In most of these blog posts, I focus on the mission work I’m blessed to be involved in – training African pastors to study, obey and teach God’s Word well. We have MANY faithful individuals and churches who regularly partner with us to do this important and desperately needed work, and we are grateful for our support team.
However, I have recently seen another example of partnership. We have been living in the Olympia, WA area for just over a year, and I’ve been using a corner of the basement for my office. It has been OK, but it is difficult when I’m talking to African pastors or doing other work late at night or early in the morning as it disturbs the family. So it has been a dream of Holly’s and mine to convert part of our detached garage and turn it into an office space for me.
The dream began to take shape late last July, and I want to share with you about the many hands that have participated in this dream becoming a reality. My good friend Steve Reid from Arizona flew up here with his boys and spent a few days with us. His boys played with our boys, and Steve and I put in about 60 hours over three days working at framing, insulating and dry walling the office space. The work was started and moving forward. Steve was a great blessing – a great partner!
Another friend from a local church, Ryan, began to pitch in, making several trips to our place to work on taping and texturing the walls. A couple other guys from church likewise helped with odds and ends, lending their expertise. A retired missionary from Papua New Guinea named Charles made a couple more visits to our home to help me with some electrical issues and putting in a heater. Another friend from church let me borrow a number of his tools so I could make more progress. I happened to meet another believer who helped with charging and vacuum pumping the heating/AC unit, and another friend named Nathan from another church has offered to gather a crew from his mission organization, Missionary Construction Teams, to build a porch cover in front of the office. Even Holly’s father came down a couple times from Puyallup to lend a hand and help along the way. My parents also made special contributions toward helping offset some of the costs of the project. And of course Holly was right there each step of the way offering support, help, and yummy food!
Although I did a ton of work on the office, there is NO WAY I could have done it all by myself. The teamwork and partnership of these and other dear brothers was absolutely essential.
In all of this, I am reminded of Paul’s words to the Romans in Romans 12. We are one body with many members, each having different gifts. God has not called everyone to train African pastors. He has called some to be construction workers, and use their gifts in various ways, such as helping a missionary to build an office from which he can do his work. Every time I sit in my office and do my work, I will remember the Steves, Ryans, Charles and Nathans and many others who partner with us to do our work. We are so very grateful, and as Paul says in Philippians 1:3-5 “I thank my God in all my remembrance of you, always offering prayer with joy in my every prayer for you all, in view of your participation in the gospel from the first day until now.”
(I hope to add a few more pictures after I put up shelves and move in. That will be in a few weeks when I return from Rwanda and Kenya!)
Pressing on with you, by God’s grace. Eric