PRE-FIELD
ENCOURAGEMENT
FUND

ABWE has 52 new appointees this year, all of whom need to raise support and travel expenses. Their names, fields of service, and missionary ID numbers are listed on the accompanying insert. At the bottom of the insert is a form for you to complete, cut off, and return to ABWE should you decide to support one of these new missionaries.

Pre-field is an arduous road of hundreds of phone calls, thousands of miles, scores of church visits, weeks of on-going training, months of study, and likely two years of work. Most of our pre-fielders initially continue to work a full time job in addition to the demands of pre-field ministry. Like anyone else, they experience medical emergencies, car repairs, financial and time pressures, births, deaths and all the stuff of life we do. When they leave jobs to pursue the ministry full time, the financial pressures increase. The Pre-field Encouragement Fund is one way to express love and meet immediate and practical needs. We assure you we will be careful and wise stewards and share it as these special needs arise. Following are examples of how the fund has been used in the past:

Car repairs and the increased gas prices
Help with the start-up costs of pre-field ministry (approximately $4000)

Each donor who gives to the Pre-Field Encouragement Fund will receive a copy of "How Many More Barneys?" written by Dan Hopkins. The book chronicles the pre-field ministry of his family, "...two adults, a third-grader with a Gameboy, a baby in a car seat, a kindergartener with a half-dozen Barbies..." and all that goes with it.

You can help us make a difference in lives and for eternity.

If God should lead you to give a monthly or one time gift to this unique ministry, please print out the Missionary Appointees document and mail the attached tear-off along with your check, made payable to ABWE, to:

ABWE Donor Services
PO Box 8585
Harrisburg, PA 17105-8585

You may also give online at www.abwe.org/give.

* All gifts are fully deductible for tax purposes as allowed by law.

August 2008

Here at ABWE, we are praising God for our 2008 Candidate Classes—one held in February and one in July. From the February class, twenty-four candidates were appointed. These included ten married couples, three single women, and one single man. Their target countries and ministries are Peru, Colombia, Hungary, Romania, Liberia, Brazil, Bangladesh, Chile, Bosnia, and WIN. From July’s class, twenty-eight new appointees (plus three who returned from the February class to be appointed with their spouses) included thirteen married couples, three single women, and two single men. They anticipate ministering in thirteen countries, including many of those already mentioned above, plus Israel, Portugal, Thailand, Japan, and the Czech Republic. The candidates God brings to ABWE are of different ages and backgrounds, and have varied skill sets and experiences. It is exciting to see how their gifts fit into ABWE’s ministries.

Brian and Jo Anderson, in their fifties, are headed to Israel after twenty years of pastoral ministry in Michigan. Brian and Jo went to Israel to study for a year on sabbatical, and came away with a burden for the people there. They plan to go back and work with our ministry team in that region.
Casey Ballard comes from a diverse family background: his stepmother is Thai, his sister is Muslim, and Casey himself grew up as a Mormon.
Nathan and Sarah Sloan met in Nepal while working there as single missionaries. They married and plan to return to Nepal to work with Tibetan refugees there. The Sloans say, "Living by faith is doing things that only God can do through you."
Jen Thigpen graduated from college with a teaching degree. After college, she applied for many teaching jobs here in the US, all the while feeling a strong desire to go overseas if she was needed there. But she wanted God’s will to be absolutely clear, so she asked Him to close all doors for jobs in the US if He wanted her to serve in another country. Then she watched as each door in the US was closed over the course of the next year. Jen has already spent two years teaching the Ron Barnes’ children in the Czech Republic, and those years confirmed that she wants to return there as a career missionary.

Thank you for your part in helping these new appointees move forward in their ministries! Your prayers play an important part in their preparations. Pray for the personal support of each new family. We currently have the largest group of pre-field missionaries raising support in our eighty-one-year history

Grateful for your partnership in the gospel,

Michael G. Loftis
President