Six.
by Tom Scatliff
on June 10, 2020
We packed our belongings into the back of a U-Haul truck, said farewell to our church family, and headed south. With fresh work visas to work as Canadian in the USA, we took a giant leap of faith, left all we knew in Canada, and headed to Indiana. Our kids were 8 months and 3 years old. It was June 2nd, 2014. 
Last day as Montrealers.
Would God really sustain us in full time ministry?
Would we make new friends, find another great church family?
Could we really be used in ministry?
Where is the grocery store!?!

We had just finished up six months of full-time partnership development (that’s the fancy term for nervously sitting down with friends, family, or anyone else who is willing to listen and, with sweaty palms and a slight stutter, ask them to partner financially with us in ministry).  During those refining six months God brought together a support team to send us off. Now, we had arrived: Elkhart, Indiana, USA to start our new life as full-time missionaries.
Brand new Elkharters.
And now, it’s six years later. Six.
 
When we took that leap of faith we had no idea the Canadian dollar would take a nose dive within the first year, or our sending organization would require us to find someone else to serve with, or a global pandemic was in store. When we took that leap of faith we had no idea we’d have another kid (an AMERICAN?!), end up in the hospital with him, navigate health insurance…

You know what else we had no idea about? We had no idea we’d be involved in so many international projects or that God would use us for things so close to our hearts! Over the past six years we’ve been involved in helping ministries in Haiti, Mexico, Guatemala, Honduras, Puerto Rico, Canada, United States, Ecuador, Peru, Mali, Liberia, Central African Republic, Ethiopia, Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, Burundi, Congo, Malawi, Zambia, Kyrgyzstan, Nepal, Bangladesh, Indonesia, and Papua New Guinea, to name a few…

We didn’t know we’d be required to travel to Congo (three times), Haiti (twice), Dominican Republic, India, Peru… That we’d work passionately on clean water projects and food security issues, assist orphanages and hospitals meet the nutritional needs of their vulnerable, help rural pastors in developing countries reach their own people.
It’s been a wild six years
We also had no idea that our support team would become like family, rallying with us through the challenges, cheering with us in the successes, and encouraging us along the way. We didn’t know how special each team member would become and how we’d cherish getting to spend time together praying, encouraging one another, and truly becoming partners in bringing the gospel forward.

From the bottom of our hearts, we want to extend the most sincere thank you for the past six years. None of this would have happened without your direct involvement and personal investment in our lives!

Happy anniversary. And here’s to many more.
 

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