Phil and Janelle Sutton Reaching People for Christ in Sanford Florida 2012 May Grandparents for the First Time
2012 May – Grandparents for the First Time
We got a chance to visit Brock & Heidi just after our first grandson was born. Ryley Josiah Sutton, (6 pound 12.3 oz. and 19 inches long), was born April 7, 2012. We arrived the day of his birth and immediately went to the hospital. It was so fun to pick up this small bundle of joy.
Later in the week he was introduced to Penny. It was fun seeing the dogs’ reaction. While in Chattanooga, I got a chance to build some shelves for Brock’s Lego business. (A belated Christmas & birthday present.) We were able to spend a few days with them and then returned to Florida by Saturday.
Brock & Heidi & Ryley are doing fine. They are adjusting to a change in schedule and having someone with a good set of lungs let them know he is hungry. Although they are working on getting that schedule set so feeding time works out best for a tired mom.
Phil and Janelle Sutton
Tags: grandparents, Janelle, New Tribes Mission, NTM, Phil, Sanford, Sutton
2012 The Search for Commitment
The Search for Commitment
In my current ministry, I am helping new candidates through the process of acceptance to NTM’s training in Missouri. As I am talking with potential candidates, I am constantly seeking guidance in what to look for in deciding whether a person is “ready” for training and moving on overseas to fill the many needs around the world. It got me to thinking about what made the members of Janelle’s and my families choose a ministry and stick with it for so many years. Janelle’s brother, living in South East Asia for 27 years with another brother, Ken & Sue serving in the Philippines for 12 years. My brothers, Ron & Verna serving in Central Europe for the past 21 years, Arnie & Cathy serving in Brazil, Mexico & the USA for 36 years. Clyde & Diane served in Brazil & the USA for 25 years. We have served for 29 years in the USA & Papua New Guinea. What a great family heritage to be a part of.
So I look at those who went out before us and ask “Will the new candidates make that same commitment?” We have one of the largest groups of long veteran missionaries who are year by year going into retirement. They have faithfully served for years and now need to be replaced. So when I look at the new candidates my challenge is that they can make the same commitment to serve for 20 plus years. That is difficult to ask in today’s world. “You want me to commit to WHAT? 20 plus years! You have got to be kidding!”
What kept those people in my family continuing to serve for so many years? I think it boils down to one thing, God keeps us serving and He needs to be first in our lives.
So you might wonder how can I ask for that same commitment of the candidates of today? God does. He also says that “the laborers a few, but the harvest is great” So in short, we need committed people, because the work of planting churches in a tribal or under developed country is hard and time consuming. It does take people to commit to serving 20 plus years. Will you go or find someone to challenge to go? Go on the Journey
Phil and Janelle Sutton
2011 Christmas Greetings
Merry Christmas from Phil and Janelle Sutton
We would like to wish all of you a Merry Christmas. We will be spending Christmas day with our new upcoming family. Janelle and I, and Kyla, Chad and Brittany (our future daughter-in-law) will be joining her parent and grandparents who live here in Central Florida. It will be fun to get together with our new expanded family. I trust you all will have a blessed Christmas with your family.
We are in the New House
We are so thankful to all the guys that helped us move. We are thankful to God for providing a nice place for us to live. The first project was to paint the kitchen prior to moving in. There is still much to unpack and do on the house. Shelves were made by the fire place in Kyla’s room, new mechanisms’ for the toilet, installed a new used stove and a dryer, etc… It is slowly coming together and we hope to be done with it enough to have Chad and his fiancé here for Christmas.
Harold, one of my co-workers, came by last Saturday and power washed the deck out back and the house. That was a huge blessing. The house has been sitting empty and the deck was black and grimy after being neglected for over 2 years. It brightened up the house too.
It has been a pleasure to work with all the New Tribes Bible Institute graduates that are headed to Camdenton, Mo to the Missionary Training. The current count for the January class is 35. This number of students is higher than resent January classes. God is raising up laborers in spite of troubled economic times. There is much to be done around the world. God is able.
Thanks for praying.
Phil and Janelle Sutton
2011 PFO
NTM has a training program called Pre Field Orientation (PFO) that prepares missionaries for service with New Tribes Mission. This past week I had the privilege along with the rest of our Connection Center team to help train 4 associates and 1 career missionary with NTM. It is a time where missionaries learn various aspects of what to expect when serving here at Sanford and abroad. Many of the staff here at the NTM home office does each class session. Some of the departments represented are the; leadership, communications, child protection, medical and taxes, etc… The list goes on, but you get the idea. Janelle and I had many opportunities to help those that were heading for Papua New Guinea.
2011 November Update
We are so thankful that we had an opportunity to get to Minnesota and see my mom. She is doing well and is on more of an upswing. We visited her each day while we were in Blackduck. She even fixed us a meal on one of the nights. She hasn’t cooked a real meal for over 2 years. So we all pitched in together and had a chicken dinner. That was special!
