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We are currently working on our end of the year letter for TTI. It hasn’t been that long since we mailed out our last newsletter, but this is a little different from the newsletter and an end of the year letter is important for our supporters as well as for our organization. If anyone is interested in helping fold, stuff, label, stamp, seal, etc. I will welcome such offers! 🙂 The goal is to have this in the mail next week.

Please keep the Sitaki family in your prayers. They have had a rough couple of days.

Only one more week til Mike & Emmanuel leave, your continued prayers for this trip are so appreciated. Specific prayers: Mike is still waiting for the actual tickets to arrive, and there are still funds needed for the downpayment for the Home of Innocence. Pray for God to go before them, prepare the way, remove obstacles, and make the path straight. The home would be ready, easily found, & easily acquired.

Thank you & God bless you!
Lisa

Mike’s tickets have been purchased and this upcoming trip will actually start on November 26th, not the 29th. He decided to extend his layover in Ethiopia for a couple of days. He will be visiting a facility operated by All God’s Children International (organization based in Portland, Oregon). As well as seeing what they do there, he will possibly be helping with some repairs needed on their orphan home. The rest of the trip Mike & Emmanuel will be in & around Kigali, Rwanda finding the location for the new Home of Innocence.

One of the ways you can give towards the Home of Innocence is by purchasing a framed photograph from Rwanda. These photographs are really special because they were each taken by kids living in the ANLM orphan homes (they went through a photography workshop even). We do not have these all listed on our website yet, but we hope to soon. If not, I may be posting them on our blog here. (Recently Mike tried to update the Ten Talents International website & bad things happened to it- but it’s back to normal now thank God!) Of course you can always contact us directly if you are interested ([email protected]).

We appreciate your continued prayers for this trip and the Home of Innocence. We believe God will provide the funds that are still needed, and if you would like to give please click on this link //tentalentsint.org/about%20homes.htm Starting a new home requires some up front expenses, but we believe God will use this home to have an eternal impact on the lives of many children who are right now on the streets. Ten Talents International is not the ministry of the McColm family- it is your ministry. God chooses to use all of us together, ordinary people, to do extraordinary things for the kingdom of God.

We are so blessed to work together with you!
God Bless You,
Lisa

You might not realize just what a relief it is when we finally get a newsletter in the mail to you! I feel like saying, “HoOoRaY!!!” 🙂 This one has had even more “bumps” in the road that have made it take longer to get out. The last one being that we ran out of toner in the middle of printing. We had to order more on-line (they don’t stock it locally). A few days later we put in the new one & the print quality was terrible! But thank God, after praying, the print finally improved! So, it was the last day of October, but we finally got that newsletter printed, folded, and stuffed so it could be on it’s way to you- whew!

There is a small insert in with your newsletter that is telling you about the photographs Ten Talents Int. has available for purchase. This is a fundraiser for the new Home of Innocence. We are in the process of cataloging these framed photographs (which are accompanied by a short bio of the child who took the picture) and you will be able to view them on our Ten Talents International website. Hopefully this will be a nice fit for some of you who would like to find a unique gift for someone on your Christmas list, or for those of you who would like to add a beautiful photo and conversation piece to your home. As a gift, how much more wonderful is it to give a something that gives twice- to the recipient as well as to the children on the streets of Rwanda who are waiting for a home.

Please continue to pray for the provision of the funds for the Home Of Innocence. Mike is wanting to raise $10,000 before his trip at the end of this month. Thank you for standing with us! God is faithful!

God Bless You,

Lisa

We had a wonderful service on Sunday night. We were very blessed to come together and be surrounded by those who laid hands on us & prayed earnestly for our annointing & ministry. It was also a pleasure for us to be able to pray & bless Emmanuel Sitaki & his wife Francoise. Thank you to all who express your love & support for us, whether you were able to be there or not.

We are working on our next newsletter installment- we will have it in the mail, on it’s way to you, before the end of the month! 🙂

God is good & we praise him for his constant guidance & covering over us.
God Bless You,
Lisa

God continues to provide for us & we are thankful for where he has led us. Mike has set a tentative date of November 29th – Dec. 15th for his next trip to Rwanda. It will be just Mike & Sitaki on this trip, as their main objective will be to find the location of the new Home of Innocence. We continue to pray about this new ministry. Please keep TTI in your prayers, specifically for God to open the doors of opportunity for us to join with more churches, and for his provision for the different ministry goals.

God is Faithful!
Lisa

The presbytery of Ten Talents International is planning on ordaining Mike McColm and Emmanuel Sitaki, as ministers of the Gospel. The official ordination service will be at Bethel Church on October 21st, at 6pm. Friends and family are invited to attend. There will be a time of prayer and laying on of hands for Mike & Emmanuel.

We had the pleasure of spending Sunday morning, September 16th, with the congregation of Grace Community Church in Woodland, WA. (http://www.woodlandgrace.com/) Thank you to our home church of Bethel for keeping us in your prayers- we had a very blessed time with Grace! Mike was able to share with their 3 morning services a brief history of Ten Talents Int. and where God is leading us in the future. They responded very positively and were very generous in giving to the ministry. We look forward to building a long term partnership with the great people at Grace, and their wonderful pastors. If you are in the Woodland area & not in a church, you must check out Grace Community Church!

We thank you, everyone, for your continued prayers for Ten Talents International, and our family. Please continue to pray for God’s provision, for his leading, for more opportunities to share, and more supporters. Please pray for the funds that are still needed for the van for ERM, and of course the House of Innocence.

God is Good!
Lisa

God is good!

