Leigh Family Prayer Newsletter - May 2004

May 1, 2004

First of all, I'd like to thank you for your prayers. The key events of April were definitely in God's hands. Angela and the kids had a safe and relatively smooth trip to the States and back. It was good connecting time for the kids as they don't see their State-side family much and it's important for them to retain some American and family roots. Being brought up overseas has a lot of blessings but it comes also with a lot of "identity baggage"; especially later in life.

Having said that, the kids have all come back to school very smoothly...even Noah, who's language skills are noticeably improving...a real answer to prayer!

As for me and the Outreach or "practical" phase of the School of Reconciliation, our team of 5 here and the rest in the States have all had significant times where we have seen God move and have been able to be used by Him. The team in the States has had awesome opportunities to be involved in intercession, repentance and reconciliation in Louisiana, South Carolina, and Florida. They've been able to connect with American intercession teams and begin the process of treating historical injustices in the United States that are linked with the French and France. It has been a powerful time for all involved.

Our team here prepared for and gave a week-long seminar on intercession in Switzerland. It was in a valley there called the "Joux Valley", north of Geneva, which consists of several small towns linked with a common heritage. We were able to study the history of the town and meet with Christian leaders there for more directed times of intercession. The Lord was able to show us things in the history of the town that were valuable nuggets that their intercession team could focus on. They have a core group of intercessors from various churches there but were looking for more input on how to really make a difference in their intercessory activities to see God really move in the valley. We were able to teach on principles of intercession, reconciliation, re-digging "wells of revival", and spiritual warfare. The teaching times were well received and they entered into the times of intercession whole-heartedly.

Now we turn our focus to May!

Prayer Requests

• Reconciliation School Outreach - The outreach continues this month, of course. The USA team returns Wednesday and the Valence team (of which I'm a part) hosts the first of two seminars we're putting on here at the Oasis Center during our Outreach. The two seminars are focused on releasing the prophetic increasingly in the Church...specifically with an emphasis on creativity. We appreciate your prayers for the logistics of this seminar which goes from Thursday May 6th through Sunday May 9th. We also need your prayers for team unity as our team adds 3 more people who were on the USA team. The transition promises to be challenging. Finally, pray for the worship/worship team and the teaching/speaker for this seminar that it would be the Spirit of God that would lead us.
• The Future - Part of our Outreach time in May will be spent in the Alsace region...our future home in France. We (Angela, Noah and I) will be in Strasbourg for the March for Jesus on the 15th of May and then back in Strasbourg the 20th-23rd for the Target Europe conference. We will also have a chance to connect with various friends and fellow missionary type-folk while in Strasbourg. This will be a key time for us. Pray for the right God connections and that our hearts would be open to what He is saying to us. Between the times in Strasbourg, we're going to go down to southern Alsace to get our kids enrolled in a Christian school down there and look for a place to live. Pray for God's guidance in all that as well. God has been doing quite a work in me to reduce my worrying about the future in general and housing in particular. I still don't see the obvious answer as to how it will all work but I'm beginning to get the picture that God does and He has our best interests in mind and will take care of us. These are huge steps for me as I'm accustomed to operating only in the realm of complete earthly security and steps of faith like this are very difficult.
• Team - "Team" has always been a part of our missionary endeavors. We've always been a part of something larger than ourselves and involved directly with others. This is something that we want to continue and feel is very important. It is not obvious at this moment what that will look like after the Reconciliation School is over and we move to Alsace. There are several aspects to this. First of all "organizational". As Americans in France, we need to be connected to some "association" which is our administrative covering for being in France, and for us a spiritual covering as well. That has been Youth With A Mission (YWAM) so far in Scotland and France. Another aspect of team is actually with whom we work (day-to-day) to do what...i.e. ministry work teams. Finally, we've had informal ministry and spiritual direction from all sorts of sources over the past few years. Personally, I'd like to be a bit more purposeful in that as I believe that God is calling us and directing us in ways that are much bigger than we've ever envisioned. With that, I'd like the wisdom of ministry and spiritual direction from a small group of people who can speak into our lives who have the wisdom of experience, the active anointing of the Holy Spirit, a personal heart for us as a family, and a compatible heart and vision for ministry. Will you pray for us as we desire to see God put these three levels of team together for us...in His way and His timing.

Love,
David and the family