Alright, it's good to be here. As you said, my name is Kevin. Yeah, Blakey and I am from a manual.
Mission, on the Navajo reservation. And, which is kind of right by the 4 corners that you can imagine Utah.
Arizona, Colorado, and New Mexico, right in the 4 Corners area. So thank you for allowing me to share with you this evening.
I've lived in Wisconsin for 9 years before. We, me and my family moved to Arizona.
But I never been to this chapel before, so. Thank you for allowing me to come and share with you.
About what God is doing on the Navajo reservation.
I want to, as I. Go through my slides here. I really want you guys to see the faithfulness of God.
As he has had this ministry. From a manual mission, Manuel Mission has been there for a hundred years.
This coming year. So we're at 99 years. And. The Lord has had this ministry, this light.
On the reservation. The Navajo. Reservation is very large. It's about the size of West Virginia.
And when you go to the mission. You get off the highway and you drive about 7 miles down this paved road and then you go about another 7 miles.
Down a dirt road and you kind of see houses here and houses there, but you kind of think why in the world is there a mission way out here?
In the middle of nowhere. Why would there be a mission here? And obviously we know the big reason is because There's a people there that need to hear the good news.
They need to hear the gospel. The particular area that we are in in the 4 Corners area is really a a place where a lot of medicine men from the tribe all gather and they it's a very spiritual Stronghold there.
And they come to receive. Hour there. For their essentially their witchcraft and their rituals and the things they're doing.
And so it is a very dark place. The enemy has a lot of strongholds there.
And so when you're looking in that light, it makes sense that God would plant a beacon of lights.
Right where he did about a hundred years ago.
So the mission has been there about a hundred years. At the mission. We have a chapel.
They're on the mission. We have probably 40. To 70 people coming on a Sunday morning.
To worship together brothers and sisters in the Lord. And then we also have a school, our school is preschool through eighth grade.
And so a lot of the ministry we do through the school is reaching the younger generations. For a long time we had a high school.
We close that down about 5 years ago, because of just Staff. Needs at the time.
We didn't have another high school principal to take over. So we are a preschool through eighth grade.
And we have about 50, 55 students that come to our school. During the school year.
The school is
The whole mission is funded by believers. Around the country and even around the world as support us. We don't fundraise.
We don't ask for money. We trust in the lower. It is his faithfulness. That has kept the mission there for so long.
Reaching these these folks out there, these brothers or these. There's people group who desperately need the gospel.
And so we. We provide. Breakfast and lunch to the students that come to the school.
We don't charge a fee. For coming to the school. We bus. Students in our bus routes go about 15 miles away and then come back.
We have 2 different bus routes. And so
We are.
Excited about reaching people with a gospel. The mission has a number of other ministries.
That it does as well. And, And I'm gonna share a few of those. With you.
But before I do, I want to show you my family. Me and my wife moved to the mission 8 years ago.
We moved from a little bit north of Green Bay here. We have been commended by Fox Valley Bible Chapel.
And we have 7 boys. Our oldest just graduated high school. And he'll be moving up to Colorado this this fall and our youngest.
Was just born in December, so he's about 8 months old.
Originally when we came to the mission 8 years ago. I came to teach the Vote class for the high school.
So I taught auto mechanics. For the first year that I was there. And then soon after that, our bus.
Mechanic wanted to retire and so. I offer to, jump into that role of being the bus mechanic.
And the mechanical for the vision vehicles, the vans and the pickup truck and everything else that breaks down there.
And which is often and to that point. Which was often considered the community can mechanic as well.
And so, my hands were quite full.
I'm gonna have some credit cards later and it has all my boys names on there.
But I'd like to ask for prayer for our family specifically. As we are seeking to honor the Lord in the ministry there.
Specifically for my oldest sons my son Timothy who will be Going to camp in this in the fall here in August and number of weeks He's gonna be going to their gap year program, which is a program for that train, train students to work at a camp.
And so he'll begin getting experience in all the different aspects. Of can't work from working in the kitchen to maintenance to counseling.
To being a lifeguard having CPR and first aid training and all kinds of things like that.
He's
Gonna be going through. While he's there going through some biblical studies from Colorado Christian University.
As well. And so he kinda has 9 months of training and then he'll be going to going and working as the camp for 3 months.
For next summer. So it's an exciting time for him. It's also A time of growth for all our whole family.
