End of an era and New Beginnings

Change is never easy! This change may be the hardest yet. Over five years ago we began praying and dreaming about a ministry that would shape the hearts and minds of young Mozambican men. Five years later God has blessed us with MozOvos our egg farm, a house full of young Mozambican men who are being shaped as Christian leaders caring for their soul, being challenged in leadership skills, how to lead in ministry and in the end work to cover the cost of their lives and ministry. Several have already graduated and moved on to life and ministry. Living with these guys has been the highlight of our life here in Mozambique. We are so grateful for the four years the Internship as we know it has made a difference here in Mozambique. However do to financial realities we are forced to make some big changes.

For Over a year now MozOvos our egg farm has fully funded the international Internship In Mission. Our life together was a 3000.00 a month bill that was payed for by MozOvos. Earlier in the year MozOvos suffered a financial set back due to to a drop in market pricing of eggs nationally in which we could not compete. This led to a snow ball effect of debt and late payments. MozOvos just did not have the capital in reserves to recover form a few months of bad sales. We realized that if we did not make some major changes not only was the internship at risk but also the business.

In lieu of going bankrupt and or loosing our good reputation, the leadership choose to shut down the internship, for 60 days, terminate 6 positions at the business, create one strong leadership team and reinvent the whole ministry. Now that we have cut the budget by several thousand dollars a month and closing down the internship the newly formed leadership team will work to reinvent the internship philosophy into the day to day life at Mozovos. These changes comes with great cost and a loss as living together is such an important element in philosophy and actual shaping of a leader.

We hope that by making these hard changes MozOvos will one day have more reserves financially, be able to invest in itself and have greater cash flow. We pray to be able to build office space, an egg dispensary, bio security room and even an internship house on our own property. We pray the hard decisions and sacrifice made today will allow the ministry as a whole to grow from a position of strength and realize our dreams.

Update

Dear Friends and Family,

We thought we would give you a short update on our support progress. In the last week, our personal support need has been reduced by $175.00 a month. We are so grateful for this. Our current deficit is now only $1,250 per month. We are still praying that God will provide and we will be able to stick to our scheduled July 2012 home assignment and return to the States.

In the meantime, even while still on the field, we are in the process of seeking new supporting churches and individuals to join our team. We need this additional support to cover supporters lost in the last few months and compensate for the immense jump in cost of living here in Mozambique.

Even if you feel you cannot commit to supporting us long-term, would you consider an increase to current support or a one year commitment that would carry us through until we arrive home and meet with pastors, churches and individuals face to face? We know supporting missionaries is a sacrifice and we honor you and you honor the Lord.

As always, we love you all and pray for you and your families and all our supporting churches.

Blessings in the Harvest,

Rodger, Lynne, Andrew and Stephen Schmidt
rlschmidt@worldventure.net

The Last Year of a Very, Very LONG 5 1/2 year Term

Hi Friends! Guess What? We're coming to the USA! Actually, not until July 2012. We still have 12 months to wrap things up here in Africa before a nice long visit will all of you, family and supporters. Andrew will graduate from High School just before we head back to get him settled in his new life and then start the many miles of travel over a nine month period to catch up with you face to face, and spend some much needed time with family. We have much to share, but we also look forward to see how God is making a difference in your lives as well. We are excited just thinking about it! However, we have 12 months of hard work ahead of us if we are going to be ready. Please pray with us for these ministry challenges that face us over the next 12 months. MozOvos Leadership: Our leadership team needs to be confident and capable to completely run the business without Rodger's day to day presence. The team is already doing many of these tasks but need to grow in confidence. Internship Leadership: Our new leadership team is growing daily in their confidence and maturity. We are so proud of how these guys are taking on difficult leadership challenges these days. We are confident they will be ready to take on the internship all on their own while we are stateside. This is a huge request as this team is key as they live out what they have learned over the past five years. The months we are away will be a true test of who they are as leaders. Andrew and Stephen: Please pray for Andrew as he prepares to launch a very new life in the United States. He has many decisions to make over the next few months. Also for Stephen as he begins the high school years without his brother in close proximity. We are thankful that our sons love each other and the Lord. Our Team: Pray for our three new families who are all continuing to learn language, settle in to life and ministry. We are so proud of these families and the impact they are making. Support: This last year has proven to be the most expensive of all 8 we have lived in Mozambique. The world economy and loss of supporters has really changed our financial situation. We actually realized this past month that 10 supporters who had supported us faithfully for many years were forced to withdraw their monthly support. The cost of living in Mozambique has increased drastically including our resident visas which now cost us over 3,000.00 a year. These rising costs are not part of our budget and have caused a major deficit. We have cut our budgets on every level including our housing costs and ministry budgets as much as we can. After all the cuts we find ourselves 1400.00 a month under supported. Starting August 1st we will be affected significantly due to this shortfall. Please pray with us concerning this challenge. Raising personal support is very difficult to do while on the field. We still have 12 months to go before home assignment and for the first time in 8 years, we find ourselves significantly under supported We are praying for increases in current supporters where it is possible but also for new support from folk who have followed our work over the years and would like to join the support team. As always we need a ton of prayer and trust your prayers and financial support will get us through the next 12 months and beyond. As always, we trust God for it all! Please contact us at rlschmidt@worldventure.net or you can contact WorldVenture directly If you want to make a commitment to be a regular supporter, follow this link: https://worldventure.com/Give/Make-A-Commitment.html And if you want to make a one time contribution, follow this one: https://worldventure.com/Give/Give-Now.html Blessings, Rodger and Lynne Schmidt

Life the last 2 weeks: A brief update.

