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A Special Prayer Request

In the next few months we are going to have to make a major change. We would like to ask you to pray that God will meet this need.                                                                Here are some facts:        1. Our van has more than 260,000 miles on it. We use the van for the majority of our meetings. The motorhome has 35,000 miles on it and we use it about 4 months per year. The rest of the meetings are "van dates."        2. We put 50,000 miles a year on our van AT LEAST! (15,000 on the motorhome)        3. Our van gets 10-11 miles to the gallon pulling the trailer

Here are some facts about our fuel costs: 1. 50,000 miles a year at 10 MPG at the cost of $3 a gallon =    $15,000 JUST IN VAN GAS!   The motorhome is another $4500! 2. Gas is going to go up. It is not hard to see with oil over $90 a barrel that $3 gas will soon be looked back on with fondness!

WHAT CAN WE DO? Obviously our van needs to be replaced. It has served us well but with 260,000 miles it is nearing the end of its life. HERE is what we are praying for:

This is a Dodge Sprinter. It gets on average 22-24 miles to the gallon! It has a diesel engine that is rated to last to 500,000 miles!!!!   A new Sprinter costs around $30,000 stripped down with and empty cargo and 2 front seats. Then you customize it to your needs.     WE ARE LOOKING AT USED SPRINTERS! You can frequently find used Sprinters around $16,000. These will have around 120,000 miles on them, which is just getting started since they get 500,000 miles! I have talked to several mechanics and they all agree this is the way to go.

Let's compare the fuel costs: 50,000 miles per year- $3 a gallon -  22 miles per gallon =     $6816.00 per year in gas!    A savings of $8418.00 per year in Gas costs!

Obviously this would be a huge burden lifted off of our ministry. Gas is going to continue to climb. The ONLY WAY that we will stay on the road is to save money elsewhere. We feel this is the way to do it.        These are high quality vans. UPS, FED-EX and many more companjies are using these. We know several gospel groups that are using them with great results.                                                                     WHAT DO WE NEED????       We need to raise money obviously. We would love to have this by spring 2008. We need to raise close to $16,000. The more we raise the less we have to finance. I would rather not have to borrow ANYTHING for this purchase.        Andrea and I are making a commitment to cut spending in everyway possible. We are not taking vacations, we will limit eating out, cut any expense that we can to help raise this money.        We are asking God to send us what we need. He will do this from other believers. If 1000 people sent $16 we would have enough! If 100 people sent $160 we would have enough. If 1 person sent $16,000 we would have enough! Don't laugh.....God can do it!

We almost never make our needs known in this ministry. We try to be very frugal and cost efficient. We try to be good stewards. The biggest cost we have is TRAVEL.  We put around 70,000 miles a year on our van and motorhome. There is no way around this. We even try hard to book our meetings to use as little fuel and mileage as possible.       WE NEED PEOPLE TO PRAY.......AND PARTNER with us on this need. There is no other way around this. WE MUST GET ANOTHER VAN SOON! We feel this van is the way to go.  Please pray that God will supply it soon.

If you wish to make a gift to this need you may send a check with "van" in the memo. We will save every penny in a special account for this need. If you wish to make a large donation and want a tax write off, contact us and we can walk you through that.    Above all PRAY for this need!             Mark and Andrea Forester      P.0. Box 190152 , Burton, MI   48519       586.873.0480