¨And God Instructed Hosea to take Gomer, a
prostitute, as his Wife¨: Spiritual Growth
Have you even wondered how the conversation
went between Hosea and God after several years of dealing with Gomer and her
lack of interest in a relationship with Hosea.
¨God I love you. But I just want
a wife who loves me and loves you. Is
that wrong to want?¨
I have these moments. This year I met and got to know my best friend,
David. Living in Curahuasi, even though
I work a lot, because of its small size, lends itself to getting to know a
person fast. In May he started running
with me on the weekends. In September he started running with me every day. We eat lunch together every work day in the
hospital cafeteria. And in the evenings,
we both attend the IEP so we are involved in the same activities after work and
during the weekend. David has the same
call as I to missions, loves God, and is always thinking of others….everything
I was waiting for. The religious wedding
is set for January 23, 2016. That’s the
EASY part. Serving God at the side of
David and enjoying every day. That´s the
other EASY part.
The CIVIL Wedding. That´s the HARD part. Trying to get him in the USA. That´s the
other HARD part. We have been working on
the papers since October. For me the
government demands my birth certificate printed in the last three months certified
the Secretary of State of California (where I was born) and a document from my
country that states that I´m single.
Each document has to be notarized and have an apostil. Sounds easy.
The problem is nobody is my family lives in California, and nobody seems
where to send the documents for these stamps.
In October I made an appointment with the notary in the US Embassy in
Lima and flew to Lima. They gave me the
document stating that I am not married.
I asked several workers at the Embassy there where I have to send the
document to receive an apostil (a stamp from the USA stating that it is a legal
valid document). They gave me a website
address. I sent the document by mail to
the USA. It arrived in a week.
To receive a certified copy of
my birth certificate with a stamp from the Secretary of State of California my
dad sent a notarized request overnight to California. To receive the document faster you have to
pick it up in person, which wasn´t possible (nobody in my family lives in Calfornia). More than three weeks later it arrived. After checking the website and calling, my
dad sent the two documents to the Washington State Capital building.
Around this time my grandmother
(the mother of my mom) was diagnosed with terminal cancer. My mom and dad flew to Georgia to help give
my aunt (who was primary caretaker) a break and help get her in a hospice
program. A week later they returned to
Washington to find that both documents had been returned by the
government. They said in Washington they
could only put apostils on documents from Washington.
So then my dad really started
trying to rack his brain to know where to send the documents. He sent birth certificate back to
California. And he look for the Peruvian
embassy in Seattle, Washington. There
they were able to give a notarized ¨apostilized¨ document saying that I was
single. The document would be ready to
pick up on a Wednesday. Two days before
my grandmother passed away. Tuesday my
parents flew back to Georgia. Wednesday
my sister couldn´t go to pick up the documents.
Thursday was Thanksgiving. Monday
they picked it up and sent it. It
arrived a couple days later. Machi (the
step-father of David) works as a security guard. He works Thursday through Tuesday. Wednesday
is his day off. He works during the day
one week and during the night the next.
He could only advance the process of the documents when he was working
nights or on Wednesdays.
The next opportunity that he had
Machi picked up the document and took it to the office of official translation. There they told him that it didn´t have an
apostil and he had to take it to the Office of Foreign Affairs in the center of
Lima. He went there and they were closed
for the afternoon. He returned the next
day, they put a stamp and he took it to the translator office. They said it would be ready in a week. When we were looking for an office that did
official translations we found one near the US Embassy. They told use translation take 2-3 days. But it´s okay and normal for businesses to
lie. It happens every day here. I guess the people feel there is nothing that
they can do, they just accept that that´s how things are. When they told us it would be ready in one
week we said that they´d said 2-3 days. They
said. One week. You can´t argue. You won´t win.
The next week the birth
certificate was supposed to be arriving from California. My dad went to his P.O. Box and the post
office explained that the document had been returned to the sender. They claimed that they couldn´t read the
address. The US mail had sent it to
Renton (instead of Auburn). So they returned it to California. But miraculously in arrived in his mailbox
the following day---with the address completely readable and clear. So that night my dad sent it to Lima. When we sent the documents to Peru they were
being sent to a DHL office with the name of who can pick it up. Because that´s the safest and fastest way to
send them. Usually you can list two
different names to pick it up.
Previously we had listed David´s and Machi´s names, but at this time
David and I were still in Curahuasi (18 hours by bus from Lima or 2 hours in
car followed by 1 hour in plane). The
problem is that Peruvians have two last names.
