God Wants You to Win!

Romans 8:5b says "those who live in accordance to the Spirit have their minds set on what the Spirit desires." As I was meditating on that scripture this week, it reminded me of a crew team rowing in a competition. All the team members concentrate totally on what the crew leader says and they obey instantly. Their backs are to the goal, so they can't see where they are going, but the crew leader can. The team members trust the leader completely, knowing they will get where they are going if they work together in obeying their leader. That is so much like us and God. He can see where we need to go and tells us just what we need to do to get there. All we need to do is obey what he says and work together.
But that's not all. All those in the boat want to win. They are not out just for the exercise or the scenery. Even the leader, especially the leader, wants to win. Romans 8 goes on to say in verse 31, "If God is for us, who can be against us?" and in verse 37, "we are more than conquerors through him who loved us." God wants us to win! He wants us to win over sins that plague us. He wants us to win the souls of people around us. He wants us to win in the assignments he gives us. He wants us to cross the finish line of heaven victorious! God wants us to win! And he is doing everything he can to get us to the goal. Let's all go out today and concentrate on the Spirit, listening to his voice and obeying quickly what he says. God bless you all!

Nancy

A-Traveling We Will Go

We are back in Des Moines after traveling about 2,000 miles visiting churches in Montana and South Dakota. We had views of some great scenery even though we saw the mountains through a haze caused by smoke from forest fires further to the west. We spent a long time in the car, but we participated in wonderful services and met great people in Hill City and Rapid City South Dakota. Thank you to Ron and Carol Walker in Hill City and Les and Sharon Potts in Rapid City who were wonderful hosts for our visits. And thank you to those who are participating in our ministry to Hungary by supporting us financially and in prayer. God bless you all.

Itineration Begins

We are now in Billings, MT on the first part of our itineration schedule. We arrived last Saturday and spoke in the Open Bible churches in both Billings and Worden, Montana. We will be spending the rest of this week with our daughter-in-law, Nadine and her family and then head to Rapid City, SD to speak at the church there. We will tell you more about our trip next week after we get back to Des Moines, but so far the response has been good.


Of course the highlight of this week is getting to spend time with our grandson, Nate. We told Nadine that we have to squeeze three years of "spoiling" into one week, and I think we're doing a pretty good job of it. Nate also ate cereal for the first time this week. He is getting sooo big!

New Family Member Soon

We are so happy to let everyone know that our oldest son Paul asked his girlfriend Kate Taylor to marry him and she said yes! Welcome to the family, Kate. We love you already.
Paul and Kate are planning to get married this fall. May God's blessings rest on both of you, Paul and Kate, and may he grant you a long and happy marriage.

Words, Words, Words

"Csak egy kicsit beszelek magyarul." This is a phrase we will be using a lot in Hungary. It means, I only speak a little Hungarian. Actually, we'll probably start by saying, "nem beszelek magyarul" (I don't speak Hungarian.) Our formal Hungarian language training will begin once we arrive in Hungary. But we don't want to arrive there totally ignorant of the language, so we have been using a computer program recommended by Mission Training International. It's called EuroTalk and it uses pictures and games to teach us words and phrases. We don't have to speak the words, just match spoken words to the pictures. It is so fun! We fight over the computer to see who can rack up the most points the fastest. Our first year in Hungary will be focused on language study.
Please pray we will learn fast and well.