Easter 2018
Reply
Ministry Update :: Changing the way we do our books
GoodSeed Canada is changing the way we do our books. Not our printed books – the evangelism resources used around the world – those will stay the same. I’m talking about our bookkeeping and accounting!
It is always a challenge for a ministry to find someone qualified and up-to-date on bookkeeping and accounting, especially if they are volunteering or have to raise support. Yet the rest of the ministry can’t go on without this important work. A few months ago, a friend told us about an organization that exists to help other ministries with these tasks.
We are outsourcing our bookkeeping and accounting to The Great Commission Foundation (GCF), a Christian organization that helps ministries with back office support. Their goal is to free people up to do the ministry of the great commission, and not have to keep up to date with the ever-changing charity laws and regulations.
GCF will be able to help us with accepting donations, tax receipts, payroll, annual auditing, and Canada Revenue Agency compliance. This will also make our bookkeeping arms-length for greater accountability.
As part of their service, GCF has created web pages for GoodSeed Canada to accept donations.
For Canada: https://53997.thankyou4caring.org/goodseed-donation-page
For United States: https://53997001.thankyou4caring.org/goodseed-us-donation-page
This is a big change for us at GoodSeed, but this service will be a huge help for our ministry as we move forward. One of the changes will be that we will now have a 5% administrative fee deducted off all donations received. In the past, GoodSeed has not had an admin fee on donations, as our bookkeeping staff have been volunteers or missionaries. We have found this 5% to be very reasonable, as most missions charge quite a bit more. Please pray for GoodSeed Canada as we make this change and for Troy as he is in tasked with making it happen.
_____________________________________________________
The month of March brought us to a milestone in our family. Our eldest daughter, Ellie, turned 13 – a teenager!
Typically, we do a family birthday adventure where we all go and do something fun together to make memories and celebrate as a family. For this milestone, we decided that we’d take Ellie on a parent/teenager trip, just the three of us, for the afternoon and evening. We spent some time hanging out in Calgary, wandering a mall in the district, and finished off a gift card with some clothes that Ellie picked out for herself.
Ellie has also developed a liking for sushi. Not sure where that came from, but we took her out for supper at a Japanese restaurant.
Ellie saved up her money to buy herself a ukulele. She has been picking away at learning how to play it. (See what I did there?)
We love this young lady deeply and appreciate your prayers for us as we guide her through another stage of life into womanhood.
gift from her little brother
Thirteen?!?
Happy birthday to our sweet Ellie
Somehow, time has marched on and, to my amazement, my eldest daughter is now thirteen years old. I would say that makes me feel old, but by the time my father was my age, I think I was in university. But I digress…
This young lady has been saving up her money and just a few days before her birthday purchased a ukulele for herself. Typically, we do a family birthday adventure where we all go and do something together. For this milestone, we decided that we would just take Ellie on a trip, just the three of us for the afternoon and evening. We spent some time wandering a mall in downtown Calgary, and finished off a gift card with some clothes that Ellie picked out for herself.
Ellie has also developed a liking for sushi. Not sure where that came from, but we took her out for supper at a Japanese restaurant.
Ellie has been trying to claim teenager status for a few years now, and it has finally become a reality. On her actual birthday, we had some family over to help celebrate. The day started with a phone call from her grandmother in New Brunswick as Ellie was getting ready for school. Ellie requested a breakfast supper, so it was waffles with whipped cream, strawberries, as well as bacon and sausage.
To my dismay, my eldest received makeup as a gift. But she also received some other nice stuff, including candy from her brother on a card he made, some fine china that her great-grandmother had owned, and lots of other things she enjoys.
The day after her birthday, she announced it was Birthday Boxing Day!
Breakfast supper of waffles, bacon and sausage
gift from her little brother
great-grandmother Jean’s fine china
No Ordinary Weekend Photos
A few photos from the No Ordinary Weekend evangelistic retreat we had over the long weekend in February.
Ministry Update :: No Ordinary Weekend
This weekend will not be an ordinary Family Day Weekend for us. Should be quite extraordinary, actually.
Naomi and I are preparing to attend a special evangelistic event for the next three days. Moved by their shared desire to share the gospel with others, a group of local business people have banded together to fund an evangelism conference. They have rented a local Christian camp, hired child care, arranged for performing artist Paul Brandt to perform, donated door prizes, and more to create an opportunity to invite people to hear the gospel message being preached. They wanted a way to have non-believing business associates, coworkers, employees, and friends and family to get away from the distractions of life and have a family retreat on the long weekend and hear this message.
The event is called No Ordinary Weekend.
The message will be in the form of a new book series John Cross has been working on. The No Ordinary Series takes some of the content he has previously written, and reworked it into smaller bite sizes of around 45 pages each. “No Ordinary Book” starts off explaining what makes the Bible unique and why someone should study it, and the remaining 8 booklets explain the Gospel message. These books will be a great Sunday School or small group curriculum.
For this weekend, these books had to be handmade for this event as they are not quite ready for publication. Expect further announcements about these in the coming months.
In the meantime, visit noordinaryweekend.com for more details about this event.
This is the first time presenting these resources and the first time doing a weekend retreat like this. Please be praying for John Cross as he teaches through these new books and the rest of the activities. We are anticipating around 100 or more unbelievers aged 13+ to be in attendance, and we hope to see many come to a clear understanding of the Gospel.
Troy & Naomi