My dad tried to list the full names of David and Machi, but he was only
able to put the first name and the second last name.
When Machi called the DHL to see
if the document was there yet they told him that it had only David´s name
listed to pick it up. The DHL told Machi
that my dad had to call the DHL in the USA and change the name before it left
in the USA. Saturday it was in Miami. My
dad called and they told him that I had to call the office in Lima Monday
because my phone number was listed as sender of the document. I called Monday. They told me that David had to send an email
to Machi with a letter to the DHL giving permission for Machi to pick up the
document and bring a copy of his DNI (his Peruvian ID card). Thankfully we had made copies of his DNI the
last time we had been in Lima. Also my
dad called DHL again and he had to fill out a form too. After all of this they let Machi pick up the
document. Tuesday he picked it up and
took it to the translator’s office.
Again they said it would be ready in a week.
There was also a medical
certificate and lab work. They wanted us
to do them in Lima in their state clinic.
And the labs had to be done within 30 days of the civil wedding. The gentleman working in the City Hall
explained to us that if was more than 30 days we had to do it again. They didn´t want us to do it in Diospi
because then they didn´t receive the money for the exam and documents. But another lady working there said that we
could as long as the document didn´t state that the Diospi wasn´t in Lima. We had already done it once in Diospi and had
those with us. But they didn´t like that
Martina had used her stamp that says pediatrician instead of general doctor
(even though to be a specialist you always have the general doctor stamp). So we took it back to Diospi to do it
again. It was cheaper to do the labs at
Diospi but there was still a cost.
Nothing was going to change in 30 days, so they changed the date to the
date of the new medical certificate. And
we sent it by mail.
Machi took all of these
documents and several others to the City Hall and finally they accepted
everything. And we could BEGIN the
process. But you have to fill out a
declaration of where you live. David´s permanent
address is still Lima, because that´s where he lived, worked and votes. But they wanted me to say that I live in Lima
because it´s easier. If I say I live
there they post the Edict that says that we are going to marry in the newspaper
for 8 days and in the city hall for 8 business days. But if I say that I live in Curahuasi they also
have to send it by snail mail to Curahuasi, post it in their city hall for 8
business days and then it returns again by snail mail to Lima. I couldn´t lie. But then they didn´t like my address in
Curahuasi. Curahuasi is a small
village. Most of the streets don´t have
names. Most of the streets aren´t
paved. None of the houses have
numbers. But they wanted a house number. ¨Put Lima¨, they told me because they didn´t
accept my address (even though I´d given them a copy of my lease statement and
electric bill of the house that had the address of Unnumbered San
Cristobal. Fortunately now it was
December 23. David finished his classes
Dec 21 and was now on summer break. He
was in my house at this moment and went down to ask the owners of the house if
they knew the house number. They
didn´t. Thankfully one of their
daughters who had married a Belgian and lived in Belgium was visiting with her
family for Christmas. She found the
property document which had a ¨future address¨.
That´s to say that in the future when the government numbers the houses
this will be its address.
They gave Machi a copy of the
Edict to send to Curahuasi. But then
said that he could scan it in and send it by email. It would be valid if the City Hall in
Curahuasi accepted it. So David printed
it out and took it to the City Hall.
They had no idea what to do with an edict. They were so confused they started listing
all the documents that we need including the document stating that I´m
single. But David pointed to the edict
where it states that I´m from the US I just live in Curahuasi. So finally they gave a document with their
stamp saying that they´d received the document December 23.
Sunday
December 27th we traveled to Lima for vacations. Monday we went to
the city hall, showed them the document and asked what else we needed. The medical exam was from December 4th,
so we were thinking that we would have to repeat it. But a different gentleman was helping
us. He said that we didn´t have to
repeat the medical exam. He said we just
have to give him the edict with a stamp from the City Hall in Curahuasi saying
that it has been posted for 8 business days.
This is where we are right now. After
we give him that we can choose a date for the civil wedding. Then I think we still have to wait 9 more
days according to one of the workers.
Right now we are in Lima until Jan 11.
Then we go to Curahuasi with my parents and his mom. If the wedding is after the 11th
we will have to come back to Lima. Once
we have the civil wedding, we have to take the document to the Office of
Foreign Affairs to make it a legal document for my country too…we think. We will see when we get that far what other
things we have to do.
And this is just what we have
gone through for the civil wedding.
