Copyright © 2010,
J & P Oliver
Last Updated on July 2, 2010
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July 2010
We realize it's a little early for Christmas cards, but it's still a good time to remember Jesus! We are thankful for Jesus - for His birth, His death for our sins, His burial, His resurrection, and the eternal life He freely gives.We are reminded, though, that there are many folks who have not yet heard the good tidings of great joy. Thanks for your partnership with us in this mission to reach them with the good news of Christ and His free gift of salvation!
Our kids have finished school for the year and are having some summer fun. Joy turned 13 on June 28 and celebrated with a fun pool party. As our reward for participating in the “Give a Day, Get a Disney Day” program, we also enjoyed a free day at Disney World on June 10.
June 17 was National Ride Public Transit day, with free rides on our local Lynx bus routes. Since I’ve been wanting to take our kids on a public bus excursion, we took a short bus trip over the lunch hour, and then that evening we rode the bus down to our Walmart plaza for dinner and shopping.
Lord willing, I’m planning to head to McNeal, AZ on July 27, to help our NTM Aviation co-workers for a few days. While there, I’m planning to drive to Tucson to visit Paula’s family and to share a ministry update at Desert Son Community Church. Pray that I’ll be a blessing, both to our co-workers in McNeal and also to our family and friends in Tucson.
June 2010
Good News! Paula's recent abdominal ultrasound showed that her ovarian mass has remained stable (not grown). She also had a uterine biopsy and found that the pre-cancerous cells are now gone. We thank the Lord for these good and encouraging results!At NTM, I'm continuing to enhance our NTMAA system and to help fellow missionaries around the world. Here's a recent example of a day where I had requests to help folks in nine different countries:
- U.S. - NTBI Jackson bookstore - gift certificates, receivables
- Canada - missionary recommended support subsystem
- Philippines - considering NTMAA, how to import spreadsheets
- Paraguay - query/report enhancements, help using query tool
- Indonesia - research problem with March/April transactions
- Thailand - import diagnostic export to evaluate GL accounts
- Papua New Guinea - intermittent bug when entering visas
- Colombia - research problem with deleted transaction lines
- Guinea - request for NTMAA personnel & accounting training
May 2010
We recently had our annual strawberry picking day. A local farmer is so kind to allow us (NTM missionaries) to glean the remaining strawberries from his field when his U-Pick season is over, so we were blessed to pick, wash, bag, and freeze a lot of strawberries.Our kids have finished AWANA for the year. Nicholas was a helper with the Truth 'n Training group, Hannah received her 3rd book award, and Joy received the Timothy award for completing all four books. Joy & Hannah are also continuing to enjoy childrens choir.
Healthwise, it's been a rather interesting month. In mid April, a few days before Hannah's 11th birthday, Joy came down with chicken pox; then, days later, Hannah also broke out. Needless to say, we had to postpone her birthday party, but we're glad the girls were able to get chicken pox over with at a young age.
We’d appreciate your prayers for: Hannah, as she’s had some ear infections (perhaps due to chicken pox in the ears); Paula, for her ovarian mass and pre-cancerous uterine cells (she’s due for an ultrasound and biopsy soon); and myself, as a tick recently found its way onto/into my leg; we pulled the tick off, but a piece of its mouthpiece stuck in my leg. I'd appreciate prayer for no infection or lyme disease, etc., and that the mouthpiece would work its way out soon.
March 2010
We want to thank you for your prayers regarding our 2000 Honda Odyssey and its repair needs. We were trying to decide whether to replace the transmission or to sell the van "as is" and buy another vehicle with the repair money saved. In talking it over with my dad (thanks, Dad!), we realized that we would likely end with another vehicle of similar vintage, but it would be more of an "unknown" (i.e., it's transmission could go any time) than staying with our van.So, with those thoughts, we shelled out the $2,744 and had the transmission rebuilt and motor mounts replaced at AAMCO. Our van was also showing an OBD code (triggering the check engine light) for low catalytic converter efficiency, but we found that our catalytic converter (which we had replaced in August 2008) was still under warranty, so the muffler shop replaced that for free - PTL!
At NTM, I've recently had opportunity to use our remote support tool to provide some additional query/report training to co-workers in Indonesia and at our Missionary Training Center in Missouri. I've also started working on a new time-saving program to help our bookkeepers by allowing them to create multiple batches at once.
February 2010
Here are some of the latest happenings from the Oliver family:- In January, we enjoyed a short visit from Paula's mom, Joan Mayshar, who we don't see often, as she lives in Tucson, AZ.
- As part of their homeschooling, Nicholas and Joy recently started some online U.S. History classes through Florida Virtual School.
- At NTM, I've recently finished some enhancements for our NTM Canada co-workers: EFT direct deposit of missionary monthly disbursements, and enhanced year end donor statements.
- Our 2000 Honda Odyssey has started having some significant transmission problems. We have discovered, though, that a transmisson rebuild (plus some other repairs) is quite expensive, so we're not sure whether to repair the van, or to sell it "as is" and look for another vehicle. We would appreciate your prayers.
