Missionaries

Martin and Julia Etter

November 2008

Dear Friends,

Thank you for your prayers over the past weeks. We have known the Lord’s protection and goodness in so many ways. It’s been a full quarter since the beginning of August.

Family News:

Mum and Dad are adjusting to just one daughter at home and finding it not so easy. We miss all our girls. Miriam has made a good start in Harpenden, working mornings at Crabtree Playgroup and part time at the family pup ‘The George’, which is about opposite our old Veritas offices in the Harpenden High Street. Seems quite odd to think she is there. Our friends, Mike and Camilla Kinton, are providing the substitute family for Miriam, for which we are very thankful. The next step of her gap year is still open at the time of writing. Please pray for Miriam as she is looking into different possibilities. Rachel is actually enjoying her third year at Uni (to Mum & Dad’s great joy) and would probably finish her BA at the end of this academic year if she had not got to do Latin (basic requirement of all students studying with the faculty of philosophy) Nicola has successfully started her final two years at school. Julia’s mother is quite poorly health wise and can’t get around much anymore. Martin’s parents are getting on but still in very reasonable health. Martin’s Dad has just turned 89. We do miss not being closer to our loved ones and find it quite hard at times. Julia’s health is doing great, Martin’s has had several doses of antibiotics this year, particularly because of stomach problems. He fell ill in Zambia a few weeks ago and is just recovering from another bout of illness. He finds studying and working rather stressful. Thus our correspondence has also suffered a bit.

Work and ministry:

We have had the joy of seeing a Japanese lady, Kunika, give her life to the Lord in Julia’s Bible study for Asian women. There are just four of them now, as a number of Taiwanese have had to leave, due to Malawi government inviting the Chinese arriving to provide development aid here. Thus the Taiwanese closed their embassy and all workers had to leave. We are pleased that our 3 new staff members (yes most of our staff changed this year!) have settled in very well and are doing a good job. We really praise the Lord for providing Felia, Chrispin and Victor. In the past quarter we held 5 holistic development workshops, with the emphasis on conservation farming. Julia has been involved in teaching nutrition. We are really looking forward to see the participants (who are also going through our Bible training) begin to get better harvests at the end of this season. Conservation farming has huge potential if done properly. Our hope is to encourage the local churches see this as a way of outreach and ministry to farmers, both as an expression of the gospel and a bridge to the gospel. Victor has been visiting the groups monthly to provide encouragement and follow up.

Three weeks of Bible trainer’s training for pastors have also been completed and as I write, Chrispin is starting a week’s training in Blantyre together with Patrick Chapola. This is a new group of 16 pastors being trained as trainers for the church-based Bible training. Our apprenticeship programme, which Chrispin manages, is making better progress now that we have made some changes to our approach and Chrispin has been working hard at follow up. To have these apprentices is really beginning to help the large parishes, where one minister looks after 20 or more churches.

At the beginning of October, Martin visited Zambia to meet Frederick and Jane Bwalya  and our new team member there Patricia Phiri (secretary). We thank the Lord for her. The work in Zambia is making good progress, the challenge as always is to see the churches follow through on the training. The Bemba translation of module 1 has been completed (its one of the 3 main languages) and awaiting publishing.

Prayer needs and up coming events:

Training Courses:

Travel:

Please continue to pray for our teams, that the Lord will protect us from the enemy’s discouragements and attacks and that we would all walk pleasing in our Lord eyes. Above all continue to pray for the pastors who are training the grass root leaders. I believe that there is much change in the approach to ministry and training of leaders needed in Africa, if the church is going to make a greater difference for this struggling continent. The alternative is great nominalism in the future. Many pastors start with training grass root leaders. Currently an average of  50% of those who start complete a class in their church. We would really love to see more of them complete. Pray for perseverance and a right set of priorities for ministry. Continue to pray for another Bible teaching staff.

We are so looking forward to being united as a family over Christmas, when Rachel and Mim are coming home.

With much love in Christ

Martin & Julia
And Nicola

 

 

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