Beloved,
Greetings
and God’s blessings on you, His beloved children. As my Guatemalan friends
might say “saludos y la bendición de los dioses en usted, sus hijos
amados”. You may be curious as why I am
speaking Spanish and making reference to Guatemala but the news and truth is
that come October 1st I will be flying out of Los Angeles airport
with my other team leaders to Guatemala in which we will meet up with the rest
of the squad 2 days later.
In
my last letter I was writing to you prior to training camp in Georgia and now
being a month later, so much has happened. Training camp was absolutely amazing; I can’t explain it in any better
ways than to say Heaven truly came down and rested on us. We worshiped the King in all His Glory, in
spirit and in truth. I saw my teammates
healed spiritually and physically. A
girl on my team was healed from her food allergy of bananas, another person’s
knee was healed from an old injury and the list goes on. We fought and prayed and cried to God for
freedom for our brothers and sisters who are held in slavery around the world. It was an absolutely incredible experience
and to know that that was just the tip of the iceberg gets me so jacked up for
what is to come in a month from now.
After
training camp and a wedding, it was time to return back to Greenville to finish
up my time living at Mosaic Manor (aka my house) and working at Dunbar Armored
which was a relief to say the least. In
the course of spending my last month here in Greenville God has blessed me with
incredible community that has fought for me and encouraged me as I have been
preparing for this trip.
I recently did a benefit concert/
art auction as a fundraiser and God totally blew me away. The night didn’t go as planned, we started
late, a musician who was to perform didn’t show up, and the crowd of people
that I thought was going to be there didn’t, so it wasn’t looking good. The way it ended up, 20 some people showed
up, I shared my heart and vision for this next year and the group circled
around me to pray for the ministry God was doing. At the end of the night 500 dollars was
raised through donations and art being bought. The take away for the night was that I can plan all I want and try to
make things happen just the way I want it to. God, on the other hand, always
has His plans and His ways and His ways are always better than any frail
attempt I can make. I shall learn to let go of my control and trust God in all
things, I believe this will be a reoccurring theme this next year.
As I continue to seek the Lord in
all areas of my life, I ask for continued prayer for traveling as I am moving
around this last month of September to see friends and family one last time
before I am gone for a year. Pray that I would find rest and learn to say no to
good things if that means I am putting them before spending time with God. Pray for my team, as I am the only guy and
leading a team of 4 girls. Pray for
financial blessings over everyone on the World Race as finances and raising
money is always a stressful thing. Pray for protection as the enemy is trying
really hard to trip us up as we prepare for this trip that God has called us
on. And lastly pray for the church at
large and the people we are going to reach, that the Word would sink into
fertile soil and grow and grow and grow for the sake of the Kingdom.
May His Favor and Mercy Shine Upon
You,
P.S. Once I am overseas, I shall not be sending mail
via post office anymore but will be sending monthly updates via email. If you wish to continue to receive monthly
updates, email me at [email protected] to be put on a mailing list or
if you wish to receive weekly updates via my blog go to
http://greghoughton.theworldrace.org and
on the left side of the screen click on “update alerts” and then input your
email address and you will get updates to your email anytime I add something to
my blog.
