joel and bethany potter a glimpse into God's cause and our lives... Will You Pray With Us?
Here are the most up to date prayer items we’d love to have you taking to God on our behalf…
- Joel’s allergies have been in an uproar between the dust of a home in upheaval and the high pollen count outside. This can be almost debilitating at times. Would you pray for relief?
- Having all three of the adults of this family home all the time now will be great, but it will also require patience and putting the others first. Will you pray that this response is our first choice?
- The Home Loan was just approved, which brings us incredibly close to the final “Closing” of the house. Will you pray for wisdom and insight so as to not overlook or forget anything important?
- Our Financial support has been stable for the last few months which is a GREAT thing. However, moving to FL means that we won’t have the extra income we’ve received from babysitting, haircuts and cake baking. Would you ask the Lord to provide this needed income through new means?
- We’ll have a tightly managed budget in order to meet our obligations in our new location, but we’re being encouraged by our leadership to work to develop new financial partners in order to relieve some of this tightness. Would you pray that God would open some doors to developing some of these partnerships?
5/18 Moving Forward->
In what seems to have been the fastest school semester ever here at NTBI, it’s the day before graduation for another class of students! Six classes of students have deepened their understanding of God’s word and purposes for the world while we’ve lived here and four of these classes have completed their two years of teaching.
What does this mean?
It means that over two hundred students have been exposed to and influenced by the Truth of God’s word and can potentially serve as our co-workers, working reach the unreached. And any of them who follow God’s leading in different directions are better equipped to serve and glorify Him!
Are we going to miss that or what?! But, what’s next is what we ask and remind ourselves with. So, with that in mind, here’s a brief update of how the moving forward process is going.
I finished up my official time in the office, two weeks ago with only an office to move out of and a couple more meetings to hold with co-workers who will be taking over some of my responsibilities. Since then, we spent three days selling household items we had set aside for a garage sale and getting into the deep cleaning, painting and packing that will precede the move itself. I’ve enjoyed the extra time to be home and be able to relieve much of the weight that has been resting on Bethany’s shoulders. Relax folks, she’s breathing again!
Three weeks from Sunday (June 10th to be exact) we’ll begin the move south. In between now and then, we’ll keep busy finishing the packing and prep as well as soaking up as much time as we can with our co-workers and friends here!
Would you take a couple minutes and pray for us? Click the “Prayer” Category to the right side of the screen for some specific things and know that we need your prayer support!
Do you like a good story?
Every night my boys ask for me to read a story. It could be something silly like “The Caboose Who Got Loose” or something weighty beyond their years like the original translation of Jules Verne’s classic, “In Search of the Castaways.” And to their credit, Jack loves to both hear me read God’s word as well as to read it himself, in all of his seven year old intonation! They have these stories quickly memorized and they influence so much of what they do. The way they play; influenced by stories. The way they think and act; informed by stories.
Stories speak volumes to them!
It’s not just them either; it’s the rest of the world. From unreached and isolated indigenous people groups to anyone who’s looking forward to the soon coming crop of Summer Blockbusters, stories speak in a language anyone can understand!
Click for Video
If stories have that much impact, they must be used to communicate important things. Jesus, using the fullness of God in the flesh of man, told stories and communicated Truth to the people He came in contact with. So much of the rest of the Word of God is told in the narrative form, essentially as stories. And we can read between the lines of the letters that the apostles wrote in the New Testament and gain glimpses at the stories and back stories that were certainly taking place, shaping the very words they wrote.
So, why am I spending so much time explaining something that you likely already understand? Because it explains both what I’m about to begin to do, and why it’s so important.
My co-workers around the world in the big cities and small hamlets of countries far and wide, are a part of stories that are unfolding everyday! Someone needs to tell those stories to everyone else. Someone needs to be a story-teller to the church. This work that God has committed to believers everywhere is incredibly exciting and powerful and it must be made known!
This is why we’re moving forward to Florida! I’m going to be part of the team of story-tellers that is NTM Communications. We’re using everything from the written word, to visual arts, to motion pictures and to the place where they all meet, the web, to communicate God’s story of redemption and how it’s changing the lives of people from every walk of life.
And if you know me, how could I possibly resist the chance to be telling stories like these?
Tags: Communication, Thoughts
We Got A House!
We Have A House… Our week in Florida has come and gone and with some excited results! We hunted for a home for three and a half days and on the final day, we found what we were hoping for – a home that is just right for our family! It is able to accommodate both of our families (Bethany and I and our three kids, as well as Lynn, Bethany’s Mom) with space for some privacy and room to grow. It even has a guest room for you all when you come to visit (one at a time please!) We made an offer the day before we flew back to Michigan and just four days ago, we received the fantastic news that our offer was accepted and we are on our way to becoming home owners! 
