Mission update letter

Hello and blessings to you all. I really want to thank every one of you who have been supporting me as a missionary with your prayers, emails and also the financial donations which God uses to allow me to be here doing this work. I have now been down here in Louisiana with Friendships Unlimited for the past six months, in addition to another 7 month period following Hurricane Katrina in 2005/2006. As many of you will know Friendships Unlimited is a non-profit organization which operates a small fleet of ships which bring humanitarian relief and the Gospel of Jesus Christ to impoverished nations both in the Caribbean and overseas. We do disaster relief, in response to Hurricanes, Earthquakes and the like both here in the US or wherever our service is needed. Other relief voyages have been to Israel, Africa, Russia, Haiti, and Honduras. Relief supplies have also been sent worldwide via commercial shipping lines. I am currently serving this missionary organization in the position of Bosun and 3rd Mate. My role is as a volunteer with the deck department. So far I have primarily been involved in the upgrades and renovations to the F/V MerSea as well as overseeing the deck maintenence, preparing her for service with our organisation. In addition I will be sailing as 3rd Mate on the F/V Hope on our upcoming voyage to do a medical outreach on Nevis Island in the West Indies during May and June and then on the F/V Coastal Pilot when we sail her from Seattle to our base in Louisiana later this summer. In Los Angeles we will be picking up a 75 foot motor yacht which our base there is currently converting to use for doing advance work for our larger ships and Pastor's seminars in the Caribbean region. I expect it will be based out of our ministry centre in Honduras. I will be heading out to L.A. in the next few days to work on this vessel. I cannot well enough express my gratitude for those of you who have sent me out to do this work. I cannot imagine anything in this world I would rather be doing. My biggest prayer requests are for wisdom in desicions regarding my role here as I have been asked to take on this yacht as her captain, director and maintenence overseer. It would be a big step up in responsibilty to say the least. I just keep saying wow. This really is beyond anything I could have imagined right now. Please pray for wisdom for me in making these decisions, as well as pray for me to do really well at what God has placed before me. I am SO honored. Finances is another prayer request I am really seeking God for right now. I don't think I have ever been quite so stretched but I know God loves to build our faith through these things. I am looking up to our father, who is our Lord and Provider. I am in a place where I am very aware of my reliance on his provision. I am praying for a miracle. Please pray with me. Although I very much love where I am at right now, I do miss you all and the fellowship we have shared at different times. May God's richest blessings rest on you each. Email me anytime. Love in Christ, Jacob Blondahl

Dependance

On whom do you depend? On whom do you want to depend? Dependance is a theme that has been in my prayers a lot lately. I am in a place of being dependant on God... Actually we all are, we just usually don't see it. I do see it, more and more. I love the fact that God loves us enough that he brings us to a place, or allows us to wander to a place- where we see first hand that we are God-dependant. He wants us to seek Him for our needs, and regularly. I have prayed a lot of times in my life for needs that I had, often financial ones. To date, I have not had a winning lottery ticket magically blow in the window and land on my bed as I was kneeling there in prayer. As much as I may think that would be great, that has not been my experience of God's provision, but I have seen God's provision! Just not in the ways I may dream of. Usually He provides in ways I don't anticipate. Sometimes He also provides in ways I don't appreciate, at least not the way I should. Living and working much of my life as a full time missionary, I often don't have the ability to go get a job and live off it. At times I have, but right now, as I am living on a ship in the US, it would be both impossible time-wise (As I work more than full time and am liable to sail away anytime) as well as illegal. As a Canadian, I can't just go get a job here anyways. So living here, and doing what I am doing, I see very clearly that I am reliant on God's provision. Believe me, when I go online to check my bank account, I am praying! I know that I have certain financial obligations, but I also know that by my works, I cannot fulfill them. My options are to 1.) Drop what I am doing, leave here and return to Canada and do something else, or 2.) Trust God for a miracle. The deciding factor is that I really believe this is where I am supposed to be. I cannot think of anything in the world I would would rather be doing, or anywhere I would rather be. I felt clearly for a long time that I needed to get back here doing this sort of thing, and I am happier and more at peace right now than I can remember being. I love my job, I love this ministry, and more than anything I love what God is doing inside of me. I love the Peace that He has brought me. I am excited about getting the Mersea ready for sea and I am excited about taking the Hope to Nevis in May. I am excited that it looks as though I will have the opportunity to sail as 3rd mate. That is so cool. It's totally in God's hands if it does happen but I am excited, it's something I have wanted to do since I was in my teens. I remember how many people shared with me pictures or words the Lord gave them for me before I came down here, and almost all of them had to do with me being on a ship, at the helm, up the mast or in the chartroom. In most of those cases the people told me they saw rough waters coming, but the Lord was there with me, and His Peace was all around. It is so exciting to be here, to see these things happening. The Lord led me to a church here that I love, and it has been such a blessing to me. This morning they didn't even preach or anything, just worship. It was so awesome. So what am I gonna do? I'm going to serve the Lord. I'm going to do what He has brought me here to do, and I just pray all the time that my very life would be a living sacrifice to Him. I pray that every word I speak, every action I make would honor Him, would please Him. And I know that my God is fully able to provide for all of my needs, whatever they may be.