We're On a Mission » Prayer http://www.wereonamission.org Using English and Technology in Europe for God Fri, 11 Jun 2010 00:31:17 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.8.5 en hourly 1 Beginnings http://www.wereonamission.org/partnering/prayer/682 http://www.wereonamission.org/partnering/prayer/682#comments Thu, 06 May 2010 00:27:30 +0000 Laura http://www.wereonamission.org/?p=682 Beginnings are hard.  When you’re planning the beginning, it seems exciting and you might even be ready for a change.  But once that beginning starts, the excitement wears off and you realize just how much work beginning again takes.  While I wouldn’t say it’s hit us like a ton of bricks, it has hit us more like pebbles falling out of the bed of the truck in front of you as you drive (I hate it when people don’t tie down whatever they have in the bed of their trucks and leave dents in your car…but I digress).  It’s really been a progression of events that makes us realize just how much work it is to start again and just how much energy we lack for it all.  But God has been good – he’s been making it “easy” on us.  While there are a lot of things to share, I’ll save most of it for our next and last newsletter.  I just want to share one thing with you today since this is the whole reason we moved to Charlotte.  Thadd begins his first Seminary course on May 10.  The course is New Testament Survey and he has been reading a lot for the class.  The class will take place from 9am – 4p Mon-Friday of next week and then he has 2 months to complete the rest of the course work.  He will also be taking a class called Spiritual Formation that meets over three weekends this summer and again, most of the class work happens at home.  But really, the thing that is most exciting for me as I watch my husband flip pages in his book and type away on his computer, is I’m watching the realization of a dream unfold.  From before I knew Thadd, he wanted to go to Seminary.  While we may have tried to bury it for a few years, it always resurfaced and now it’s here.  This beginning is exciting because knowing more about Christ, the WORD of God, and who we are in relation is just so exciting.  I’m excited to see what things we both learn during this process.  And most of all, I’m excited that we’re taking this journey together.  I get all the benefits of Seminary without having to sit in class and read all the books!

So anyway, please pray for this new beginning.  God will use Thadd in great ways and we are asking him to do just that.

]]> http://www.wereonamission.org/partnering/prayer/682/feed 0 Full-circle http://www.wereonamission.org/partnering/prayer/663 http://www.wereonamission.org/partnering/prayer/663#comments Fri, 26 Feb 2010 18:47:54 +0000 Laura http://www.wereonamission.org/?p=663 For those of you waiting on the edge of your seat for an update from us, it will just have to wait a little bit longer. I can say, that our container is loaded, our apartment is painted and mostly cleaned and our landlord will do a walk-through on Monday. Please pray he isn’t picky – we could really use our deposit…

Really, what I wanted to talk about was an experience we had today. We attended the funeral of our friend, Anita. Anita was in her early 30s, she was Croatian, but was born in Germany and she was married to a wonderful African man named Obinna. Anita attended our small group and we got to know her a little over a year and a half ago. It took us a while to find out that she had just received a kidney from her mother and she was going to dialysis 3 times a week and that the cause of all this was Lupus. 6 months ago, the kidney she received from her mother had to be taken out because her body was rejecting it and from then until last week, her body continued to give up and she remained in the hospital. Her husband was a mighty prayer warrior, and although God didn’t heal her body on earth, she is now rejoicing with her new body in heaven. Today was her funeral and we were surprised to see people standing outside the doors of the chapel because there was no more room. Our small group sang “Soon and very soon” as we watched Obinna in his chair, slumped over and mourning the loss of his bride and Anita’s mother, sobs racking her body. It got us thinking about how this was perhaps a fitting end to our time in Germany. We experienced the birth of our daughter here and now we’re experiencing the death of a friend and the death of our life in Germany. We are in mourning for both today. It does tend to hit you hard how short your life is when you witness the death of someone so young. And it made us all the more encouraged in some regard that our life is too short to waste and we need to follow God’s leading. Even though we will miss Germany, our friends, our neighbors, our life here – we are assured that we are following God’s will for our lives and that makes the mourning a bit easier.

Please join us in praying for Obinna and Anita’s mother. I cannot imagine the sorrow that they are feeling at this time.

]]> http://www.wereonamission.org/partnering/prayer/663/feed 0 A New Direction http://www.wereonamission.org/updates/blog/656 http://www.wereonamission.org/updates/blog/656#comments Tue, 26 Jan 2010 18:29:28 +0000 Laura http://www.wereonamission.org/?p=656 Dear friends and family,

It has been such a blessing to have you praying for us! We believe God has used your prayers in so many significant ways in our ministry with eDOT and TEFL, as well as the opportunities He’s given us to minister to our neighbors and friends in Germany.