We had a wonderful time at our banquet on September 9th. It was so much fun! We loved seeing everyone who was there & being able to come together to kick off taking Ten Talents International to the next level. And I even survived talking in front of everyone! 😉 We had about 75 people there and we were very blessed by everyone’s support. I would like to say thank you to:

• The Empress Palace- Rob & Becky Neuschwander, Anja Shoun, and your whole crew! Thank you for giving of yourselves & your facility because you believe in us & Ten Talents International. The Empress took care of just about everything- from invitations to decorations, to food, to clean up. You are awesome! We love you guys! http://www.empresspalace.com/
• Shawn & Natasha Lewis- Here is a couple who has been given amazing talents & loves Jesus! You & your band were fantastic & we so appreciated you giving of your time & talents for this night. And thank you for being sensitive to God’s leading & writing the song “Water in the Desert” (aka “I Let Go”). It still speaks to my heart intensely. Shawn has a song on the Glory Revealed CD (I believe they are on a short tour right now) http://www.gloryrevealed.com/ and his band is Hyper Static Union http://www.hyperstaticunion.com/music.php or http://www.myspace.com/hyperstaticunion
• A Clear Image Photography- Thank you Davina for taking our photos (and enduring the very distractable state of Nate). And for taking the photos Julie McComb took in Rwanda & making some wonderful posters/prints for us. Davina is a sweetheart as well as being a great photographer. You can see more at: http://www.aciphoto.com/
• Emmanuel & Francoise Sitaki of Evangelical Revival Ministries (http://www.ermrwanda.org/) for coming & sharing with us. We look forward to partnering with you for many years to come.
• Bryan & Laura Davenport (our pastors at Bethel Church- http://www.experiencebethel.com/). Thank you for being there for us all the time. You are very important people in our lives.
• Everyone who made time in your lives to come to the banquet or donated in lieu of attending. Thank you for your support & standing (and sitting) with us. 🙂 I hope you all had as much fun as we did!

**There were a lot of links up there, but now if you want more info you can follow those links.**

We did take an offering that night and collected Faith Promise cards for those who wanted to give to the ministry. The offering was specifically for purchasing a van for ERM for them to use as a taxi, so older orphans can earn money to support themselves. The van cost is $10,000 (US) and we brought in $2400, so that is a great start. In Faith Promises we also received $1500 in new monthly pledges. Praise God as He moves the ministry forward- it’s all about Him, we just say OK God!

God Bless You!

Lisa McColm

Here we are- less than two weeks until the big banquet, and a little over a week into Mike working full time for Ten Talents International!

• The Banquet- we still have some tickets available for our banquet, happening September 9th. If you were thinking about coming & haven’t RSVP’d yet, we’d really like to encourage you to contact us soon! This night is going to be wonderful. Beautiful setting, engaging speakers, fantastic live music (Shawn Lewis, of Hyper Static Union, will have a band there with him, as well as Tasha Lewis singing with him), not to mention all the amazing food! There will also be door prizes as well as the drawing for a free night at an Oregon Coast Shilo Inn. You will most definitely be blessed to come, and every penny of the money from your ticket goes to further the work being done by Ten Talents International. Thank you!

• Ten Talents Website- there are some exciting additions here also. In addition to being able to give on-line via Paypal, you can now also subscribe to become a monthly donor. This also is through Paypal, and you can sign up to support the Faith Home, the McColm Family, or the new Home of Innocence.

• What’s that you say? What is the Home of Innocence? Mike is going to talk more about this at the banquet, but there is a special “sneak peek” available at our website! To get this “insider” info., you can visit our website //tentalentsint.org/, click on the tab for “Ministry”, then click on the highlighted phrase “children off the streets”. God is placing new dreams in Michael’s heart for new things in Rwanda. It will be a blessing!

Praise God for providing for us & guiding us. He is always faithful. We had the opportunity to visit Truth and Grace Foursquare church in University Place, Washington this last weekend & it was a blessing. They welcomed us & prayed over us & we look forward to working with them more in the future. Mike has meet with a few other pastors in the last week and continues to work on building connections so that we can share the opportunities for others to become involved in advancing the Kingdom of God around the world. Praise God that he delights in using ordinary people to do extra-ordinary things! He is so good!

Thank you for your continued prayers

*for this banquet- that it would be a success in every sense of the word

*for our family as God continues to watch over us & provide for us

*for the connections that Mike is making with other ministries to be fruitful

*and that God would continue to give us more opportunities to grow the ministry & that he would provide for the dreams we believe he has placed within us

We are so glad to have you along in this amazing journey of faith & thank you for supporting us & praying for us. We pray that God richly blesses you & that you walk in the path He has for you- for that is the best place to be!

In Him,

Lisa

*Just a little more than a month until the banquet, and we are beginning to get responses in. As a reminder, the first 100 people to purchase tickets will be entered into a drawing for a night at an Oregon coast Shilo Inn! Just a little motivation for those who might be drawn to procrastinate! 🙂 You can make your donation on-line at //tentalentsint.org/ or through the mail to Ten Talents International. Some of you may have gotten your invitations late, as there was a mix-up with the amount of postage required, but I think that’s all taken care of now. Please keep this banquet in your prayers- that God would release people to come & for this to night to be used by God for his glory.

*We found out recently that a church is fully funding the Kanombe Children’s Home through Africa New Life Ministries. That is wonderful to know, because funding that home was one of our goals for this year. Praise God the home is taken care of! (We still need to fully fund the Faith Home- please pray for that.)

*Mike is wrapping up his “final” days at his carpentry job, probably just one or two days left. I put “final” in quotes because he will go back occasionally, a day here or there, to do fixes and such. He is very ready to move on to working full time for Ten Talents International. This has been on his heart for a long time!

You are a blessing to us & we so appreciate you standing with us as we move forward in God’s calling!

God Bless You,
Lisa