As we. See him go and kind of going on his own and so you'd be praying for our family is, We're kind of adjusting to all that change.
And praying for him. He, he said. That it's clear that the Lord wants him to go, but he himself is not so sure he wants to go.
When he finally made the decision to go. He We called. The director at the camp and we're kinda asking about the finances and everything and it costs about $4,600 to go to this camp.
For for the Gap year program and and as we're talking to him, he said, well, You don't have to worry about the payment because somebody called months ago.
And they've just been waiting for your decision because they want to pay for for his year. And so that was a big step in my son Timothy's life because he could see God was already planning.
He was already preparing the path. And the way before he even got there. And so I'm excited for my son in his own life.
I mean, he's seen God be faithful for in our lives and as a family, but him personally.
This was a big, thing for him. To see God's faithfulness that before he was even ready to make a decision god was already preparing the way so God is very faithful to us.
He's very faithful. I never thought I would have a, a, a son who's graduated from high school and also a newborn at the same time.
So it's, challenging and as Most of us know newborns take a lot of time and energy and But it's really been great.
I mean, I have 5 helpers. That live with us. So, but it's been a year of girls for our family.
There's a this about 3 years ago. We, moved off the mission compound.
The mission compound is about 8 acres and it has the school on there. It has all the mechanics shop we have a bus barn for doing all the mission vehicle maintenance we have a Votech building a full it has a full shopping it for, automotive welding all kinds of stuff.
And then the majority of the staff live on the campus. There. But about 3 and a half, 4 years ago.
We were praying about the opportunity to move off the mission. Because there's still a lot of walls up in the community.
They kinda see. The mission as, well, that's the staff, that's the mission, they're the workers.
And they live in nice houses. At least compared to They're nothing fancy, but compared to what most Navajo live in, they're really nice homes.
And so they Kinda well that's the staff and we're over here and there's these walls of separation and we really wanted to break some of that down.
So we were praying that the Lord would allow us to be able to move. Off the mission and into a home into the community.
And. To be able to live more like the people with the people. And so the Lord allowed us to do that and it's been a huge blessing.
It's allowed us to build relationships that that we would not have been able to if we didn't.
So, but the lower also has a sense of humor because when we did that, we moved into a house that was for for 9 years.
And it was right in the time of COVID that this happened. And so though the house had utilities hooked up to it, we could not get them on.
Because they wanted the lady that owns the house to come in and fill out all the paperwork. And she happened to live in Kansas at the time.
And so we were living in a house with no water and no electricity. We lived without water for about 8 months.
So we really live like the people because there's many Navajo that do not have running water and do not have electricity.
And so it was a great experience for us. We did live out that water for about 8 months we had a haul our water we had to have our water tanks on our trailer and we have to go to the windmills or go up to Red Mesa, fill up our big water tanks and come back and and put it in our other teams.
And at the time we got Because we had no idea how long. We were gonna be without utilities.
About after 4 months or 3, 4 months living there, we finally got a little solar unit. For to run our fridge.
And it could run our washer and dryer on a very sunny day right in the middle of the day and it could charge our cell phones and stuff like that.
And so, we were able to do that and then. You know, if we wanted to watch a movie in the evening or something like that, we had to go out and turn on the gas generator.
If it was a really cloudy day for a couple of days in a row we had to go out and run our our generator gas generator to keep the electricity to the house and but this So we did that for about 3 years, 3 and a half years.
And then. Back in November. We were finally through the Lord's help able to get our electricity turned back on.
They wanted to charge about $4,000 to be able to turn it back on. And at that point we're like, well, we can't afford this.
So, but our solar generator was starting to kind of go downhill. The batteries weren't staying charged and things like that.
And So we were having issues with our fridge. Not being able to run enough. Especially in the summertime.
And with a new baby coming. My wife really needed to be able to use her wash and dryer when she needed to be able to use them.
And so we're praying about it and After we got that quote for $4,000.
We were talking to a friend of ours who worked at the utility company. He worked on the water side of the utility company and not the electric.
And he was able to help find. A electrician. That works with the utility company that was able to come in and he.
Went into the utility office and said, okay, what is the bare minimum that needs to be done? To be able to get the electric turn back on this house.
And so he He talked to them and then he came and he looked at it. And he said, okay, well, it'll be about $800.
