Friday, June 12, 2009

Letter from Lonnie Smith, Jr. and Martha

Dear Pastors and Friends,

Greetings in the name of our Lord. We are late in getting this letter out due to our travels. We have been gone from our U.S. home for two and a half months. During that time we were in churches in Texas, Kansas, and Missouri. We did see a number of you at the May fellowship meeting in Springfield. We were encouraged by those we got to see and by those who said, "keep up the good work; our support will continue, but there's no need for you to come by this time."

We have enjoyed being in the churches that have had us for services or conferences and we thank them for inviting us. We had some really good services. We appreciate so much the generous love offerings. We were treated very well and all our needs were supplied.

While we were in Missouri, we had the joy of witnessing the birth of our fourth grandchild. Finlee Ward Smith was born on May 19 to our son, Bryan and his wife, Allison. They did not want to know what they were having ahead of time, so he was a surprise to all of us! He was a little guy (6 lb. 10 oz. - 20 in. long), but is healthy and a welcome newcomer to the family. We also got to attend a school program at Mavrere's (Finlee's big sister) pre-school which was very special.

While in West Texas, we got to see our daughter and her family. We were able to attend little Hannah's first birthday party. It was the first time we've been to any grandchild's birthday party! We also got to attend one of Isaac's tee-ball games. Isaac asked if we could go live with him! We took lots of pictures of all four of our grandchildren and stored up memories for the future.

No churches scheduled us during the months of June, July, or August, so we are going to go back to Guadalajara for the summer. If any of you wish to contact us during that time, you can do so by email. We are scheduled in Arkansas, Missouri, Kentucky, Illinois, Indiana, and Ohio for the months of September through November. We still have some open dates that time and would like to fill them if possible.

We want you to know we are so thankful for your financial support. Our livelihood depends on you holding our ropes. You have been faithful and consistent as they years have rolled by. We have been missionaries for 35 years and are in good health and plan to continue working. Yes, some churches have quit supporting us for various reasons, but we are pressing on and are praying for 15 new supporters to replace those we've lost.

Once again, we thank you for being there for us. We plan to continue on...

'Til Jesus Comes,
Lonnie C. Smith, Jr.

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