Family & Ministry Update - Issue 1

HEINO FAMILY UPDATE

We Bought a House!

God has been very faithful to us! We became proud homeowners of a 1970s manufactured home sitting on 15 acres of land in mid-August. Some walls are painted, our guest room looks more like a storage room, and we are slowly getting things set up the way we like. Steadily, we are getting our land ready for our homesteading dreams! We have Cortunix quail and we will be proud owners of four Kune Kune piglets this upcoming Saturday. We also have a one-year-old puppy named Koda, who was a recent and unexpected addition to the farm. 

As you can imagine, there are lots of things that need to get done around here. We would appreciate your prayers as we navigate through this new lifestyle of raising animals, growing our family, and managing a home! We are learning more and more about what it means to truly trust God with each aspect of our life, leaving it in His hands to guide us with all of these things. It is wonderful that we don’t need to worry about tomorrow! We are eager to see where He leads us in this next season of our life.

Preparing for Parenthood

We will soon be welcoming our baby boy into the world. He is due in less than 3 weeks!! We are working on getting the house (and ourselves) in as much order as possible before then! Our list currently looks like: finish painting the walls, organize the guest room, and organize the nursery. Alysha and my grandma, Suzie, painted a beautiful mural in the nursery. 

We ask that you pray over the rest of the pregnancy, the birth (us, the baby, the birth team, the hospital), our baby’s life, and our commitment to raise him in the ways of the Lord. We are so excited to be parents and for the new journey that awaits us!

MINISTRY UPDATE

Summer 2023 - As an island, we took 25 middle schoolers to camp! Two of those kids were from our middle school group. They LOVED the experience and can’t wait to go back next summer! We really got to see God at work in the 4 days that we were there, and we are grateful for the roles and experiences God opened up to us as leaders to these wonderful kids!

Camp Fundraising - Rakeem organized several work parties to help kids fundraise their way through camp, for both high school and middle school. Our middle schoolers fundraised themselves completely! We also volunteered at the YL booth at the fair. Rakeem was a pro at making curly fries! It was a fun day!

Kid Support - We love to support our kids outside of club! Whenever we can, we show up for sport events, concerts, and 4H shows. We want to show our kids that we care about their day-to-day lives, beyond the two hour time we meet on Fridays. We went to one of our middle schooler’s volleyball games, and she lit up when she noticed we were there for her! We also went to a few high school football games, where we saw lots of middle schoolers who have come to club at least once! 

First Club - We had our first club of the school year in October! This year, we are meeting every Friday instead of every other week. Kids last year really wanted to meet every week, so we listened! This change was made possible by the opportunity for Rakeem to enter into ministry through YL full-time.

Thank you to everyone who has supported us through this transition! We ask you to pray for our kids and that God continues to open doors. We are grateful for all of you!

                                                Love, The Heinos