To See The Glory

Archive for the ‘Dominican Republic plans’ Category

Our friends Jim and Debra Tunnicliffe spent 6 years serving the Dominican people in the Dominican Republic. They returned to the states for a period of time to plan and then to return to the Dominican Republic with a renewed vision. I met them in 2008 in Sosua (Northern part of the Island) and I felt instantly connected. Their heart to serve the people and to reach out to the lost was obvious from the start.

Island Light Ministries

They plan to return there and continue implementing the vision they have. You can read more about Island Light Ministries at their website www.islandlightministries.org

Please lift them up in prayer as they will need God’s protection, guidance and finances to accomplish their goals. If you are your church body is looking for short term missions to be involved with contact Island Light Ministries to set up a date and plan, they will be glad to host small groups who desire to see what God is doing in other parts of the world.

Being involved with online marketing for over the last 10 years, has taught me many skills in SEO and SEM. (SEO – Search engine optimization, SEM – Search engine marketing) These skills are invaluable for anyone trying to use the Internet for sales and marketing. Locally I have noticed most do not have a clue how to optimize their websites for search engines and I know there are plenty of scam artist companies who prey on the ignorant (really ignorant isn’t a bad word.)

What I have decided to do is offer a full day workshop on SEM and SEO here in Medford. I hope to pass on some of my knowledge and skill to those interested in implementing this technology for their own or client websites. I plan on putting on this workshop March20th. Putting all this information together in order for teaching has been quite the task and I don’t want to miss anything and make it as clear as possible for the attendees.

Let me know if you have any interest in this and I can let you know the details as they become set. You can see the business website at SEO Workshop

If you are wondering how this relates to us going to the Dominican Republic, it is a two-fold answer:
1. I plan on teaching different Internet related skills to those trying to improve their work conditions in the D.R.
2. By offering workshops here, I should be able to hire help with my current sites which will give us more options to move without having to sell the businesses first.

Are you looking to support a great mission group?

We visited Jon and Shannon Haslett last year when we took a trip to Sosua, Dominican Republic. We met them through the Tunnicliffes. They run a program in the Dominican Republic that is an extension or continuation of what they have been doing in Venezuela for years.

Read about their history here: http://www.ninosdelaluz.org/know_history.html

 We contacted Jon resently about working with them for a year (or more) depending on the Lord’s leading.

 Please pray for that ministry and that God uses the Hasletts and others involved to reach these children.

We returned home on Saturday after driving about 6-1/2 hours from the San Francisco Airport. It is Monday and I am still in the fog.  Between the jet lag and a little uneasy stomach, I am not really here. Besides leaving even larger pieces of my heart back in the Dominican Republic.

We had a great 2 weeks with a group of 19. I believe it was 13 teens from 13 to 19 years old. What a great group of kids and young adults, they all behaved maturely, worked hard and had fun despite some long days.

We had opportunities almost every evening to minister throughout the city, from rough areas on the streets to a church service out in a park. We were blessed to be a part of the ministry that the staff at JUCUM (YWAM) has there. This is one awesome group of people who love the Lord and serve Him with all their strength.

Street ministry in the D.R.

Praise God!

He did it. He provided all the funding. Some of it came on the day we were to turn it all in – and it was quite a bit. Thank you to all of those who helped financial and through prayers.

Just a few days left before we leave. So many things to take care of and we are quite excited about the trip. We did get one thing done (mostly…) we sprayed the house this last weekend.

Just to let you know, heavy boom lifts on hard tires can get stuck to easily off of pavement. So, I rented a boom to get to the peaks and dormer windows on our house. I drove it onto the front lawn, leaving a 1/2″ indention everywhere I drove it. Then I tried to drive it back onto the driveway, but it would just spin the tires. Tried with plywood and 2X4′s as instructed by the rental company, but no go.

I then turned and went the other direction and figured I would try to drive around and into the backyard to access 2 of the dormer windows as planned. I got over some bark area and was going onto the sidewalk. The lift is wider than the sidewalk and as 2 wheels went over the side where more bark is, they sank. It so happens that under that area the clay ground was still really wet and clay leaves no traction. Well, we tried to help it out with a pickup and cable but that didn’t work. $95 and 5 minutes with a tow truck, it was back onto pavement.

So, the lift didn’t quite get used as planned and I still have the facia of one dormer window to get to probably by a 30′ to 40′ ladder. But the house is sprayed and looks really good.

Pictures to come shortly….. maybe.

I think we are coming to the end of the fundraising…. It is always hard to ask people for money and this time, like times before we did as much “working” for the money as possible. Jessica did 3 different yard sales, two of which was with donated items, the last one being at our house for 2 days.  (Now, for the trips to Good Will and maybe the dumps.)

