Cars are for Missions too

I still remember the words well from Russell Howard when we were working together to lead an evangelism team here in North Italy. It was his turn to lead our devotional time with a gospel exhortation and he touched on a reality that I'll never forget. He suggested that since God is both Creator and Sustainer, bringing all things into being then we must conclude that all modern technologies are also brought into being by God himself through man.

We have Skype for example, because God brought it into being so that missionaries could communicate with family far away while they labor to bring the gospel to distant peoples. We have phones so that missionaries could simplify their work and reach more people for the gospel. The same is true for computers, gadgets and even means of transportation such as cars and planes. God brought these things into being, above all for the sake of the preaching of the gospel. Missionaries benefit from these things, most importantly, and everyone else on the planet who benefits from them are blessed as well, by means of common grace we could say.

It's a striking thought isn't...?

I remembered this today, because recently our VW car randomly died on us. Though it was running flawless and all was in order, the timing belt, though new, managed to skip a tooth and as a result valves were damaged. Now the labor to fix our car is more than the value of our car. It's old and it served us well, but it is no longer useful to us so we had to have it taken away to the dump. For the moment we are without a car. We're not sure exactly how we are going to get by because a car is essential to our work as church planters. We are constantly involved in 'going' to the people. Our job of going doesn't stop when we leave America. But we are trusting the Lord, that this is according to His good and perfect plan. He desired for this vehicle's life to come to an end because He has something else in mind for us.

Will you please join us in prayer for this? We are looking into one option known as long-term rental. Other missionaries on our team here in Italy who worked previously in the car business confirm to us that it's the best way to go. It involves a monthly payment which includes insurance, all maintenance, all checkups, all tax payments. It would greatly simplify our life here to free us up for more gospel ministry. And one of new church members happens to work in the field. For this we would need a small monthly support increase (one couple who supporters us already committed to paying part of the expense for the first year). Would you be interested in covering the other part of the expense?