April 2019
Dear Friends in Christ,
We had a wonderful day yesterday on the Navajo Reservation. Sam was the moderator for the ordination of 3 men from the Tuba City Baptist church; George Adson, Clifford Hyden and Alfred Hyden. These 3 men have been leaders in the church for years and were a real blessing to us when we served there as interim pastor. The church has several older folk that speak only Navajo and also younger adults that speak only English. The schedule allowed for morning services in Navajo while the English SS was taught. Then everyone switched rooms and the English worship service was held while the Navajo SS class was taught. These men took turns preaching in their Navajo language. The purpose for the ordination is to send them out to other Reservation churches to preach. For 3 years, these men sat in Sam’s doctrine classes each Sunday afternoon for 2 hrs. What a joy to see them putting to use the teaching and training.
This coming week-end, Janet is to speak at a ladies’ banquet on the Yavapai-Apache Reservation. Pray for her as she travels and that is will be a help to the ladies as they spend time together in God’s Word.
Sam now has tickets to Thorne Bay from June 25-July 19. Please pray with us that the needed supplies will be ready for this summer’s projects and that we can continue to build and stay out of debt. This summer we hope to see the skirting put on the foundation and the wood stove installed. We have all that is needed to put in the stove, just needs to be done. Once this is completed, workers can stay in the cabin and work on completion at any time of the year that is convenient for them. There are no volunteer work crews this summer, so pray for Sam to get much accomplished and maybe find some local Christian men to pitch in.
Our calendar between Christmas and Easter are usually pretty free and a good time to schedule annual check-ups, dental work, eyes, ears… It’s easy to share with you scheduled events, but harder to share the ministry to individuals while visiting and counseling. The personal struggles are not ours to share but we do appreciate your prayers for wisdom as we pray with them and try to encourage. Thank you.
This past year, our old wood truck has been in the shop and for the first time, our yard was emptied of firewood. God met our needs for the winter (our wood stove is our main heat source for the house) but it is now time to restock for the coming winter. Pray for Sam as he travels up the mt. for our firewood and for safety as he cuts and loads up the truck. It’s been a year and he needs to get back in shape for this type of labor.
We have plans to visit Sam jr.’s family in Alaska from May 28-June 4. This is when we normally get out another letter so we don’t expect to send one out next month. We don’t get to spend much time with our family and Sam’s family rarely gets to NC for the Thanksgiving family time. Pray with us as we travel and for a good time together with Sam, Amber and the 3 boys (ages 2-7)
Thank you to each of you for your prayers for us and the ministry God has put us in. You are a blessing to us.
II Cor. 2:11 “Ye also helping together by prayer for us.”
In Christ,
Sam & Janet Grammer