August Newsletter

Dear Friends and Family,

Tabi here, writing another newsletter. This ought to be a nice, short letter.

Let me begin this letter by offering profuse thanks to all of you for your prayers. Our success rate has amazed us. We believe that God has listened to your prayers and blessed us by opening the hearts of His people. This endeavor cannot succeed without prayer. Again, thank-you.

At the end of July, Mike and I made one of our circuit trips around the area. Circuit trips go as follows: Before we go, Mike spends an afternoon looking up churches and planning a route to take. He tries to plan the trip so that we'll travel in a loop, and selects eight to ten churches to visit. Once he has roughly estimated the loop, he looks up directions on Google and dictates them to me. I write them down on a piece of paper containing the names, addresses, and telephone numbers of the churches we're going to visit. Mike then checks the map online (with our route traced onto it) to be able to lay out a rough "map" in his head. When everything has been prepared, we set our maps, directions, and papers aside until the day we travel. Usually the circuit trips are relatively uneventful. Over here in the country, well, we had a few unexpected turns. If you'd like to read about it, you click on this link. If you can't click on the words "this link," then copy and paste this link into your browser: http://www.xanga.com/MK_culture_shock/668395677/play-by-play.html.

After we did our circuit trip, we began going back to visit the churches where we left our brochure. We find this technique useful, because people see our brochure and recognize us when we come by again. Once in a while, we get people who think that we look familiar (because they saw our picture in the brochure). It's a wonderful feeling to me, because it lets me know that people have made a clear connection with us.

We spent most of our August Sundays going back to visit these churches. So far, out of the six churches we have gone to talk to since we arrived in Wellsville, four have offered their support. On August 3rd, Mike preached at First Christian Church in Wellsville. On August 19th, we had a little scare with our bank account and a loan we're working to pay off. Apparently, decimals are important little things. I wrote more about it here. If you can't click on the word "here," try to copy and paste this link into your browser: http://www.xanga.com/MK_culture_shock/671119853/a-heart-stopping-moment-and-a-sick-computer.html. We are happy to say that everything got cleared up, and this is a story to laugh about now. God is good.

As you can probably see from this letter, support-raising is a slow process. We are, however, doing much better than we expected. Missions classes teach young hopefuls that the usual success rate is very low, and to expect three years of support-raising. Given these statistics, four churches out of six is a tremendous success rate. We hope things we continue this way so that we can be off to Chile very soon. Keep praying for us; it's working!

Northeast Bible College did contact Mike back. They wanted a full statement of faith in his own words, as well as a curriculum vitae. Mike relished the opportunity to write something thoroughly theological, and has been working on their request. It's too late to get in as a professor this semester, but he hopes to get in next semester. Also, the minister at one of the churches we visited mentioned that they needed someone to teach Wednesday night Bible study in basic Bible doctrine. After some prayer and consideration, Mike contacted the church to offer his services. We have not heard back from them.

That sums up the month of August. Things have gone well, and we hope they will continue to go well. God has sustained us thus far, and we believe that He will not let us fall. Thank-you for the kind emails you have written back to us. They're an encouragement and a joy. May God bless you all as richly as He has blessed us.

Our prayer requests this month are:

• Pray that things will continue to go as they have been. At this rate, we'll be in Chile in no time!
• Pray that Mike's curriculum vitae will favorably impress the people at NEOBC (Northeast Ohio Bible College).
• Thank God that He has blessed us so much so far.
• Thank God that our little scare at the bank cleared up quickly.
• Thank God for the incredible support from friends and family we have received.

May God bless you all.

In Him,
Mike and Tabi Boyce