Up, Back and Forward

I thank my God upon every remembrance of you.

Writing from his place of incarceration Paul begins his epistle with words of his prayer for the Philippians. He rejoices in his fellowship with them and encourages them with words of affirmation. But what stands out at the very beginning is his gratitude to God every time he thinks of them. Every time we think of you dear friend and supporter, we give thanks to God for you. It is our prayer that God will continue to work in you and use you to further the ministry here in Argentina.

As you may recall from our last update in December, we were able to make a six-week administrative trip to the USA. It was a whirlwind trip to take care of official business, attend the GMSA annual conference, and visit family. It was a wonderful time, and we are so thankful to God for His provision and timing. Thank you to all of you who prayed that we might be able to get our temporary residency papers so that we could go, prayed that God would provide the funds, and prayed for us while we were on our trip.

Upon our return, we hit the ground running. As directed by immigrations in December, we all applied for permanent residency before our temporary status expired on January 31. Things moved quickly this time around, and after our appointments in mid-February, we were all given our preliminary papers for our permanent residency.

The other item that has kept us busy is . . . SCHOOL! Instituto Centro Bíblico is set to start classes on March 21. This first semester will be fully virtual with the possibility of a mix of in-person and virtual classes in the second semester.

This year, a new program is being inaugurated: the Basic Bible Knowledge Certificate. It will be the foundation upon which all other classes will be built. In the first semester there will be five classes taught: Hermeneutics I by Pastor Julio Llagarías, Introduction to Bible Doctrine I by Pastor Gustavo Paz, Spiritual Disciplines of the Christian Life I by Pastor Denis Pérez, Biblical Hebrew III (not part of the certificate program) by Professor Steven Rivoire, and Panorama of the Old Testament by Dave. Please be in prayer for each of these classes, the teachers and the students.

At this time, we have eight students who have registered and a couple more who have stated their intention to take classes. We expect more to register in the next week. Please pray for the students that the Lord gives us in this coming semester.

Serving with you in Argentina,
Dave, Patti and Michael