Dear Friends,

Just a couple of days ago I had the pleasure to cut the grass in our yard yet when I went out the very next day, already dandelions had sprung up to as much as 10 inches. Wow, what makes them grow so fast? Of course, for most of us that makes them a nuisance. Who wants those “weeds” in their lawn? Our neighbor has a nearly perfect dandelion free lawn and works hard to keep it that way and I think they must cringe every time the wind blows for fear that some of our dandelion seeds will end up in their lawn. Well, I have a news flash! I don’t like those weeds either but yet I haven’t taken the effort that my neighbors have to drive them away. I had this image of Christians as well. I think of what fresh and lively Christians are like. The just seem to sprout all the time with new fresh flashy happy faces as they spark life in the middle of their new world of revelation. The sing, shout, rejoice, dance, and don’t quit. Then we who are more “established” or “mature” Christians begin to spray weed control on them by tempering them with “understanding, wisdom, and maturity” and before long we see them slow their growth and hide, die, quit, or stay in the shadows. I pray that more us hide our weed sprayer and allow the freshness of our new friends and family members to bloom, be happy, shout with great excitement, rejoice to the top of their voice, and return us into the pleasure of fresh love of a great God who enjoys our laughter.

May has been filled with lots of activity and excitement as we have been fundraising and recruiting for camps this year. The garage sale resulted in a blessing for scholarships for campers and workers. Thanks for your donations of sellable items and purchases made at the sale. Thrivent Financial gave a 50% matching grant to our proceeds, what a great blessing that is.

Camp is here in the next two weeks and the excitement is growing in intensity with each day. From all we have received so far it seems that both camps will near capacity so it is imperative to get as many workers as we can muster together for these beautiful kids. We could sure use your participation, come if you can, let us know what we can do to make that possible.

Our family here is doing very well. Osito sure is enjoying the beginnings of a warm summer in Minnesota. He went fishing the other day and caught about 15 or more sunnies, bluegills, and pumpkin seeds. It was a blast to see him having great fun catching, releasing, and keeping some for dinner. He also was fascinated by a sizeable snapping turtle that circulated around the dock.

Our extended term missionary, Kristin Gillingham is working effectively to get the effort in Cuenca, Ecuador set in motion to succeed as an established ongoing church outreach to host families and children with disabilities. MariaGusta in Quito is also doing an awesome effort to keep the developing team on task and getting more churches in their area connected. It is so encouraging to us to see the work of the Lord taking such powerful definition in Ecuador. We give a lot of kudos to Marjorie Andrade as the Ecuador leader for her oversight and leadership.

Thank you so much for partnering with us to share hope in Jesus as the Centerpiece to so many in our world today. Your finances are vital to the fulfillment of the Great Commission we have been elected by our God to do, so at best we need your continued and increasing financial commitment, at the least we need you to continue in the relationship you have established with us already. As you pray, we ask you to include our willingness to stay the course with God’s plan for Cristo Vive International and follow His call to our family destiny.

In His Great Love,
Gene and Jordana Engebretsen