Troozshoes

Dear Friends and Family,

After a brief time off the grid, we now have email and internet access,
and can send you an update! On Friday August 3, our SIL pilot expertly
flew us down through thick clouds to finally land on the Aiyura
airstrip, where were met by many of our good friends here in PNG! It has
been great to reconnect with friends here; it has eased the pain of
leaving all of you.

Since then we have been unpacking and settling back in to life in PNG.
Our activities during the next few weeks will include getting
established back in Ukarumpa, communicating with the Sam people,
planning when to drive to Buan, encouraging the Sam translators by
phone, polishing the Sam translation f Mark to consultant check it in a
few months, working on other language related work and fixing our
village house. I am not looking forward to fixing the septic tank lid,
which collapsed several months ago. :( During this time, I am waiting
for my Adelaide University advisors to pass on the feedback from the
thesis examiners. When I receive their feedback, I will be able to make
those edits and submit the finished thesis via email.

Thank you for your partnership in the Sam ministry!

God bless you,

Dave and Sarah, and Joanna, Samuel, Matthew and Rebekah

Dear Friends and Family,

We are overwhelmed at God's faithfulness to us! He has surprised us by
providing in beautiful ways over the last week and we praise Him! As
well as hearing about some new financial gifts in person and via email,
many people gathered together on Sunday and gave generously to help meet
our monthly financial needs. After we had spoken at First Baptist
Church's fellowship meal one man stood up and spoke to those gathered
about how the Holy Spirit was prompting him to encourage people to pray
and also to act. Even though we still needed a lot of money pledged, he
believed the need could be met if people each gave what they could.
After a prayer time people lined up to pledge to give and we were
stunned! What a precious gift from God this has been which we will not
forget. His love endures forever!

We are now looking into booking plane tickets to return to PNG soon.
We're excited to see what God is going to do amongst the Sam people! He
has clearly called us to work with them and has provided for us to go!
It was amazing to see people used by God to accomplish this miracle of
giving, and we look forward to the way God will also accomplish the
miracle of giving the Scriptures to the Sam people! Praise the Lord!

In His hands,
Dave and Sarah

Dear Friends and Family,

We would like to connect with those of you who are in the Cambridge, Minnesota area. First Baptist Church in Cambridge has kindly offered to host a fellowship meal at the church this coming Sunday (July 1) starting at 12:30. The Church is providing meat, dessert and beverages, - if possible, please bring a salad to share, but don't worry if you can't. We would love to have a chance to meet with you and share about the Sam ministry, outlining how things have been going in the translation and literacy work, and our hopes and vision for the next few years!

Please continue to pray for us as we trust God to provide the remaining $400 of monthly financial support that we need so that we can return to PNG. We are eager to get back as soon as possible for our kids to start school and so that we can reconnect with the Sam people.

Love,

Dave and Sarah

Dear Friends and Family,

Now that Dave has handed in his PhD thesis for assessment we are blessed to be able to be spending time with his family in Minnesota before we return to Papua New Guinea! Our time here has been full of meals with our family and friends, great times of fellowship, summer activities like kid's choir, and drinking coffee with Mom and Dad on the porch.

We love to spend time with our American family here, but we are also looking forward to seeing the Sam people again and getting back into Bible translation work in PNG! Though we want to return to PNG soon, we are still lacking some funds that we are required to raise before we can purchase airplane tickets. Our hope and plan has been to arrive in PNG in time for the beginning of the school year on July 18. However, that is only about three weeks away!

Would you please pray with us for the remaining $500/month (USD) that we still need and consider whether God may be prompting you to partner with us financially and in prayer? If you would like to give, you can do that through Wycliffe Bible Translators (see below for instructions).

We know that God is able to do immeasurably more than we can ask or imagine and we also know that His ways are higher than our own. We're trusting in Him, His provision and His perfect timing, and are waiting to see what He will do, whether that means making it back to PNG in July or not. We rest in Him.

Thank you for your prayers and thank you so much to those of you who faithfully support us financially. You are in our prayers and we thank God for each of you!

Love,
Dave, Sarah, Joanna, Samuel, Matthew and Rebekah
_______

How to partner with us financially:

If you are in Australia:
Email finance@wycliffe.org.au with your desire to give. Mention our names and this account number: 2-7455.

If you are in the USA:
Go to http://www.wycliffe.org/partner/9AF436

Dear Friends and Family,

After several weeks of packing and moving, and help from many wonderful
people, we handed in the keys to our rental home today. It was hard to
realise that our time in this house was ending, but we are looking
forward to what God's plans are for us in the next stage of our journey!
We will be leaving Australia on May 29.

For those of you in Adelaide:

There will be a farewell afternoon tea gathering

 from 2 to 5pm on Sunday May 20

at CityReach Baptist Church, 215-233 Fosters Rd, Northgate SA.

Please bring a plate of afternoon tea to share.

We'd love have an opportunity to say goodbye to you before we leave.

Please continue to pray for Dave as he finishes his thesis and for our
remaining monthly financial needs.

God bless,

Dave and Sarah

Dear Friends and Family,

We are in the middle of "crunch time" now, and would appreciate your prayers! We are getting tired, and need the Lord's peace and strength! We have a few big deadlines approaching:

- We are sorting, packing, and cleaning so that we can move out of this house to Sarah's parents' house on about May 12.

- Dave is finishing off his thesis and will be handing it in around May 21.

- We are working on finalising our airplane tickets to Minnesota, with a travel date of May 29.

- Wycliffe has not released us to go to PNG because we are not yet at 100% of our support; we still lack about $860 USD/month. Please let us know if you feel God is leading you to partner with us financially.

We have a new prayer card ready for you! We will be printing out copies to give to people, but if you want to download and print one yourself, you can do that by downloading it from our shared folder at Dropbox:

https://www.dropbox.com/s/72vydfbwicbj6x1/Bamboo%20draft%2C%208%2C%20printing.png?dl=0

God is great, and He is the one who daily bears our burdens,

Dave and Sarah