Leaving for Ecuador

If you’ve been following our website, you know that we’re just about ready to leave for Ecuador. We are so excited about how God is going to let us be a part of in this ministry! We just bought tickets yesterday, and we’ll be flying out of Miami on June 12th. My parents (Bob and Sara) will be going down with us and staying for a week to help us get settled in. It will also be their first trip to Ecuador, so you can pray that God will make it a beautiful experience for them.
We’ve had several people that have been following our story and asking us how they could help. So here it is. First and foremost, we need prayer. Most of you have been praying for Valerie, some of you for over two years, and for that we are more grateful than you can imagine. There have been many days when I just couldn’t pray for her for one reason or another, but I took great comfort in knowing that she was covered in prayer. And those prayers have not gone unheeded. God has done wonderful things through her. We’ve seen her optic nerve heal so that her “bad” eye still tracks with her good eye. We’ve seen her good eye go from where the eye doctor said she wouldn’t be able to see out of it much longer to where, at her last test, she was seeing 20/20 with it. We got through 14 months of chemotherapy with no side effects. There have been times when I thought, “What are you doing God? Why are you prolonging this? It’s cruel of You to let us grow to love her more and more if You are just going to take her from us.” But lately, my thoughts have been, “What are you going to do next God? I’m excited to see how you are going to amaze me next through this little girl. Thank you for doing things the way you do.” Saints, your prayers have all been a part of this, so again I thank you. And I would ask for continued prayer, not only for Valerie, but for Natalie, Courtney, Brooke, Celeste, and I as well as the children in the orphanage and the building project.
Next thing you can do is consider coming down to Ecuador on a short term mission trip. We aren’t set up for it right now, but we have people coming down as soon as August. There are so many benefits to short term missions. The first and foremost goal is for you to have a special opportunity to meet up with God in a different environment. If you’ve talked with people who have been on mission trips, you have undoubtedly heard how it changed them. There’s just something about serving God outside of your comfort zone. Another benefit is that you get to help us with the work we have to do. We will have abundant opportunity to help with building projects: clearing land, building fences and walls, and working on houses. There is also unlimited opportunity to minister to these children by just spending time with them. And for those with special interest in mission aviation or mission hospital work, both the MAF airstrip and HCJB mission hospital are here in Shell and can always use volunteer help. Additionally, these trips help to rise awareness for the orphanage. The building project that has been proposed is a big one and will take a lot of resources and labor to complete. Eventually, we would like to see churches or other groups sponsoring the construction of different buildings. Raising awareness of what is going on with the orphanage is the first step in being able to fund the project. Our goal with short term missions is that people would come and see what God is doing in Shell and would go back and tell others who would then want to get involved in one way or another.
Which brings me to the final way that you can support us. We decided early on in this endeavor that we weren’t going to go begging for financial support. It wasn’t that we were too proud to do it, but that we didn’t want to put people on the spot or make people support us out of guilt. I am strongly opposed to anyone supporting any ministry out of guilt. God has plenty of money and He can provide for us in whatever way He wants to, but I know that He often uses the Body of Christ to support these kinds of ministries. We have a planned annual budget of $40,000 for the six of us. That includes rent, food, insurance, travel expenses, etc. Our home church (The Family Church, Gainesville, FL), is providing approximately one fourth of that budget, for which we are very grateful. Of the remaining $30,000 we still need to raise we have, to date, raised just over $600. So, we will be living off our savings for a while, which is fine because God has provided that for us. But if you think you would like to help support us financially, please pray about it and ask God if that’s how He wants you to get involved. The details on how to do so are on our website (www.thewelchfamily.org). Just click on the blue box that says, "Click here for information on how to support our ministry".
We will also be starting a mailing list soon to mail out updates on our ministry (on real paper!). We will also be continuing our email updates as well as our website. So if you would like to be on our mailing list (the paper one), please email us and let us know. You are already on our email list or you wouldn’t be reading this, but if you would rather just be on the paper mailing list, then let us know that too. We do plan on keeping both lists going while in Ecuador. Also, I know that several of you have been forwarding our email updates regularly to friends and family. So if you got this as a forwarded message, you are also welcome to sign up for our mailing list, either the email one or the paper one (Did I mention it will be on real paper?).
Well, that's all the new information I have right now. I'm going to get back to helping Celeste make packing lists to figure out just what all we want to take down.

Yours in Christ,

Craig

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