Instead of $4,000. And so we're just praising the Lord for that. His faithfulness to us.
And so we were. Excited to get electric on. So they came and they turned. The electric on.
And it ended up only half of our house. Works the other half The outlets, the lights, nothing worked on it.
And we're like, okay, now what? So we were praying about it and that was right around the time.
When. Josiah and Anna, We're coming with their 7 kids. And Anna is a midwife and she was coming to be a midwife for my wife for delivering our baby.
And, I didn't know it, but. Josiah turns out to be an electrician.
So he was able to over the next couple of weeks help me rewire everything and figure out all the wiring in the house.
To be able to get all the lights working. And all the outlets working. And then, he ended up.
Talking to his church and they ended up buying us all a new LED lights for our whole house. So God has just been so faithful.
To us. Just time and a time again. Another bonus to having electricity is now that after 3 years we can finally have a swamp cooler.
For A/C in our home. And so that has been a huge, blessing for us. Because Hey, it gets hot in Arizona.
It hasn't been very hot this year. It's only been about a hundred degrees.
For the last number of weeks. So we've been blessed not to have the 100 1,015 degree weather yet.
And I'm hoping it will just kind of not come, but. When you don't have a spot in the summer, especially when it gets really warm out.
To be able to just cool down. It gets to you after a while. It's it's hard.
Especially when you grew up spoiled away having A/C. So It's been a huge blessing.
For us.
I just wanna share quickly a little bit about the culture. I was a Navajo people.
It's a matriarchal society, which means The women are the boss.
And so. In their culture, they kind of view men as just kind of the servants. They are just there to really just do whatever they want you to do.
They don't really have much status in life. They don't have much. Worth except for Did you do the cooking, the cleaning, fix the car, do the yard work.
And just kind of be the servant of the family. And in that's kind of a society, you see that men are pushed down.
Men are told you're worthless. And so. Most of the families. That we come in contact with.
The the dad of the kids usually is not around. It leaves broken families. So there is a lot of.
Substance abuse, drugs, alcohol, broken families where most of the time the dads not even in the picture.
And the mom has kids with a number of different dads because marriage is hardly existence. Out there. They just have partners and when they're done with that partner, they go kinda go on to the next one and.
So there's not much marriage. In that culture. So is it very broken culture? Their, religion It's hard to get a real good grasp on exactly what do they believe.
Because a lot of the They'll talk to you and they'll listen. About the Bible, the list about God, the listen about Christ.
But they don't really want to let you into what they really believe and what they really think. So a lot of the more traditional people.
Really won't say a whole lot about their religion But in general, they believe in. Earthly people and heavenly people.
They leave the heavenly people you have to please you have to you pray to them and you want to keep harmony.
With everything. I. You have to keep harmony, otherwise you're going to upset. Some spirit and that's spirit will put a curse on you.
So it's a very beautiful. Place. Very superstitious. A lot of the people.
Have all kinds of superstitions you can't go into a home and take your shoes off Most of them were shoes even to bed because You have to be ready to go.
If something happens in the middle night, you have to be ready to go. If there's a coyote that crosses the road.
Nbsp. They'll stop. They'll turn around and go home. They won't cross that coyotes pass.
Because that's gonna put a curse on you. And depending on what's direction.
The coyote went. Depends on the curse that's gonna happen. And all the way leading up to death.
So it's a very superstitious. They
They are just trying to stay in harmony with nature with the spirits so they don't cause commotion and don't essentially try not to get a cursed.
So there are some. St, struggles with a gospel that we can be praying about.
The and their language. There is no word for forgiveness.
Because they don't see they have a need for forgiveness. They don't see themselves as bad people because they're always trying to appease the spirits.
So when there's a dispute or an arguments. In the home. They just kinda wash over it.
Our neighbors who one of them struggles with alcohol and so there's many times where he's out and he's driving his truck and he'll run off the road and Get stuck.
Or he's running around with a gun and or something like that and you know, he'll frighten the whole family.
Week after week after week and all that happens is One he's sobers up, he comes back home and they don't even talk about it because There's no word for forgiveness.
There's no need. They just cover it up and keep going. There's no accountability.
And so this makes it hard for them. To see themselves as sinners. It makes it hard for them to understand that.
There's centers and they are in need of a save here. They need Somebody to save them because they can't do it on their own.
They're trying and they're good works. To try to keep. In peace with the spirits.