Why do we have to buy a house? We have been blessed in our years with NTM to have always had heavily subsidized housing provided in each location we have served in. At NTM’s Home Office (HO) in Sanford, there are currently only a few homes/apartments available and for a limited time. God has recently provided a newer building for our HO to reside in and this new building has no housing with it, necessitating that all staff need to either buy or rent a home in the area. Bethany’s mom is making this move with us and actually, by her living with us we are able to purchase a home together. Without Lynn, this would be impossible for us financially. We all feel like it is a win-win situation. First, God is allowing each of us to serve Him in reaching the yet unreached with the gospel by being spokes in the wheel of church planting. Second, we are all able to be together while doing that. Mom is now an intimate part of our family and we LOVE having her with us. And now, we have seen God provide a home for us all to live in while we serve Him. 
What type of home were we looking for? We’re not the traditional family. Since we have taken Bethany’s mom, Lynn, into our family, we have some needs in a home that many people don’t have. While she (Lynn) loves all of us, she still has a need for her own space, within any home we would buy. And with three young and growing kids, we really desire to give her the space she needs to both enjoy their energy but escape if needed. And on the other side of the coin, Bethany and I as a couple, still have a vital need for a certain amount of privacy and space to be able to thrive as a married couple. We’re also desirous of buying a home in a neighborhood where a family with three young kids can feel a high degree of safety and security. We’re confident that we were able to purchase a home that meets all of our needs!
Compromise and Possibility
And the house hunt continues…
These last three days have yielded a whole slew of possibilities and oddities that are only experienced when you look at alot of houses! We’ve seen, when my memory is clear, 16 houses in pretty good depth since we started on Monday! Not knowing what to expect, we’ve tried to go into this process as learners and keep our expectation realistic and yet we’re really hoping in God’s ability to show us the right house!
We’re all tired and yet each day have sought heavenly counsel and wisdom and been energized by the possibilities of what our God is capable of.
So, at the end of the third day, after connecting with friends we haven’t seen since Joel’s time as a student at NTBI, we’re about to get some rest and we’re tentatively happy to report that we have found a great home! We’re sensing that we may be seeing God answering that big request of ours to find a house in the space of time we had.
Tomorrow, we’ll talk details with the team of realtors we’re working through and we’d covet your prayers that God would make even more clear to our hearts and minds the path that we sense Him already laying out for us!
And as we’re not ready to share any details of this house in particular I thought I would leave you with some of the intriguing and repulsive possibilities and compromises we came across these last few days. Enjoy… Or not!
Update on the House Hunt!
On This Episode of House Hunters…
Six months ago, we were just two months into what we thought would be just one of many more semesters that we would be serving at New Tribes Bible Institute. We love what we get to do here and were not looking to do anything else.
Fast forward six months and we’re sitting on a jet taking us to central Florida where we’re about to spend a week immersed in a hunt, the likes of which we never saw ourselves in. A house hunt!
In the six months I just referred to, we were invited to consider serving in a different but just as vital aspect of church planting. We were training the church planters who would be a few short years away from being in locations around the world. We poured our lives into their lives, hoping to pass on the lessons we had only recently learned in our walk of faith, to these students who were only a few short years from being our co-workers.
But…where do these students come from?
A big part of the answer to that question is found in why we’re moving our family from Michigan to Florida.
Communication…story telling, essentially is why we’re moving. Convinced of the need for Christian’s in churches around the country and around the world to realize their need to be a part of God’s purposes, we’re joining New Tribes Mission’s communications team to be a part of making clear to people what still needs to be done. We want to see even more students coming to NTBI to study God’s word. We wan’t to see even more people around the country understand and take responsibility for what God is calling all Christians to be part of.
That’s why we’re moving to Sanford Florida. That’s why we’re about to enter the home buying fray.
We need you to pray with us every step that this transition and move takes! This week, after seeing God provide finances for us to begin to search for a home, we’ll be seeing many homes as well as looking at some of the possible schools that our kids will attend. It’s a big week for us, all three of us (Bethany’s mom, Lynn Stroud is with us)!
Will you pray that we might find the “impossible”, the right house, in the space of time we have? That’s a big thing to ask, we know, but God can do that!
Visions… (Pt. 1)
You know what a mirage is right? That hazy, blurry image of on the horizon. You’re not quite sure if it’s something real, something tangible or if it’s a figment of your imagination, a distant hope…
For the Potter family, life is a bit like a mirage right now. The events that unfold in our days cause time to pass so quickly that we often wonder, “Did that just happen?”, “No, wait, that was two weeks ago already!” Can you empathize with us?
