As we have been going around sharing updates we have had the chance to share with some folks we have not meet or shared with before. We just wanted to give a brief summary for any new readers out there about us and the work we get to take part in.

Allison grew up in a wonderful Christian home and attended First United Methodist in Tulsa, Oklahoma. She was able to go on many mission trips and felt the Lord’s calling into missions as a career at a young age. She attended John Brown University, that is where we met, and majored in Community Development. Her heart longs for being in community and helping them use what they have and giving them tools in the form of education in areas like water purification and agriculture to improve their lives. This shows the love Christ shows by meeting physical needs leading the way to open ears and hearts to then meet spiritual needs.

Taylor also grew up in a Christian home and went to John Brown University. He always thought he would enter the business world and be a supporter of missions but that it wasn’t really for him. He was interested in media and majored in Digital Media. Through a talk from a videographer for a mission group called Mercy Ships he saw that the Lord could use his skills too.
A brief history:
After giving ourselves a few years to get use to married life we got serious about looking into what agency we wanted to go with and settled on SIM. Our first assignment was to go to Sudan and Taylor would be in charge of helping produce the media needs for the Sudan team. This would be film, pictures, promotional tools, prayer cards, you name it. After settling into life in Sudan it became clearer that perhaps it would be best if we could be used by other countries as well. About the same time SIM was looking at starting new media hubs that would service areas and not just countries. They invited us to join and move to Kenya. Taylor was able to go back into Sudan for some projects, help out with things in Kenya, and even went to Burkina Faso.

Looking forward:
At the end of our first term SIM informed us that they were putting the media hub idea on hold for the time being. This would mean another change for us ministry wise next term. We still desired to stay with SIM but would need to find another location in which to continue media ministry or look into secondment. Secondment would mean that we would be “borrowed” from SIM and work for another agency. Taylor had been working out of the media office for another mission agency, Africa Inland Mission (AIM), while we were in Kenya. Thankfully it looks like things will work out for us to stay in Kenya and be seconded to AIM for our next term.

January 15, 2012 we will fly back to Kenya for two years. Taylor will continue to work in helping spread the word about missions through media. Allison will focus primarily on being a mom to our two little ones but keep her eyes out for something else to help with be it formally or informally.

So that is a basic re-cap of our journey to the mission field, our first term, and what we plan on for our next term. After that we will reevaluate and see where SIM is in the process of their idea of media hubs, what other opportunities they might have in other countries, or if the Lord is calling us to another agency. As always we would appreciate your prayers for wisdom, discernment and for us to lean even more on our Heavenly Father.