There The spirits that they're praying to are obviously evil spirits. And their ceremonies and in their rituals.
They see real power. In the spirits. We had a A teenage girl telling us a couple weeks ago how she was going to a squad dance, which is usually a healing ceremony.
And that's. She was kind of the guest of honor for this ceremony. And so she was going to the ceremony and usually it's 5 to 7 days long And so they were praying to the spirits over this woman in a wheelchair who couldn't walk.
And, as a The first night she said that this woman couldn't get out of her wheelchair.
She said the second night this woman started to be able to walk that she had the third night this woman was up dancing and singing with them.
And so they see power. From these spirits. So the hard thing comes in is that we come with the true gospel.
Of Christ. And we say, no, that's wrong. And here is the one and only true God.
Who is all power from they say, well, why do I need that when II already know there's power over here.
And the devil has them blinded. Cause we know the power that Satan has only leads to to see or deceive them.
From that they really can have. That they can really have salvation. And so.
Many Navajo We have a lot of Navajo that will say yeah, I believe in Jesus.
Or they'll come to church or they come to the mission. They'll hear the messages and you could ask them questions and they have all the right answers.
But they truly haven't put their faith in Lord because they're still holding on. To the traditional ways because they're still in their mind and their hearts are still saying, well, This is what is powerful over here.
And they don't see their need. For a savior.
They don't see that Jesus is the only way. He is the one true God and he is all powerful.
And he is the only one that will truly bring freedom is the only one that truly bring hope and peace.
The spirits they can't do that. They might have power, but they they can't do what Jesus can do.
And so these are ways. So we praying because these are our spiritual strongholds. That are holding a lot of the knob whole people back.
From seeing the truth of the gospel, from seeing their need. For a savior.
So we have the. Emmanuel Navajo Chapel. That's a mission and
This chapel we have. Like I said, 40, 50 to 70 people. Coming on a Sunday morning.
And, we've been seeing it grow. Despite the strongholds despite. The work of the enemy despite the the spiritual strongholds God is doing a great thing here on the Navajo Reservation.
People are coming to know the Lord. Over the last couple of years, we've seen a number of people come to salvation.
Through Christ. And we're seeing people using their spiritual gifts. We're seeing people wanting to serve, wanting to help.
At the church and as at the mission as a whole. This past year we recognized 6 deacons in our chapel.
To help with service. To serving the people of the chapel. Though we do have one.
Kind of big prayer request. And that is we do need a Navajo speaking. Brother to share on Sunday mornings.
We need somebody who can speak in their own language. The The language in in a lot of ways is a dying language.
You kind of have generations. The very young generation don't speak any Navajo, but maybe a few words.
You have kind of the the 20 to to 40 year olds that maybe speak a little bit of Navajo.
Usually they can listen to it and understand some of it or even most of it, but they don't really speak it.
At all. And then you have kind of the 40 to 65 70 year olds who Mainly speak, Navajo.
But they understand the English fairly well. Well, they mainly speak, But then you have, you know, 65, seventys and up.
Who don't know any English. And only know Navajo. They might know a little bit of English, but We have a number of outer leaves that are coming to our chapel who are very gracious and they come and they sit and they listen to the message but they really don't take a whole lot of it up.
Because it's not in their own language. And so we are praying for. A.
Hey, godly man to come and be able to share in the novel language. About the Lord and be able to share and teach from the Word of God.
And we do have. One, He's in his early thirties. Bye. He doesn't speak very good, And even those who speak Navajo.
I've been told by a number of people that even if you speak Navajo, it's still hard to.
To teach and preach in Navajo because there are so many words in the Bible that don't have a direct translation.
And so you have to describe. Different things and in different ways. And so it's even hard to share.
For another whole person who speaks Navajo well for them to share in Navajo. And.
But we need somebody to come and speak. And so. We would really appreciate prayer. On this.
For our chapel there to have a novel speaking. Rather to share on Sunday mornings.
Here's our open shop ministry. And there is me and one of my sons. But most of my sons come and help.
And there have a group of other Navajo brothers who come and help as well. We do Open Shop.
Usually every Thursday. From 9 to 3, we open up our Votack building and as you can see, we have a lift in there.
We have. We can fit at least 3, 4 cars in there at a time. Into the shop.
And so we invite guys from the community to come in and work on their vehicles. And to be able to.
