In January we embarked on a road trip with three purposes: to raise our support, promote Host Israelis, and share the Gospel with Israeli travelers we meet along the way. 

So far we have traveled about 5,000 miles, met with pastors from dozens of churches, and gained dozens of new prayer partners and 2 new financial donors. Many pastors and churches that we met with have expressed interest in supporting us financially, but these things take time. Pastors have to meet and pray with their teams and evaluate budgets, so it could be months or years before some of these churches are able to support us financially. Please pray for God to provide full funding for our ministry quickly. Many churches and individuals have also expressed interest in becoming hosts with Host Israelis or in learning more about the network. Praise God, He provided a truck for us to tow our new travel trailer (our “homey”, as Ari calls it), which we moved into 3 months after we anticipated.

We originally planned to return to Virginia in April. However, due to delays in getting our trailer, learning more about the Israeli travel season, and our desire to promote Host Israelis in more locations; we have decided to extend our trip through August! The Host Israelis vision for the U.S. is to have over 1,000 hosts on our network all over the country. Wherever Israelis might visit or travel through on their way to another destination, we want to have Christian hosts available to provide hospitality and a positive witness of the Gospel. Staff with Chosen People Ministries are based in and regularly travel to many cities all over the country. They will be able to recruit hosts in all the major cities. However, Israelis also spend a lot of time visiting National Parks, which are often far away from bigger cities where CPM staff regularly travel. 

Because of this we plan to spend April through August traveling to many of these locations to recruit hosts. We also hope to meet Israelis in the parks with whom we can share a meal and the Gospel; however, we expect it will be difficult to meet Israelis in the crowds of hundreds or thousands of visitors. Please pray for divine appointments and boldness to share the Gospel.

As always, thank you for partnering with us in prayer!

Love in Messiah,

BJ, Carissa and Ari