November Monthly Update

Dear Friends,
Amy and I arrived in Michigan this morning. We came most of the way yesterday, driving over 700 miles. I will be doing a workshop tomorrow with two churches and then we go to Grand Rapids for the IFCA Board Meetings. We will be in Michigan, New York and Virginia on this trip and will get home the day before Thanksgiving. We are expecting a rich time of ministry and fellowship.
We were home the first 4 days of October, and then Jerry traveled up to Canada for a workshop and speaking at Boston Baptist Church in Wilsonville, Ontario. Jerry had a pastors luncheon on Tuesday, Oct. 10 and then we left for Valdosta, GA on the 12th. We were involved with The IFCA Dixie Regional there until after lunch on Friday.
When we left Valdosta, we began driving to Louisiana, where we were scheduled for meetings on Sunday. That’s the day we began our Bonifay, Florida experience. Most of you have heard about this from our prayer updates but we will recap it for some who may not have received those. We ran over a large piece of metal on the interstate, and were towed in to a small mechanic shop in Bonifay. They determined that the oil pan was destroyed and also the left rear tire. They couldn’t fix it on the weekend so we spent Friday night there and on Saturday had a friend take us 45 miles away so we could rent a car and go to our meetings in Louisiana. We returned late Wednesday, returned the rental car, and discovered they were still working on the car and seemed to be having trouble. We spent the night again and then waited most of the day Thursday for the mechanic to finish the repairs. Finally, about 3 p.m., it was all back together.
We started for home. Actually we only got 3 miles before the car just quit. Waiting for a tow truck was very tiring and we were asking the Lord why we could not seem to get out of Bonifay, FL. This time we asked to be towed to a Chevy dealer and when the tow truck turned into the dealership he dropped the car and ruined the front left fender. We soon discovered that the oil pump was not working so the motor was ruined. Since we had 213,000 miles on it, putting a new motor in it was not an option. We had been praying for several months for the Lord to make it clear when we should trade this car and get a new one. It seemed that the answer was clear. Now was the time. It was about 4:30 by then and the local car rental would not rent for a one way trip to Atlanta. “Lord, what do you have in mind?” We needed to get home so Jerry could fly to Wisconsin for a weekend of ministry.
Then we asked the owner if he had any vans for sale. He showed us a 2006 Chevy van with only 9,022 miles on it and a price of $18,000. We asked about our old car, which by this time was only good for junk, and he gave us a trade in of $2,000, so within 30 minutes all the paperwork was done and we had a van to drive home. We got home in our new car about 1a.m. the next morning, and Jerry made it to the airport by 9 a.m. to fly to Waukesha, WI.
All we can say is Praise the Lord. We wanted the Lord to make it clear when we should get another car and He surely did. Sometimes He uses interesting circumstances to get our attention. We do need your prayers. We are asking the Lord to provide the funds to pay for this new car. Any funds sent to BMW and marked for Jerry Smith Vehicle fund will be used for that purpose.
In the meanwhile we did have a great Pastors Summit in Louisiana and Jerry had a great weekend in Wisconsin. The last week of October we had 11 men at the BMW headquarters to be trained to teach the Change Workshops. On October 29th we enjoyed being at our church for a special Harvest Day Celebration.
Thanks for all your love and prayers,
Jerry and Amy