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As this year draws to a close, our family is very thankful for your ongoing prayers and encouragement. We have enjoyed worshiping with many like-minded churches, meeting so many new brothers and sisters in Christ, and sharing with many others about what God is doing in Africa. Christ has truly blessed us this year!
And looking ahead to next year, we are excited to see what the Lord has in store for us. John was recently asked to join the team going on the January conference run to the KwaZulu-Natal province of South Africa with the theme “Christ Building His Church in Africa Today.”
So on January 1st, he will be flying to Africa to co-teach at five conferences with a South African pastor. With this in mind, please pray for John as he has a few weeks to prepare four messages: What is Christ’s Church?, How Does Christ Build His Church?, The Church as Living Stones, and the Government of the Church. Additionally, please pray for our family since John will be away next month. While Jennifer always does a wonderful job taking care of our children, it is obviously harder for her to do so with John out of the country for a few weeks. But we are excited about this opportunity to equip African pastors and look forward to sharing more with you once John returns!
At the same time, our family has run into another hurdle as we prepare to move to South Africa. African Pastors’ Conferences recently lost one of their major donors, which has led them into financial hardship. With this in mind, they are not able to provide us with the rent for a place to live or a monthly stipend for John to serve as the APC conference manager. As a result, our monthly financial need increases from $5,200 to $7,100, and the percentage of monthly commitments decreases to 30%.
When you add this to John’s recent resignation as administrator of Covenant Baptist Theological Seminary to serve with APC, we are entering into quite a challenging situation. If we do not see a rapid rise in our monthly financial support by the end of January, then John will have to seek full-time employment to provide for our family. APC’s struggles also increase the longer they continue their ministry without a conference manager.
Brothers and sisters, we need your prayers more than ever! Please pray that the Lord will build the support team that our family needs to move to South Africa so that John can serve as the Conference Manager for APC. Pray that the Holy Spirit will give the directors of APC wisdom as they work through this significant hardship. And pray that our family will grow closer to Christ as we learn more fully to depend on Him.
Furthermore, if you are able to join our financial support team to equip African pastors, then please prayerfully consider doing so by the end of the year. Monthly commitments and one-time gifts can be made online, or you can use your bank’s bill pay service to set up regular payments to Faith Global Missions. As always, if you have any questions or would like to discuss supporting us further, please feel free to let me know.
We do not see the mounting challenges we face as a discouragement, but as an opportunity to trust in Christ and to see Him at work. We are grateful for all of your prayers and support as we seek to bring biblical reformation to Africa!
Because of His grace,
John Divito