Truth 4 Utah
Truth 4 Utah Mission Update #26– July - September 2023
Give careful thought to the paths for your feet
and be steadfast in all your ways.
27 Do not turn to the right or the left;
keep your foot from evil.
Dear Family & Friends,
Life can be so hard and there are so many things going on all around us as well as in our own lives and relationships. Be careful to remain steadfastly focused on the Lord. There are so many distractions and so many ways that we can get sidetracked. Let us fight daily to give our attention and devotion first and foremost to God and to our relationship with Him. Whether through our time in the Word, the music and podcasts that we listen to, the books that we read, the movies and shows we watch, or the choices we make, let it be the mark of our lives to consider the direction and decisions in our lives! Don’t grow weary in doing good, and don’t do it alone! Walk with others in a faithful, Bible teaching, disciple-making, local church!
General Update
AnneMarie is now working at our local PRC. She received her training over the summer as we had talked about and has done some appointments by herself, start to finish. She really enjoys working in this area and her boss recently encouraged her regarding her role and level of work there.
Most of our kiddos will be starting a new adventure this school year…American Heritage for the girls and Trail Life for the boys. These groups (a sort of Christian version of girl and boy scouts) are designed to teach kids how to do a lot of practical things, like survival skills, and be more involved in community service type projects. So, we’ll see how it goes and if it ends up being a good fit for our kiddos. There are homeschool families from our co-op that are also actively involved so the kids will already have some friends.
Emmeline, Patrick, and Daniel are all doing music/piano lessons currently. AnneMarie is enjoying working with them on that as well! She’s a music girl, and I know it’s a good way for them to connect, and let’s just say that our house has become an even more musical house.
Alana is in tumbling weekly which is something she has wanted for a while. That is going well, and she’s already moved up a level after only about a month of doing it. She’s also learning how to do some sewing from a class that meets monthly.
Brendan did a cyber-security camp over the summer with a friend and had a great time! He really enjoys that kind of thing and is developing his skills in that area. He and I have been going to the gym together to play basketball as well, which has been a great blessing for me.
Micah is doing 4-year-old things and seems to have a pretty funny sense of humor. He is articulating a lot of thoughts now too in more mature ways. He loves music too.
Noelle is still as cute as ever and a precious little joy in our lives. She’s starting to talk a bit and also seems to be finding her ability to voice her opinions on some things.
We visited AnneMarie’s parents in early August which was a great blessing. We’re very blessed to have a great family, and spending time with siblings and cousins was sweet. We had some fun too (lol).
We spent a couple days at the lake with the kids being able to swim, kayak, and just enjoy family and God’s creation. Both flights were extremely early, and it was crazy but, by God’s grace we only had a couple of melt downs and there were lots of laughs. We also got to see my sister and her kiddos, who lives on the East coast, for the first time in 4 years. That was a great blessing too!
So, as we get back into school, co-op and life gets busy again, we’re thankful for God’s goodness and His faithfulness through the trials and challenges.
Gospel Seeds & Opportunities
The kids have continued spending time with our mormon neighbors and there have been a couple of conversations about the differences between our beliefs. We haven’t had a lot of time to connect with our mormon neighbors as a family since I was gone for a month and work started the day after we got back from VA. That being said, there were some unexpected conversations recently with mormon neighbors that God brought along regarding faith and truth.
I was able to go to lunch with my mormon boss over the summer. We didn’t get into the differences but we did talk about faith and truth and what’s going on in our culture. He’s a really cool guy, a great boss, and I’m praying that the Lord brings him to faith. I also recall a conversation with a mormon lady at work that I just met. She noticed that I said that I’m blessed and she asked me if I was from Missouri. I responded no and asked her why. She said because she spent some time there and that was a pretty common response. I smiled and told her that while I wasn’t from Missouri, I am a born-again Bible believing Christian and that is the reason why I responded that way. I also prayed for her out loud, in the kitchen area of our workplace. Mormons don’t really pray with each other so it stood out to her. She said she could feel God’s love and that that was a good thing.
There have also been other good conversations with co-workers and I’ve had the opportunity to minister to a large number of students on my school buses this year. I’ve had multiple of my middle school students tell me thank you for talking to them about things that matter and even a couple of them asked me if they could share my talks from the bus on their social media.
So, even though it’s hard and stressful in different ways, God is giving me opportunities to point people to Him.
TruthPoint Apologetics ( www.TruthPointApologetics.org ) officially launched 1 year ago with our website and YouTube channel, which is pretty cool! Please check us out on
Facebook ( https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100082643648261 ) and on
YouTube ( www.YouTube.com/@TruthPointApologetics )
It continues to be a lot of work and we’re thankful for and in awe of what God is doing in us and through us in this venture. It is distinct from our missionary work here in Utah, but there is definite overlap. Our radio work is continuing here locally and we're hoping that will expand as well!
Over the summer, we had the opportunity to put on two different Apologetics and Evangelism Conferences at two churches: GraceNM Church in Los Lunas, NM ( https://gracenm.org/ ) and Redemption Hill in ABQ, NM. (Redemption Hill Church | Teaching God's Word (redemptionhillnm.org). Sunshine Church of Belen, NM also partnered with GraceNM to put on that conference. Both were a blessing and we got to hear some good encouragement from those who attended. You can check out some of the sessions on GraceNM’s website or on our YouTube channel there are some clips. We’ll ALSO HAVE A VIDEO RELEASING THIS MONDAY recapping what God did this last year, including our top 5 most watched videos, and then a video the following week looking ahead to what we’re moving towards in year two!
I also attended a really cool Apologetics training conference that was put on by Frank Turek, Alisa Childers, Brent Kunkle, Allen Parr, Greg Koukl, Natasha Crain, and other apologists to help us grow in our ability to defend truth and engage others with the Gospel. It was a lot of info., a good opportunity to meet other people around the country who desire to engage others, and a lot of time, but it was well worth it!
Not sure how God will work going forward, but thankful for His goodness!
PLEASE CONTINUE TO PRAY FOR US! There is a lot going on, and we know that apart from God’s power and presence, we will falter.
As always, God is doing more than even what is written here, and He is the One behind all of this and doing His work should always be an overflow and extension of our worship of Him! He alone is worthy of all glory, honor and praise, and He alone can take our wretched, helpless selves and transform us to be more like Him!
Be sure to check out our online resources as well! If you have any questions or topics you’d like to see us address, feel free to reach out so we can consider and pray over them to help equip believers and engage the culture!
https://www.youtube.com/@TruthPointApologetics
Check us out on Facebook too!