Fix the vehicles themselves so they can use the lift, they can use the tools. And then usually I'm there and a few other guys to just kinda.
Help as needed. Most of the guys. That come.
Have a fairly good knowledge of cars. Even though they'll say, oh, I don't know how to fix anything.
But they probably know more than I do because they've had to do it their whole entire life. And, but we, have the shop there so that.
You know in the summer they can get some shade and get out of the wind and and in the winter they have a warm place to work on their vehicles.
At the same time, we serve lunch. My wife is very gracious and she feeds everybody lunch and we have anywhere from 30 people show up.
This past year, a little bit, the numbers have gone down a little bit this past year, but.
And then I'll share, a devotion with everybody. Me or one or the other.
Believers there. And so it's been a really nice good ministry. I started this ministry about 5.
Years or so ago. Because like I said, as the bus mechanic. I was also the community mechanic.
And so I would constantly have people coming to me. Oh, can you help me fix my car? Can you help me fix my car?
And I said, had to keep saying no, I can't because I have too many bus things to work on and I don't have time for everything.
But the past bus mechanics have always helped in the community and so it was just kind of expected.
So instead, I said. Let's have one day a week where we can get together and we can work on cars together.
And so that's kinda how this ministry came about. We also work on a lot of elderly people's vehicles.
In the community who can't physically work on the cars and and financially. It's difficult to go to town drive all the way to town and then pay somebody.
To fix it and so we were there to help them. So we are I am asking for prayer because This ministry, though we're only open one day a week, It takes number of days to go look at cars and visit people and and try to diagnose all the cars.
So it's ready to, be there on that day. And so it it takes quite a lot of time.
And Yeah, as my family's changing a little bit and. It's getting harder for me to be able to do it and a number of guys that were helping me.
Have kind of, because of other responsibilities they've taken on are not able to be there as much.
And so I am praying about maybe. Going down to maybe one once a month. With an open only open the shop up once a month.
Instead of every single week. So you'd be praying with me just for God's wisdom on that.
It's a great ministry. I love this ministry. But I also have to prioritize.
What is best for our family and what's best for. The other ministries that I'm also involved with.
The other ministry that I lead is the team ministry. Which is, we have groups from kind of all over.
The country that come out and they do work projects and they do VBSs. And so when they do a VBS, you can kind of see that bottom picture.
That's Where we're at one of the houses. When we do VBS is we go to different Navajo homes.
And we set up and. We usually do 3 or 4 nights in a row. To homes and share the gospel play games with kids.
It's kind of neat because when you're going to these homes The ministry is not just reaching the kids, it's reaching the whole home.
So if mom or maybe if dad's there or grandparents or siblings everybody kinda gets involved.
And so they're all here in the gospel. And if we do it at the mission, which we do here and there.
Sometimes we we're not able to reach the same people group. So, same people that we would if we go to their home.
People are a lot more comfortable at their home. They feel more relaxed, they feel they open up better.
To and warm up better to those visiting Lot of the homes. I'm praising the Lord this year because We've been able to go to a number of homes.
This summer that are the parents are traditional. Which means they believe the traditional religion. And their parents won't come to the mission at all.
If ever, because they They don't want anything to do with it. But because, The kids come to the school.
That the parents have been opened up to, okay, well, you can do a VBS here.
And so there's one home that we were able to do a VBS at and the mom.
Is, an alcoholic. She's addicted to drugs. She's extremely traditional.
But the kids. Have come through the school. Some of them have put their faith in the Lord and some of them haven't.
But they all come and hang out at the school. They all come and With the mom will not. And so we were able to do a VBS at their house.
That's and I think this is the first time we've ever been able to go that particular home.
So I'm praising the Lord for that. There was another family that we were able to go and it's a very traditional family.
Who? The kids occasionally come to the mission. But generally they don't. But there's one little girl there.
Her name is Summer and she's about 10 years old. And she's a believer.
She's come to the school and she's put her faith in the Lord. And so it's because, this one little girl that her parents finally said, okay, you could have a VBS here.
Because she, this little girl. Really wanted to have a VBS there. And so, it's just an encouragement to be able to go to new homes.
That we typically haven't been able to go to before. And I, and it's a very encouraging thing, especially for this little girl summer who is really by herself in her face.
