Our next mission trip will include two weeks in Swaziland and two more in Mozambique in June/July of 2008. Tracy and I are full of expectation as we make our preparations.

In Swaziland, we will return to Hope House, where Pastor Lewis and his wife Maggie minister to 22 orphaned children, providing food, schooling, clothing, and training in God's ways. We help by finding sponsors for each child, and it has been a delight to partner with them. While we're there in June, we'll be updating photos and biographical information on each child. We trust there will also be ample opportunities to share the Good News of Jesus Christ with the Word and in song.

We will also look forward to visiting other orphanages, homesteads, schools, and rural ministries with Pastor Stan and Sue, our missionary friends from the Seattle area. Our hope and prayer is that we will be able to connect with many more pastors and children so that when we return home, we can match up children with new sponsors to help provide their basic needs.

In Mozambique, we will be helping to build a Christian school in the village of Vladimir where our friend Israel Jovo is reaching out to believers and the lost. The only hope for change in the ravaged, remote areas of Africa is reaching this new generation of children. Many are eager to train the little ones in the ways of the Lord, and Israel is moved with awe that God has not forgotten his work.

He is working to purchase land, then we will be helping to send materials for the villagers to begin making bricks for us to use in July as we build.

Down the road we hope to be able to help this village also get clean drinking water. They suffer from many water-borne illnesses, and the they have to walk 1 - 3 kilometers to get even to the diseased water. The lowest figures we've been able to get so far to accomplish this goal estimates around $10,000. Please pray with us for someone to partner with us who is already digging wells in Africa who could help us with this project.