The Crawford Chronicles #4

The Crawford Chronicles #4

“Into the Unknown”

April 3, 2020

Prayer requests:

1) Travel safety – Thank you to those who prayed for Graham while he continued to travel out west.  He enjoyed the time he had to visit with friends and family.  We are thankful he was able to arrive back in New Brunswick before everything shutdown.

2) Pandemic – Many people’s lives have changed a lot recently.  You have either been infected by this virus or affected.  Perhaps you are simply stuck at home or worst case having to continue to work with a lot of extra precautions.  We ask for prayer for those struggling with the restrictions and isolation.  Pray especially for those who are ill or have loved ones that are ill.  We are hopeful that this will all be over sooner rather than later.

3) Austin’s final vaccines – Austin’s travel clinic appointments in April were cancelled because of the state of emergency in New Brunswick.  We are praying that the clinic will reopen in time or that our family doctor will be able to do them before we depart for Senegal.

4) Support raising - A huge THANK YOU to those that have partnered with us through their prayers and finances.  Things have gotten a little more complex for us with the current corona virus pandemic.  With the amount of uncertainty in the world right now, we are not confident exactly how much monthly support we need due to the potential escalation of plane tickets, baggage fees and all sorts of other things once things calm down.  We also are aware that some of our supporters may not be able to continue to support us depending on how they have been affected by the shutdown.  We currently have 90% of our support raised so pray that once all the craziness is over that we will have the financial support we need to get to Senegal.

5) House sale - Its official!  Our house sale closed on April 2^nd and we couldn’t be happier with how it went.

6) Housing situation - Due to the pandemic, getting temporary housing organized for our family proved very difficult.  We are currently staying at Kathleen’s parents place but it is a bit tight for the 5 of us.  Pray that we will get along well as a family as we self-isolate together.

7)  Sale of personal items - Pray that we will be able to get rid of personal items that we have that we will not need for our trip to Senegal.  As expected, this is proving difficult as well because of the pandemic.

Back home.... well at least back to New Brunswick

Graham returned back to New Brunswick on March 12 after being in Alberta and British Columbia.  He had a great time visiting with friends and family in Fort McMurray, Calgary and on Vancouver Island.  Big shout outs to Brad and Delima Rushton, Brian and Diane Tkachyk and Dave and Lori Reid for hosting us during our time out west.  As usual, we had more people to visit than we had time.  Sorry to those we didn’t get to.  We’ll do our best to see those we missed during our next visit.  The thing we were most grateful for is that we were all home before everything shutdown due to the pandemic.

While Graham was still out west, I (Kathleen) was able to start packing and selling our stuff.  As many of you know, our house went up for sale and sold very quickly (in just 5 days!).  Our closing date was set for April 1^st so the last two weeks or so have been very busy with me working and having to pack up the last of our stuff.  Last Friday was a long day but we were finally able to get the last of our things out of the house.  We hired professional cleaners to clean the house on March 29th.  We are very thankful that my parents have been willing to have us stay with them until we leave.  Unfortunately for them the state of emergency was declared after telling us that...so...we are hoping they don’t change their minds!  Thankfully, they are big fans of Austin so we can thank him for finding us a place to stay. J

Life of uncertainty

No one really knows how things will progress, but right now Graham and I are still planning on leaving at the end of July for Dakar, Senegal.  If schools are still closed at that time and international travel frowned upon, we are not sure what we will do.  Lord willing, we will soon be at 100% of our monthly support so that when they say we can go we can just throw our things in our suitcases and hop on a plane!  We are very excited to start life in Senegal and pray that we will be able to leave by the end of July.

How Austin is handling self isolation.

Support

As many of you would have read in our prayer requests, thing have gotten a little bit more complicated as far as financial support raising goes.  We have currently raised 90% of our support goal.  However, due to the uncertainty in the world we are not sure whether our support goal is still valid.  Potentially, there could be fluctuations in prices of plane tickets, baggage costs, and all sorts of other things this year.  We also realize that some of our supporters may not be able to continue their commitments depending on how they are affected by the current pandemic.  Please continue to pray with us that the Lord would not only make it possible to leave for Senegal in July, but with the necessary funding as well. 

Conclusion

We want to thank you all for taking time to read this prayer letter update.  Thank you so much for your prayer and financial support.  It is very much appreciated.  Until next time!

Blessings,

Graham, Kathleen and Austin Crawford

Online donations can be made at https://www.sim.ca/graham-and-kathleen-crawford/
The opinions expressed in this letter are our own opinions.  They are not necessarily the opinions or views of Serving In Mission (SIM).