Upcoming Trip to France

Hello friends!

As you may recall from our previous letter, “Martin Update“, Kendrick and I are planning a trip this May to France with TEAM (https://team.org/) to go on a short-term or “Vision casting” trip. The main goal of this trip is relationship building and working with permanent missions teams located there. It is our goal to prayerfully seek God’s will in how we can use our talents to build and extend His Kingdom, and share God’s love in practical ways. As you may have heard, there is a massive influx of refugees in Europe, and that number isn’t going down anytime soon. These people are coming from a wide array of backgrounds, and have an even wider set of needs. In addition, the French country has a growing number of Muslim immigrants moving from various nations around the world. Couple this with the fact that France is one of the leading post-Christian and post-Catholic communities in the world, and you have a huge need for the Gospel. Years ago, Kendrick was moved by a sermon about the need for missionaries in France and since then he has felt that we would end up there someday. It is our hope that we can utilize our love of community building, and supporting marginalized people groups to strengthen the Church by showing Christ’s love in practical, relational ways.

The Lord has been preparing us in so many different ways over the past couple years. I have been attending missions conferences, learning more about the refugee crisis domestically and globally. I’ve also been learning a great deal at Portland Rescue Mission as I work with broken women trying to get their lives back from addiction, abuse and heartbreak. Kendrick feels especially called toward discipleship and he has pursued this ferociously
. He’s been meeting with multiple small groups of guys on a weekly basis for some time. Whether it’s book clubs or Bible studies, their consistent purpose is to enrich each other’s lives through community focused on Jesus Christ. I am so proud of his commitment to consistent discipleship and I’ve learned so much from his example. We’ve also been volunteering together at Portland Rescue Mission for the past two years and took over the leadership of our volunteer group this past year. On a monthly basis, we help serve a meal and share the gospel in a short chapel service. Here’s some verses we’re meditating on in preparation for our trip: Genesis 12:1-3; Matthew 28:18-20; Luke 24:45-49; Revelation 7:9-10.

We would love to have you join us on this journey. Since the main goal of this trip is fact finding and seeking a longer-term vision, prayer is a huge part of that. We both ask you to keep us in your daily prayers, to keep our minds and hearts focused and listening to whatever God is calling us to. We are also in need of financial support to make this trip happen. Our budget is $4,556.60 and we need to raise that by April 22nd. We’re committing to cover just about half of that and trust the Lord to provide the rest. We’d like to ask you to partner with us in meeting our goal of raising $2,300 in this next month and a half. Whether you can afford $10 or $100, it would make a huge difference for us if you joined us financially and prayerfully.

 

The easiest way to give is online, follow the link below and enter “Martin” into the search. Then we should pop up as Martin, Kendrick & Emily – 012165. You can choose to give once or at a few different frequencies. When you give online, your donation is automatically tax deductible.  You can also donate cash or check by mail and we’ll submit your donation to TEAM on your behalf. https://secure2.convio.net/team/site/SPageServer?pagename=donatenow

 

There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love. We love because he first loved us. 1 John 4:18-19

 

Martin Updates

(This was sent around to various people so I thought I’d keep it here for anybody who didn’t get it elsewhere)

2016 was a very full year for Emily and I. I’m still working at CrowdCompass on the operations team, continuing in my 4th year there. In 2016 our parent company, Cvent, was acquired by Vista equity, and this acquisition is offering a lot of potential for new job opportunities in the company. In the fall Emily joined the Portland Rescue Mission working in the women’s program as an advocate and mentor. We had both been leading the volunteers on a monthly basis at PRM through our church, Door of Hope, and Emily was quick to make connections. She’s really enjoying her time working with the ladies, and loves having an avenue to share the gospel through practical use of her love of personal relationships.

I got heavily involved in homebrewing this year. We took a trip over memorial day weekend to the Oregon coast to be part of a homebrewers wild-beer event. Brewers from the local sour-brewing De Garde, in Tillamook, came out and spent the weekend with us as we brewed two 50 gallon batches of beer. We got to take home 5 gallons ourselves to sit for a year before it will be ready to drink. I also brewed, and won, a local homebrewing competition that allowed me to work with a local brewery to brew my recipe at large scale and serve it at a brewpub.

The major highlight of our year was our tenth wedding anniversary in July. To celebrate this, we took a three week whirlwind trip through France, Spain, Morocco, and Iceland and crammed as much adventure in as we could. It was an encouraging experience of exploring many different cultures, and getting outside our comfort zone. We loved every minute of it.

Part of what had originally drew us to this area, is we are considering working long-termas part of a missions outreach. Both Emily and I feel very called to the Muslim world, and the increasing struggles with the refugee crisis only highlights this even more. In fact we are planning a two week trip to France in May of 2017 with the organization TEAM as short-term missionaries. The main goal of this trip is relationship building and seeking God’s guidance as to whether France is somewhere we’re called to work long term. We’ll be sending out more information in the coming weeks to request your prayer and support.

Thank you for taking the time to read this update! We would love to hear back from you. I personally love all forms of communication be it post-cards, emails, or skype conversations and would love to have any of them with you. We both hope you take the time to listen for the still, small, voice of God speaking in your life. This current political climate offers a lot of distractions, frustrations, and worries. I plead with you to remember the call to sacrifice your personal comfort to take up the cross and follow our Savior.

In His Peace,

Kendrick and Emily Martin