6 Given 2 Jesus

My apologies for the recent confusion. I thought I had, but hadn’t, mentioned that our MO-move would not happen until next summer (as far as we know). Please forgive me!!

Since the last post more exciting news has come our way. The Indonesian field committee was very encouraging in a recent email. We filled out a questionnaire relating to our interest in serving with the Indonesian field. I would love to share the whole letter with you. but a couple of excerpts will hopefully give some picture of what we received.

“I just went through your Questionnaire and everything looks great. I sure
appreciate your hearts to fit in where the needs are. I can see already
that you will be a huge blessing to the field, and I am so excited about
your heart to help us out in the technical area of the field.”

“Your Experience in the past is going to be a huge asset too. I don’t think
it will take long, and you will totally understand how and why the Lord has
used these years to prepare you for the ministry here.”

“Looking forward to your coming…”

Like I said these are just a portion, but our hearts are SO encouraged right now. Keep our previous prayer list nearby and if you would add these - Possible trip to Indonesia later this year for Roland, meet some of the field leaders there, gain perspective of technical center planning for Indonesia (maybe Asia-Pacific region) - possibly meet and travel with Tech Ministry chairman.

Once again, rejoice with us before the Lord for these encouraging times we are experiencing. We praise the Lord for your prayers of thanksgiving with us!

More to come, I’m sure - to reach those with no gospel yet

in Christ,
Roland & Jinni
2 Cor 3:4-6

All our paper work has been finished and we are now officially members of the New Tribes Mission, ministry team! What a blessing to continue forward in our journey to serve the Lord with these wonderful folks.

Now begins the next step in our great adventure with the Lord. We have a little more preparatory training to complete. It will involve relocating to Camdenton, MO. The New Tribes Mission, US Training Center is located there. I, Roland, will be going to learn the ins and outs of supporting much of the globally deployed technology used by NTM missionaries and their teams. I will be required to serve at NTM MTC for a year as we prepare. This will encompass research, assembly, troubleshooting, break/fix, and teaching. It means interacting with missionaries already on the field using these configurations and teaching those future missionaries the same things I learn.

Jinni will have some time to learn from field missionaries more about how to utilize homeschooling, classroom environment, and other teaching methods to educate our children while we are on the field. She has lots of personal experience to tap into, also. The overall plan is to glean as much as she can and come to the field prepared to hit the ground running in putting together something like a One-room Schoolhouse, for all ages.

You already know God has provided a sweet Indonesian woman to help us get a little glimpse of Indonesian culture and language before we have to relocate to Missouri. How thoughtful of the Lord to encourage us in such a tangible way. We are so thankful that He has shown us this kindness. Our helper is so precious to us and we thank the Lord for her ministry.

Please, pray with us in these specific ways …

1) God will direct us to our ministry team

2) We will rest in the Lord’s timing and provision

3) God will give us clarity in how to present our future opportunities of service

4) Our family will be available to meet and share with everyone the Lord allows

The Lord has blessed us to know you will pray - THE BEST THING YOU CAN DO! We are privileged to pray with you, too. Let us know how we can do that, would you? Thank you for your care and encouragement, too.

serving to reach those who have no gospel, yet

in The Beloved,

Roland Jr & Jinni Shafer

2 Corinthians 3:4-6

Only God, only God! Our hearts are burdened for the people of Indonesia, especially the tribal folks who have no chance to hear our precious Gospel in their own language. There are over 500 people groups in Indonesia who have no Scripture in their language, and they do not know how to read and write their own language. When you first get to the field, you usually spend 6 - 12 months or more, learning the National Language. God has blessed us in 2 ways, to help us get a jump start before we even get there! Roland’s job allows him to use Rosetta Stone for free, (a wonderful software that is similar to the language learning technique we learned at NTMC) and a sweet Indonesian Lady, Bernadeta, has agreed to help us learn Indonesian in exchange for swimming lessons. We are definitely getting the better end of this bargain, and I tell her every chance I get.

One of the things you do in “NCLA” (National Culture & Language Acquisition), is Culture Events. The idea is to participate in a cultural activity together, and learn from the shared experience. Here is our first. We are going shopping for Indonesian food…1/2 mile from our house. Another “co-incidence” hahahahahaha.

Going to the FAR EAST! (oh yea, way far)

This is the Indonesian section.

Buying some other fun stuff, not on “ingredients” list.

We actually got most of the stuff at Kroger.

Preparing the meal at home. Actually a separate event.

Marinating the meat

Here is dessert almost finished!

We were so hungry, we forgot to take pictures of the finished products. Sorry, we are new at this. Tomorrow we will begin to go over all the pictures and learn new nouns, adjectives, verbs and procedural speech.

http://www.wordplayers.org/

Click on the link to go to the website of the Word Players.

Jinni was cast as Medlock for this production.  Performances are July 18 -26th.