NTM - New Tribes Mission | Planting Tribal Churches

Well, we’re here in Florida! Finally! Our first weeks have been typical moving-in chaos: unpacking boxes, transferring licenses, finding doctors (more about that in a minute), trying to get the family into a schedule—we’re getting there! The apartment is lovely—we put a quick video together if you want to see it: 

Diane and the children have started back into home school. There’s also a New Tribes school where the children are taking art, music, and Spanish classes. The children have made some friends, many of whom live right here in the same building.

Dave was able to get into the office after the first week or so. Maybe we’ll have a “geeky” section in future newsletters explaining what’s going on in the software project world. Right now it’s just getting computers set up in the new environment and becoming familiar with the existing code.

So here’s how NOT to learn a new area. A couple of weeks ago, Samuel fell from the top of the bunk bed ladder and was knocked unconscious. He was only out for about half a minute, but scared us enough that we wanted to have him checked out at the hospital. We didn’t yet have a pediatrician or family doctor down here, so called our pediatricians back in KY. And even though we haven’t been patients there for over 6 months, they paged the doctor and were eager advise us. (Shameless promotion: Pediatric Associates in Northern KY, for those in the area with children.) Anyway, God is good; Samuel is fine. But now we know where the hospital is! (Which will come in handy in March when the baby is due.) The doctor who checked out Samuel had just moved from KY and recommended a local dentist—a “from-Kentucky-plain-and-simple-I-don’t-need-a-hygienist-I’ll-clean-the-teeth-myself-and-talk-about-UK-basketball” type of guy. We’ll have to check him out.

We hope that each of you has a blessed time this Christmas season celebrating our Savior’s birth with family and friends. You all mean so much to us—thank you for your partnership with us to enable us to be down here serving, and ultimately hastening the preaching of the Gospel to those who have not heard.

Now that we are here, our main prayer request is for wisdom for Dave as he joins his programming team. Wisdom for his place on the team and how to best serve both the missionaries working here and the missionaries working abroad. Please also ask the Lord for a smooth transition a cohesiveness of the team as well.

Thank you all for praying for us as we moved. We arrived safe and sound and are now getting settled. We arrived just over 2 weeks ago and your prayers were felt and appreciated.

Hooray! The time has arrived at last to make the move down to New Tribes Mission’s offices in Florida and “get to work.” Thank you all so much for the support and encouragement you’ve shown our family through this partnership development phase. God has taught us valuable lessons about the interdependence between every member of His family, and we give thanks to Him for the gifts He has given to each of you, and for you committing to serve our family through those gifts.

Lord willing, the U-Haul will pull away from Beaver, PA on the morning of November 4 (after we cast our election vote, of course!) We’ll stop for a night at Diane’s parents’ house in South Carolina before finishing the journey to Florida.

It continues to bless us how the Lord works out the details. We just learned that NTM is having a staff orientation event the week just after we arrive there. These are relatively infrequent events, so being able to absorb this “big picture” information immediately is a great benefit. Also, the perfect apartment came available at the NTM campus—it is larger (for our larger family), very nicely kept up, and has lots of storage space! It’s also a good time for Diane to move in her pregnancy. Not too far along so it’s unsafe or exceedingly uncomfortable for her to travel, but far enough along that she can make me do all the work. (I’m kidding, of course; I have children for the heavy stuff.)

Speaking of our newest baby, we found out that we are having a girl! (Well, we’re 95% sure I guess…) We are elated and although we would have been thrilled either way, it is nice to balance out the genders a bit in our family. Sarah especially was thrilled! We are due on March 10.

How could we ever truly express to each one of you how much your interest in this ministry—your prayers, financial support, notes and emails of encouragement, and conversations—mean to us? Without you, we would not be where we are with the opportunity to serve unreached peoples with New Tribes. Thank you for your part in proclaiming the good news to all people!

In our last update, we wrote about the lessons that the Lord desires to teach our family through this time of waiting. In many ways not much has changed since we wrote the last update on our lives. We wish we had a dramatic development to share, but we don’t. Every day we ache to start the work, but partnership development is a necessary phase for now. 

