Team 15 Out the Door

Running out of ways to announce departure's ;-)

Team 15, mainly made up of adults and teens from New Life in Canal Winchester plus Mark and Becky McGiffin of Spring Road left at 8:30 this morning!! They are 18 strong and were all really excited about the work that awaits them.
Fifteen teams and the 16th is ready to leave next Saturday morning. WOW! I'm so pleased the support continues to be there and we've been able to continue this operation past the original 4 trips and be planning for our next response. This is GOOD WORK and I'm thrilled and humbled to be working with you all on this.

To that end Melinda and I spent the first part of the week in Louisville at the North American Christian Convention. We didn't have as much interest in the booth as I expected, but managed to find attendees walking by with Ohio on their name badge and sent information with them for their missions/ministry staff. We also met some others who had been to work in Louisiana and found the same "life changing" experience is shared by others who have worked in other locations.

We also got to hang out with Janet, Gary, and Megan from Hilltop, meet Don Yelton from Whites Ferry Road for the "elevator" presentation on what we are building. We met Keith Wood and Rick Jett, Executive directory of IDES, a Christian Church international disaster relief organization that is starting up relief operations in the US in response to Katrina. We are investigating their DART project to see where we may fit in and so is Hilltop Rescue.

We will have a booth at the Westerville Christian grand opening (our building is now double it's size a year ago). Like we've done at Grace Point, we can set up a table at your church any Sunday or when you have a focus on missions and can speak to the congregation about our organization.

I wanted to pass along what I'm sure is a shared personal experience. Janet Hines and I were discussing being "under attack" Tuesday. There are times when you feel like all is pointless. All the mission work all the church work, effort put into kids and work, all the "good" we do seems to meet opposition. Sometimes even from the Christian brothers and sisters we expect to be our brothers in arms.

We know we have an enemy who attacks the work we do in God's name and we know how to defend against it (Ephesians 6:10-18). As much good as Janet has done since last September, she has faced more attack than most of us. She talked about being pushed to the point of frustration and going to a friend very angry about it. But by keeping the perspective that "we are not fighting flesh and blood, but spirits in the heavenly realms", using the whole armor, and praying for "all the saints", we can know that when others appear to attack us, they may not know they are being used and think they are doing good. We can defend against Satan's fiery arrows, and we can support and plead to God for one another's success working in his fields.

Take a moment now, before you forget, to pray for Servants Unite's leaders and volunteers; Janet, Tim, Brendan, Corkey, Megan, Gary, Bogden, and Savita at Hilltop; the people managing the ongoing effort at Tammany Oaks; Fred Frankey and the others at Carrollton Avenue, the thousands of volunteers, and the hundreds of thousands of storm victims who are struggling so hard to get their lives back together. Pray for strength, wisdom, energy, peace, and satisfaction in doing the Lord's work.

Thanks!

John McGuire
Servants Unite!