- serving 2 large neighboring apartment complexes. Then Jim is in the band for evening worship sessions. The evening clubs started Sunday night and it was a wet start. The clubs that meet at 5:00 (including  ours) were timed perfectly to get drenched by about a 45-minute deluge! Water day was planned for mid-week, but God has his own event schedule. On Friday evening there will be a big Power Surge final event to further connect with families from the week. Please pray with us that this week many children and their parents will be introduced to the Savior! 

This week is also the first introduction of Patty (see more about Patty in the previous post), our newest Proclaim member, to the office. We are looking forward to distributing office responsibilities to best use all our gifts and strengths. I am in the office as much as possible this week to work with Patty and to finish up some projects since we will be leaving Saturday to head north. On that trip we will spend time with family and stop to visit friends and supporters along the way.

Jami will not travel with us this time as she is in training at her new job at Chick-Fil-A. She is enjoying it, doing well, and learning a lot. This job is a provision from God -- thanks to all who prayed for her through the long search!




(Trying to wake up for an early morning shift)

It's All Coming Together

Thanks for the prayers for our office transition after the seeming disaster with the lightening strike. It has all been pretty challenging, but not nearly as overwhelming as we had anticipated. All the upgrades have been made and new equipment in place, and I am quickly getting past the point where multiple times a day I have to Google what I'm trying to do in Office 2010. 

It was a big victory this past week when we made the decision to finalized the purchase of donor software we had been testing for about 3 weeks. This is a move we have needed to make for at least 6 years! Thanks to God's timing all this has been happening while the Smalleys are back in Jacksonville. Todd amazes us with his ability to make sense out of all this and make everything work like it's supposed to, making all these transitions more painless than we could have hoped. And even when there were frustrating times, I think all of us felt a peace and confidence that God was in control. I have no doubt that prayer carried us through.

So we are back in business just in time to welcome a new office staff member -- an extraordinary blessing and answer to prayer!  Patty and her husband John have been long time supporters and friends of Proclaim in our church in Jacksonville. Most importantly, Patty and John both have a heart for missions and a love for Proclaim. But on top of that Patty has had 12 years experience in administration with another mission organization that uniquely qualify her to meet a growing need within Proclaim as we have recently added several new or reappointed members. This is a lavish provision of God, beyond my most faith-filled prayers! Can you tell I'm excited?

Once again -- God has shown how pointless it is to fear and worry ahead of time about his provision and his enabling. I think he might have mentioned that a couple times . . . 

Kathie

Blessing in Disguise

We are still dealing with the results of one lightening strike! It wasn't even in one of the hurricanes -- just a normal Florida storm. A direct hit to the business where the Proclaim office is took out everything in the building that was connected to the internet or a phone line. That meant several days of scoping out the extent of the damage and then making replacement decisions. The bright side is that it prompted a lot of long overdue upgrades in both hardware and software. The biggest blessing and challenge is a complete change in our donation software. A huge undertaking to select the best program and transfer all the data, but a huge blessing to have a system that will better accommodate the growth that Proclaim is experiencing. We are still in the middle of this transition. 

Proclaim has just finished a tour in Croatia and Bosnia where our newest band Soul Tattoo was well received. See more about the band:  http://www.proclaiminternational.com/bok-hrvatska/

One member of the team is a young lady who was a guest at the Gala in April and was really excited about getting involved in Proclaim's ministry. Destiny immediately put in her application and in less than 2 months was on her first Proclaim tour! She loved Croatia and the tour experience, and even changed her return plans at the end of the tour so she could stay an extra week to help with an English language camp there. We're blessed to see such a quick response on one of our major goals for the Gala events!


Tour photos by Maasej & Haidy

Keeping Tuned In and Tuned Up

I remember those old TV sets we had when we were kids. It seemed my dad was always fiddling with those knobs in the back to adjust the vertical and horizontal hold for the picture.  When everything was just right I could actually see what was going on with the Lone Ranger! Without it I could only hear the music and the gunshots and had to guess what kind of adventure the Lone Ranger and Tonto were getting into.

