Dear Friends,
360 Lumbar Fusion
We greet you in the name of our Lord Jesus and hope you and your family are doing well. We praise God for taking care of us all of this time while being Stateside, it has been a journey full of different challenges and blessings. There are many things that had happen in this first half of the year. I can Start with a report on my health, back on mid December I (Gabe) had a major back surgery(Lumbar Fusion 360).
It was quite challenging to recover from that one and then in mid March again I had an Inguinal Hernia surgery. These two surgeries left me with a lot of scar tissue and very weak core muscles. I had lifting and bending restrictions for many months. Early last month I started physical therapy and I can say is getting better, I know I still have a long way to go but I am glad I started the process. God has been teaching us more patience and dependence on Him. We thank you for your prayers and continuous love and support in many ways to our family through this time. Thank you for each prayer, call, meal, gift, card and even helping sitting our kids many times as well as your continuous donations towards our ministry in SL. You have been a blessing to us and we thank you and God for that.
Proud of these boys!
In the last few months God allowed us to have some celebrations like Sada’s birthday(Feb 16th), then our 7th year Wedding Anniversary (Feb 24th). Isaiah turned 3(March 4th) and Lucas turned 1(April 2nd). I will be turning 35 years old this June 13th and I just can’t believe how fast time is going by.
As many of you know, last year we encountered some issues/complications on regards to my Immigration status because of spending too much time out of the country under the Status of a U.S. Permanent Resident. This caused us to return Stateside to take care of this situation while we also knew that the surgeries were going to take time to heal and recover from, and as well as we needed to complete and finish raising our financial support to return to Sierra Leone. We have sent the paperwork of Naturalization/citizenship to the Immigration Dpt. and we are now just waiting on their approval so we can get move forward in the process and soon return to our ministry in Sierra Leone without any kind of restrictions.
Previous Youth Camp
Sada is presently in Sierra Leone on a mission trip facilitating/coordinating the Youth Leadership Camp there with a team from our church and some Sierraleoneans partners as well, she is to return next week. They will be focusing on studying on 4 topics; Servant Leader, Integrity, Purity and Building Others. Our prayer is that these Youth will be encouraged, impacted and transformed by God’s word, his Holy Spirit and fellowship/accountability this week. In this way that they will return to their churches and share it with others and impact their church and communities by living the Jesus way.
Our dental nurses continue to practice basic dentistry at the downtown hospital there in SL and they continue to learn and get more experience under our dentist friend supervision there. One of them, Alice S. she is due this month and she will be having a baby girl. We are very excited for her family.
As I said earlier, so much had happened and even though our hearts long to be back home in Sierra Leone to continue our ministry and call that God gave us. We know that God has bigger plans and He is in control of our lives. We believe that He continues to help us grow and mature by facing different trials and difficult/complicated situations so we can serve Him better. He wants us to trust Him and depend upon Him in EVERY aspect of our lives so only Him can receive all the glory.
Please join us in prayer this month for the next prayer requests below:
- Youth Leadership Camp in Sierra Leone: please pray that the lives of the youth who attend to camp this week will be impacted and transformed by the power of His Spirit and in this way they will be godly leaders in this generation and in their society. Pray that Sada and the team there will be used to love on those youth and bring glory to His name.
- Continue to pray for the health of our son Lucas, many of you know we have been dealing with his eczema condition and allergies for so long and so far we have not been able to keep it under control. We have been several times to doctors, dermatologist, allergist, you name it we have tried and still is a every day challenge for him and for us. Just pray for healing and find a solution for his condition and as well as grace and strength to take one day at the time, finding Joy and Purpose in Him.
- Please pray for the Immigration situation will get resolved and approved in the next few months so we can return to Sierra Leone without any restriction in the future.
- Pray for a safe delivery for Alice’s baby this month and health and recovery for both mother and baby.
- Pray for the next few months as we continue our raising support efforts, for opportunities to share our story and for God to bring on board the ministry partners that he has prepared to join us. Pray that we will be able to raise 100% our funds by the time my physical therapy is finished and also by the time we get clearance from Immigration to return to Sierra Leone. At this moment we are about 50% funded, just help us pray for the other 50%. Our hope is that by mid or late August we can return to Sierra Leone.
Thank you for taking the time to check on us and thank you for your support.
“For I am the LORD, your God,
who takes hold of your right hand and says to you,
Do not fear;
I will help you” Isaiah 41:13 NIV
God bless you.
Herrera Family.
