Saturday, July 31, 2010

August 2010 Prayer Letter

Dear Friends and Family,

It has now been about one and a half months since we completed candidate school, and we are excited that the Lord would use us to do His work. Right now, we are still laying the groundwork for our deputation ministry. We understand that by establishing a strong prayer support base, God will answer those prayers by blessing our ministry. We were encouraged to see how many people are supporting our ministry with prayer. We plan to keep our supporters up to date on our ministry.

This month has been full of blessings. This is now our second prayer letter which we are also sending out by snail mail for the first time. We also completed our prayer cards and they will be printed soon. Next, we are working on our presentation/video, display table, and information packet we can send to churches that are interested in our ministry. Michelle and I both received promotions at work, which is a blessing because it will help us to transition into full time deputation sooner.

While our hearts go out to those who need the Gospel in Nicaragua, we are still involved in reaching those who are here. We intend to minister to those around us- no matter where we are. Currently, we are involved in children's ministry at our church, and it's always a blessing to see children learn to love the Lord. We know that the Lord is preparing us now for the ministry we will have in Nicaragua. Please pray that we will complete our materials in a timely manner and that the Lord will keep his hand on our ministry.

In Christ,

Jeremy and Michelle Blanz

Thursday, July 1, 2010

Dreams and Goals

Dear Friends and Family,
As I sit down to write this it just thrills me that Jeremy and I are finally here. Our first prayer letter. I can hardly believe it. We have been looking forward to this since before we were married. As of tomorrow we will have been official BIMI missionaries for three weeks. There really is a lot to do! Jeremy has been working on designing our prayer card almost non-stop since we were approved. We started by gathering as many cards and we could find and then used some our favorite elements from them to create our own design. We hope the end result will be professional but also appealing. I am so proud of Jeremy as he has learned how to do all of this from scratch. He downloaded a free design program and then watched online videos that taught him how to use it. Every day he shows me something new and the card just looks better and better. Next up will be our presentation video, letter head, information packet and display board. We have some ideas for our video, but we may end up putting that into the hands of someone else. Pray that we can find the someone who can give it just the right touch.
When we went on our survey trip in March, we bought a lot of things for a potential display table even though we weren't sure we were headed there yet. We thought that if we didn't end up using them, we would at lease have some neat souvenirs! To complete our table we will need a table, table cloth and a display board that communicates what we are hoping to do. So as you can see we have our work cut out for us!
More important than all of the bells and whistles of our deputation presentation however, is the fact that we are headed for a needy country, and we are just so excited and ready to go! I have been searching the internet for pictures that we could possibly use. Oh, the children! The landscapes are pretty. The shots of the ocean are beautiful. It's the pictures of the children however, that keep gripping my heart over and over. So many precious faces that have never heard the truth about the gospel of Jesus Christ. We truly cannot wait to get there and get started. Pray for us that we will finish our materials quickly and professionally and also that God will keep stirring our hearts for the people of Nicaragua!
In Christ,
Michelle Blanz