Hailes on Mission

Almost four years ago, a group of 12 volunteers raised a couple thousand dollars each in order to come and pray over a vast area of Southern Madagascar.  They yearned to speak the truth of the Gospel, but a majority of the 40 hours they spent on this trip was traversing bumpy, harsh, taxing curves, rocks and sand whilst praying.  Upon arrival in a town where they could rest, they would struggle out of the vehicle, regaining mobility in their aching bodies and attempt to recoup in order to do it for another 10 hours the next day.  Amidst the discomfort, the group would pray in each village along the main road of Androy (South Madagascar):  Tranoroa, Beloha, Tsihombe, & Ambovombe.  Turning back after the third day of travels, they faced deep, wet mud holes.  The rain was a miracle because Androy is a desert and doesn't get much rain.  In each village the volunteers had prayed in as they passed by, it had rained.  The Antandroy peop...

Driving through the rough roads in Androy land we set our eyes for the goal ahead.  We are heading out to train trainers, encourage local believers, and set up some baptism services.  Full of hope and excitement we drive down the road re-capturing the beauty of the desert.  Then reality begins to hit us.  All the fields are burnt up.  The corn didn't make it.  The balahazo (kasava) is small.  The fields are being cleaned out.  Another year of no real harvest.  We continue on the long journey but as we pass by field after field with no new crops our hearts begin to break within us.  We begin to just pray within our soul asking the Lord to send rain and to help these people out. We arrive at the first town and visit a local pastor.  He just had a baby.  Praise the Lord!  We rejoice with him and give a small gift according to customs due to the new baby.  We begin to chat and it is evident that the people are...

As we continue to seek the Lord’s guidance for our lives we desire to know that we are being obedient to His will for our lives.  We have been asked and given an opportunity to leave the field in a good way which at other times is only accomplished by dying, getting severely ill or after serving for a looong time on the field.  We have prayed and will continue to pray to make sure that we are stepping in line with the Master’s will but feel very confident that we are supposed to stay here in Madagascar and continue to build His Kingdom here in Madagascar.  With that said we wanted to give you a few reasons why we will not be moving back to the USA at this time and a few reasons why we would.  This will hopefully help you know our hearts and how to pray for us. Why we will stay in Madagascar: ·          God’s Call on our lives :  We feel very deeply that this is the place that the Lord has for us to serve Him....

Happy New Year!  We have entered 2016 and we have so much to be thankful for.  This past year 2015 was a tough year for us as a family overall.  Many transitions, heartaches, struggles but with many wonderful works done by the Father of which we give praise to Him and Him alone.  We desire to give you some numbers of what the Lord has done over this past year (2015) with us and our teammates here in the South of Madagascar (SoMad Team).  However, we do want to remind you all that these are much more than numbers.  They are people who have been changed by the Father.  They are grandparents, parents, children, youth, healthy people, sick people, rich, poor, hurting, etc... Each number represents someone special and we are thankful that the Lord has allowed us to have a part in their lives.  The Lord is Great and Greatly to be praised and so as we look back please know there are names, faces, and stories behind each number. Also, these numb...

It has been our experience that the Lord is able to do more than we could ever think or imagine.  We have so many times wondered how He could ever use us.  We are just sinners redeemed by the blood of the Lamb and we just seek to give the King of Kings what He already purchased on the cross.  Our lives.  It doesn't seem to be much from the outside looking in.  We don't have extraordinary gifts or talents (we do have some just not extraordinary), we have been and still are at times the biggest hypocrites to ever live on this earth, we don't have riches, we don't have much to offer anyone much less our Lord.  However, despite our inabilities or lack of resources we serve a God who is gracious and kind and chooses to use us as His witnesses in a dry and desolate land.  He is also just and will not let sin reign in our lives.  He continuously reminds us of His measuring stick of Holiness and we are constantly submitting ourselves to His authority. So...

There are certain moments in life and especially in ministry that we don’t deserve to get.   We work expecting God to do great things but we know that it is only by His grace and mercy that we will see those things come to pass.   Well this upcoming month is one of those months which makes us be excited about how the Lord is going to allow us to see His hands have been at work here in the South of Madagascar.   We can only say that to Him be all the glory and we pray that we have many more months like this one coming.   It is so amazing to think that the Lord is dong such amazing things. So what is this month going to hold for us?   Well simply put we have the potential to see our churches in Androy land double, number of baptized believers double and we believe that we will see more be called to Salvation in Christ Jesus.   Our teammates had a wonderful last trip out to the bush and the Lord has been working on people’s hearts to h...

As many of you know the IMB is making a lot of changes and the impact is great here in SSA (Sub-Saharan Africa).  We have just finished some needed Church Planting training and have been afforded the opportunity to say good bye to some co-laborers in the Gospel who will not be returning to the field.  We have to be honest that these losses really do hurt us in many ways.  The leadership, the wisdom, words of encouragement, family relationship and friendship provided by these saints will be missed.  Many of them have been so helpful to our family over these past few years and we are forever thankful for their faithfulness in serving the Father.  We will be praying for the Lord to give them peace and allow them to do great things for His glory wherever it is that they end up.  We do want to make it clear that our personal feelings in all of this at this point (and we pray at no point) don't impact the fervor and zeal that we have for completing the task ...