Just wanted to update you about the 4 major events of the last 2 weeks.

Luis Manhica: from the post previous to this, you know we almost lost our much loved Luis. Since then, Luis is home and we are all learning about diabetes and how to cope with it. Luis shared with me this week that the hardest part for him are the emotional high and lows and picking up on all the cues his body is now giving him. Please continue to pray for him.

The amazing, even miraculous news is this: while in the private hospital, we learned that his insulin shots were going to cost about $150 a month. while he does have a job and salary, this is just a massive amount to consider every month for the rest of his life. Through some further research, we have found that he, in fact, CAN get the insulin through the national health care system for much, much less every month. Please pray for us as we help him work through the details of all of this. Thanks to those who contributed to help MozOvos recuperate the cost of Luis' hospital stay. You will be blessed to know that the 2 local churches we started together with our interns have also taken up love offerings for Luis. This is a testimony to how much he is loved by all. If you would still like to contribute, there is still a need. Please see the information in the previous post.

Jonathan Edwards(the seminary student, not the famous preacher of long ago!): We welcomed Denver Seminary student, Jonathan to live and work with the interns as part of his needed field internship for his degree at Denver Seminary. Jonathan arrived the day before Luis was put in the hospital and fortunately for him, he is an adaptable, flexible, easy going young man! :) He sort of just jumped into our chaos and has done really well in this business of working at the egg farm, life together, church leadership, etc. He is a joy to have around!


Andrew and Stephen: God gave Lynne a gift in the form of an unusually inexpensive plane ticket to Kenya to spend time with Andrew and Stephen! The boys were on their mid-term break and we spent time together at the home of our Worldventure colleagues who always so graciously welcome us. We were able to continue time together back at school when classes started again. It's always a blessing to be with them, spend time with their friends and get to know the people who are a part of their every day lives. Just 4 more weeks until they will finish their school year. Then we will have a senior and and 8th grader. YIKES!

Island house: Just this week, we were able to start some small projects to get our house on Mozambique island ready to live in. This is something we have been hoping and praying for this last couple of years as we continue to take steps toward dividing our time between our internship ministry here in the south and beginning other projects in the north including MozOvos north and another project that we will soon be able to talk more about.

Thank you so much for you prayers and love for the Schmidt family. Oh! Another important event happened this month! June 4th marked 8 years of life in Mozambique. God has been so good to us!

How MozOvos saved a life

Early friday morning, we rushed the assistant director (Luis Manhiça) of the International Internship in Missioin to the hospital (Heart institute of Mozambique) with what we thought was an infection in the bloodstream induced by an abscessed tooth and root canal gone bad. When we got to the hospital Luis was unresponsive and his breathing, which had been labored, had all but stopped. He was immediately admitted to the hospital.

After a few days of constant care he is recovering slowly but has also been diagnosed with type I Diabetes. He is 27 years old and had no idea of the condition as it was a sudden onset. He lost almost 10-15 lbs within a 10 day period, complained of dry mouth with constant urination and need for water. The night before he became unresponsive, he complained that his fingers and toes were numb. By the time we realized something more and more sinister was at play he was on the verge of diabetic coma.

As we were not willing to risk his life we chose to take him to the same hospital where Rodger was treated for staph infection. We were not convinced that this was the right choice until others, including medical professionals and our Mozambican friends confirmed that had we taken him to the central hospital here in Maputo, he would have surely died just waiting to be treated.

We are so grateful for his recovery. However, he now faces a life time of insulin shots and diet modifications. We know that many people in the world suffer from diabetes and lead healthy and normal lives. This is comforting and we continue to pray for him as he recovers.

For many of you who have already been informed of this situation, we wish to thank you for your prayers for Luis during this time. He is a faithful servant and wise leader. We are trusting that this new development will only make him stronger in his faith, more compassionate in his leadership and even more passionate about the calling of God on his life.

Our choice to take him to the heart institute resulted in a $3000.00 hospital stay. We believe that our son Luis is worth every penny or, in our currency, centavo. We are also so thankful for the fact that MozOVos( our egg farm) exists as it was due to MozOvos that we had this kind of cash available to pay the bill (We must pay in advance before any treatment is offered). Many of you have prayed, sacrificed and given to make MozOvos a reality. Not only has this little business provided funds for the internship ministry but now, it can honestly say that Luis is alive and well in Mozambique because MozOvos exists. We praise the Lord for Luis, MozOvos, and all of you.

Though we are grateful that MozOvos was able to cover these costs in Luis' time of need, this expense is not part of the budget. If you would like to assist MozOvos in the care of Luis during this time we invite you to send a one time gift to the internship special project at WorldVenture (see address and account number below).