On our trip back to Florida we also got a chance to visit the training center in Missouri. It was nice to see the fall colors. We were in meetings for most of the week. Janelle and I learned a lot about the classes our missionary candidates take before going overseas. They are in a course that takes a year and a half and has modules on language learning, relationship skills, child protection, phonetics, team building, cross-cultural training, family, missionary kid issues, etc… We met with the leaders to help communicate what the Connection Center (the department I am a part of) in Sanford does in screening applicants who will eventually be their students. It was a great time to learn and meet new people that are a part of the training team.
There is not a lot of new news on the purchasing of our house. We keep getting new requirements that need to be met before we can get the house. The process has gone through 4 different extensions or amendments to our original contract. Pray that next week we will be able to get the repairs done on the house that the FHA has required to be made prior to the final sale. If the house passes the inspections required by the FHA next week we could close the deal soon. I just keep saying, “It ain’t over until it’s over”. We are looking forward to finally moving into a place we can call our own.
Thanks for praying.
Phil and Janelle Sutton
2011 September Phil and Janelle Update
September 2011 Phil and Janelle Sutton Update
We are so excited to announce that our youngest will be getting married! Chad is now engaged to Brittany Engaldo. They plan to be married on June 23, 2012. Chad is in his second year at New Tribes Bible Institute in Waukesha Wisconsin. Brittney has graduated from NTBI and is working in the area until they come to Florida for the wedding. Brittany grew up just north of Tampa Bay Florida. Let us know if you would like to attend their wedding and we will pass that information on to them.
We had a good time with Brittany’s parents a few weeks ago. Brittany’s mom Barbara is the daughter of Paul and Pam Rasmussen who are one of our co-workers here at the USA Head Office. Barbara is a missionary kid from Colombia, South America. Andy is a home improvements specialist. Courtney is still in high school and likes to be the life of the party.
We are looking at a house on Sanford Ave about 2 miles from the USA Home Office. Pray for us as we did get an offer on our house in Georgia. We are working through the loan process this week for the house here in Sanford.
Yours in reaching the unreached around the world,
Phil and Janelle Sutton
August 2011 Phil and Janelle Sutton Update
“Over the next few years, NTM USA will move into a six-story office building in downtown Sanford, only a half-mile from our current home office.
An anonymous donor generously provided for NTM USA to have use of the building. We have been considering a move to a more efficient office building for a number of years, as the existing building has required increasing maintenance. This very building was considered, but it was not available until recently. The move should enable us to operate more efficiently and at a lower cost, thereby better serving our NTM USA missionaries throughout the world.”
This was the headline in NTM in house communication.
Pray for the families that are currently living in the current home office building. With this move those families will be trying to locate alternative housing. Eventually we would have desired to move into mission housing ourselves, but chose to rent a house for this year. We are finding that paying rent is higher than what it would be to own our home. So pray for us as we try to locate a house to buy in Sanford. The housing market at a low point and it’s a good time to buy. With Janelle not being able to drive, we desire to find a house that is close enough to continue to commute by bicycle to work. (By the way the current mile meter for our bicycle commute is at 244 miles since June!)
Many of you know that in 2008 we purchased a home in Flintstone, GA. Brock and Heidi, our son and daughter-in-law live in that house and now desire to buy a house for themselves within the next 6 months. So we will put that house up for sale and put the proceeds of that sale into the house we wish to purchase here in Sanford. (Anybody want to buy a great retirement house in GA?) Pray that our GA house will sell.
Yours in reaching the unreached around the world,
Phil and Janelle Sutton
2011 June Update
A Journey Begins… 2011 June Update Phil and Janelle Sutton
Our transition from the field of PNG to USA Headquarters is complete. It has taken us from spending time with our prayer and financial supporters to starting our new ministries. We have enjoyed the time we have had with people while on our “Home Assignment”. Each morning you can find us getting on our bicycles heading on our journey to the mission. It is really nice to be close enough to ride the ¾ of mile to the mission. It’s good exercise too!
Phil - Both Janelle and I have been in the office for two weeks now. I am working with the candidate office being trained as a “Candidate Coach”. I always wanted to be a coach. I never thought that I would be coaching people in the process of becoming missionaries in a cross-cultural setting. Coaching involves giving advice for a candidate to connect with their home church. We see the local church being a vital part in sending these missionaries around the world. I get a chance to interact with many pastors who have a heart to see a member of their church being involved with reaching the unreached around the world. Pray for Harold as he tries to press his 12 years of experience as the Candidate Administrator into my brain.
Janelle - Janelle has been learning how to update the personnel data base from Becky. It is important to keep records up to date so that our member care and representatives can see the latest prayer requests of our missionaries. Their prayer letters also reveal information on new members of the family born, changes in ministry, marriages, etc… Janelle then gathers that information and often verifies with the missionary that a change is needed. Pray for Janelle as she continues to be taught new responsibilities.