We´ve only started going through the same go-around for David´s visa to
the USA. This is why I feel a little bit
like Hosea. Sometimes I ask God why he´s
permitted it to be so complicated. I
never wanted to waste a lot of thought and money on a wedding, but in my
situation I´m forced to. But God says to
me, the greatest testimony of your life isn´t the product, it´s the journey. It´s the decisions and attitudes that we
choose each day. That´s what brings God
the most glory. At the beginning of this
process I was still very much dominated by my American desire to plan and
control everything down to the last second in order to make the most of our
time. Five months later I feel like I´ve
changed so much. Because in the begging
when things didn´t go as I wanted I felt super frustrated. And when the priorities of the people who
were helping us weren´t the same as ours I snapped at them or at David.
But when I sat with God and
talked to him about it, he told me that was his purpose. He wanted me to trust him more with the
direction and timing of my life. He
wanted me to do the best each day with the circumstances I was in and treat
others well out of his love and not out of my frustration. Maybe I felt everything so much more strongly
because I´ve been the only American living in Curahuasi since September (the
Caire´s and Heaths went on furlough to the States until March). There are days that I feel like no one things
like, acts like or talks like me.
The
other day David took me to an American church in English in Lima. I almost cried. It´s the first sermon in person in English
I´ve heard in more than a year. In Curahuasi,
some of the Germans speak to me in English, but it´s not the same. When someone speaks to you in your language,
with your accent, and your country´s way of talking, preaching and relating…it
touches you in the core of who you are and melts your heart, like a shot in the
core of the Death Star causes the whole thing to explode.
Meet David
RUMBO A SEGUIR LA MISIÓN QUE DIOS TIENE PARA MI
GUIADANCE TO FOLLOW
THE MISSION THAT GOD HAS FOR ME
Mal para bien (Génesis 50:20). Bad for good. (Genesis 50:20)
Hola soy David Rafael. Hi, I
am David Rafael.
El año 2015 volví a recibir el llamado de Dios, para
servirle en misiones luego de 10 años de preparación en mi carrera profesional
y espiritual en diversos ministerios en la iglesia.
In 2005 I received again the call of Dios to
serve Him in missions after 10 years of preparation in my professional career
and spiritually serving in a diversity of ministries in the church.
Este llamado ocurrió después de la muerte de mi primo Rubén
el cual fue secuestrado y asesinado, en todo el tiempo que estábamos en su
búsqueda hasta su entierro vi toda la pasión que tenía él por compartir de Dios
con sus amigos y querer alcanzar con el evangelio a muchas más personas, esto
motivo a que tomara una decisión extrema:
This call happened after the death of my
cousin, Ruben, who was abducted and murdered.
Through our search for him until his burial I saw his immense passion to
share God with his friends and his desire to reach so many more with the
gospel. This passion motivated me to
make an extreme decision:
Yo: Aló
Diospi Suyana
Me: Hi, Diospi Suyana.
Director Christian Bigalke: Necesitamos profesores para la
misión.
Director Chrisitan Bigalke: We need profesors for our misión.
Yo: Voy dentro de una semana.
Me: I will come within the week.
Director
Christian Bigalke: te esperamos
We will wait for you.
Es así como fui trabajar al interior del país lejos de la
capital (Lima), una gran misión compartir de Dios con los niños del colegio
“Diospi Suyana” a través de la educación.
This is how I came to work within the country away from the capital
(Lima), a mission to share God with the children of the school "Diospi
Suyana" through education.
Una
gran responsabilidad (Proverbios 22:6). A great responsability (Proverbs 22:6)
Soy profesor de matemática y tutor del 4to grado de primaria
que ahora pasan al siguiente grado, ha sido un gran año trabajando con ellos:
·
Trabajando en la vida espiritual de cada
estudiante.
·
Formación académica llevando educación de
calidad a los niños más pobres.
·
Fortaleciendo lazos interculturales entre los
niños extranjeros y peruanos.
I am a Math teacher and the homeroom teacher of
4th grade (now pass to the next grade).
It has been a great year working with them:
• Working in the spiritual life of each
student.
• Academic training leading quality education
to the poorest children.
• Strengthening intercultural ties between
foreign and Peruvian children.
Mi Tesoro (Proverbios 18:22). My
treasure (Proverbs 18:22).
Durante mi tiempo en la misión conocí a la chica que pronto
será mi esposa, ella conoce a mi familia y yo a sus padres, Dios me envió un
gran regalo “ARI” mi amiga, hermana y esposa que irá conmigo por todo el mundo
para compartir del amor de Dios.
