Marlton, New Jersey

Not much to write this week. We are east of Philadelphia, across the Delaware River, in Marlton, New Jersey. Beginning Sunday (tomorrow) we will be in a missions conference at Wiley Church, which has supported us since 1976. The conference will end on Wednesday night, April 30, and we will head toward Oklahoma early Thursday morning. We plan to make the trip in two days, so we should arrive home sometime Friday evening. We're ready to go home! Pray for our travel, and also that we will be a blessing to people at Wiley Church. Thanks for thinking about us.

Mount Vernon and Arlington National Cemetary

One of the great advantages of being on Homeland Ministry Assignment is being able to see parts of our beautiful country that we otherwise would not be able to visit. During our week in Maryland we took one day to drive down to Mount Vernon, the home of George Washington. It was wonderful. The weather was gorgeous, the grounds were beautiful, and we had such a great time going through the mansion and strolling the paths. It was crowded with lots of school groups, but there was plenty of room for us all. The view from the veranda out to the Potomac River was beautiful.

After spending the day at Mount Vernon, we decided to stop at Arlington National Cemetary which was directly on our way back in the late afternoon. I am so glad we did! It was a wonderful experience walking through the grounds, reading memorial markers, and seeing the Washington Monument across the river. But the highlight of our time there was watching the changing of the guard at the Tomb of the Unknowns. The military rituals are very meaningful and touching as we saw several wreaths laid before the tomb and heard taps played each time. We also saw the graves of Robert F. Kennedy and John F. Kennedy, as well as memorials to both the Challenger and Columbia space shuttles. We wish we could have stayed there longer to see all of it.

West Virginia

Well, friends, we had a great weekend last week near Martinsburg, West Virginia. The Snyder Bible Chapel is in a beautiful setting in the hills and valleys of eastern West Virginia. We were there for their annual missions conference along with Jim and LouAnn Smith of World Gospel Mission and John and Trisha Fraser of OMS International. John and Trisha are missionaries in Budapest, Hungary, and were there with their three children. The youngest is only four weeks old--little Jonathan. We spoke five times and had wonderful fellowship with everyone in the church. This church as taken several life-shares in our ministry in the past and we felt that we were with old friends.

This week we have been staying in Westminster, Maryland, with our hosts Royal and Patty Mattoon. Their basement is fixed up as an apartment complete with stove, sink, fridge, tv, etc. So it really is a great place for us to stay. Royal and Patty were our hosts in February when we were in their church for a missions conference also.

This weekend we head back to Pennsylvania where we will be in a small church on Sunday morning, filling in for the retired pastor who is now in Florida. Then next Wednesday we head to New Jersey for meetings in that area. We will be in the missions conference of the Wiley Mission in Marlton, New Jersey. This conference will last through Wednesday, April 30. After that we head home to Oklahoma for a few weeks of catching up on things at home.

We appreciate your prayers for us during these meetings. We still have a ton of support to raise and it is coming in very slowly. Of course, the economy is not helping us at this time, and people are just not ready to commit themselves to long-term financial support. Pray that their hearts will be moved and they will be obedient to what God wants them to do to help us get to Ukraine in the fall.

Web-link reminders

This is just to remind all of you of our two other Ukraine-related websites:

The field website is www.sevenloaves.org.

World Gospel Mission's official website is www.wgm.org.

Pray for Brock

This is Brock, our five year old grandson. He was the Very Hungry Caterpillar in his pre-school program. That's our daughter, Laura, with Brent, her husband.

Brock is a happy, cheerful boy who loves soccer and anything with wheels. He had an accident on the day before Good Friday when he fell off his swing in the back yard. By Friday morning his leg was very painful, although there were no bruises. Laura and Frank took him to see the doctor that morning and the doctor took x-rays to see if there was a hairline fracture. Well, there wasn't a fracture, but the doctor discovered that Brock has a disease of the hip joint called Legg-Carve-Parthes Syndrome. Something cut off the flow of blood to his hipbone and it has started to die and shrink. There isn't any cure for this, but with care the bone may begin to grow again. So, for now Brock cannot play any team sports (like soccer), he cannot wrestle with his big brother, and he cannot do anything that will add pressure to the bone and cause it to crumble more. The specialist will check on Brock every three months to see what the progress is.

Pray for Brock because our busy boy is going to have to give up a lot of the things he enjoys for now. We think the "accident" was providential because the doctors were happy that the disease was found early enough to reverse its effects.

By the way, Brock's big line at the end of the story of the Very Hungry Caterpillar was "I can't believe I ate the whole thing!" Grandma Chris is happy she got to be there to see it.

Sweet Lance

I can't pass the chance to put up a picture or two of our sweet little Lance. He is Brock's baby brother and he was eight months old on March 26th, and he is adorable. He loves people. He is going to be a sociable boy. Pick him up and talk to him and he gives a big grin. Grandpa Frank obviously likes him! We are crazy about Lance.

On the Road Again

Well, it's been two weeks since I've written in the blog, so it's time to get caught up on what's happening in our lives.


We drove to northern New York, arriving at Peirrepont Manor on Saturday, March 29th. We have been in the church there at least three times before and we felt welcomed by the pastor and his wife. The pastor is also a dairy farmer, so he was busy during the day getting his cows taken care of. We stayed with a wonderful retired couple, Chester and Ruth Rudd. They had a lovely house and we were upstairs with our own bathroom and comfortable bedroom. Our service on Sunday, March 30th, was good and we enjoyed a carry-in lunch afterwards.


One of the highlights of our time in New York (besides the coooold weather!) was being able to visit a missionary friend from India. Buelah White is 82 years old now; she never married and devoted her life to young village women in the state of Andhra Pradesh. She was principal of a school for these young women where they learned to read and write, they studied the Bible, and learned some practical skills like sewing. They all loved her and many of them keep in contact with her even now. Buelah retired in 1990 and returned to her family's home in the Adirondack Mountains of New York. What a change from hot, dusty, dry Andhra Pradesh. We stayed one night with Buelah, sharing old memories and hearing about her life in retirement with her cat.






Last weekend we were in a church in northwestern Pennsylvania at a small town called Emlenton. We participated in their missions conference where Frank preached both services on Sunday. He did a great job! After we left there we returned to Harrisburg, Pa., to spend a few days with Jo and Truman Long. We stayed with them in March when we were in their church's mission conference, and they invited us to come back if we needed a place to stay for a few days. We have enjoyed their friendship for a number of years and the fellowship is always good in their home.

Tomorrow, Friday, April 11, we head toward Martinsburg, West Virginia, where we will participate in another missions conference. It's only a 2 1/2 hour drive, and we must be there by 3:30 in the afternoon.

Pray for us right now. Both of us are having stuffy heads from colds and we don't have a lot of energy. We'll probably be running on adrenalin during the weekend since we'll be speaking at least four or five times, some shorter, others longer. Both of us sort of crashed today. Praise the Lord for wonderful friends like Jo and Truman who gave us a lovely room with it's own bath, upstairs away from everything that was happening downstairs.

I'll write more next week. Thanks for your prayers.