Goldfuss update (July 27)

Dear Prayer Partners,

You might be shocked, but we are freezing down here!!!! We have had to light the woodstove three times this week. In Mexico????? Well, we live in Mexico City where we are just about 10,000 feet--almost twice that of Denver. The rains have been very cold and the sun hadn't come out before today for about 6 days. We praise the Lord for a cozy home where we can take refuge from the downpours.

Praise:

We had a very good teacher training sesson last Saturday where 5 teachers received positive constructive criticism on their presentations by Victor Labelle and the rest of the listeners. We appreciate Victor's hard work helping our teachers develop their abilities. We are scheduling more training sessions so that the other 15 teachers and assistants can give their presentations and benefit from all of the feedback.

Prayer requests:

1. Wisdom in dealing with two difficult church situations.
2. Teresa--who is very discouraged. Her husband Alberto has a very serious lung condition. Teresa has been doing everything for him. He is very depressed and will not speak to her. He is also refusing to take his medicine. Pray for the Lord to give Teresa endurance as it is hard for her to sleep at night with his care giving. Pray also for her as she struggles because she so wants the Lord to save her huband. And lastly, please pray for Alberto's salvation. They are only in their late 50's. Alberto's brother died about 2 months ago from the same rare lung condition.
3. Jason and Danielle Boyle--as they are looking for a permanent home in the city. Right now they are staying with us above our garage. Their goal is to begin language school this fall. (In the meantime we are putting them to work in VBS!)
4. Reme and Juana as they have to move again. This will again be a temporary situation. Pray for permanent housing.
5. Jon and Andrea Crocker---(Our missionary co-workers that live in our cabin) They will be leaving tomorrow for about two weeks, travelling to California for Andrea's sister's wedding. Pray for Mike as he has additional preaching responsibilities. **Also, another church just called and needs a preacher for Sunday---so Mike will be going over there on Sunday evening. Please pray for endurance and wisdom in helping this church as they have had problems in the past.
6. Two of our teens who are helping in VBS---that the Lord would develop a love for teaching and serving Him.

Coming dates:

• July 31: VBS final preparation meeting from 2–4 p.m. We will also be giving out invitations in the neighborhood.
• August 2–5: VBS
• August 9: the Crockers come back
• August 11–17: Visit from the Batorys-our GFA director
• August 23: school starts
• September 4: teacher presentations

Family news: We are trying to be able to download some of Cristi's textbooks to be able to listen to audibly. She is reading well, but the amount that she now needs to do with entering junior high will be exhausting and give her a headache. Pray that we will be able to figure out exactly what she needs to study well on her own. We thank the Lord that BJU press is helping us in this process.

Thank you again for your prayers. We depend upon them.

In Christ,

Mike, Faith, Mikey, Cristiana, Carissa, Matthew, Cherith, and Caralyn Goldfuss

Goldfuss update (July 22)

Dear Praying Friends,

This has been a very busy time.

We were privileged to have good friends of ours, Dave and Marie Wickman, from our home church, visit us for an entire week. They were a great encouragement and a huge blessing in helping get some projects done and also just talking. Praise the Lord for great friends.

Please pray for a number of people who are discouraged about debt problems that they are having. Because of this, it is affecting other areas of their lives, including their worship and walk with the Lord. Please pray for encouragement and wisdom for them and for us.

Thank you for praying for the church discipline issue a couple weeks ago. The Lord worked in that situation and both parties appear to be seeking to do what God wants them to do in the situation. Keep praying.

Our Vacation Bible School is coming up quickly--it will be August 2-5. Please keep this spiritual endeavor in your prayers. Pray for visitors, and for God's Word to work in the hearts of our own church children who are able to attend.

You may have heard about recent violence here in Mexico. Mostly, Mexico City has stayed free of the drug violence that has been rocking much of the country (that is apart from all the normal everyday violence that is characteristic of a big city). :-)

1. However last week, Teresa, from our church, told us about the federal police agents/SWAT agents in front of her house. They told her to stay inside while they arrested her next door neighbor who has been involved in some kind of drug activity. She just thought he was a normal next door neighbor.
2. Just this morning as Mikey was on his way with Morgan to basketball practice, they were detained about ten minutes as three police trucks passed their taxi, stopped a man in a car, pulled him out, threw him down and stomped on him. Mikey said it was right before him. He came home talking non-stop about what they had seen.
3. Monday, Mike and Cristi made a border trip (735 miles) to McAllen, TX to pick up Jason and Danielle Boyle. Jason was our first intern about 10 years ago. They now have all their support and are coming down to live permanently now. We made it up Monday evening. Jason and Danielle came on Tuesday and we left McAllen for Mexico City yesterday (Wed.) morning about 6:30 AM. The Mexican border city with McAllen is Reynosa, Mexico where there has been a lot of drug violence in the past year. We praise the Lord that He kept us safe and that we made it home here last night about 9:30 PM. We got to stop in Monterrey to have breakfast with our wonderful friends the Zartmans. This morning Mrs. Zartman wrote with the news headlines from yesterday morning. I'll just give you the translation:

Three Die in Shootout in Reynosa
A heavy shootout between two groups of organized crime members left a total of at least 3 people dead and also paralyzed traffic on the Reynosa-Monterrey Highway around kilometer 21.
According to witnesses, the shootout happened about 8:00 AM and lasted about 45 minutes . . . dozens of people who were going to Monterrey or Gustavo Diaz Ordas were direct witnesses to the confrontation between the two armed groups.

From our calculations, we only missed that by 5-10 minutes—we went right through there. If you were praying for us on Wednesday, thank you very much. The Lord is good. When we get to heaven, it will be very interesting to see how many times He spared our lives here on earth because He was not yet done conforming us to Christ's image.

There continues to be a heavy amount of violence in Mexico. Please continue to pray for the Lord's protection and that we would be faithful witnesses of our Lord Jesus.

Please pray for Esteban, a tremendous contact that Faith and I had an opportunity to witness to in a taxi last week for about two and a half hours. Also pray for Olivia, a friend who execises with Faith. She had opportunity to witness to her today for about two hours as well. May the Lord find us faithful.

In Christ,

Mike for all the Goldfii