During my time in the mission I met the girl who
will soon to be my wife. She knows my
family and I her parents. God sent me a
great gift "ARI" my friend, sister and wife to go with me around the
world sharing the love of God.
Es tiempo de decir adiós a mis amigos y compañeros de casa, dos alemanes locos.
It's time to say goodbye to my friends and housemates, two crazy Germans.
Aquí con el regalo de mi novia (Ari), recordando
como desde muy pequeño yo era pastor de ovejas y ahora Dios tiene otra misión
para mí.
Here the gift from my fiancé (Ari),
remembering how when I was very young I was a shepherd, and now God has another
mission for me.
All that I have and that happens to me isn´t
luck, it´s a blessing from Heaven.
Tumors for Eyes
I don´t
know why it is but the hardest, rarest pediatric cases always come in when
Martina isn´t here. Martina was out for
the week. Dorotea, the other pediatrician only works Thursdays and Fridays in
the morning. And just my luck this kid
was sitting in my office. My thoughts,
¨I can tell you it´s bad. But I can´t
tell you its name.¨ Xoime is a 12 year
old boy, underweight and under height.
He came from a rural village with his dad and a government social
worker. He started with skin changes
since 2 months of age. The doctors in
the local health post told his parents to cover his skin and that he should
always use a hat. One time he went to an
ophthalmologist in Cusco because he was losing his vision. They diagnosed him with Xeroderma Pigmentosum
and said there was no treatment. He´s
now legally blind. Pus was coming out of
the tumors of both of his eyes.
His eyes were the principal
complaint, so I called the ophthalmologist.
Ursula came and looked at him.
Admitted him and cleaned the eyes.
While he was hospitalized all of us were trying to decide what he had
and how to help him. Dorotea came and
looked at him. Monday Martina
returned. In the end we couldn´t agree
if he had Xeroderma Pigmentosum or a syndrome LEOPARDS. Xeroderma Pigmentosum is autosomal recessive
(less common), more closely fit his presentation and had the worse prognosis. It´s a defect and lack of the natural
defenses of the skin against UV radiation.
It´s lack of the body´s natural ability to correct damaged skin to
prevent formation of skin cancers.
Looking at his skin you see the skin damage and advanced skin tumors
(including what appears to be a melanoma) than you would expect to see in
someone with 80 or 90 years. The
prognosis is that ¾ of them die by age 20 of advanced skin cancers.
What we all agreed on was that
he had tumors in front of his eyes (as seen on the CT that we took) and he
needed to go to Lima to the National Cancer Hospital or the Children´s hospital
if they took biopsies and decided that they weren´t tumors. Accompanied with his government social worker
we sent them to Lima because we knew that with his help they would go and
receive the treatment and help he needed.
Women´s Bible Study Morphed
One night
in the women´s bible study group Saddith, Yulissa (both of who are Peruvian
Christians working in the lab at Diospi), and I discussed how we could modify
the group to attract more of our neighbors to come. The majority of the people are cultural
Catholics (they are Catholics because their parents are) or without a personal
relationship with God. In general, they´re not real excited to enter
a church building or a setting that they´re not familiar with. Saddith and Yulissa told me that most
Peruvian bible studies have a craft project integrated into the time. Maybe one step of a multi-step project.
Since we had finished the
previous study, we started this new modified women´s group. We started with
project geared towards the women, but recently I had started inviting some of
the teens from Ultimate Frisbee, so we actually had two projects going on at
the same time. On the left the girls are
making animal shaped piggy banks out of papier-mâché. On the right we are making jerseys for
Ultimate Frisbee (see the section below about Ultimate Frisbee).
From 7pm until 8pm Monday
evenings they worked on their projects.
Then they cleaned up and we studied a small section of James. It was amazing to see how much more the women
responded to this new format and those that God brought. Sometimes the girls arrived as early as
6:30pm. I asked them to come back in half an hour because they lived in the
neighborhood and I had just arrived home from work and hadn´t eaten yet. Even though they were super excited for the
craft, they also actively participate in the study of James. I changed the format to a more interactive
format. We read 2 or 3 paragraphs, then
repeat each one and I ask first questions that can be answered directly from the
text and then questions that you have to think about and apply to real life.
