It’s been a little while since our first News & Prayer update and a lot has happened since then, so it seems it’s about time I caught you up on how things have been going!

In terms of the items I mentioned back in News & Prayer Update / 001 back at the start of January, here’s a quick update:

• We had a positive response from the American Mission re. the property which could make a great home for the first Novō Community. However, we felt the rental price they came back with was too high to justify making a move on the property at this time, a good number of months before we actually need a property.

• Jony Muñoz has arrived and is both loving being at Yeldall and making a very positive impact as part of the therapeutic team.

• We are still a few steps away from being in a position (in terms of our bank account being set-up) able to apply for charitable status for Novō here in the UK but we appear to be very nearly there.

So, what’s new?

Well, it’s been a busy period with my time as Director of Yeldall Manor coming to an end, a fabulous holiday visiting friends in St Andrews at Easter, and now a period of packing-up and preparation for what lies ahead!

We are very grateful to have secured tenants for our house who are moving in at the end of the month. This means, having boxed up our personal effects and sent them off on their 40-day sea voyage to Bolivia, we are now taking care of everything that remains and ensuring we leave the house empty (with items given-away, dumped or sold, as appropriate!) and with everything ship-shape from a maintenance perspective.

We have also had some super opportunities to share about Novō and what lies ahead for us as a family and we’re very thankful to Wymondley Chapel, Crowthorne Baptist Church, Great Hollands Free Church, Woodley Baptist Church for the different ways in which they have welcomed us and adopted us as a missionary family.

We’re also very grateful for the support of our church family at Kerith Community Church where we held a Novō Evening to which a mixture of Kerith people, Yeldall people and other friends and family came. For us the highlights of the evening were the interview and Q&A, which enabled us to really talk through in some details the opportunities and challenges which lie ahead, and the time of commissioning prayer with which the evening ended.

We are continuing to raise the financial support we need as a family, having got to about two-thirds of the way towards our start-up and monthly support targets. We now have an online facility with Stewardship through which you can make a one-off donation or set-up regular giving which you can find here: www.give.net/20171708.

We’re also starting to turn our attention to fundraising for the Novō Charitable Trust and this was given a great kick-start by a brilliant team of 8 supporters who ran the Reading Half Marathon dressed as sloths. I can’t tell you how hot it was in those costumes (something not helped by the fact that I had to run with the flu) but it was well worth it to see nearly £4,000 raised as seed money for the first transformational community in Santa Cruz, Bolivia!  

Looking ahead, our flights to Bolivia are now booked for 3rd July! During June we have a family wedding and then holiday time planned with both Mickey’s family and my family. We’re so grateful for the chance to be able to spend special time with our families before our departure and a new season where our relationships will hinge on the quality, more than the regularity, of our time together.

We’d so appreciate your prayers in relation to all of the above, or anything else you feel prompted to pray into. Thanks for your support and please don’t hesitate to get in touch if you’d like to follow-up on anything!