Jeff Knudson and Family
Missionary Chaplain to New York City
WINTER 2008

   Dear supporting churches and friends, it has been this verse that has captivated me over the last three months. While it is a natural response to praise God when all is well and there is bountiful provision, it goes against the grain to do so when trials come. Am I really to give thanks for those trials and believe that it is God’s will that I have a spirit of gratitude throughout all of it?

    Over the fall months we as a family have been learning to do just that. We left New York in September to travel to North Carolina for meetings in Goldsboro and Matthews. We were also able to attend a missions conference at our sending church, Tri-City Baptist in Forest City where we gave an update on INNER-CITY CHAPLAINCY and our plan for planting a church in the New York City borough of Staten Island. Due to the aftermath of Hurricane Ike, it was a blast trying to get gasoline in Charlotte. On one particular night after following a fuel tanker into an Exxon station where I waited for two hours, I was finally able to fill up about 1 AM. While waiting ever so patiently in the van in a gas line that resembled a Wal-Mart parking lot on Christmas Eve, I thanked God that this was NOT the normal routine of filling up and being charged $4.50 a gallon on top of it. After the conference, and because of financial reasons, we returned to New York to place all of our furniture in a storage facility in Staten Island with the goal of returning there upon receiving our financial support for the church plant. In mid-October, we traveled to Oklahoma to help my grandmother who fell and broke her hip. While traveling enroute through Tennessee we had a blowout on the travel trailer. While changing the tire, I thanked God that the weather was beautiful and that the tire blew on the passenger side and away from oncoming traffic. We were able to be present with my grandmother through her surgery and also assist some with her physical therapy. Praise GOD she is recovering well even though she is suffering from Alzheimer’s. We spent the month of November in Oklahoma City where the Lord provided a unique ministry opportunity. We were all able to stay at an old ten-story hotel in the downtown area where we had our rooms and meals provided in exchange for doing some work on the grounds. Derec, Wesley and I performed various maintenance such as landscaping, tearing out old sheetrock, cleaning rooms, and we even sealed and re-striped the entire hotel parking lot. The boys had a great time on a couple of nights assisting the clerk at the front desk and also acting as security. Through it all I’ve been thanking God for the experience we’ve had to be able to really bond as a family towards the end of this year.

     Our time in Oklahoma also gave us the privilege of presenting the church plant to a few churches in the area. We are very thankful to Bible Baptist Church in Chickasha, Oklahoma for making the commitment to begin supporting us once we start the plant. This was really an unexpected blessing as we didn’t have a meeting scheduled there but just showed up one Sunday morning. The church also provided us with a gracious love offering that was much needed at the time.

NEW MINISTRY PRESENTATION ONLINE

     We are extremely pleased with our new DVD we have been showing in churches since September. The presentation is about eight minutes long and shows some of what we’ve been able to do in New York City since arriving there in 2004 while also laying out our goals for church planting in New York City in 2009. You can see it today by going to Church Planting. We praise God for His blessings and for your prayers. 

In HIS service,

P.O. Box 7925 New York, NY 10116-7925  •   516-509-7458