Thank you so much for your encouragement and support, over the last few weeks - it's meant a lot!

News since last time:

1. IBM have approved Ricky's 'Leave of Absence' so that is a very encouraging answer to prayer.

2. We met Miguel Tamayo (The Bishop of Uruguay) in Chichester, and spoke with him for a while and he showed us a video of the work that is currently going on in the Anglican church in Uruguay - which has given us an idea more of what sort of place we'll be in and where we will probably fit in. He also has said that he'd like us to stay with him for the first month we are out there in order to adjust to the culture / language and to plan with him the rest of our time in Uruguay.

3. The friends that were going to rent our flat while we are away have decided that it wouldn't really be suitable for them. So we now need to find an alternative! We've spoken to an estate agent (Leaders) about letting our flat through them and so far that sounds promising.

4. We met with Mark Gilmore on our way back from our holiday, and spoke to him about Uruguay and short term work there. He was fairly negative / realistic (we'll find out which when we get there!) about the experiences of short termers in the past, so this worried us a bit, however it was good to meet him and he shared a bible verse with us, warning us against expecting too much of ourselves (2 Corinthians 8: 10-12), and we had a time of prayer. He has put us in touch with a couple who have just returned from short-term work in Uruguay and some missionaries who are currently over there so that should be interesting.

5. Fundraising
We are very grateful to all those who have or pledged to support us financially.
Some people have offered to hold a fund-raising event on our behalf, and if this something you'd like to do we would really appreciate it.
We're planning to hold a Latin American evening some time in August and it would be great if as many of you as possible could make it, we'll let you know when it will be soon.
We've started selling greetings cards on our website - see http://www.samespirit.net/store to see the designs

6. We've found some reasonably priced flights

Thank you so much for those of you who have been praying for us; here's a few more things to pray for

• Our preparations: pray that we will keep God at the centre of all our plans, and that we don't get too frustrated with everything we've got to do.
• Pray that we will be able to prioritise effectively.
• Pray that we'll both find time to improve our Spanish.
• Pray for our relationship, that we'll grow closer together as a couple and all the challenges we are facing will only strengthen us, and that we will still find time to read the Bible and pray together.
• Pray for the Church in Uruguay, praise God for all the work thats going on there at the moment and pray that we'll be effective in the community we've been placed.
• Pray that we'll find people to rent the house to and that you'll give us your peace about that situation.

Keep in touch!

Lots of love

Ricky and Laura