Please excuse the method of writing to you. We wanted to send out a letter to each of you, but due to a shortage of time, we thought it best to send this via email. We are writing to share with you how God has been leading us to a point of transition in our lives and ministry which is both exciting and sad. (We realize that this letter is a long one, but please read it through to the end! Thanks!!) Laura and I have been seeking God’s will for a number of months and we’re sensing that He is making some significant and unexpected adjustments in our journey. We would like to ask that you pray with us as God continues to reveal His future for us in ministry as a family.

I have always dreamed of someday going to seminary to further my education with the hope of becoming a pastor and ministering in a local church. While we were serving with GEM in Germany, this calling was put on the back burner, but never far from our minds. We thought that once our commitment with GEM was over (2012), we would begin to pursue seminary education.

As you know, we’ve been back in the U.S. these last few months reconnecting with many of you as well as working on raising more support. To date, we are still $1800/month under what we had hoped to raise by February 2, 2010. While we have told many of you Germany has become “home” to us, there has been one area where I have felt my skills were not properly being utilized and that is in the area of TEFL. While we believe in the vision and mission of TEFL, we feel God wants to use my gifts and talents elsewhere. After seeking much counsel and receiving confirmation, we believe TEFL is no longer the calling God has placed on my life. We believe it was a necessary step in the process of preparing us for seminary. While finances are not an obstacle in God’s economy, we believe that this, combined with a lack of fulfillment in my duties with TEFL, is God’s way of leading us to seminary sooner rather than later, and more specifically, this fall.

Obviously, this will be a big transition in the timing of things. Though I will not be working with TEFL anymore, Laura is praying about returning to a her role with the technology team of eDOT while I go through seminary in order to continue to impact Europe through this important ministry. Even though we will be state-side, we will need continuing partners (like you!) to pray for us and support us financially in Laura’s ministry role with GEM and my education. We are excited about this transition even though it will be difficult. We will have to say goodbye to many in Germany we have come to know and love.

We originally hoped to return to Germany on February 2, which we will still do, but now with the purpose of moving out of our apartment and allowing Laura to attend eDOT’s annual planning meetings. We plan to move our belongings back to the U.S. and return to San Diego March 17 to continue the discernment process and raise additional funds. There are still many details about our future that we do not yet know, but we are confident that God will lead us forward.

We also believe that God uses His people to minister and counsel when needed. And so we are asking you to email us or call us (858.926.5674) and let us know what you think of this new opportunity. We are hoping that God will confirm and refine His direction for us through our conversations with you. We are really excited about this opportunity, and want to be wise in how we proceed.

Since we will be extremely busy from now until March when we return to the U.S., we may not be able to communicate with you as often as we’d like. Know, however, that once we return to the U.S., we would really like to connect with you, answer any questions you may have, and see if this new direction resonates with you. For now, please pray specifically for the following:

  • that God would give us clear guidance through His Word and your input in upcoming decisions.
  • for continued prayer and financial support for our ministry.
  • that God would make the path to the right seminary clear.
  • for the logistics of moving and “closing” our life in Germany. Pray for good “goodbyes” with our friends in Germany – this will be very hard for us.
  • for Laura, Lilli, and me as we go through a significant amount of transition from now until we’ve settled next fall.

Thank you so much for praying! So many of you have expressed your love and support of us while we’ve been in the U.S. We are very thankful for that. We hope that we will be able to continue in partnership with you on behalf of the peoples of Europe!

In Christ,
Thadd, Laura, and Lilli Davis

]]> http://www.wereonamission.org/updates/blog/656/feed 0 Leaving FL and other things http://www.wereonamission.org/updates/blog/614 http://www.wereonamission.org/updates/blog/614#comments Tue, 01 Dec 2009 01:25:21 +0000 Laura http://www.wereonamission.org/?p=614 Well, we leave FL tomorrow morning bright and early.  We’ll be flying into Atlanta and arriving in Birmingham to speak with a small group tomorrow night.  We’re excited to share what God is doing in Europe with a whole new set of people tomorrow.  Please pray for that presentation.

Our time in FL has been great.  We saw so many family members and so many friends while we were here.  We had some really encouraging conversations and made some great progress in our fund raising efforts.  God has been good!

