Dear Ones in Christ,
\nA Christmas card we received stated it so well:
\n\u201cJESUS is – The Lamb of God, to die for our sins.
\nThe Prince of Peace, to change out hearts.
\nThe Good Shepherd, to guide our lives.\u201d
\nOur prayer is that each one reading this might know Jesus Christ in this way.<\/p>\n
We sent our last semi-annual newsletter in August. Events since then were:
\n*Sept. 4 – Celebrating the birth of precious little Aletheia Joy, born to the family of Paul & Naomi
\nSondergaard, our Youth Pastor & wife.
\n*Great visits in Sept., Oct., & Nov., from several friends and family members from Indiana.
\n*In Oct., we attended the annual IBIMI board meeting in Yuma and also the wedding of Lydia Veldhuis,
\ndaughter of fellow-missionaries Mike & Dawn Veldhuis.
\n*Nov. 14 was a special day of remembrance. It was twenty years ago on Nov. 2 we were privileged to have a
\npart in the Lord’s beginning Yavapai- Apache Baptist Church (now Living Waters Baptist Church.) What a
\nblessing to review pictures of the Lord’s working during those years up to the present. We enjoyed wonderful
\ntime of food and fellowship after the service with over 40 in attendance.
\n*Dec. has been a busy month with the ladies Christmas party at our home. It was a fun-filled evening with
\nnine ladies attending.
\n*The children’s Christmas play was held on Dec. 18th. It was based on the story of the candy cane and how it
\nrepresents Christ. Naomi did a wonderful job putting together the play and the children did their parts well.
\nWe were thrilled to have several of the children’s family members attend. A blessing was seeing, after the
\nmessage, that God had worked in the hearts of parents.<\/p>\n
OUR FAMILY;
\n*Kirt, Elida, Joseph (7) and Micah (6) still live in Glendale, AZ. Kirt is doing well after his triple bypass
\nsurgery last January. So thankful for God’s healing in his behalf. Kirt continues his work as composite
\nartist for the Phoenix Police Dept. Thinking ahead to retirement years, they have developed their own coffee
\nbusiness, ROYAL SOLITUDE COFFEE, a product of Elida’s family plantation in El Salvador. Elida is busy
\nwith that, but mainly taking good care of her family. Both boys were involved in flag football this fall.
\nJoseph is taking guitar lessons, and Micah would also like to begin lessons. They are such fun and are
\ngrowing so fast!
\n*JD, Jenny, Jake (20), Zac (18), Hunter (15), and MaKayla (10) still reside in Conway, Arkansas. Having
\njust completed their third year of ministry at Grace Baptist Church, they are very busy, but enjoy the work
\nthere. Jake & Zac are both attending Central Baptist College. Jake is a Junior and Zac is a Freshman.
\nThe year seems to be going well for them. Jenny continues to homeschool Hunter, & MaKayla. Hunter’s
\nfavorite pastime is playing basketball on a homeschool team. MaKayla loves drawing and crafts. Our
\ngrandchildren are a tremendous blessing from the Lord!<\/p>\n
We are so looking forward to Christmas with our family Dec. 28-31. We haven’t seen Jenny’s family since June, so needless to say, we are counting the days!<\/p>\n
As we end this 2016 and launch into a new year, our desire is that in all we do God would receive glory, and that we would see fruit from God’s working in us and through us. Wishing you a very Merry Christmas and a blessed New Year.<\/p>\n
Love in Him,
\nGary & Beverly Messick<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Dear Ones in Christ, A Christmas card we received stated it so well: \u201cJESUS is – The Lamb of God, to die for our sins. The Prince of Peace, to change out hearts. The Good Shepherd, to guide our lives.\u201d Our prayer is that each one reading this might know Jesus Christ in this way. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_themeisle_gutenberg_block_has_review":false,"hide_page_title":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[53,8,7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1426","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-53","category-messick-missionary-letters","category-missionary-letters"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ibimi.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1426","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ibimi.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ibimi.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ibimi.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ibimi.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1426"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/ibimi.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1426\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1427,"href":"https:\/\/ibimi.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1426\/revisions\/1427"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ibimi.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1426"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ibimi.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1426"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ibimi.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1426"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}