Katherine and Wayne serve as seconded missionaries to Interchurch Medical Assistance (IMA).  Wayne serves as the in-country liaison officer with IMA for financial and accounting matters.  Additionally, Wayne has been helping Congolese people through a development project to grow more food. Katherine is working with a group of Congolese Christian professionals in training community leaders, urban and rural, to be promoters of health in their communities. 

They write: On January 13 we return to Congo for another term of service.  We’ll hug Christopher, our college freshman, goodbye and leave him on this side of the Atlantic.  Jonathan will go back with us to finish his junior year at the American School of Kinshasa (TASOK).  … We have much for which to feel thankful, and a litany of experiences marking God’s faithfulness to our family.

We’re looking forward to our return to Congo.  The primary project to which Wayne has been providing financial oversight ends in October.  IMA World Health, the group with whom Wayne works, has other projects in the pipeline but given the change of government in the U.S. and the global economic conditions, it’s hard to predict if these will be funded.  If they are, we will continue living and working in Kinshasa for the foreseeable future.  Otherwise we can move “up country” where, arguably, the needs are greater.  We remain open to the Lord’s leading.

I’m looking forward to rejoining the team of physicians and others doing community health work among the urban poor.  In the months I have been in the U.S. they have been building teams in other slum areas of Kinshasa, identifying leaders, problems, and potential solutions.  Because of some networking and synergy with the Presbyterian church in Kinshasa, this spring we hope to establish this grassroots approach in two other cities: Mbuji Mayi and Kananga.

Because of God’s faithfulness to us, and your faithfulness through prayer and gifts, we are looking forward to our return to Congo. 
•    Pray for our family through this transition. 
•    Pray for God’s people we serve in Congo, where poverty and hopelessness often feel like unshakable companions.