Because her parents won't bring her to church. Her parents don't bring her. So that allow her to come for school at the mission, but other than that, they really don't have a whole lot to do with.
With the mission. And, so when this little girl goes home, she doesn't have really a lot of encouragement.
For her walk and that's that's what a lot of the kids that we That come to our school and that they put their faith in Lord and they go home and they don't have a lot of encouragement.
That might be allowed to come into school, but. The parents, they don't want to be Christians.
They, they don't want them to turn away from their traditional beliefs. And so sometimes they really persecute them and and other times.
They'll allow it, but. They're not getting any support.
We've also the summer been able to we've seen a an increase in how many kids have been coming to the VBSs.
Since especially since COVID. We were. Having VBS in the summer and we'd only see maybe a couple of kids.
2 3 kids. And then of course the mission kids. That live on the mission would come.
But not very many, but this year it seems like a lot of our VBS has had N, 10 to 1520 kids.
Coming. And so it's been a huge blessing. For a greater turnout To be able to hear the gospel.
And when we do, PBS at a home, usually it's their neighbors and everything that come and bring their kids.
And so we've seen kind of the whole community. Coming across. We'd even see people coming across the community to go to these VBSs.
And that's not very typical. So. We're excited about what the Lord's doing.
Through the VBS. The other part of the teams is we do work projects. And so there's a few pictures of some of the work projects that we've done this year.
The biggest project is, The project on the right up here and that is a an addition that we did to a house.
For an elderly lady in our community. She's actually the The mom of the lady that owns the house that I'm I live in.
But she's getting up there in age and, so she needs to live. Closer to her daughter.
To be able to help take care of her and keep an eye on her if she falls or gets hurt or just help cleaning and stuff like that and so We were able to put on an addition.
To her daughter's house. You can see the other picture is we painted a a house on the mission and replaced.
That whole side of signing. We were able to accomplish a septic field for another one of the houses on the mission.
The original house was a small little camp, mobile home. And then after you and then they put in this small little septic field and then after years they actually built another house there as a 4 bedroom house and so the septic field wasn't able to to hold the waste and so we put in a 50 by 15 for septic field for them.
And, We dug our big pit and then we had to go, we had teams go down to our wash and they had to collect rock by hand and go in and we filled in this big pit.
To put our pipes in and for the septic We've been able to replace the picture on the left there is of defense around the mission we have fencing around the mission that's Then 50 years old and the post were rotten out and we had horses and cows and donkeys coming in and getting into people's gardens and getting into trash and leaving presence on the playground and
And, so we had to keep them out. So we had to replace a lot of the, fencing this year.
Which is all done through the, the teams that come out. So it's a huge blessing to have these teams come out.
We are able to improve things on the mission. We're also able to paint. An elderly's home who lives in the community.
We are able to do some onings. For a number of people in the community we are able to do, some fencing for, somebody in the community, we were able to.
Get a lot of projects done that we wouldn't be able to do otherwise. And so. I'm praising Lord for we had a great year of teams this year.
Everybody works really hard and able to accomplish a lot of projects.
Here's a couple of pictures of the school. So the picture on the left is our gym.
And the picture on the right is our last eighth grade graduation. And,
So we have really nice facilities there. Like you said, we have about 55 students. Our biggest requests.
Though is for teachers. We need a kindergarten teacher. Our kindergarten teacher currently, she.
Is in our mid sixties and she's seeing that in the next number. Couple of years or so she's gonna have to kind of step down because she's running around with all these little kids and it's hard on her getting up and down and and everything and so she's looking for.
Somebody to come that she can kind of over a year or 2 kind of train. To be a kindergarten teacher.
So we would really appreciate prayers for that. We also need a second grade teacher. Her husband Jim Price.
He is. Currently doing second and third grade. At the school and Right now, I think this coming year he has Maybe around 10 students.
But the following next year, if our numbers stay the way they are, he's gonna have about 18 students.
At 2 different grade levels. And so it's very hard for him. To kinda balance that.
And so He's really praying for somebody come over and take over the second grade. Class.
Cause if we have 55 students and we have 18 in one class that's like a third of the school Just by himself.
We're also looking for a middle school teacher. Our middle school teacher, she teaches sixth, seventh and eighth grade.
And. Most of it by herself. She has a little bit of help, so but she's really hoping and praying for somebody to come and help with the middle school age kids.
