Newsletter 2011

Since we last wrote to you, life has taken a few turns for the Sampsons.

  

On April 5^th, our housemate, friend and Keiran’s classmate, Luke Teale-Sinclair, died in a motorcycle accident on his way to Coldstream airport that morning. Luke was our friend and brother and his sudden passing was a shock to all of us. His cheeky grin and ridiculous pranks will be missed both at home and at Coldstream, the airstrip where ACMA is based. Despite this tragedy, God has shown His hand and proven that in all things His name will be praised. We now have the painful task of finding someone else to take Luke’s place in our household. Please pray that we will do this with wisdom and sensitivity.

 

We thank you for your prayers for a job for Corinne. She now works as a waitress in The Moo Wine Café in Mooroolbark, only a fifteen-minute drive from our house but unfortunately she has only received about four shifts since she got the job in early March. We would very much appreciate prayer for two shifts per week for the extra income that would bring in.

At the moment, Keiran is also looking for weekend or night work. Please pray that a job comes up that suits the balance he requires so that he is still able to focus on his training at Coldstream.

Both of us are roughly halfway through our semesters ... we began our mid-semester holidays during this Easter week. We are both so grateful for this break, and hope to be well rested for the term to come.

Corinne is doing well in her studies; she has been challenged by the great need for God in Spain having been studying Spanish Culture this semester, and she looks forward to learning more about Latin America in the second semester of this year.

Keiran is also doing well in his studies.  Last month he passed his engineering aerodynamics exam and he has another coming up in a weeks time. Please pray for him as he studies aircraft materials and hardware.

One of his instructors, Ken Baerg, has been in Canada for the past five months raising missionary partnership support so he & his family can be at ACMA (Australian Centre for Mission Aviation). Because of Ken’s absence, there were not enough instructors to teach the engineering students for the first part of this year. Praise God that Ken was able to raise the needed support and is now back in Australia, and starting back at ACMA after the Easter break, with all his energies directed at instructing the engineering class. 

A side note of interest: Keiran & his family went camping in Botswana Africa, with the Baerg family back in 1999 when Ken was an engineer for Flying Mission Botswana. Keiran’s dad & mum are now serving with Flying Mission in Zambia Africa, & Ken & family are now in Australia!

In March, Corinne finished her work experience at the Salvation Army’s Warcry magazine, having proofread many articles and even getting the opportunity to write two herself! She had a great experience learning about the publishing business and sees this as a field she could become involved in in the future. You will find below one of the articles she wrote during her time there.

The Bible study we started eight weeks ago has been going really well. We have been reading through Romans and are up to Chapter 6. Luke was also in our group and we are feeling his absence each Monday night. Through God’s providence, our first Bible study after Luke’s death was Romans 5 which encouraged and challenged us that we are to rejoice in our sufferings because it builds perseverance, character and hope. On the last weekend of our holidays, we and some others from our study had the opportunity to stay at a farm in Horsham, which belongs to one of the girls in our Bible Study. We had a great time with kittens, one-week-old kids, horses, cows stalking us, a huge bonfire, puzzles and a great time to get to know each other better.

After four months of phoning, emailing and chasing Telstra, we have at last gotten the phone line into our house repaired and should have the Internet connected by early May. For this we are very thankful and it should make it easier to be in contact with family and friends than it has been so far this year. 

We would also like to ask you to prayerfully consider joining in partnership with us financially to help us through Keiran’s flight program next year. The flight component of Keiran’s course will cost $65,000 and we do not presently have enough money, and we will not, even with both of us working part-time. If you would like to support us in this way, you can give through the Annabel Charitable Foundation (the organisation who awarded Keiran his scholarship) and your gift will be tax deductible. To do this you can email us or comment below and we will email you the forms!

Thank you all for your prayers and your messages of encouragement over the past four weeks. We are very grateful to know that you have been thinking of us during this hard time and we thank each of you who emailed, called and messaged us with prayers and words of support, and for those who prayed that we don’t know about. This was a wonderful example to us of the unity of believers, the support of the body of the church, and the power of prayer. Thank you.

Prayer Points

· Keiran will find a job

· Thank God for the close friendships we are forming, and for the chance to get away for a few days last week.

· Thank God for Corinne’s job

· God will provide financially for us next year

· For Luke’s family, that they will find comfort during this hard time, brought closer to one another & rely on God.

· We will be able to find a new housemate