We’ve started a new Facebook Page. If any of you are on Facebook, please click here and Like the page to get updates! Dave and Tomo and Japan: on Facebook!
NOTE: We’ve learned that due to a miscommunication we actually need to raise more support than previously thought in order to attend MOP this Summer. We now need to be up to 50% by July 10. Please see the post above this one for an updated explanation of our situration, and please continue to pray that God will provide.
As always, I want to start by thanking you all for your prayers and support. It’s been a long journey so far, and many of you have been partnering with us since the begning. It is our sincere hope and expectation that one day, Lord willing, Tomo and I will be serving the Church in Japan. In light of all that is happening there now, we hope it will be soon, and invite you to pray with us that God will allow us to go to Japan shortly.
Prayer Requests
1. That God will provide an additional 7.5% of monthly support by the end of June. This is crucial. Unless we get to 40% of monthly support, we will be unable to attend SEND’s Member Orientation Program (MOP) in July, a required training that must be attended before departing for the field. If we do not get up to 40% we will have to wait until next Summer to attend MOP, and consequently push back our departure date till after that. Pray for David as he makes phone calls, and tries to find one person each day to invite to support us. We need one new commitment of $40 a month each day till the end of June to meet this goal.
2. Pray for Tomo’s pregnancy and health. Tomo has been having a lot of morning sickness throughout most of the pregnancy, and on top of it has just come down with a pretty bad cough. Pray for healing, and that the morning sickness will ease up, and also that she will be able to gain weight, as its been difficult to do so with the nausea she’s been experiencing. Her due date is December 1st, and we’re not sure yet if its going to be a boy or a girl (we both want a boy!).
3. Pray for the outreach that Japanese churches are participating in the disaster areas in northern Japan. We’ve heard a lot of really encouraging stories coming out of there, and it seems as though God is begning to open hearts that were previously closed and unresponsive to the gospel. Pray for people to come to find salvation and hope through Christ Jesus, and that new churches will be planted in those areas.
A Word About Our Departure Date
Many have asked about when we will be going to Japan; we’re considering and praying about three dates. The earliest one would be September 1st. If we are not at 100% by then, we will wait here in America until after our baby is born, and then try to leave sometime in the Spring of 2012, again, if God provides the support. The latest we hope to leave would be late next Summer, 2012. Despite the slow going on the support raising, we still feel God’s calling just as strongly to go to Japan. And if God keeps us here, there seem to be many opportunities to be involved in ministry here that will only give us more experience, which, Lord willing will further prepare us to be effective missionaries in Japan. This entire experience has been very difficult, and yet at the same time we have seen God work in so many ways, and teach us so many things that we have little room to question why He hasn’t hurried things along, or sent us sooner. We’ll go exactly when He wants us to. But we’re praying that if He wills, it be soon!
Due to the rapidly approaching June 30th deadline, and the large impact it will have on our departure plans, I would invite you to please comit to praying each day till the end of June for God to bring us up to 40% of our comitted monthly support. Also, please pray that God would bring to mind someone that you feel would be willing and able to meet with us to hear about our ministry. If He does, please try to connect us. I would be greatly encouraged if you would let me know if you will be praying for us during the next two weeks.
Thank you all, and God Bless!
Dave and Tomo
www.gloryspeaking.com