And lastly, we have, we were looking for a bus driver. We have one of our bus drivers, his name is Sammy Davies.
He's also from Fox Valley Bible. Up there in Appleton. But he's 72 years old and He has a lot of back pain and So his doctor said this year that he cannot drive bus anymore.
And he actually has to go in for, he's looking at getting surgery in the next.
Month or so. For his back. And so we are We are praying for our bus driver.
To come and and replace him. To be able to help with our buses. And that's also another reason why I'm praying about open shop is because Currently I am We have 2 bus drivers, Sammy, which is not able to drive a bus anymore.
And then Scott Valentine. He's our other bus driver. And then our principal. And Denny.
So, and Danny can't really drive a bus because she's. She has too much on her plate.
So I'm the next option. So, cause I as well have my bus.
Drivers drivers license but if I have to drive a bus like That means I have to say no to other ministries as well.
So we're just praying for God's Providence. With these these needs that we have.
And,
So we would appreciate prayer and if you know of anybody that wants to come out to the reservation, we would love to have them.
So then just a few other. I know some of these I mentioned already. But, prayer request for a Navajo preacher.
And then our other bus driver Scott Valentine, he is gonna be getting knee surgery. Within I think it's this coming week.
He scheduled to get knee surgery. So we're praying that. The surgery will go well that there'll be a fast recovery cause school starts, I think it's on August sixteenth.
And so we're praying that he's gonna be able to. Drive a bus by then and he says The doctor said that he should be able to.
So we're praying for that. so praying for the staff needs, the teachers and the bus driver.
If we could be praying for Sammy Davies with his back and needing looking to back surgery in the near future.
For, wisdom with that and then just healing as well. And then in general, just continue strength and in terms in the ministry it's been there a long time and There's all of our staff there's about I think there's about 27 staff.
At the mission and but we are all doing a lot of different positions. A lot of different ministries and so we, need strength.
We're, fighting a spiritual battle. Now we need strength and endurance. Continued direction from the lord As we go out and we make decisions about what needs to be happening with the ministry and how.
Best to reach. The novel whole people. And then also soft and hearts to hear the gospel.
Hearts. The people that will, really see that they need a savior. Despite what their culture tells them in spite with their they're the lies the culture keeps them in.
They need to see savior. They need the Lord Jesus Christ. So please pray for soft and hearts to hear the gospel.
So. And we know that God is faithful. We know that he has put this mission where it needs to be.
Sharing the gospel of Christ, sharing the good news. And we know that he will provide. Everything that's needed to do the job.
And he has for us to do. So.
That's kind of the end of my presentation, but I would like to open up if anybody has any questions.
About the ministry. Well, what's going on there? Any specific things that you would like to know?
How many?
On the reservation, there there is about a hundred 72,000. Navajo on the reservation.
Now the reservation is about the size of West Virginia. So it takes from one end of the reservation to the other end, it takes about 5 and a half hours to drive across.
So it's very large reservation and people are really spread out. On it but there's about a hundred 72,000
There are also. We are not the only church in our community. There's probably about 5, 6 other churches.
In our community. We are one of the bigger churches most of these churches are little family they call them family churches because it will kinda be it will be a house church and it'll just tend to be that person's just closer family.
That goes there. But many of them are, rooted in the assembly of god doctrine so they do not believe assurance of salvation.
They don't believe that they believe you can lose your salvation. A lot of them are. You know Teach about women speaking and that's okay and they are very big in the speaking in tongues and they're you know they're a lot of their doctrine is not They look cool.
So. Though there's other churches. There's very few. And to me the biggest thing is that assurance of salvation, are you really putting your trust in the lower?
Because if you are then You can't lose your salvation. Cause it's not based on our works.
It's based on him on the Lord Jesus Christ.
Most of my family is back in Arizona. I came up this week to work at the bunkhouse.
Kam. That Brian Jocks does. He's from Fox Valley Bible. He does in his home.
And for the last number of years I brought one or 2 of my sons up to join in the camp and so my one son, Michael, my third oldest, he is at camp.
And I brought 2 other boys from Farmington, which is off the reservation of Harmington, New Mexico.
They're good friends of our family and I brought them so I brought 3 boys up to the camp.
But the rest of my family stayed home. And is continuing the ministry there. So.
Alright, there's no other questions. I'm not sure. What's scheduled after this?
Alright.