Recently, Kathie and I started going to a chiropractor.  No major complaints -- we just knew some things were “out of whack." We learned that the body is an amazing creation and that when everything lines up vertically (spine and head) and horizontally (shoulders and hips) it can heal itself of many of the aches and pains of daily life. So, the doctor is helping to train our bodies to line up the horizontal and vertical hold.

God designed us to also have the proper spiritual relationship of the vertical and the horizontal in our lives.  When Jesus was asked what the greatest commandment is, he answered:

Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind; and, love your neighbor as yourself. (Luke 10:27)

In this compact answer is a deep well of wisdom concerning our relationship with God, ourselves and others.

For the next two weeks I am in Pennsylvania receiving training in how to help us in our Proclaim Community keep our relational horizontal and vertical holds in good adjustment. Pray with me that I would be open to anything the Lord cares to show me in this process.


Jim

Ministry Starts Here

We are all about evangelism in Proclaim. We put incredible amounts of time and effort into planning and leading overseas tours completely focused on that goal with all our energy and passion. Our Los Vecinos team has just finished such a tour in Belarus where every event and activity has been planned to maximize opportunities for the gospel.

But what about times when we are not involved in an organized tour. One of the concerns that we have felt is the importance of keeping this priority in focus all the time, in our individual encounters with people and in planned events. During the past year Kim Peterson has headed up regular excursions where Proclaim musicians and even others from our local Christian community can take it to the streets nearby -- playing music and engaging people in conversation. Lately St. Augustine has been the target area. Pray that we will keep finding creative ways to reach people locally.

PROCLAIM! GALA  Another big focus for us right now is planning our April fund raising Gala. This year we are especially praying that God will bring people who have a passion for missions and will catch the vision for partnering with Proclaim in significant ways. We need to have a strong Jacksonville ministry base to provide resources for all that God is doing through Proclaim internationally. We are praying for people who through their partnership will fuel the fire and fan the flame! 

OUR PART  As we're working on addressing the needs in Proclaim, we are not forgetting our own support shortage. In fact, getting our personal support more stable through monthly donors or special gifts would have a positive effect on Proclaim overall. You can help with donations for our ministry through the DONATE link on the right sidebar. Contact us if you would like to find out more about Proclaim or our part in the ministry.

FAMILY  

Jami just celebrated a big birthday. A milestone for all of us! She is busy finishing up a writing project between her church commitments, part-time care giving, and still looking for full-time work. 

Jim has had a lot of playing opportunities -- men's retreat and Sundays at church, street evangelism, in addition to several private events. He has an interesting opportunity next month coordinating music and playing for a wedding where the bride and groom have definite evangelistic goals for the event. 

Kathie's role of coordination and communication in the Proclaim office is challenging and fun as we are adding new members to Proclaim and gearing up for the coming tours this year. A recent project has been helping develop the new website which is up now. See it at www.proclaiminternational.com

Fall Update

We didn't realize what a full month November is until we started trying to find a few days in a row to make a trip up to Indiana to pick up our car. Yes! we found the perfect deal right in Warsaw. The sale notice was posted on Facebook by a friend for her mom's car, a 2004 with 25,000 miles! Actually it's the same car we have now but 3 years newer with almost 200,000 fewer miles! It checked out mechanically so we sealed the deal. After Thanksgiving weekend we will attempt to squeeze a final 1,000 miles out of old faithful to get us there.

  OLD CAR                                                              NEW CAR

We just hope we can adjust to the drastic change!

Proclaim has been challenged since the summer news that Co-director Bob Johnson had to leave the tour he was leading in Poland and was diagnosed with advanced prostate cancer. This meant a major change for leadership as the other two co-directors divided up most of the responsibilities. The US office is impacted as John Bowers took over leadership of the newly forming team in Germany and Bob McIntyre assumed responsibility for the US office. John and Diana are in Germany now, the first of some extended times they will spend based there through at least the next year. A lot of very positive things are happening there with our team and their ministries and local churches. 