Thank you to everyone who donated or supported our efforts!

Now with less than two weeks remaining before we leave, we are preparing for our trip by packing items and getting things ready and planned for the kids who will be staying with grandparents.  As any mother reading this would know, this is a hard thing for Jessica, to leave all her kids for 2 weeks, but the Lord is good and they will have fun.

So, it is getting here fast! We are leaving for the Dominican Republic on the 13th and at this time there are 17 people on this trip. About 10 of them are High Schoolers (or close in age). 

Please pray for those going, finances for the trip, and for God to use us throughout the trip to reach people, to bless His children and to give Him glory.

The Lord will be stretching all of us before and during the trip and the adversary will want us to be in discord, discouraged and overall defeated. We pray that we will fight the battle in the Spirit and not each other :~)

Well, we still have the house, so right now we are just planning on going for a short-term trip in June. This trip will be about 2 weeks and we will be going to the new building in Santa Domingo, Dominican Republic.

Currently we are raising funds for this trip, so if you are so inclined to help donations can be made to Helping Hands International here in Medford, Oregon. This trip, like many will be a combination of working on the facility there, ministering on the streets (or towns) and possibly doing something for a needy family.  The plans are never set in stone, since we have to go on faith. That is one of the cool things about the trips, we get to see God do miracles.

This Saturday, May 3rd is the jogathon, if you want to pledge per lap or just a flat amount. Jessica plans on running about 24 laps, I…. well, she will probably be lapping me since I haven’t ran any distance for quite some time.

Please pray for us and the others going on this trip. There will be a few from Cascade High School going, but none of our kids will go with us this time. The kids will enjoy a couple of weeks being spoiled by grandparents.

We have had many ask in recent months how are future plans are coming. With a future trip on the horizon we figured now would be a good time to bring everyone up to date. First of all we are still moving forth with plans to move to the Dominican Republic. We do need to sell our home in order to free us to be able to move. Once that happens we will be on our way. We are currently praying for further direction beyond that. Before we head to the DR we might go to a language school to dig into the Spanish language. Costa Rica has a school for missionaries that seems to fit our families needs. We are unsure if this is what we need to do. It would not be a cheap undertaking and would take four months to do one session. Although it seems like a good idea we want to be absolutely sure that this is what the Lord has for us.

As far as ministry in the DR there seems to be two things we keep coming back to. The first being a Discipleship Trade School. The second providing a place where other missionary families can come and get some much needed rest and refreshing. Both of these will take time and resources to bring to pass but we know that God is faithful and that if these things are from Him than we will have all we need in order to accomplish what may seem impossible.

For now we continue to move forward. Shawn and I are planning on going on a short term trip in June for two weeks(see attached letter for details). Each time we go, there is more confirmation of the future. It also give us the opportunity to connect with our friends there and to meet others that we might work with in the future. One thing we have learned from our trips is that the more people you know in the country the better. We are looking forward to what God has for us on this particular trip.

We thank you all so much for your prayers and support of our family. Below are some things that we would ask you to keep in your prayers.

We need to raise $3200 for the June trip-we hope to accomplish this by group fundraisers, our support letters, and the selling of tamales (I’ll be taking orders soon)

God’s protection for the team going in June (about 20 people)

Pray for Shawn’s parents and the kids during the two weeks we are gone

The selling of our house

Whether or not to go to a language school before moving to the DR

Clear direction for ministry

Unity of mind and purpose for our family

In this time of waiting we would not grow weary or anxious but trust in the Lord’s perfect timing.

Now, those of you that know me (Shawn), know that I am not one for school. I am not against learning, I just dread the thought of sitting in a classroom bored out of my mind and my mind wandering. (I guess I do that anyways.)

You see, through high school all I wanted to do was my time and get out. I was bored. I did just enough to get A’s, B’s or C’s and move on. I really didn’t try in most of my classes with exception to Spanish or a couple of others. Needless to say, I didn’t go to college (or collage as one highly educated person I know of writes.) I filled out the paperwork for a junior college, but couldn’t get myself to turn them in.

Anyways, back to the subject – language school. We have been kicking around ideas on learning the language, which is Spanish for the Dominican Republic. We have thought about just moving there and hiring someone there to teach us, or for one of us to take some sort of classes there. We heard of other missionaries going to a language school in Costa Rica and in Mexico. So right now we are looking deeper into going, possibly the whole family, to language school.

Our friends, the Tunnicliffes, are heading down to Guadalajara this week and if they have the time will be checking out this particular school for themselves, which we just found out after already looking into it. Well, I just thought that was interesting.