Come now, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go into such and such a town and spend a year there and trade and make a profit”— ¹⁴ yet you do not know what tomorrow will bring. What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes. ¹⁵ Instead you ought to say, “If the Lord wills, we will live and do this or that.” ¹⁶ As it is, you boast in your arrogance. All such boasting is evil. ¹⁷ So whoever knows the right thing to do and fails to do it, for him it is sin. James 4:13-17

There have been quite a few days since my last update. One of the things that has been glaringly clear and frustrating, freeing, lesson/reminder/lesson/reminder/lesson/reminder… is that I have no control over today or tomorrow. But, today, I am called to do the right thing under the King who has rescued and called me.

So, here we are at the brink of May, 2021. I am grateful for the things God has been doing over the past year, and I look forward to what He leads us into.

First, I want to thank all those who have prayed for me over these months and generously supported the work financially. I’m humbled, more than ever as I pray for my list of supporters. It’s a crazy, beautiful, gospel-thing, that people would deny themselves and give their money to the Lord to accomplish the work we get to do together.

Second, I’m excited to let you know, Lord willing, we will be returning to Uganda very soon. I have the privilege of traveling and training with Stu Dix and Larry Szyman under the authority of the St Croix Valley LEAD Team. We have tickets for a flight from MSP to Uganda departing May 11! We plan, Lord willing, to be with the men we’ve been training over the past months, to renew our growth together as teachers of the Word of God. Our training sessions are scheduled for May 17-21. I’ve purposely held back publishing this trip until things were more settled. So, I will ask you again, to share in this work by praying. The men have continued to meet in smaller groups over these months. I’m so impressed with their faithfulness and long to see them again!

Third, please pray for the Lord to use our travel. The additional logistical steps of covid testing will likely make this trip interesting. I expect other surprises that often accompany travel. My regular prayer, for travel and otherwise… Lord, please prepare my heart to be surprised and allow me to respond in every moment, to every person, with gospel grace.

Fourth, this happened… I went to my annual eye exam about three months ago. Some of you know I have had to use prisms in my lens for the last eight years to get my two eyes to play a little better together. The exam has steadily called for the power of the prisms to be increased. That was the case this year too. There were several pretty crazy steps that I will withhold. After three eyeglass orders and several additional adjustments my Dr did a follow up exam. She was dumbfounded (her word). She wrote a new prescription adjusting my prism power from 12 to 3. She said she had never seen anything like that. She told me during the exam. “Honestly, I have no idea what has happened.” I told her, I have no idea what happened either, but I do know who to thank. (She had no response. I’m asking the Holy Spirit to bring this to her mind often.) 

With my new glasses, I can say there is definitely some weird stuff going on with my eyes. What, I don’t know. But, I know it is a gospel opportunity of some kind!

Finally, please pray for the adjustments that Jill, and Moriah, and Crosby (Moriah’s puppy) will have to make while I’m gone. 

I am more grateful than ever for the family of God. I pray God grows each of you in the grace of the gospel. 

Keep lookin’ up,

ME

Outdo one another in showing honor. Romans 12:10

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