Welcome to the #UBP14 party over here!
We are Eric & Kristine Reed and we love serving God, learning about other cultures and meeting new people. Currently we are working towards becoming missionaries with Mission Aviation Fellowship. Eric is a pilot & a software engineer and I have my teaching degree. We hope to be able to utilize our skills to serve God overseas with a missionary organization.
We've chosen Mission Aviation Fellowship because they incorporate both our skills perfectly. They utilize aviation and technology to reach those than can't be reached. In the countries where they serve, there are often no roads between remote village or the way is so treacherous that it takes days or weeks to get to where a 10 minute flight can reach. This saves time yes, but most of all it saves lives. Mission Aviation Fellowship transports people, food and supplies to areas most needed to support the efforts in those areas. They might fly in a doctor in one area, a bible translator in another, food in another, new translations of a bible in another, the list goes on and on. In this way by showing people love and relating to them on a personal level to help with needs, MAF shares the gospel of Christ. We have friends in MAF that have flown vaccines in remote areas of Africa and others that do emergency medical flights that save lives. It is a much needed area of service because without it, people would die and the gospel wouldn't continue in those countries because of how remote the tribes and cities are.
Here is an example of an air strip in a remote area:
Here is a short video on MAF:
What also excites us is not only the aviation part, but the technology component. MAF has a department called Learning Technologies that works together with pastors and leaders to help them be able to grow and lead their community of believers. We've all heard about the short term missions that go into a country, help teach about Jesus, people become new believers and then the missionaries leave. What happens next? Without bibles or tools to grow in their faith, many fall back to their old ways. Some leave the area to learn and never return. In several areas people are also illiterate and learn best by oral methods as they have for years. This is where MAF LT comes in.
MAF LT creates and develops methods to help grow those communities. For those without resources they bring the resources to them via digital books. They along with some partners created a digital library on a CD. So the pastors without resources suddenly have a full library of books at their finger tips. In areas where people learn best by stories, they have team members come to the country to teach the bible in oral form. In this way, the people learn and in turn teach others via oral stories about the bible. It's an ever growing ministry. I suggest you check out these links to see more! (Plus videos are more fun anyways right?)
Here is one about a resource sharing program called Estante:
You can read earlier posts to catch up on what a journey this has been for us. We had to take a break a couple of years ago to become stronger people in our faith and in our family life, but we hope to take our evaluation in the next year or so to see if we can indeed go overseas with Mission Aviation Fellowship still or if God is calling us to a different ministry. Regardless, we'd love to have you along in our journey! Please join us on this blog to follow our adventures and learn about our family. Speaking of family....
Two huge blessings in our life are our daughters, Jennavieve and Lillian.
Jennavieve 3 1/2 years
Lillian around 8 months
These two are the little loves of our lives. We adore them and are so blessed to have them. We plan to take them on this journey and to go as a family. We love them and want them involved in everything we do and to raise them to be girls of integrity who have open eyes about the world around them and strong hearts for the hurting. We try to teach them that every new kid is a potential friend so that they don't prejudge those they meet. (Unless they are clearly dangerous or doing something bad!) We also teach them to be cautious and get to know people too. It's our hope to raise them up to be strong believers in Jesus and to share that with others.
If you like to follow us, please join our page! Leave a comment here with a link to your #UBP14 post and we will follow you back! If you want to check out more videos of MAF, want to pray for us or learn more check the links above!