I know we are called to
obedience and not to results, but you always feel good when God lets you see a
little of the fruit of your efforts and service to Him. You can pray for these teen girls and women
who come. Right now we have paused the
woman´s group for summer break because most of us are all traveling. In March we plan to restart. What I feel on my heart right now and David
is also on board with is to select from the teens in the woman´s group and
Frisbee to form a separate Discipleship program where we can challenge their
faith and relationship with God to a deeper level. You can pray for this. For the timing of when to do it, how to do
it, and that God prepares the hearts of those He wants us to minister to.
¨I
attend the Church of Ultimate Frisbee¨
Frisbee has
grown to more than 50. Now that it is
rainy season we thought numbers might drop.
But in pouring rain the kids keep coming and keep running! David plays football with the adult men, and
if there´s a little fog or rain they won´t play. But our group comes, no matter what. The last couple of months we have integrated
a short devotional message in the middle of the 1.5 hours that we reserve the
field for (Miqui is giving the message in the photo on the right). Then we started inviting those from Frisbee
to Teens/Young Adult group on Saturdays.
Here we have faced the same problem that I found with the women. They are very resistant to enter the church
for a multitude of reasons. The first
time we invited them, one student of David came. Then we invited them to church on the Frisbee
field. David gave his message part by
part every couple of points. Numbers
were at least 30. So then they varied
the location of the Saturday night group.
Sometimes on the Frisbee field, once at the Diospi school, twice in my
house (one of which was a worship service and the other was a Christmas party
with a Dirty Santa Gift exchange).
Because there are usually at least
50 at Frisbee we usually make 5 teams, sometimes 6 teas if we have enough team
leaders. For that reason we are making jerseys
of 5 different colors. Because the
majority of the players are new, for the game to flow well we need a minimum of
one and preferentially 2 on each team that can play relatively well. One of the team leaders is usually Florian,
the youngest son of Klaus and Martina, who is 15 years old. He usually brings a group of his Peruvian
friends from school and so they all want to form a team together. These two weeks that we are Lima we left
Frisbee in the hands of Florian. Mostly
because the majority of those who come respect and obey him relatively
well. We´ll see what we return to ;). This group we are getting to know and growing
rapport. Please pray that God guides us
in whom to invite to our discipleship group.
In this group are four girls who
have begun coming to Mondays, Wednesdays and Saturdays regularly: Xiomara,
Ariana, Marciella, and Rut. Some of them
were coming to Frisbee. One day I walked
into my clinic room to see Xiomara. I
recognized her from Frisbee and we talked a little about Frisbee during her
visit. Since that point her and her
friends have been glued to me. Sometimes
if I get out of work late or am on call I don´t always make it on time to Frisbee. They wait for me to arrive and then they are
on my team. They even refused to play on
David´s team even though in general he has a lot more rapport than I with all
of the kids and teens.
One day in the devotional
message I asked for them to stand if Jesus is the boss of their life. They all stood up (the forces of copying the
crowd is very strong here. no one what´s to stand alone for what they
believe). ¨How many of you asked God if
he wanted you to come to play Frisbee tonight?¨
They all sat down. This is what
we really want our focus to be. To help
them make their very, very superficial ¨faith¨ REAL and a lifelong relationship
with God.
Jeopardy and The Fall of the Walls of Jericho
We continue
to work with the kids. For the church anniversary
this year the child presented some choreographies, skits, and songs. Then we had a huge Jeopardy session with them
as review of all that they had learned this year. The group of kids has grown to nearly 25 and
we had to buy more tables for them to use in their class. We still haven´t found a good classroom
yet. Right now we are using the patio of
the owner of the church building. It has some cover but not enough for the
drenching rains. Fortunately there has
been very little rain this year so the kids haven´t suffered too much yet. Please pray that we find a classroom for them
and that God blesses us with more kids to teach and more teachers to share the
load with.
Recently we taught the story of the
Fall of the Walls of Jericho. We walked
down the block to the park in front of the Health Post that is maybe 100 feet
by 100 feet. David says, ¨Let´s walk 7 times around this park.¨ The kids were between 5 years old and 12
years old. At the end of the 1st
lap they were dying. The sun was pounding
down (it was almost noon). ¨One more
lap¨says David. Four of the kids are
carrying broom handles with a table upside down with a golden cloth on top to
represent the ark of the covenant.