There’s a great tension in the decisions we face right now. Part of us wants to just go to Florida immediately. Would this be an act of trusting God and stepping out in faith, or would it be presumption and impatience? Is waiting for our minimal support exercising perseverance and wisdom, or is it masking fear and doubt in pragmatism? Answers to our prayers for wisdom have come in the form of counsel from our church leadership who are recommending that at this time we continue to wait for our support to come in. Thus we continue to wait and pray and seek the Lord in this time; we appreciate your prayers on our behalf as we continue to go through this phase.

On another note, this past week our family took a wonderful trip to Alabama for a 40th anniversary party for Diane’s parents. It was a time of getting together with old friends that we had not seen in 20 years, seeing family and rejoicing in God’s goodness in giving Diane’s parents 40 years together. On our way down to the “deep south,” we had a refreshing few days in Kentucky, going to our KY church and being refreshed in the company of wonderful, godly fellowship. Truly God gives us a bit of encouragement and refreshment at just the right time. It was truly a blessing.

Speaking of blessings, the Lord has decided to bless us with another child. Come March, Lord willing, we will welcome our fifth child into our growing family. Diane got to see the little one moving all around through the wonders of modern medicine when she got an ultrasound. It was an exciting moment. I guess we will have to up our grocery budget again!

God bless you all!

Have you wanted something so bad you could taste it, but the answer from the Lord was, “Wait?” That is precisely where we find ourselves right now. We are so anxious to start the software development role to which the Lord has called us, aiding the tribal missionaries in
their work. We are literally aching to go and we hear the Lord saying, “Wait. Don’t rush. I have things to teach you during this time. Wait on Me as I provide what you need. This lesson is important. Don’t rush it.”

Raising our financial and prayer support team is a process and is in many ways the hardest thing we have ever done as a couple. (OK, trying to raise 4 children in the ways of the Lord probably ranks above it.) This time of being in Pennsylvania has been invaluable. We are learning a ton. We are learning contentment, waiting on the Lord’s timing, watching Him provide and move in hearts in a way that can only be from Him. We are getting to know people in the church and those on our newsletter list better. We are learning to abandon our illusion of self-sufficiency and let the church be the serving body she’s intended to be. We are seeing God’s hand of mercy in it all. We are learning to “wait.”

In many ways, this is a strange season. We are enjoying our time in Pennsylvania and blessed by the friendships we are developing. We also miss intensely the sweet fellowship we had in Kentucky with our dear friends there. We are working hard on trying to make contacts with churches and individuals, all the time praying, praying, praying for the Lord to receive all the
glory. We are anxious to go, and learning to wait.

We want you as our precious partners to know that the Lord is working on our behalf and we are so grateful for each and every one of you who are a part of this ministry.
Thank you for your part in reaching the lost with the Gospel. You are a blessing to us.

We are now here in Beaver, PA and mostly settled in. Moving has taught us a few lessons:

First, I’m an internet junkie. I was captive in our new home without high-speed internet for 3 WHOLE DAYS! Aren’t there laws against such torment? We actually had to use the yellow pages! (Apparently they publish a hard copy of the thing.)

Second, we have a lot of stuff. I thought we could get by with the 17-foot U-Haul, but Diane encouraged me that we would need the 26-footer. We filled it. Boxes of books, toys, kitchen utensils, toys, kitchen utensils, toys, and kitchen utensils piled high on desks, dressers, and dryers.

“Coincidentally,” (ha!) the Scriptures to which the Lord has led us in recent days have particular relevance given our circumstances. We were reading through the Sermon on the Mount with the children the other night and came across these commands from our Lord:

“Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys, and where thieves do not break in or steal; for where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.” (Matthew 6:19–21)

I’m going through Hosea, a collection of prophesies largely directed at an unfaithful Israel who, in her God-given prosperity, developed an apathy towards her covenant with Yahweh. Hosea records this indictment:

“But I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of Egypt. You shall acknowledge no God but me, no Savior except me. I cared for you in the desert, in the land of burning heat. When I fed them, they were satisfied; when they were satisfied, they became proud; then they forgot me.” (Hosea 13:4–6)

Boy, that’s our danger as well. We recognize that our family has stuff-a-plenty. Our contentment can lead to pride (“Look what we’ve accomplished!”) and neglect of our devotion to Christ.

