The trip to Cali

Rich and I took a trip to the Northern California area to visit some Grace Brethren churches. We left Costa Rica Saturday, June 7th, and returned this last Wednesday, June 11th. As most of you know the Elledges are in need of alot of financial support. He was planning on “tent-making”, working part time online for his old company, but a few weeks before departing for Costa Rica in January they cut his contract. He was out of a job and they were out most of, if not all, his salary. They had raised enough money to cover insurance and field budget items, but his “tent-making” job was going to cover his salary. Enough emergency support came in in the last weeks of December to help them get to language school here in Costa Rica. But, they need to either find more support (at least 15K) or find another “tent-making” job in order to make to Argentina.

Sometime at the beginning of the year La Loma Grace Brethren Church in Modesto CA started supporting them out nowhere. We took that as God’s leading so we planned a trip out there to try and find other churches or individuals that would want to partner with our team. Tara and I are 100% supported so I went to help Rich.

Last Sunday I visited with the Ripon Grace Brethren Church in Ripon, CA. It was a good visit! They are a very friendly group and were extremely encouraging about our mission. Here are some pictures of my visit:

If I remember right, this is Jon. A wonderful man who said he’d pray for us on a regular basis!

These are the Grovers. I had met them awhile back while in Philly. It was great to see them again.

I met with the youth group on Sunday morning. A view from the back.

John and I. I had first met John while in Philly. He came to Philly on a short term team. He’s a great guy!

Sunday night we got a treat! Don Richardson, author and an elder-statesman in the mission community, spoke at the Ripon GBC church. What a blessing! I may share more about that in another post.

On Monday Pastor Richards took Rich and I out for 9 holes of Golf! Thanks!

Pastor Richards nicknamed Rich “The Ringer”. Apparently Rich won at everything he did during his time there (cards, golf, horse shoes, etc..)

Study Time! Even though we were away, school kept right on going back in Costa Rica. We needed to stay on top of things

Dinner out with some wonderful folks from La Loma.

Tuesday was a monthly meeting of the pastors from GBC churches in the area. Rich and I had the privilege of sharing about ourselves and about our vision. The number one thing we asked of them was to look throughout their congregations to see if any of their people had a job opportunity for Rich. Ideally, Rich (and the rest of us) wants to have a “tent-making” job while church planting. That kind of model would be a great help in what we are trying to reproduce. It was a great meeting and again, given our position, it was encouraging.

To all the pastors and people we met: Thank you! We came away encouraged and blessed by you.

Overall it was a good trip! Now, we continue to pray for people to respond to our message and either Rich will find a job, or enough support will come that we’ll be able to continue on to Argentina.