Halfway through the second lap I´m carrying the two back handles. One of the girls has taken over the place of
one of the 10 year old boys who´s whining that he is tired. Finally we reach the starting point. ¨Shout and sound your trumpets! Enter the
city and kill everyone and everything except for Rehab and her family!¨ shouts
David. The kids shout, sound their
rolled paper trumpets, and grabbing stick swords from the ground they run into
the park (which is a dirt and rock mound because it´s still under
construction). I laughed! They looked like they were dying walking
circles around the park but now out of nowhere came mounds of energy.
Afterwards I reflected to
David. I can´t imagine how Joshua
felt. We could barely convince these
kids to walk two laps around a teeny tiny park.
How was it for Joshua to convince all of the people to walk 13 times
around a huge city to cause something impossible that they had never seen
before to happen?
A Peruvian-German-American Christmas
Rossmery, Dennis and I at the Diospi Christmas party.
Miqui
(works in IT at Diospi and is in charge of the teens and young adults at our
church) and Damaris, his fiancée (psychologist at Diospi and her and her sister
live the apartment next door to me).
Marcos: Diospi´s traveling pastor, but also a friend from church. Celebrating Christmas. I asked him why he was drinking from the measuring cup. ¨Because I´m really thirsty¨he replied.
The
Germans and Peruvians celebrate Christmas the 24th at night. So
I took 24 hour call the 24th.
In the evening the missionaries put together a Christmas service. But
since David and I are the only ones who don´t speak German, it was in German
and we had Klaus translating for us.
Afterwards we went to a Christmas dinner (a Peruvian and German
tradition) in the home of two of the single German girls. I left to the hospital at 11PM, David stayed
until midnight when they watched fireworks from the roof of the house. Christmas morning we went for a run with our
friends. Christmas day a bunch of our
friends came over for a Christmas dinner (American tradition). We cooked turkey (you can only buy turkeys in
Curahuasi 23rd and 24th of December) and watch the movie
Son of God and then sat around and sang and talked.
Running
And we keep
running. Sometimes we can convince our
friends to run and pray with us. J
Visit of Ed Morrow (on the right) and Dr. Dick
Furman (on the Left) from Samaritans Purse
In
November two of my bosses from Samaritan´s Purse came to visit the
hospital. It was funny because it was
the first time that they´d met David.
When we arrived at the cafeteria to eat lunch David was there and they
recognized him from his picture. Then Ed
Morrow, who normally is really nice and friendly and a jokester telling stories
from his million years in the Congo, starts speaking with a very strong tone of
voice to David.
¨Who do you
think you are? Do you think marriage is easy? Do you think it is easy to be
married to someone of a different culture (Ed is a Irish-American married to a
German)? Do you know that marriage isn´t
just for two years?.....¨ And on continue the barrage of hostile accusations. The funny thing is Ed doesn´t speak Spanish
and David still only understands words of English. So I was the translator. I tried to maintain the same hostile tone in
between my laughter (because this was so much outside of the natural character
of Ed).
That night we shared dinner
together with Jens, Martina, Ed and Dick.
Ed entertained us with all of his crazy missionary stories and
adventures and he and Dick ended by giving marriage advice to David and I. Up until that point I was translating all the
conversation for David. But at this
point Dick said that I couldn´t translate or I would bias the advice J So Martina translated.
Dunn—dunn, dunn, dunn----duh, da, dah, dunn…..
So now we are catching up on things,
planning the wedding, looking into the VISA for David, and visiting churches
that David was a leader in previously in his life sharing our mission and
trying to find those who God has called to support us.
Depending on what we find out
about the Visa (we went down several dead ends and then found an office that is
open for two hours a day two days a week that should be able to help us know
what forms we need to fill out and what we need to do. But I think we have to finish the Civil
Wedding before we can advance with the Visa.
And the Visa process looks to take between 3 and 6 months. David starts his work meetings mid-Feburary
but has permission to come back as late as 29th of Feburary. The first days of March the kids start their
classes. David has permission to leave
for three weeks at the end of May and beginning of June. Depending on what we find out about the Visa,
maybe I will come to the USA for the first couple weeks of March to give
presentations, answer questions, and visit friends and families.
So
far several of you have expressed interest in supporting us. This time I ask (if you haven´t already) that
you commit to a monthly gift, an annual gift or both and let us know so that we
can know that we are fully supported.
The only change to the previous budget is that we have signed up for an
international insurance plan as a couple that costs $1400 a year. Please send me an email at ari.cale gmail.com
with questions, commitments, or if you would like me to send a copy of the
budget again.
Thanks! God bless you!
David and Ari
