Deputation

"Among Christian missionaries, the process or period of time during which they raise support for going to their mission field. This use of the word has been common in churches and missions organizations for over a century but recently has been giving way to the more 'bureaucratic' term 'home ministry assignment'. As commonly used, a missionary 'does deputation' or is 'on deputation'. However, the missionary is not called a 'deputy' nor is the person said to be part of a 'deputation'. Deputation is said to begin when the missionary is commissioned to be a missionary and it ends when the person goes to the mission field." Wikipedia definition

Got it? Me neither. I thought I was going to get a badge. Actually, for years I thought it was called "debutation." At any rate, that's where Cindy and I are at now. We've been back from the DR for over a month now, training, speaking at our home church, meeting with friends, family and supporters and taking care of paperwork.

What kind of paperwork you ask? As you can see in the photo above, we've been developing and printing our support and information materials. Praise the Lord for Cindy's design skills! We've also been navigating the wonderful world of health insurance. We are responsible for finding our own healthcare coverage and we never realized how much the corporate world subsidized our premiums. After checking with the major health insurance providers we were blessed to hear about a company called Medi-Share. It is a Christian based health care coverage company that works a bit like a cooperative. Our premiums are matched with the needs of a particular patient. We receive information on them so that we can lift them up in prayer. The customer service reps are very helpful, even praying with you over the phone. Our rep is a Puerto Rican married to a Dominican from an obscure town we are very familiar with. It's amazing how the Lord works!

The next few months are going to be very busy for us. We leave on Monday for a week in the DR to take care of accounting duties and catch up on some construction and maintenance projects. From there we fly to Dallas for the TIME board meeting. We're back in Des Moines for a couple of weeks after that and then down to Orlando to visit with friends and to some partnership building. Then we fly back down to the DR to help with a short-term group. We'll be back during the week of Thanksgiving and then off to Colorado Springs for three weeks of missionary training. It's a crazy schedule and we humbly ask that you pray for travel mercies for us.

As promised before, we'll try to keep the updates coming and take you along on this adventure with the Lord through the web! Thanks again for your prayers and support.

Praises:

The ability to stay in the church's parsonage during our time back. It has been a helpful base for operations. It also gave me some exercise mowing the lawn. And here I thought I was done with that...

Reconnecting with friends and family, thanks so much for your interest and support in God's work in the DR.

Cindy has completed her Education Specialist degree and Principal licensure. Praise the Lord Drake allowed her to finish when she got back.


Prayers:

That partnership building would go well and our support would come in quickly but also patience and waiting on Him.

Boldness as we share about the Lord's calling in our lives.

Travel mercies, especially when we drive to Colorado for training. We trust in the Lord, we do not necessarily trust in our older vehicles!

Pray for the TIME board meeting and for more workers to enter the harvest field.






Training with TIME Director of Operations Rick Jacobsen. Rick is the former Site Director for the TIME Monterrey location.