Howdy y'all!

Hello to all! I have been long in writing a report and so many exciting things have happened since I wrote.

Mom, Dad, Amy and I left for our furlough and fund raising March 13th and had a very busy (but fun) furlough, visiting family, friends and supporters. We were very glad to be able to visit with you all and catch up! We were blessed that a group from the Jersey Village Church of Christ met us at the airport and lent us one of their church vans to use for our traveling. For the first month we bounced all over the place. We drove as far south as San Antonio, TX and as far north as El Dorado, KS. Needless to say, we added a lot of miles to that van!!! The second month we spent in Tarpley, TX with Dad's family and took on a renovation project for my grandparents! Our third month of furlough was spent in College Station, TX visiting with Mom's folks and finishing up fund raising. I was even given the privilege of speaking to the youth at the Jersey Village Church of Christ. Our furlough was finished up with a short visit to Murrieta, CA and we had a great time visiting with the members there during their Mission Month. We had a wonderful time in the US and enjoyed seeing everyone! Thank you for all your prayers for our safety during our travels!

We returned to the Philippines on June 18th and were met at the airport by a very large and very crazy group of people! Jon, Gina (with their 4 day old son, Sean David), Clint, Rachael (with their 5 month old son, Andrew), and Becky & Richard Emperado with their children Jennylyn, Jennylou and Grant all met us at the airport and we shared many bear hugs! It was wonderful to be reunited with our family after being three months apart! We were so thankful that the Lord kept us all safe and healthy! We were amazed at how much Andrew had grown since we left. When we left for the US in March, Andrew had weighed about 10 pounds (he was only 2 months old by that time). When we returned he weighed 20 pounds! We were also excited to meet little Sean who was born while we were in California! What a joy to be back with family!

While we were in the US, my little sister Amy and I (with much help from our parents and the Lord) worked on raising funds so that when we returned we would be able to move out and get an apartment closer to the Bible Study Center. We were able to do this and (ironically) on July 4th, Amy and I moved into an apartment right next door to Jon and Gina, across the street from Rachael and Clint, and around the corner from the BSC. We are finally starting to get really settled in and have been enjoying ourselves and learning to cope with each others quirks :). We really like the fact that the apartment next to Jon and Gina opened up, but we had expected to move out until a later time. Things have worked out very well and the only thing I regret is that I am not with my parents 24/7 anymore. It's funny, I have been looking forward to moving out for so long that I didn't think about what it might be like when I actually did. What's worse is that I still see my parents everyday and yet I still miss them! I'm hopeless... :)

We've been busy at the Bible Study Center! We are in the middle of Session 4 of 2009 and have been doing a lot of distribution of flyers to try and attract students for our Bible Correspondence Course. We have also been working to convert more of our classroom courses into correspondence course format. This is going well and we are really excited about the opportunities this will give us!

Thank you for your friendship and continued interest in our work! Please keep our students, specifically Felipe, in your prayers and all of our efforts. Also pray for the success of our next session of classes, which starts August 2, that we will be able to interest people in studying God's word. Keep my family and our health in your prayers! Feel free to send me an email, I would love to hear from you! God Bless!!!

In him...

Sara Murrell