changes...

Hello my friends, family, and faithful supporters,

Thank you for your love, your prayer, and your support. You have been an encouragement to me these last months. Thank you. The main thing that has been on my heart this year is a partner. I’ve been praying for the Lord to bring the right person along, and I know many of you have as well. Thank you for praying with me.

So far, it hasn’t happened yet, and since I need a partner to be able to work & live in a remote tribal area, the leadership here in Mexico, my family, myself, and my churches have prayed, sought the Lord and have considered other options. At this point, we feel it would be best to relocate to a place where there are more opportunities to meet people who would be open to partnership – specifically NTM’s training center, where all the new single missionaries are finishing up training & looking to the Lord as to where they should serve.

It is not yet finalized, the people at the training center are talking out logistics, etc, and they’ll get back to me in the near future. I’ll let you know what they decide!! But, would you please pray for the Lord’s will to be done in this matter. Please pray for me in this new transition, as I leave Mexico behind to go find a partner. And please pray for a partner or partners. I believe the Lord has some great things in store in this next year, and I’m excited to see what this next year will bring.

Praise Update:
This past month, three new Tarahumara believers were added to the Church!! Toribio, Candelario, & Matara! Praise the Lord!! Others are interested in learning about God from the testimony of other believers. After long years of seemingless fruitless ministry, the Lord is working to build His Church!!
Here's Toribio - You can see the joy and peace on his face. The weight of sin is gone!

Candelario & Matara - I love the joy that just bubbles up out of them! You can SEE it!!

May the Lord bless you & keep you,
Rachel

I'm leaving on a jet plane...

God is Good. He blesses us above & beyond what we can imagine!

I am not worthy of His blessing, yet in His kindness and grace, He chooses to bless me anyway. His unconditional love is so humbling.

The Lord provided tickets through a family friend for my sister & I to visit our parents & Josh for his graduation in Papua New Guinea!! We are so excited to be able to visit them, share this memory with them, see where they live, and experience the PNG culture!!

So, here I am with tickets in hand (yes, the old-fashioned paper kind!) ready to go!! Only a few more days. Thank you Lord!

Please pray for Elisabeth & I on the trip.

-Pray that our flights might be okay so we can join up and fly together

-Pray for the long trip - over 30 hours - that we might be alert & awake when we need to (changing flights), but also sleep well on the plane.

Thank you

Honoring Teachers

In Mexico, people and relationships are very important. As a result, people are honored. May 15th was Teacher's Day. We had a wonderful time all gathered together - most of the students (a few were sick) were there to honor & thank their Spanish teachers for the great job that they do.
In the US, thanks to Hallmark, it is quite appropriate to send a card. It conveys our love, our respect, and our thoughfulness - that we took the time to pick a card, write in it, and mail it.
Here in Mexico, sending a card like that would be an offense. Because it shows you don't care enough about the person and the relationship to go and spend time with them to tell them in person how you appreciate them. We could learn from this, don't you think?At our Teacher's Party, each student prepared a bit in Spanish expressing their thankfulness to God for bring the teachers into their lives, for the valuable input the teachers have had, for their friendship outside the classroom as well as their patience and perserverance inside the classroom. It was great to hear how much everyone has progressed in the last few months. It was a very encouraging time!
Yoshi Castillo has been helping 3 of the women with Spanish & Mexican culture. She's trusting the Lord to be able to enter NTM's missionary training here in Mexico in the fall.
Dany, on the left, is a great teacher, who is ready at the blink of an eye to help with whatever needs done. He never says no! He's been a wonderful part of the Spanish Program for the last 1.5 years. He's currently looking for an English as a Second Language teaching job in Texas. We'd love to keep him around, but know he would be good at this, also.
Edwin, on the left, is planning to enter NTM's missionary training with his wife this fall.
Steve & Katrina Marti, center, wrote a song put to a traditional Mexican melody, and delighted us all!! I wish I'd recorded it...
Caleb & Rosario have been a great part of the program. Rosario has been finishing Bible School this last semester. Caleb was ahead of her, so he was already done. But, he'd accompany her and a few days would come upstairs to the Spanish department to help different students with Spanish. And, every Friday, he would teach a Bible class in Spanish so the students could practice their "spritual" words! He's a great teacher. They are trusting the Lord, also, to be able to enter NTM's training in the fall.

America, left, filled in different times and days when she was needed. She's very flexible and has been a great help being able to teach some of the mom's in their houses. She's heading to NTM's missionary training with her husband, Edwin, above. Arehmi, right, is a member of NTM, and has been teaching Spanish for the last year. She's hoping to work with one of the tribes in Baja California when the team is able to move in.