SPRING 2011

The kids hanging with our good friend, Judah

First things first: this is the longest I have taken in between the writing of two newsletters since we moved back to Europe in June of 2004. My sincerest apologies. Hopefully this update will help to fill in some of the blanks.

Happy Birthday Kara! We miss you, Charis!

Happy Birthday Mikayla Ann!

CCBCE

The last time I wrote, there were definitely some prayer requests. Good news in this update: God is good (I know: "surprise, surprise" right?). The semester definitely finished well; thank you so much for the prayers. Seems like everyone over here is excited about what God has in store for the ministry here at the Bible College.

WHEELS

Speaking of answered prayers, we have a van. I repeat, we have a van. More on this in a second, but for now: thank you for praying. It is actually the same type (and a little nicer!) as the one we had last year. It is very nice to be able to get around at a whim again (but at +/- $8 a gallon... "at a whim" isn't all that often). We're making some payments on it, but it should be all taken care of by next fall.

Lola, taking a break from her rigorous Frisbee workout session

SUMMER

Summer is officially upon us here at the Bible College. We've gone from school mode to conference center mode and we're ready to rumble. Tomorrow is day #1 of our annual Foundations Conference for pastors, missionaries, and national leaders from all over Eastern Europe. We'll have around 350 guests descending upon the premises for the conference. Along with conference season, we're also gearing up for our six week summer school of discipleship: A Vision for Life. We have around 25 students starting up in about a week and a half. Feel more than free to pray for: Foundations Conference, AVFL, the rest of the summer conferences, as well as our serving crew. I'll most likely be slightly busier than expected this summer; more on that in a second as well.

SCANDINAVIA

Feel free to pray for me come August (well, you can pray for me before then, too). I will be traveling to Sweden for the Calvary Chapel Scandinavian Conference. I was invited to teach at the conference, and I will be joining an awesome team of pastors that will be sharing God's Word with His people. The conference is 3-7 August. "Nervousness" and "excitement" generally sum up my thoughts on the subject.

BIRTHDAYS

Mikayla is now officially six years old. This week I celebrated my "spiritual birthday" - the anniversary of when I gave my life to Jesus Christ back in 1993. I have now been a Christian for half of my life. What a wild ride it has been! For those people that think that following Jesus seems boring, you literally haven't the slightest idea what you're talking about! My "regular" birthday was the other day and so I'm now one year older. Kara's 8th birthday was on Saturday (June 18). What did I want for my birthday, you ask? Nothing special. Just an iPad 2. (Insert token laughter here.) As my good friend Arpi likes to say, "It isn't your birthday that makes you older, it is the other 364 days."

VACATION - REALLY?

For whatever reason, it always sounds odd to hear about missionaries taking a "holiday." "Time off" traditionally translates to "furlough" in mission-speak, but tradition aside, we're going to try to take four or five days and go to Germany in early July. One of the perks of actually owning a car.

SMALL DROPLETS OF SLIGHTLY SALINATED MOISTURE FROM THE EYES

Good news / bad news about the van. The reason we were able to get this van is because one of our team families needed to head back to the States. We said goodbye to the Beller family last week. Kim is pregnant and it is a high-risk pregnancy. They have a heart for another spot on planet earth as well, so part of their decision was based on the pregnancy, but part of it was based on their hope to launch to the next stop in their ministry. Pray for them for sure, and also pray for us as we fill in the blanks for the college and conference center. Caleb was our pastor in charge of conferences and his wisdom with that will certainly be missed this summer!

And there you have it. As my dad likes to say, "It's all part of the adventure." There are certainly very few dull moments around here.

Thanks again for all the prayers - we need them.

Continue to pray for the Bible College - we're excited to see what God has in store for us over here.

Pray for us this summer as the conference season is a very busy part of CCBCE's calendar year.

Allergies is another one to pray for (er... to pray against). They tend to hit pretty hard for most of the Foster family this time of year here in Hungary.

Thanks again for everyone's patience in between newsletters. Hopefully things will begin to settle down a bit over here and I will be able to get back to a normal monthly routine with writing again.

God bless you all!

Thanks so much for all that you do for us to enable us to do what we do here!

Jeremy, Christi, Ian, Leah, Kara, and Mikayla