- We're thankful that January was a good month health-wise. Paula is scheduled for an ultrasound (to check the ovarian mass) and uterine biopsy (to re-check for pre-cancerous cells) in April. We would appreciate your continued prayers for Paula's health.
January 2010
We hope you had a nice Christmas and New Years holiday. We were home for the holidays again this year and appreciated the extra time to relax and catch up a little. My mom & stepdad stopped by, though, on New Years Eve and took us out for "lupper" (our word for a late lunch, early supper), in celebration of Christmas and of our 20th wedding anniversary (on Dec. 30). In our NTM ministry, 2009 was a pretty busy year with two new NTMAA installations (Colombia in February/March, and Paraguay in May). I also spent a week in September at our New Tribes Bible Institute (in Waukesha, Wisconsin), providing some further NTMAA training to our co-workers there.At home, 2009 was a rather difficult year: with Hannah's OCD, Nicholas' skin cancer, and Paula's D & C and other health issues. We are very thankful for the progress that Hannah has made, that Nicholas skin cancer was removed, and that Paula's D & C was successful, and we are trusting God to continue to guide and heal. We would appreciate your continued prayers.
We’ve recently put together a 2009 Annual Report, which includes an update on our family, our ministry, and our finances, as well as some praise and prayer requests for the new year. If you would like an electronic copy, please let us know and we will be glad to email you a PDF copy (1.1 MB).
In any case, we wanted to share our 2010 praise and prayer requests from our annual report.
PRAISE & PRAYER REQUESTS
- Praise God for His great salvation and the work He is doing around the world, reaching the lost with the Gospel of Christ. Pray that He would continue to raise up folks to partner with us in this important task - through going, giving, and praying.
- Praise God for our three precious children, Nicholas, Joy, and Hannah. Pray that they will come to know, love, and serve God, develop in maturity, make good decisions, and walk with the Lord.
- Pray for us in our relationships: with God, with each other, with our children, with others - that we would be the man & woman, husband & wife, Dad & Mom that God wants us to be.
- Praise God for good progress with our NTMAA system. Pray for wisdom & guidance as we work on various enhancements.
- Praise God for the excellent progress Hannah has made this past year in learning to deal with OCD. Pray that she would continue to grow in victory over OCD.
- Pray for Paula and the issues with her ovary, uterus, and lower abdomen. Pray for good health for all of us.
- Pray that God would give us humble hearts and make us a real blessing here at NTM Headquarters.
We also wanted to include an update on Paula's health issues:
Toward the end of December, Paula had another ultrasound of her lower abdomen, especially to determine whether the ovarian mass was growing and whether she would need surgery to remove it. We are encouraged that the mass was not any larger. The doctor is recommending periodic follow-up ultrasounds (the next one is scheduled for April 2010) to continue to monitor the ovarian mass. It is possible that it is cancer, but is more likely that it is not.
Paula is using a progesterone cream to try to get her hormones back into balance and hopefully resolve the endometrial hyperplasia which caused her excessive uterine bleeding. The doctor will likely do a uterine biopsy in April to see if there are still pre-cancerous cells around.
Paula has also been having some uncomfortable pressure (of unknown origin) in her lower left abdomen. It does not seem to be related to the issue with her ovary (which is on her right side) or uterus. In December, Paula had a colonoscopy, which showed some diverticulosis, which may or may not be related to this feeling of pressure.
We would appreciate your prayers for guidance and healing for Paula, especially as relates to her ovary, uterus, and this abdominal pressure. Thanks much!
Oliver Family Updates - 2009
Oliver Family Updates - 2008
Oliver Family Updates - 2007
For the past several years, we have also been summarizing these monthly updates into a year-end Oliver Family news summary:
2009 Oliver Family News Summary
2008 Oliver Family News Summary
2007 Oliver Family News Summary
To review some of our prayer requests from previous years, please visit our Praise & Prayer Request archive.
For a number of years prior to our monthly Oliver Family Update emails, we periodically sent our Oliver Family Newsletter to keep folks updated on our family & ministry news, praises, and prayer requests, so here are links to those:
(These newsletters are in PDF format and can be viewed using the free Adobe® Reader®. If you don't yet have the Adobe Reader installed, you can download it for free).
Newsletter 44 - Aug 2007
Newsletter 43 - Mar 2007
Newsletter 42 - Nov 2006
Newsletter 41 - Apr 2006
Newsletter 40 - June 2005
Newsletter 39 - Mar 2005
Newsletter 38 - Oct 2004
Newsletter 37 - July 2004
Newsletter 36 - Mar 2004
Newsletter 35 - Sep 2003
Newsletter 34 - Apr 2003
Newsletter 33 - Feb 2003
Newsletter 32 - Aug 2002
Newsletter 31 - Mar 2002
Newsletter 30 - Dec 2001
Newsletter 29 - Sept 2001
Newsletter 28 - June 2001
Newsletter 27 - Mar 2001
Newsletter 26 - Aug 2000
Newsletter 25 - May 2000
Newsletter 24 - Dec 1999