Pack, Unpack and Pack again!

 

How would you like to gather with the people you work with every morning at 9:30 to pray? Well, that is what we do here at the home office of CTEN Missions. Why do we gather as a group? It is to support our family of missionaries and cover them in prayer as we do so. We have a card box with each family/single's name in it. Every morning each of the home staff members and visitors select a card, the prayer needs are shared for that missionary from their Pastoral Care couple, and then we pray individually for them. With over 260 missionaries world wide it takes about three weeks to go through the rotation. As our missionaries update us with new activities and prayer concerns we are then able to share this with the staff and hold them in prayer more specifically.



11 new Missionaries at the Summer Orientation

 

Bob doing what he loves-Worship on the drums

Last week we were involved in our first orientation as part of the  Pastoral Care team. We have them 4 times a year and each time we commission people to serve all over the world. This orientation brought to CTEN 11 new missionaries. Three of them beautiful young women to serve in Africa.  Two young ladies are going to Uganda and one to Rwanda. They have great vision and have chosen to give up the riches of this world to serve the poor. One young lady will be working at a children’s home for street boys, one will run a small country school and the other will be working in a Crisis Pregnancy Center. It is wonderful to hear their vision and see their passion for the work God has called them to in Africa.

The latest members of our Team to Africa-Sarah, April & Amy

 

This has truly been a season of packing and unpacking for us! It all started back in January when we got the call from the home office at CTEN to join the Pastoral Staff Team in Kerrville, Texas.

First we packed to close up our rental home in Costa Rica to head back to Maine to repack and then unpack in our new place in Kerrville, Texas!

Wow! It was a lot of packing but here we go again! We are packing this time for....Africa.

 

We will visit Mozambique, So. Africa and Zambia. This will give us a chance to see up close the work of the missionaries in these areas and more importantly get to know them personally. One of the things we do in the office is read the newsletters our missionaries put out and through this we get glimpses of their work but I believe there is no replacement for seeing those little faces they work with and learning about the culture they live in.  Also,it is our time to really connect with the missionaries to encourage and suport them in their work.
A friend gave me the book, Left to Tell, written by a genocide survivor in Rwanda and it so impacted my heart. I feel like I have already got a small feel for what this people group has gone through. There are many stories to be heard and chances also to share the love of God with them.



We leave for Africa July 24 and ask if you would hold us in prayer during this time especially for safety, health and a heart to hear and support the people we serve there.

Costa Rica to Texas

Bob serving with the Children's Ministry in San Callatano

 Our lasts days in Costa Rica were very busy ones! We had time to say good-buys to our friends, get doctor's check-ups done, sell household items, pack up our house and then host a team from Maine Street Baptist (Brunswick, Maine) for our last 10 days! Needless to say we were running! In God's planning the team came at the perfect time to serve with us at a small church in the mountains and then they helped us transport our belongings home to Maine, for which we are very grateful to God and the team! 

Working with the team to replace the roof of the new ministry center in Cartago

Two of the women in the Ladies Bible Study in San Callatano

The reason why we go!

Jail Ministry with team form Maine 

 

 

We arrived in Texas just over a two weeks ago and after catching our breath over the weekend we spent the next week at CTEN's orientation for new missionaries. It was pretty exciting to be on the other side of the table helping send out missionaries after having been sent ones 6 years earlier!

CTEN had a group of 18 new missionaries going all over the world to serve in various types of ministries. Bob and I will be serving as pastoral care for those who are going to Africa, Europe and the western USA. We had four families going out this time. Two singles are going to Uganda to work. One will be teaching law in a Christian University and the other will be working with women who were prostitutes helping them get established into life again with a job. We also had a family from Cameroon heading back to work among the pigmies. Our last family will be staying in the USA for now working with media to help missionaries get the Gospel out to people groups who don't read well by using short movies of Gospel stories translated into their languages. All of this is so exciting for us to see how God is getting His Good News out across the globe!

Natalie Lynn Nesbitt March 17, 2013

Parker and Blake, proud brothers!

Tomorrow we leave for a short visit to California to greet our newest granddaughter and welcome the first girl into the family! Natalie Lynn was born March 17! She joins two very proud brothers! I can't wait to buy some pink things for her!
After our visit to California we head to Maine to pack up and drive our little red truck (the Thorpe's old one!) to Texas, remind you of the Clampets? We will start our new position of service the first week in May. As a pastoral care couple for African and European missionaries we will travel one month every quarter to visit and encourage them. We will get to see their work up close and be a part of their lives for a couple of days. 
While we are in Maine we hope to visit as many of you as possible! Please contact us! We now have state-side phones. Bob's number is 830-353-2117 and B's is 830-353-2115. We will be staying at our half-done apartment in Wiscasset, so pray for a heat wave as we have been hearing of all the snow up north!

