” If you remember when you were here to visit us, we had a fixer up house. We have been thinking about adding on a sun room as a place that we could host our international students all the more and extend our dining room area when we have large gatherings. It all started out with a phone call to Marsha and Mick and now as of this past Saturday, we had a 2 week work team here and a sun room! Mick and Marcia’s hearts were so kind and generous! 

They not only came but they recruited others from their supporting churches to be a part of it as well. It became much more than just a building project of a sun room but  a great encouragement to our hearts in our ministry as well as hearing stories of God’s goodness in the lives of the other team members.  It also gave us the opportunity to include our international students to come and participate ( a suggestion by Mick and Marsha). Our times around the dinner table became a rich time of sharing life stories of God’s goodness which the students got to hear. 

Just to give you more of a testimony of how this all came together… Mick normally does remodeling but this was from the ground up. So he told God he was willing to help but he did not feel adequate but would need someone that knew better how to read blueprints. Well within 48 hours of his prayer, another couple had phoned the supporting church of Mick and Marsha’s asking if there were any mission projects going on as they had been set to go to do a trip to Hawaii but because of covid and quarantine times, it was not possible. So the couple specifically wanted something stateside and where he could use his ability to read blueprints! 

Then Marsha and Mick along with this couple were meeting together at the church and one of the pastors walked by and so they called out to him as he passed by and asked if he wanted to join them. Amazingly, he said yes if his 15 yr. old son could join him. Well that guy, Daniel, proved to be an amazing key person as previously he had a contracting business and had built like some 400 homes. He was the young guy in the team and so was able to join Fred in putting up the roof along with his 15 year old son. We stand amazed at God’s provision and goodness particularly in a time when it is hard to get contractors and the cost of things are higher. 

We encourage you to promote the Helping Hands Ministries on a regular basis as we would have never dreamed there was something out there like this that could have been made available to us. I understand that they also are willing to accompany families to the mission field to help them get set up. Oh what we would have done to have had that.  We remember arriving at our place in Madrid and had to move everything into the 9th floor apt.. We were scared to death to leave our 7yr. old, 5 yr. old and 2 year old in the 9th floor apt. alone while we unloaded and brought everything up in an elevator. 

It amazes us at the variety of ways that God provides for us but never did we dream of this one!!!! “