Please continue to pray for Luis as he faces a lifetime of insulin shots and dietary restrictions in a country where both are challenging at best.

WorldVenture

1501 W. Mineral Ave.

Littleton, Co. 80120

Att: Internship Special Project 6484-910

Blessings to all our family around the world.

Rodger and Lynne Schmidt

Happenings: A pictorial review of the last few months

All the day to day ministry and life go on as usual and we see God at work. Today, however, we'd like to share some of the highlights via photo.

Lots of anniversaries: April 6, Rodger and Lynne's 20th anniversary

April 7, the anniversary of MozOvos egg farm

April 14, the third anniversary of Evangelical Community Church of 25 de Junho

In April, we were delighted when two intern graduates too the money they had saved in their three years as interns and opened their own business. They are raising fryers to sell.

Also in April, we welcomed back our dear Blanks family who had been gone on medical leave.

We met with all of our Worldventure Mozambique colleagues as well as field leaders from Madagascar and South Africa for our annual field conference.

Sweet friends from one of our partner churches came to do a program for the missionary children.

Two lovely ladies from two different partner churches came to cook scrumptious meals for us.

We enjoyed times of worship together

And did work together as a team.

We all benefited greatly from time with our International Ministry Directors, Glenn and Kathy Kendall. They love, encourage, counsel and share out of their ministry experience and wisdom.

We enjoyed time together with our colleagues.

And their children

We have been richly blessed!

Family

We thought we'd take a break from the normal ministry updates we post on our blog to tell you what we've been up to this last 10 days.

Our children, Andrew 17 and Stephen 14, are students at Rift Valley Academy in Kijabe, Kenya. It was the most difficult decision we have ever been called upon to make; to send our dearly loved children to boarding school. Sending them there has been and continues to be simultaneously the most difficult and most joyous experience of our lives.

Junior year is a big year for RVA students. They have worked hard and saved money as a class to put on a fabulous banquet(like prom) for the senior class. Parents are invited to participate with the class and teachers who are class sponsors, as we work together for a long weekend and then the following week on set construction, food prep, program designs and every imaginable detail. This year, we were blessed to be asked to be substitute dorm parents for Andrew's dorm of 24 boys during this long weekend.

We loved being with our boys and part of their school life. We loved meeting and getting to know their teachers and friends. We loved getting to watch both of them play basketball with their respective teams. We loved the heart to heart talks. We loved being there to embrace them every day, eat meals with them, watch the choices they are making as young men. We think they are growing up to be fine young men.

Below are a few pics of our time with them:

The whole family on Rodger's 47th birthday.

Andrew's drama rehearsal. That's him on the left.

Stephen on a game day

Andrew and some of his buddies

Andrew and his lovely date

Powers

We are regularly reminded of the spiritual darkness that surrounds us.

Our neighbor just over the wall, a young man who came to know Christ through the ministry of our interns and has grown by leaps and bounds in his faith, came to speak to us.

He is being persecuted by his family for his faith because he no longer wants to participate in the rituals of the family's ancestor worship and witchcraft. They believe he is possessed by an evil spirit because he won't participate with them in these things.

Some in the family wanted him kicked out of the house. Others intervened on his behalf and let him stay but have cut him off financially as far as school fees, uniforms, etc.

He came to us for help. We are trying to help him find a job so he can leave his current situation, but we told him to stay and do his best to love and honor his family though not participating with them in their rituals.

We do have a budding relationship with his mother. She has agreed to come to church with him a week from Sunday. Maybe then she'll believe that he really isn't demon possessed. Maybe then, the LIGHT will begin to illuminate her heart and mind.

God chooses ordinary human beings to carry His light into very dark places. We are honored to do this. We are unafraid because we know it's not by our might, or our power, but by His Spirit.

Please be in prayer for this family.

Intern Retreat 2011

We started the new internship year off with our fourth annual intern retreat at Nascer do Sol camp in Chizavane, Mozambique. Here are a few photo highlights!

First things first, lets throw people in!

Then enjoy the beauty of our surroundings.

Even the cooks went swimming.

Teaching time was shared by Rodger and our leadership team

Lots of group participation

Games happened to help us learn unity and leadership principles

Some became overwhelmed by the intensity of the game and needed some pastoral care.

As always, soccer happens!

As well as plenty of singing....

and dancing!

On to Their New Lives!

November 27, 2010 was the graduation day for the first six interns of the International Internship in Mission. Here are the graduates with the Schmidt boys.
During our time together, we learned to love these young men as our sons and many special relationships developed between the Schmidts and the interns and the interns with each other.
Of the six interns, two are returning to lead the internship, being trained and mentored to do the work that we have done for the last three years. The other four are in the early preparations stages of starting their own businesses as well as working in different capacities in their home churches or missions of the churches.
We love them so much and will continue to pray, give counsel and walk alongside them as we are needed!

We spent the first three weeks of Janury preparing for more new interns to arrive. This involved our moving to a different house to free up more space at the intern house, painting and cleaning of the intern houses, making beds and lots of meetings and planning.

Yesterday, January 22, our new interns arrived! Pictures soon.