The December Outreach spotlight is on the Wheaton family, EPC missionaries to North Macedonia. The family is still in California while they sort out visas to return to the Balkans. Their furlough was meant to end in late summer of this year, but the ongoing visa challenge has forced the family to wait things out in the US while continuing their ministry remotely with the team on the ground in North Macedonia. Here’s the latest update from the Wheatons:

“As a team we have been discussing chapters of a book on the response of faith during our regular team meetings. We begin, knowing there is nothing we can do to earn any chance to receive the immense gift we’ve been given in Jesus. Our discussion has been a springboard into questions of what it means to follow a King whose kingdom is increasing. There are personal life applications and indicators of how it intersects with Tetovarchi culture at a core level. There’s still four chapters to digest, yet our ending thoughts land towards the necessity of an outward embodied response which demonstrates the depth of what we’ve been given. In other words, mental acknowledgement to Jesus as King is not a sufficient response.

One immediate response is embodying gratitude, not as works but that which is evident of our faith. Most often I use my words to show gratitude. The other day Pru read how celebration moves from a mindset of scarcity to one of gratitude. Celebrating God’s goodness is both a physical and mental act. Yes, even in greater LA, we live among an abundance of Jesus followers. Even more, we’re thankful we have a community of believers who prays with us and for us as we seek to bring Jesus into a place where He’s not known. I often don’t think twice about the opportunity of ordering an Advent devotional on Amazon, yet in places we’ve lived that ability is nonexistent because the people there don’t know or perhaps even care that Jesus is King. The thought weighs, how can I best share the abundance I have with gratitude? Despite the challenges and obstacles we’ve encountered, to share Jesus among a people who don’t have access to entering the realm of Jesus’ Kingship is an overflowing passion to which we have devoted our lives.”