New People Group

     God continues to amaze us with His plan for our lives! Have you ever come to a cross road in life and in your mind there were a few options available. And you wrestle with them looking for the best way to continue. But then as you are seeking God's will another option straight from His hand comes that surpasses all the others such that you know He is opening a door for service that will not only be a blessing to you but to many others as well. Well, grab a cup of coffee and we'll share our adventure with you!

     We have felt a transition coming for about six months now but we were having a hard time getting a handle on exactly what it looked like. It became clearer when right before Christmas ESEPA, the seminary where Bob has served for the past two years as the director of administration and facilities, expressed their desire to hire a national to fill Bob's post in order to fulfill a requirement necessary to get national accreditation. The transition was planned for March 2013.  Bob has had the opportunity to help them get their financial picture back together as well as planning for and laying some groundwork for future growth.

     Since Christmas Bob has laid his desires before the Lord.  Four of them were: to serve 1) working together as a couple, 2) working within a team, 3) living in a rural area, 4) continuing to work in missions.
We had been considering  a missionary post offered to us in Nicaragua, an opportunity to teach at a Christian school in San Jose or a move to a more remote  location within Costa Rica where we have made connections with a small church. We were not at peace with any of the choices and so we continued to seek God's direction. We wrote our pastoral care couple from our mission agency CTEN, Commission to Every Nation, to share our status and ask for their prayers for us in early January. They wrote us back asking us if we might consider working in pastoral care as CTEN needed one more couple to help with the work load.  (We later found out that our name had been mentioned at the home office for the position during a prayer and planning time before Christmas!)  As we prayed and talked about it we could see all the desires of Bob's heart fulfilled in this position.

Our new area of service!

     The condensed story is that after several conversations with the director of CTEN and a two day retreat set aside for prayer, we accepted an invitation to serve as a pastoral care couple for CTEN missionaries who live and serve in Africa, Europe and Western USA. B, the more conservative part of the team, felt lead during our retreat time to read the story in Judges about Gideon. Gideon was pressing grapes in the threshing floor to hide from the Midianites. God sent an angel to him saying "The Lord is with you, O valiant warrior,...go...have I not sent you?" (Judges 6:11-18).  And although all the details are not the same between Gideon and  us, the realization that God enters situations to dispel fear and gives us the assurance that the work done will be by God's strength not ours resonated with us.

     Another interesting 'detail' is that two years ago we had the opportunity to visit our son, Ryan, in Mozambique, where he was working with an NGO. We visited at Christmas so there was time to travel. Not only did we see Mozambique but also parts of Zambia, Zimbabwe and South Africa. B remembers reflecting to Ryan that she felt a real love for the people of Africa and their culture.  The thought even passed her mind of missions there.

     The pastoral care position entails one third of our time in Africa and Europe making personal visits to the 78 families under our care.  The other two thirds of our time we will be in Texas at the home office involved in praying for our missionaries, recruiting and training the next wave of foot soldiers for Jesus, and maintaining contact with those in the field. We are very excited to be a part of what God is doing in Africa and Europe through our missionaries. What a blessing to see firsthand their work, to come alongside them and encourage them in any way we can. 

     Details are developing quickly here in Costa Rica. We will host a mission team, which we are so excited about, from Maine Street Baptist Brunswick, Maine at the end of February through early March. They will be helping in Cot de Cartago, a rural area. We will then leave the same day as they do and head to Kerrville, Texas, our eventual new home. There we will help out with New Missionary Orientation and spend time getting to know the other Staff and the surrounding area. We will then head back to Costa Rica by way of California. Our sons know we love circuitous routes! This will enable us to meet our newest grandchild, who will have made his/her entrance just a week or so earlier.We expect to get back to Costa Rica about the first of April to pack up our things, say our good-by's and leave for Maine by the 15^th. There we will visit our home church, family, friends and repack our belongings we have had in storage for almost six years.  By mid May we should be arriving in Texas. We will be located in Kerrville, Texas.  (Our sons were quick to tell us that it doesn't come up on the map search at first as it is quite small!)   It is located some 105 miles WSW of Austin and 65 miles WNW of San Antonio. For those of you who didn't get a chance to visit us in Costa Rica, here's your chance!
 
     Like all the Pastoral Care couples at CTEN, we are support-raising missionaries though we are based in Texas and are required to raise 100% of our support.We are currently funded at 60%. Would you prayerfully consider supporting us in this amazing call of God? Do you know people or groups that would be interested in hearing our story and potentially help us prayerfully and financially to make an impact on Europe and Africa?

     We appreciate your continued support for the work God has called us to serve in, knowing that it is a team effort. If you are not a current supporter would you consider joining us at this time? The contact information is included at the end of this letter.

Thank you, thank you for your prayers and encouragement, without which we could not be here.

  God never ceases to surprise us in His never ending passion to see all men come to Him through Jesus Christ the Lord. May we continue to serve Him with passion, love and joy!

Support Information:
Commission To Every Nation
PO Box 291307
Kerrville, TX 78029-1307 Phone: (830) 896-8326
Toll-Free: (800) 872-5404
You may send support checks with a separate note saying  that it is for the Nesbitt's