Freitas Ministry Update,

 Wedding:

Please keep us in your prayers as we celebrate Lauren's wedding in August. We have learned that one of the most difficult challenges in our lives as missionaries in Africa is not being able to be a bigger part of Lauren and Aaron's lives as their relationship developed over this past year. We have known Aaron for many years now and are certain that he will make a wonderful husband for Lauren.  Holly is currently in the US for Lauren's bridal showers and to help Lauren with final preparations for the wedding. I am currently on a flight to Alabama to meet with a church that I am working with in one of the villages in South Sudan then, on to Indiana to be with Lauren and Aaron.

Intern Update:

On July 1st we said goodbye to our 5wk intern, Hope,  who came out to work alongside Holly and get a feel for what a life of ministry in the mission field would be like. Holly kept her quite busy with language learning, understanding culture, relationship building and working through the books "Cross Cultural Connections" and "Africa Friends and Money Matters". I believe that Hope now has a very clear idea of what it means to serve God in the mission field and what the life of a missionary looks like. I have a strong feeling that Hope is hooked on missions! 

                                                                                                 

     Our New Home:

Ministry is going amazingly well! Because of our extensive travel we have decided to move into a much smaller 1 bedroom guest house on our South Africa friends property. This will help reduce our living costs and redirect those savings toward our travel into the many new areas where ministry is expanding i.e.; South Sudan, Congo, Burundi, Rwanda, Uganda as well as Kigoma Tanzania. Holly is beginning the process of releasing the Maasai to do their ministry among the other Maasai as they are eager to move ahead on their own. Over the past year, Holly and I have been developing a new ministry strategy where Holly trains the pastors wives in women's health from a biblical perspective and womens ministry while I train the pastors in CHE and bi-vocational pastoring. This combination of training has led to an amazing expansion of ministry with many new opportunities. We have to choose those opportunities wisely!  We have a saying, "If your visibility goes beyond your ability you will lose credibility"! Pray that we stay within our ability as it is sometimes tempting to go beyond!

        We have a new teammate:

We had a newly accepted ReachGlobal missionary visit our team in Dar Es Salaam last month to see if ministry in Dar would be a good fit for her. During our lunch meeting with Glennis, she became so excited about the work that Holly and I are doing that she has decided to join our CHE ministry and become a part of our CHE training team. This was an unexpected answer to prayer as we have been praying that someone would come alongside us to take on some of the workload.  CHE wasn't even on her radar and likewise, Glennis wasn't on ours. Glennis has allot to do before coming to the field and then a year of language learning, culture learning and CHE training when she arrives so it will be awhile however, the process of reproducing ourselves and the development of an actual CHE team is very exciting. 

        Church Planting Movement:

We have just completed the first of six trainings for new church planters in South Sudan. These church planters will be trained in Effective Church Planting, Pastoral/Congregational Development, Bi-vocational Pastoring, CHE, and Bible Orality for Illiterate Cultures. We currently have 25 potential church planters who are being trained. I expect that this training will take approximately 1yr. Holly will be facilitating a Womens Cycle of Life / Womens Ministry class for the wives of these pastors and other potential women's ministry leaders. We are excited to see the beginning of this important movement to plant churches in new unreached areas.

   Ministry continues in our absence:

July 30th - August 7th A team from Gadsden Alabama will be traveling to Pajok South Sudan while we are in the US for Lauren's wedding. Tony would usually travel with the team however, we have wedding plans so the team will be on their own. Their pastor, who has been to this village before,  will lead the team so the team will be in good hands. This well trained team will be completing the final level of CHE training, "TOT" (trainer of trainers) 2&3. The churches in Pajok have embraced this training and have already been using what they have learned so that they can meet both the spiritual and physical needs of their community. Historically, the churches in South Sudan have been seen by the communities as only caring for the spiritual needs of the people and that the church does not care about their physical needs. Jesus clearly cared about both!  These churches will now have the tools that they need to be a reflection of Christ's ministry to their community.

Holly and I appreciate your commitment to our ministry and ask that you stand with us and lift these important requests before our Lord.