November Newsletter--Shock and Surprise

“Do you know what you’re saying?!” a church volunteer wondered, mouth almost agape. Her pastor had just invited me to speak at a service and ask for supporters. I’d introduced myself over the phone a couple minutes earlier, but he still didn’t even know my name, having trouble understanding me. The volunteer accepted the phone to interpret, still wondering what had possessed her pastor to invite someone he had met two minutes ago, without completing his normal process of meeting in person for a longer conversation.
I had no idea then that the people on the other end of the line were as shocked as I was at this invitation from a church I’d found in the yellow pages. I discovered our mutual surprise at a potluck after the service, when the pastor explained that he’d abandoned his normal carefulness because He felt God’s hand on the situation, something I didn’t really feel until I hung up and pinched myself.
By the time I made it to the potluck that day, I expected the pastor to change any feelings of positivity he’d experienced. I had unknowingly set up an earlier version of my power point to run during my presentation, something I realized when the wrong slide came up during the service, containing information I had no intention of talking about. Until that moment. When the power point I thought I’d discarded took over my speech. But as I reached the potluck, where I was enthusiastically received, I began to recognize that my connections with people and my speaking ability were far less important than God’s mysterious, sometimes worrisome ways of working.
I look forward to more of God’s surprises as I finish speaking to people and churches in Kansas and head to Indiana for some more work there.


Praise God For:
· The 8 churches I was able to speak at in September and October.
· The time I had in Kansas to raise support and to reconnect with people in my home town.

Please Pray That:
· I will have safe travel to Indiana.
· Churches and people in Indiana will be open to hearing about my ministry.

August Newsletter--The Biggest Gift

pictures: 1) I prepare a display table before speaking at a church.

2) Every penny helps. A friend collected almost $50 in pocket change for my ministry.

One dollar. The “biggest” gift I’ve received from ten weeks of raising support.
While I was in Indiana, a girl about nine gave the softened, old bill to me after I spoke at her church. She wanted to help African girls, especially poor ones who come to Burkina Faso for jobs, but are tricked into prostitution or slavery. “I wish I could give more,” she said, “but here’s everything I have.” She reminded me of the biblical widow who impressed Jesus by her temple gift of two measly coins, all she had.
I would never have met this girl if a friend hadn’t suggested I share my prayer and financial needs with one of her friends, a complete stranger to me. When I nervously introduced myself by phone, wishing that not being allowed to talk to strangers was still a valid excuse, the lady surprised me by being so excited about my ministry that she wanted to involve some relatives. Before we could arrange a meeting, however, she called, inviting me to speak at her church in a town I had never before heard of. When I called the pastor to work out the details, I discovered he is also from Kansas. “Oh yeah,” he exclaimed. “I remember your town. We creamed your junior college in basketball!” After this gracious introduction, he started a generous, preacherly kind of coercion, forcing me to speak as long as I needed during the service on a date he forced me to choose.
Of course I pray for people who can give more than a few extra minutes of speaking time or a one dollar bill, but I am thankful for people like these. They make the long, sometimes discouraging process of sharing the need and laboring to trust God for provision worth it.
God Bless,
Chelsey Horkman



Praise God For:
· Opportunities to share about the work and the needs of my ministry with more people than I expected.
· People at home and in Indiana who have provided for my ministry through praying, giving, hosting, introducing, and encouraging.

Please Pray That:
· I will be able to minister to others even as I share my needs with them.
· God will continue to lead me to people who can join my support team.

May Newsletter--Starting the Earthly Version of God's Spreadsheet

pictures 1) A classmate and I practice support-raising calls, using bananas as phones.

2) Ten of us attended the two week Missionary Candidate School at CEF headquarters in Warrenton, MO.

“God’s heavenly Excel spreadsheet of supporters is already full for each one of us,” one of my classmates at Missionary Candidate School encouraged us earlier this week. After several days of discussing methods for raising the prayer and financial support necessary to work with Child Evangelism Fellowship®, we were a little overwhelmed at the thought of 12 - 18 months spent writing letters, making phone calls, and paying visits in order to gain our full support. But I was relieved as I thought about God sitting in His desk chair (perhaps a swivel throne) surrounded by ten laptops, each displaying a different student’s completed spreadsheet. After all, if God owns “…the cattle on a thousand hills” (Psalm 50:10, NIV), why couldn’t they be the cows from Dell computer commercials?
Unfortunately, I wasn’t thinking about that divine spreadsheet later this week when I was the one sitting in a swivel chair preparing to make my first call. I wasn’t even thinking about how I had already practiced the conversation with a classmate, each of us talking on bananas while our teachers (the ones making us use the bananas) took pictures. Or how I had practiced out loud by myself enough times to make the girl one room over think I was crazy. Or how I had spent the last few minutes praying something like, “Help. Help. Help.” I was actually thinking, Answering machine. This is my answer to prayer! And I thought that for two more calls.
But on the next call, the true answer to prayer came. A lady from my church answered the phone. Even though she was having company soon, she asked me to call back later, happily agreeing to get together so I could share about my ministry.
Praise God! Soon I will start my earthly supporter spreadsheet.
Thank you for praying,
Chelsey


Praise God That:
· On May 6 I was accepted as a CEF missionary candidate.
· On May 23 I completed the Missionary Candidate School.
Please Pray That:
· I will be able to raise my full support in God’s timing.
· I will keep a positive attitude as I raise support, trusting in God to provide.