Life and Ministry Together

Hey friends! It’s been a busy 2 1/2 months since you heard from us, but we are excited to update you!

WEDDING

Just in case somehow you missed it, we are now Josh and Autumn Miller!

The story is too long to add here, but if you'd like to hear about one of the unexpected blessing
that God gave us that relates to our wedding pictures, send me an email and I'll tell you the story.
It was a sweet reminder that God cares about the little things in our lives!! 

We got married on March 24, and then went “off the grid” for about four weeks without social media or emails (or blog updates! 😉). In case you are interested, here is a link to our wedding ceremony video. It was our desire for our wedding day to reflect the true meaning of marriage, to picture Christ and His incredible love for His Church. Our entire lives are supposed to be about that, so we wanted this important day to really emphasize the right things when so much in our culture emphasizes the wrong things about a wedding! Obviously it was an amazing day for us, and we were really encouraged to get feedback from people about how spiritually encouraging the day was for them. (Check out about 6 minutes into the video to see one of the special touches we planned for our processional). 

Thank you to everyone who has been praying for us as we start our marriage and ministry together! What a huge blessing and also a huge responsibility to make this life-long covenant! There are a lot of unknowns ahead of us, but we continue to be reminded that we have a faithful God. (And to answer our most-often asked question,"Married life is even better than we expected!").

LIFE ADJUSTMENTS

One of our adjustments has been moving. After our honeymoon, we moved in a small apartment above a garage/shop in Orrville, Ohio. That’s about 2 hours from where I (Autumn) lived before. We’ve spent some time getting settled in, arranging our stuff, figuring what things we needed to put into storage for later when we go to PNG and what stuff should just go! (Pretty sure a garage sale is in our future).

We are also praying and seeking God’s will for how best to get involved as a couple at our home church here in Orrville. It might seem obvious to just “jump in” and get involved as much as possible, but since Lord-willing, we are only here for another year and a half, we want to make sure we are getting involved in ways that will benefit from our short-term help! Thank you for praying for wisdom and leading for us in this area.

NEXT STEPS TOWARD THE MISSION FIELD

The next big thing in our missions timeline is for Josh to take his ordination exam. Right now, he is working 2 days a week and taking 3-4 days each week to focus on studying and writing his paper for the exam.  This is a huge undertaking (60-100 page paper and a 6+ hr oral exam with a panel of pastors) and it can be difficult to come home after an 8.5 hr work day and then sit down and study for 2-3 more hours, much less to just sit at a desk and just study and write for 8-9 hours some days. Please pray for him for focus, encouragement, and that the study will be profitable! 

Josh spends 30+ hours each week studying and working on his paper
for his theological examination with our national fellowship.  

I am working one day a week at the church, helping out with secretarial work, which is a nice way to get a better feel for my new church. We had also been praying and trusting God to provide a job for me as well, if that was one of the ways that He wanted to meet our financial needs.  We specifically needed jobs that would be quite flexible, since Lord willing, in the fall after Josh’s ordination, we will start traveling again on the weekends to speak in churches and raise support. Josh’s boss has been a huge blessing by giving us so much flexibility, and God answered our prayers by giving me part-time work that also is flexible. I am also working right now on getting prayer cards, our blog, brochures, and other such materials made and updated for us as a couple.

I am enjoying working one day a week in the office at church. It has helped me
get a little more connected as I'm getting to know my new church family as well. 

NEW BLOG ADDRESS

Speaking of updates, from now on you'll be getting updates from us from a new email address and our blog will have a new URL. Since I'm no longer Autumn Arp, our blog URL will be changing to

joshautumnmiller.blogspot.com 

(This will be active in the next two days.)

and our new email address is

joshandautumnmiller@gmail.com. 

My former email autumnjoyarp@gmail.com still works and I'll still be checking it, but we are working to transition over to this new email for ministry-related stuff.

HEALTH

Many of you have been faithfully praying for my health, and that means so much to us. Just wanted to let you know that I have healed really well since the surgery and there haven't been any outward signs of the cancer having spread. We had a meeting with a specialist this month to be able to ask more questions, such as "Do you have any recommendations for us as we look at needing to have check ups in Australia after we move to PNG?" We are thankful that the doctors don't see any reason at this point for us to change our plans for living and serving overseas.

COMING UP...

July
       - We'll be attending our fellowship's National Conference and facilitating a presentation for our future teammates who are overseas.
       - Lots of study for Josh!!!
       - Josh's district theological exam
August
       - Josh's second district theological exam
October
       - Josh's first national theological exam
November
       - Team building and time with our teammates who will be home from Papua New Guinea

Thank you to all of you who are supporting us through prayer, financial support, 

and encouragement! It means more than we can possibly say! 

Follow us on Facebook to get more regular updates and prayer requests.Click HERE to download a pdf bulletin insert of this update.