Please pray for safe travels tomorrow and yet another adjustment for Lilli.  She is a trooper!  Also, please pray for healing for Thadd.  He’s been sick the last few days (no, not the Swine Flu).  And pray that Lilli and I would not get what he has!

We’ll be seeing some of you very soon!

Oh, and if you send us an email and we don’t respond – don’t take it personally.  We may be without internet for a few days.

]]> http://www.wereonamission.org/updates/blog/614/feed 1 We arrived! http://www.wereonamission.org/updates/blog/591 http://www.wereonamission.org/updates/blog/591#comments Wed, 11 Nov 2009 20:52:16 +0000 Laura http://www.wereonamission.org/?p=591 We arrived safely yesterday (Nov 10) at 8:20p, FL time. Lilli did great. We had an extra seat between us on the flight from Zürich to Newark so she was able to chill in her car seat. A few people commented that they didn’t even know there was a baby on board. Our flight from Newark to Tampa was a bit more crowded so Lilli had to sleep on Thadd’s lap. The guy in the window seat next to him was nice and jumped over Thadd and Lilli when he had to go to the bathroom so we didn’t have to wake her :-) We picked up our car from an organization that loans cars out to missionaries as their ministry (Missionary Ministries) and got back to Laura’s parent’s house around 10:30p. Lilli slept fairly well during the night, but has had a rough day with her naps. We’re sure she’ll adjust soon. The coming days are packed with visits with family and friends as well as speaking at churches and youth groups. We’re excited about our time in FL, but know it will be busy!

Please pray for:

  • The many conversations with friends and family
  • Balancing time with friends and family
  • Lilli to adjust well to being out and visiting people a lot
  • Energy and passion when relating God’s work in Europe
  • God to be honored and glorified in our support raising
]]> http://www.wereonamission.org/updates/blog/591/feed 0 English Evenings http://www.wereonamission.org/partnering/prayer/562 http://www.wereonamission.org/partnering/prayer/562#comments Fri, 30 Oct 2009 11:46:12 +0000 Laura http://www.wereonamission.org/?p=562 Every Monday night from the beginning of October until the end of November, a group of GEM missionaries is holding a conversational English meeting in a church in Müllheim, Germany. This coming week, they hope to have 23 Germans attend. This is the second time they’ve offered this to the community and the first time, it was a great success. The premise is to offer a casual atmosphere for non-native English speakers to come and simply converse with native English speakers. This approach is extremely successful for bridging the gap between churches and their communities. Whenever we tell people that Thadd is an English teacher, the reaction we get most often is “I want to learn English (or I want to speak better, etc)” and the follow-up response is “Would you tutor me (or do you know where I could go)?” Now, if we had an English Evening such as this in our community, we could hand them a flyer and encourage them to come. This is exactly what we have in the works. Thadd has met with the Pastor from our church, Stadtmission, and a few other key people to discuss how we might replicate English Evenings in Lörrach.  We hope to start something in the Spring.  This coming Monday, November 2, Thadd will go to Müllheim (45 minutes north from here) to be a part of the English Evening there in hopes of getting some ideas for what we might do here and to have some fun while he’s at it.  Thadd loves socializing in this capacity and he’s excited to meet some new people.  Our hope is that English can draw people into the church and show them a church that is radically different than the one they have in their minds because of the transforming love of Christ.

Please pray for:

  • Thadd and the other missionaries to be the fragrance of Christ to those that attend the November 2 English Evening
  • The English Evenings as they take place in Müllheim
  • Preparations for English Evenings to start at our church in the Spring
]]> http://www.wereonamission.org/partnering/prayer/562/feed 2 Our friend from Bible Study, Anita http://www.wereonamission.org/partnering/prayer/460 http://www.wereonamission.org/partnering/prayer/460#comments Sun, 25 Oct 2009 14:59:19 +0000 Laura http://www.wereonamission.org/?p=460 Please pray for Anita, a friend of ours from our Thursday night Bible Study. She has lupus and as a result had a kidney transplant a few years back. The kidney has since failed and she was doing dialisys 4 times a week. She took a turn for the wor…se a few months ago and had that kidney removed and has been hospitalized ever since. It looks like she may die. Her husband is from Nigeria and they were only married 5 years ago. Anita is 33. She has no more strength even to speak. She is a Christian, but she still is in so much bodily pain. Please pray for comfort for her and her husband in this time. Thank you.

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