“Don’t dig up in doubt what you planted in faith.” — Elizabeth Elliot
Elizabeth Elliot passed away this month. She was an incredible woman of faith and a person that I greatly admire. After her husband was martyred in Ecuador, she went back there as a missionary to reach the tribe that had killed him.
The above quote is my favorite quote of hers. There are times in my life when I chose to trust God, follow Him, and grow in my faith. When difficult times arise that fill me with fear and doubt, I need to remember Who God is and how He has led me and provided for me thus far. There have been times on this journey of preparing to go overseas that we have felt afraid and unsure about the future, but God keeps reminding us of how He has called us, provided for us, led us, and been faithful to us so far. We know that “Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever,” (Heb. 13:8) and we can continue to trust Him.
We also enjoy reflecting on the lives of missionaries that have gone before us because it reminds us that we are not alone in this. So many godly men and women have followed Christ’s call to take the gospel to all nations, and we are privileged to follow in their footsteps.
We are thankful for your continual prayers and support as we continue to work on support raising full time. New Tribes refers to support raising as “partnership development,” which we really like because it emphasizes that you who pray and give are not merely supporting us; you are equal partners in this mission to reach an unreached tribe for Jesus. Our day-to-day work currently consists of making phone calls, having appointments, writing thank-you’s, following up with people, and various administrative tasks. Meeting with people is our main focus.
When we meet with people, we simply share about what God has laid on our hearts to do, and invite people to be involved, whether through prayer of through finances. If we have not yet met with you, and you would like to, please let us know! Even if you are not in Minnesota, we can always arrange to call or Skype with you.
Please pray for us this month that God would give us perseverance to continue on in this long task of partnership development. Also please continue to pray that God would raise up more prayer and financial partners. We are still asking God to get us to 50% of our monthly support raised by the end of this month. If you have expressed interest in giving, but have not gotten that set up yet, would you consider doing that by the end of this month to help us meet our goal?
Our family is doing well. We are preparing for our new little one to come in September, and Ty is having lots of fun playing outside every day with a water table from some friends. We have been leading a Bible study on Love and Respect, a video seminar about strengthening marriages, and we are thankful to be involved in ministry now through that. Karissa has been encouraged through a Bible study she is attending based on the life of the apostle Paul, the first foreign missionary. Matt has been encouraged through a Bible study he is doing on forgiveness. Please continue to pray that God would grow us and prepare us to serve Him in Papua New Guinea.
Till all know,
Matt, Karissa, and Ty Long
Karissa_Long@ntm.org
Matt_Long@ntm.org
Please Pray:
-That we can get to being 50% funded by the end of June
-Karissa needs to switch doctors for insurance reasons. Pray that the details of that work out smoothly.
– For an upcoming meeting we have with a church missions committee
Praise God:
God has been growing us a lot spiritually
-Ty has been loving church childcare
Karissa is happy to be done substitute teaching for the summer, so she can focus more on partnership development
– We are now 36% funded