Matt's prayer e-mail update

Greetings to our precious family in Christ. I apologize as it's been so long since we've last sent an update.

Beka and I continue to lead a life after high school discipleship team for juniors and seniors. There is at least one unsaved member in our group, and all of the students plan on attending a secular university when they graduate. Please join us in prayer that we can be the examples and give His wise advice, not our own.

We continue to learn names of God in our elementary and high school chapels. This week we learned that God sees, and He sees our hearts. I pray that the teaching will take root.

A group of teachers and high school students will go to the Philippines this coming April for a missions trip. The decision to go there came after much prayer and discussion. God will bless, and we thank Him as He provides for this trip.

Also after prayer and discussion, Beka, myself and another teacher have decided to go to Priority One India to experience and report back on the ministry opportunities there. This would be at the same time as the Philippines trip.

Beka and I have felt God's pull toward India for some time now, and He seems to be providing an opportunity to go. Our prayer is that we continue to seek His will and provision.

We cannot get an exact estimate on plane tickets from travel agencies this early, but the closest estimate so far was near $1000 for one ticket. We are currently praying for the amount of at least one ticket. As we say this, we know and trust God can provide above and beyond our needs.

Please join us in prayer and prayerfully consider if God wants you to help in this short-term ministry. If He has laid it on your heart to give, please send us an email and let us know.

In closing, thank you for your prayers, encouragement and support. God bless as you continue to serve Him.

The Type of Church Satan Loves

I saw this on a friend's site and couldn't help but share it. There is so much truth in this.

• Sit in pews and wait for the sinner to come to you
• Preach about God but prove you don't know Him
• Preachers and teachers aren't a Voice, just an echo
• Stress membership but not relationship
• Doesn't make repentance and righteousness necessary to follow God
• Spend more money on themselves than the poor
• Spend their time convincing themselves they are OK
• Lives don't really have to change
• Aren't known for prayer and fasting
• Known for programs and ad campaigns
• Don't believe in healing or miracles
• The only fellowship is looking at the back of heads and a handshake out the door once a week
• Exalt individual ministers
• Forget the priesthood of all believers
• Spend lots of money on average Christian entertainment
• Don't seek a move of the Holy Spirit
• Focus on the cares of this life
• Feel impressed by the famous and wealthy
• Don't expose sin
• The women do all the work of the Church
• Where the opposite sex are not brothers and sisters but potential suitors
• Where you do not work out your salvation with fear and trembling
• Where you will not learn a new song but squeeze to the old ones
• The scripture is not read
• Missionaries are not sent
• Leaders are not raised up
• Discipleship is delegated to a Sunday School class
• Men have no integrity
• Women have no purity
• People have no modesty
• You laugh at sin instead of weeping

The devil loves that kind of church!

In need of prayer/ sorting things out

Lately it seems as though everything has been crashing down around me. There are so many things that I've been dealing with; from my aunt and her heart problem, anxiety for a physical (really just the blood test part of it), feeling like I spend more time on school then my marriage, feeling extremely isolated and cut off from just about everyone, to feeling extremely disrespected by people that I would have never thought would make me feel that way, to downright wanting to quit my job.

The last on the list is probably what upsets me the most. Never, in the time that I've been here, have I even contemplated quitting teaching at ICS until Tuesday this week. The chain of events that has gone on has proved to not be good.

Please pray for me as I have some confronting to do within the next week. Pray that I say what God would have me to and NOT what I want to. I know that what I want to say would come out with a much sharper edge than what should be said. I will be addressing issues of disrespect with some of my students and that is very difficult for me. Again, it's difficult because I'm constantly fighting my mind to say what is right instead of what I want.

Also, please pray that I'll make it through whatever this is that's going on. There seems to be SO much and dealing with it is extremely difficult.