These last few weeks have been filled with an unexpectedly busy semester here at NTBI, several speaking opportunities at local churches, a quick trip to the Chicago area to represent NTBI at a national AWANA Summit, the final throes of packing Lynn’s home and planning for our own big move.
The aspirations I hold to communicate about the significant things that we learn in the midst of these experiences can’t beat the constant barrage of time going by. So, life feels a bit mirage-like. The most important thing right now though, is not slowing the pace down, not better time management, but better rest! No, not physical rest (though on this warm summerish afternoon, I long to lay down for a quick nap on the green grass just outside my window), but spiritual rest. It’s a state where instead of trying to fit more in, to get up earlier, to check off my “to-do” items, I settle my anxious mind on the truth that in all things, busy or not, my Lord would have me to gaze at Him and and let that gaze be a filter that I evaluate everything else with.
We can’t control the passage of time, but we can choose to look all around us, to be aware of the people around us, to be sober minded in our interactions, to bring Glory to God rather than simply sit in the backseat of the speeding car of our life intently playing games on our phone, oblivious to the world around us.
The rest (in the midst of the craziness) I’m talking about is more like putting that phone down, rolling down the windows and sticking our hands out, letting them mix with wind passing by as we look all around us to see the sights we’re passing by. The rest doesn’t stop the vehicle, it enables us to savor the ride…
House Hunters (Florida Edition!)
We posted the big news about our move to Florida almost three months ago. And while we hate to leave people in the dark, we entered into a period of busyness that took us off the radar.
But while we moved forward in faith, and anticipated a physical move, God walked us through many opportunities (read challenges) to trust Him more! Not every time did we meet those challenges with optimism based on God’s ability to will and work in us, but in the end, we could see the fruit He was growing in us as we trusted in His working.
We traveled to CT and NJ right before Christmas to visit with Joel’s family before his parents returned to Guyana South America for their final term as missionaries there and after coming home a day before Christmas, we took a short breath before taking a big plunge.
That big plunge was stepping out in faith and listing Lynn’s (Bethany’s Mom, in case you forgot) home in a town and housing market not known for it’s rapid sales. But we knew that as God was giving us the freedom and leading to make this move, this was necessary! And we would trust Him, not sales statistics, to allow this house to be sold.
Well, He did it! In the midst of an outbreak of a particularly persistent cold/flu that took down all 6 of us for weeks, Lynn received and accepted a great offer to buy her home!
So, with one of the biggest steps behind us, we continue to move forward. The house closes on March 30th and we’re planning to take trip to FL in mid-April to hunt for a house and visit local schools. We may be optimistic, but we’re praying that God might allow us to find a suitable home during that week.
In the mean time, we’re deep into packing and prepping to move and Joel is actively working to leave his responsibilities here at NTBI in a state ready to be picked up by whoever will step into his roles when he phases out in early May.
So, would you pray:
- That the closing of Lynn’s house would take place smoothly.
- That the packing process would be tempered with the rest that we need!
- That our “House Hunt” in April might yield some suitable options
- And that we would continue to rest in our God’s capable hands!
Happy Holidays?
Christmas Dinner
In my son Jack’s 1st grade class, the students are intentionally exposed to a host of various significant holidays that take place roughly around this time of the year.
Christmas, Hanukkah, Ramadan, Kwanzaa…
It’s an attempt to teach the children that there are other things happening at this time of the year besides the pervasive concept of stuff. And I have to say, I get easily caught up in the trappings and God quickly, lovingly gives me perspective on the deep significance of Christmas. It’s often like that, I get distracted and God, the giver of Christ, re-focuses my attention.
But for the Siar church, the fledgling group of believers in Papua New Guinea, who only became a church a few months ago, this Christmas likely held none of the distractions that mine did. There was no other holiday on their minds this December. It was simply a chance to celebrate their freedom.
When was the last time you experienced Christmas for the first time? For the Siar, it just happened and it probably didn’t involve any gifts! For more of this story click here.
And on that note, we, the Potter Family wish that you would be encouraged by the life-giving Truth of God as this December and really whole year is about to pass us by!
Tags: Papua New Guinea, Siar, Thoughts, Tribal
Yes it’s true!
We are in fact beginning the process of transitioning to a new ministry within New Tribes Mission. Approximately 6 weeks ago, we were asked to consider joining the NTM US Communications team. To make a very long story short (if you would like the long version, we’d be happy to share, click here), we have sensed tremendous leading and courage from the Lord to walk with Him in the details as we take on some big challenges. And the reward for these risks is potentially incredible.
We will have much more to share with you in the coming weeks as well as some practical ways that you can help us along as we look to the Lord. But for now, would you take the next minute or so to pray to our Heavenly Father, who has opened our eyes to this opportunity to tell His story in a greater way?
Tags: Communication, Ministry
