Avoiding Catastrophe in the Workplace
The Webster’s Dictionary defines catastrophe as “a great disaster or misfortune.” This year has been a year of catastrophes around the world. I (Tim) am thinking about the earthquake in China that reached 7.9 on the Richter scale. This earthquake is said to have killed over 69,000 people. We all remember the Myanmar (Burma) Typhoon earlier this year, which is expected to have, in the end, a death toll of over 100,000 lives. What more will this year hold with it only being halfway through the year? Only God knows.
June and July have traditionally been the two months that are months of transition in our mission. By this I mean our missionaries leave the foreign field for home assignment or leave their home countries for their respective fields for another 4 years of service. As a result of this the NTM medical plan office is busy trying to keep track of the comings and goings of the missionaries. Our job is to keep a running list or spread sheet that keeps track of what missionaries are on foreign fields and what missionaries are on the medical insurance plan, the medical evacuation plan, the health savings account or the life insurance plan. Someone once commented to me, “. . . it would be a catastrophe if a particular record wasn’t dealt with correctly”. With this in mind we are careful to do our best to keep track of the missionaries’ records and forms. Although we can try our best to head off a catastrophe with each month’s spread sheet, we can’t foresee the future and what kind of catastrophes are in store for the missionaries (or for us, for that matter) but we are grateful for your support and prayers that allow us to help them take the right precautions for some of those catastrophes here in the Medical Plan office.
The catastrophe that happened to us recently was that the hard drive on our computer crashed. We lost a lot of digital pictures and other information, including most of our current e-mail addresses. We were sad to lose the information we had on that hard drive, however our computer department here at headquarters had our computer up and running in less than a week. What a blessing that was!
How can you pray for me in my ministry in the Medical Plan office?
Pray as I work in the office and deal with the information on the spread sheets, and as I communicate with individual missionaries by both phone and e-mail. Pray that I can clearly answer the missionaries’ questions.
Avoiding Catastrophe in the Family
After living a fairly sheltered life in Papua New Guinea for most of our kid’s lives, a few Sundays ago we found ourselves in an unusual situation. We remember the situation clearly. Let us fill you in. . .
Angela was traveling to a retreat and was somewhere between South Carolina and Pennsylvania.
Kari, who is now in Minnesota for a summer job, had her front brakes fail on her car. She was trying to get to a place to get them fixed.
Jillane, who is counseling at Wildwood Ranch in Michigan, was at that exact same time, in a Tornado Warning.
We found it very unsettling to have 3 of our kids in different states and to have each of them in potentially dangerous situations. We realized worrying wouldn’t help any of them but we knew we could commit them to the Lord in prayer.
What do we do to avoid catastrophe in our families? There is nothing we can to foresee or avoid catastrophe. But we do have the promise that because of Jesus Christ, God has taken care of the only one true catastrophe and that is the catastrophe of the separation of mankind from God due to our sin.
It is this message we want to share with the world. We are so grateful for your support of and prayers for us that make it possible for us to continue to serve the Lord by serving with New Tribes Mission.
We also want to ask you to continue to pray for us for the Kafe believers. Pray that they will faithfully meet together. Pray especially for Susan who has been the most faithful of the believers.
So as we look at the rest of this summer, what are we trusting the Lord to do for our family? At the end of August, Kari will be traveling from Minnesota to Tennessee and then back to Michigan. Kari will be starting her 3rd year at Calvin College in Grand Rapids. Thanks for praying for Jillane. After praying for many months as to what the Lord would have for her, she will be returning to Florida at the end of August and attending the local community college. Continue to pray as there is much to be arranged yet, and with Jillane in Michigan it has been a bit hard. We are so grateful to the Lord has really answered our prayers as Angie has made good friends here in Florida.
Saying goodbye to Kari at the Angie and her friend Katrina going
airport. Saying goodbye doesn’t to a formal party for the Missionary Kids.
get any easier.
Praise the Lord With Us and Pray For Us . . . .
Praise the Lord for good health and strength.
Praise the Lord for the our adjustment to being back in the USA and also to being in Florida.
Pray for Tim as he works in the NTM Medical Plan office.
Pray for the Kafe church that they will grow strong in the Lord.
Pray for Kari and Jillane as they finish up their summer jobs and prepare to begin college this fall.
Pray for Angie, Adam and Nicole as they get ready to start school again on August 13.
Because of His Love, The Holmgrens
James Raymond…
I have been looking looking around for this kind of information. Will you post some more in future? I’ll be grateful if you will….