Bob McIntrye is making trips to Jacksonville and connecting in other ways to keep things on track at the home base. In fact, he and Vicki will be here this week with a full agenda checking in with our local Proclaim people and advising on ministry here. Bob Johnson has now made remarkable progress with his  treatments and is optimistic about a full recovery. Thanks to all who have been aware of that situation and praying for Bob and Alyce and our mission.

It seemed that our December tour in Tunisia would be a go when we got word that a big hurdle had been cleared for getting our sound and video equipment into the country. Then within a few days we learned of changes in the economy there and outrageous airfares that would at least double the projected budget for the tour. So it was decided to postpone to a later date to adjust the planning. We had both been scheduled to go on that tour.

That does take some pressure off for the end of the year here. We would have returned mid December with all the year-end letters to be processed and mailed! So we can do that on a bit more realistic schedule. Other regular ministries continue -- Jim meeting with men - individuals and groups - and involved in the music ministry at church. We both have committed to help with a newly forming Mission Development Team at our church, taking young people who are interested in missions through an extended mentoring process to provide some deeper preparation in the process of getting to the mission application stage. And we have recently joined a family group that is just getting started. Jami is a teacher for the 1st grade girls in the mid-week Pioneer Club and working part time as a helper for a couple of elderly folks.

We are thankful for really good times we have been having together as a team in our Tuesday morning Bible study and prayer. We have been challenged with deep teaching as we spent time thinking through the disciplines of the Christian life and lately exploring what it means to be a community. It helps us keep things in perspective. 

Pray for us as a family and Proclaim in general as we continue to face decreased funds with which to operate and carry on the ministry. By reducing our salary and cutting costs, our ministry fund had stayed in the black for several months, until the past couple months when we have gone in deficit. Please pray for wisdom to manage well our personal finances and the courage to continue to invite new people to join our team of senders.  A note of praise is that Dave Wilbert, a former board member who has recently returned to the area, is helping us and other individuals, as well as Proclaim, in our efforts to raise the needed additional funds.  We are thankful for this encouragement!

Summer Stretch

We were not on a tour this summer, but it almost seems like we were there through involvement in recruiting, communication, logistics support, and lots of prayer for the two summer tours. We had a pretty exciting last minute challenge getting a sound tech for the Poland tour when the scheduled tech was not able to come. In a little over a week our replacement was able to raise his support and get a passport! See the Proclaim! site for some news on Adonai's tour in  Croatia/Bosnia  and the tour with Writing on the Wall in  Poland.

INDIANA

We did some actual traveling the first two weeks in July to Indiana. We had a great time with family, especially the main event -- a family reunion in Michigan.  Hard to have it without Kathie's Mom -- but time with her sisters and many of our cousins and their kids was really precious. We hadn't seen some of the cousins in MANY years.

My mom's sisters -- she was the oldest of the 6 sisters and 2 brothers

We had over half of the cousins (my generation) there plus spouses and kids/grandkids

Once again we experienced God's intervention in the timing and planning of the whole trip. We came away feeling like we'd had more quality time with family, friends and supporters than we could possibly have planned. We can never get enough of those adorable grand nieces and nephews -- it's such a gift that they (and their amazing parents) are all in the same town or nearby. (Facebook members: see pics)  Going home increasingly overwhelms us with appreciation for God's tremendous blessings of our wonderful family and friends who are part of our heritage and who we are.

We were happy to get in on a gathering put on by our Europartners prayer support group that has prayed faithfully for us and our dear friends, the Hoberts in France, for 30 years. We actually were able to be back in town at the same time with them and catch up on each others' ministries as we shared with the whole group. We are anticipating possibilities for Proclaim members to provide support for some of the ministries in France that they are involved in.

Now back in Jacksonville summer tours are over and we will be moving into plans for the fall and 2012. Overseas we have 2 families -- one first term and one returning for their second term -- getting settled and forming a team in Germany. Please pray for a good transition for the Libertis and the Davises, and for a strong team to be established there.