Prayer Letter – November 2009
November 2009
Dear Praying Friends,
The past few months have been difficult, exciting and rewarding.
At the beginning of August we headed 10 hours south of Monterrey to Debbie’s dad’s house for a family reunion. We spent a couple of days with many family members who we had not seen for many years. It was also a special blessing that we were able to minister as a whole family to a church nearby on a Sunday morning.
On the 16th of August we received a phone call early in the morning telling us that Debbie’s dad had suffered a stroke and was in the hospital. We quickly packed our bags and headed to Mission, Texas where he was in the hospital. We are thankful for the friends who were hospitable providing meals while we were there and the ones who volunteered to watch Carena so we could be up at the hospital. A couple of days after the stroke the doctors found an aneurism on his brain and had to go in and do surgery. Through the faithfulness of God and the prayers of God’s people around the globe the surgery was a success and he is now recovering. He spent about 6 weeks in the hospital before being allowed to return home to his house in Mission, TX. We are grateful for the many prayers and phone calls we have received. We know that God still has a plan and purpose for Debbie’s dad’s life.
September brought the start of a new school year for us in Monterrey. Carena entered K5 this year. She continues to excel in both her English and her Spanish. She was excited to return to school even though it was only for a couple of weeks.
The Christian University of the Americas also began with the largest enrollment in our history. We are thankful to God for the many new students in school. We are excited about what God will do this year. We were assigned four campus daughters this year. Carena was so excited when she heard we had four adopted daughters because she thought that meant that they were moving in with us. We quickly corrected her and explained that they would be living in the girls dorm, but we would have them over as often as we could. We finished remodeling a new classroom for the theology classes right before classes began. We expanded the room so that it can now seat over 30 students and installed a computer and projector in the room. We are thankful for a couple of churches who helped provide the funds for this project. We also are thankful for a church in Ohio who sent us funds to be able to purchase a couple of projectors as we are wanting to put projectors in each classroom.
The end of September took our family to the city of Ciudad Madero, Tamaulipas, Mexico for a week. A church there asked me to come and preach for a week on the subject of Personal Finances. We had a wonderful time with many of our friends in the church, and the Lord worked greatly in the lives of many to dedicate their lives and their finances to God. Over the past few years God has continued to open doors for us to go into churches and teach on this subject. We have a burden to help God’s people with this very needy area. An accountant friend of ours in Monterrey and I are beginning to work on a program that we can take to pastors and leaders to help them understand basic finance and the responsibilities we have as leaders in regards to finances.
After the finance conference we returned home for two days and then departed again. This time we departed for the United States for a two month trip to visit many of our supporting churches and to visit several other churches with the desire to raise some additional support. We have to date driven over 6,000 miles and been through 17 states in the month of October. We have several more meetings scheduled for the month of November and then plan on returning to Monterrey the end of the month. We are enjoying the fall colors as we travel.
Please be in prayer for our family as we travel, and that the Lord will continue to bless our ministry in the churches.
Thank you for your faithful prayer and support over the years that we have been privileged to serve our Master here in Mexico.
In Christ,
Russell, Debbie & Carena Raymer