PFO – In the next couple of weeks there will be 17 new candidates going through training prior to going to the field as associate missionaries. The candidates come from over all the USA to Sanford NTM USA headquarters for Pre Field Orientation. They will be exposed to how to better adjust to cross cultural situations. Over the next several weeks they will start a journey to the field. Pray for them as many of them are leaving family and friends for the first time. Pray that they have a core group of people and churches to hold them up in prayer for their 1-4 year assignment overseas.
Financial Update – We thank everyone who keeps giving to our ministry. We could not function without those financial gifts. We continue to trust God to see more people who can financially partner with us as we do our ministry here in Sanford Florida. We are not given a salary like a normal business, but totally rely on financial partners to meet our daily needs.
Yours in reaching the unreached around the world,
Phil and Janelle Sutton
Tags: Florida, Janelle, missionary, New Tribes Mission, NTM, Phil, Sanford, Sutton, Transition
2011 March Update
2011 March Update from Phil and Janelle
God Uses His People in Papua New Guinea
God has a way of using his people that goes beyond what we expect. There are exciting things happening with God using the people from the Chronological Bible teaching that started in Port Moresby.
John our co-worker picked up the last package of Chronological teaching material and delivered it to the NTM center in Port Moresby. It was an exciting day as it marked the beginning of getting teaching materials into the hands of the Bible teachers.
Below are some excerpts from e-mails sent to me.
“Just an update.
We (Togaro, Alice, and myself) met with Brother Dave Yunker on Saturday for the handover of the chron material.
Alice was given her set as she already has 50 students to teach in a religious instruction class at a public school.
As soon as a date is fixed, Togaro and I will head down to Kwikila to handover a set of teaching materials to Pastor Sepa.
About 20 student workbooks were given out to our members of the English Congregation on Sunday. After I explained and challenged them, they agreed for me to restart from the beginning now that they have the workbooks.
We decided to have two classes. The first class is the Phase 1, Firm Foundation: Creation to Christ. That’s from 8am to 9am.This is mainly for the unbelievers but believers are encouraged to sit in as a review or to learn the story so they can be able to teach it themselves or to others.
The second class is on phase 2. This is only for believers. That’s from 9am to 9:45am. For the first time the believers are enjoying their teaching.
I will be doing a teacher training with Brother Charles and George so they one can both teach the materials Phase 1 & 2. This will release me to reach out to others.
Thank you very much. Thank the Cokato Thrift Shop once again for us.( The Cokato Thrift Shop made a donation to purchase and send the materials to Papua New Guinea.)
Thank you for your continued prayers for us as we now move to assist Pastor Sepa and others in the “how to” teaching chron materials.
God Bless!
Kokou Niara (Mr.)”
Continue to pray for the teaching that continues to reach the people of Papua New Guinea.
Phil and Janelle Sutton
Personal Financial Note: Though we are joining the NTM USA Headquarters staff it is not a paid position. We continue to live by faith from the donations we receive from partners who continue to financially support us.
2011 Moved to Sanford
Greetings from Sanford, January 2011 Update
We had a great time with our family for Christmas. Everyone was able to make it to Flintstone and stay for about a week. It snowed on Christmas day so we made a luge in the front yard. Steep hills and snow and ice do not mix so it made it difficult for businesses in the area. There are not many snow removal vehicles in northern Georgia. It made it interesting to get around.
We rented a U-haul trailer and moved our belongings from Flintstone, GA, arriving in Sanford, FL on January 21. Another winter storm was moving in so we decided to leave in the afternoon before it hit. We had a good trip to Florida with no problems. Thanks for praying for us in our move.
We are settling into a rented house 6 blocks from the USA headquarters. It will make it easy to get to work. The short walk will be good for us each day. We have been officially offered and accepted positions in the Personnel Department. I’ve been asked to train into the position of Candidate Secretary. I’ll be working with the Bible School students as they move on in their mission training. Janelle will be doing computer data input and various other tasks in the office. We will continue to be on “Home Assignment” meeting with churches and supporters until our official start date of June 1. We plan to meet with the department to get some strategy for learning our new positions on Feb 4. There is need for us to be reviewing and updating ourselves on NTM policies so that we are better prepared for our ministries.
We like our new house. It has 3 bedrooms, so once we get set up we will be able to have a place for guests to visit us in Florida. We still have a ways to go to get the house set up. Kyla had a few pieces of furniture which we could use in setting up the place. We are seeking out the bargains at garage sales to furnish the house and are finding some good deals at local stores. There sure are a lot more choices here in the USA.
Kyla is living with us and is already back taking a class at UCF. She continues to work for her church as an office administrator and she has kept her part-time job as a book keeper at Albertsons. It is good to have her with us.
We will be making a trip up to Savannah, Georgia to pick up our crates. We have heard word that they will be in port on February 17-18. Pray that they will arrive safely and get out of customs okay. We will visit with a friend in Vidalia and work through the process of getting our crates. In March we hope to get back to Flintstone to put new shingles on our house.
Pray for us as we transition to our new ministry at the NTM USA Headquarters.
Phil and Janelle Sutton
Tags: Janelle, New Tribes Mission, NTM, Phil, Sutton, Transition