Recession? Not for God.

Happy New Year to everyone. New Year’s Day is a time to reflect on the year that was and look forward to the year ahead. For this project, the reflection does not go back very far. It was October 31 that we felt God calling us to make an impact for His kingdom in Africa through clean water and the Gospel. November 16 was the day we made that “public” by sending e-mails to friends and family and starting this blog. Since that time God has truly accomplished more than we could have possibly imagined. In about a month and a half, God has provided $3,160 for this project. In a period of about ten days in December the total moved from $760 to $3,160. One could make the argument that this is one of the worst times in history to raise funds for a project like this. With our country in a recession and the holidays approaching we weren’t expecting this type of generosity. Early on we were concerned with how much needed to be raised each month, and hoping we could stay “on pace” to have this accomplished by November 16, 2011. Clearly God has blown that “pace” out of the water. We have seen God use so many people for His glory through this project. Not just through dollars, but through conversations and prayers as well. We are so thankful that we chose to be obedient to God’s command for our lives and anticipate what God has in store in the future for this project.

As joyful as it is to reflect on the past two months, looking to the future is so exciting. Possibly the best part about getting closer to our goal of $5,000 is that we are getting closer to finding out specifically which villages in Sudan will be getting these wells. (Notice that was plural. We began this project to provide one well for one village, but because of the matching donors God has brought along to partner with us it will now be two wells for two villages.) This means praying for a specific village, and specific people groups, and specific pastors as they share the Gospel with these people. It will also mean we will all get to see photos of the work being done and the people being impacted. Also it will give us a destination that we hope to one day get the privilege to travel to and continue to impact for Christ.