Maybe it’s time for another Goodwill run…

We appreciate your continued prayer for our family during this time. We’re pretty much settled in now, at least as much as we’re going to be. This week we should be able to start focusing our efforts on our partnership development. We’ll keep you up-to-date on how it’s going. Thank you again for joining us in this ministry.

On May 1, a U-Haul full of Mateers and Mateer stuff will be pulling out from our home down here in Kentucky and cruising up the Interstates to our new (temporary) home in our old stomping grounds near Pittsburgh, PA. For many months, we have been juggling the responsibilities of two jobs: Dave’s current employment at Answers in Genesis as well as partnership development for our work with New Tribes. We knew there would be a “magical moment” where we would need to step out and devote ourselves full-time towards our work at NTM. That time is now!

This is only a temporary move; we continue to build our missionary support network, sharing with others the mission of NTM and our involvement in that mission. We will establish our temporary “center of operations” in Beaver, PA, where Dave grew up. (We’ll provide an updated address and phone number once we are moved in.)

So basically, life is a wheel of insanity right now! But the Lord has been so merciful and faithful to us through this process. Our house in Kentucky is taken care of; some beloved friends of ours from church have offered to rent it from us and take care of it. An apartment has opened up in Florida and is being held for us. I found a laptop computer that will be an excellent fit for the work with NTM. I could go on and on … man, it’s great to be on the same side as the Sovereign of the Universe!

Please pray for our faith as we start out on this new adventure. I (Dave) am the quintessential bean-counter / pragmatist / type-A / budget zealot—pick your cliché. Leaving the security of a predictable salary pushes life to a whole other level for me, filled with both excitement and apprehension. Our church has been teaching through Mark’s gospel, and the theme of faith and prayer is a weekly rebuke.

Lord willing, after a few months of focusing full-time on partnership development in PA we will be able to move down to Florida to start the actual software development. So stay tuned for the sequel….

We love you all! Stay faithful in your service for the Kingdom!

On February 12, my grandfather passed peacefully into the eternal presence of his Lord and Savior Jesus.

During his sojourn in this world, he personified humility, gentleness, and the quiet but active concern for others that is the hallmark of the Kingdom. This letter will not eulogize my grandfather; it would not be what he would want. But I would like to comment on one aspect of his faith that was evidenced during his final days in this world.

Even as my grandfather’s health progressively faded during his final weeks, he remained mentally acute. Diane and I visited with him just four days before he passed away. Although he spent much of his day sleeping at this point, when he awoke during our visit he immediately knew exactly who we were, asked about the children, and commented on the church-speaking appointment we had the next day! He knew exactly what was going on in our lives.

He also knew what was going on in his life—that his life on this earth was ending. In the midst of this, he showed no fear of death. He was able to calmly make difficult decisions in full confidence that he would soon be in the presence of his Savior. This quiet, fearless confidence in God’s provision through Christ is perfected love:

1 John 4:10-12, 16-18: “This is love: not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and His love is made complete in us…. God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in him. In this way, love is made complete among us so that we will have confidence on the day of judgment, because in this world we are like Him. 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.”

Here, then, is the pattern that should govern our lives: in His love, God grants us forgiveness in Christ, which motivates our love for one another, which completes (perfects) love, which drives out our fear of divine punishment.

Whether it is the tribesman in a remote jungle living in fear of the spirits, or one’s next door neighbor fearing the unknown as he dies of cancer, people fear death. The Gospel provides the solution, and we have been given the task to proclaim and live its message.

One final note: as I reflect on my grandfather’s obedience to God’s love, I have to confess how often I still have moments of doubt and fear. Why? The Scripture makes the correct diagnosis: because I fail to love others. Let us pray for one another, and exhort each other, towards perfect love.