Rich & Ramona WagnerJanuary 26, 2009Great News to Start the New Year!God has ushered in the New Year with very good news for us! You may remember that Ramona contracted Hepatitis C1A after an operation in Mexico. That disease caused her to spend a year in bed with weekly Interferon and other nasty, painful shots. When we came to Cusco Peru in December of 2007 her viral count was at zero. We were warned that the virus could possibly come back, so she would need to be tested again after a year. We have just completed that testing, and Ramona's virus count is still at zero! We praise God for His grace in dealing with this disease. Ramona continues to recover her physical strength, and has progressed to the point that she got a weight training set for Christmas to help with her recovery. I can hear the moans & groans out there all the way up here 13,200 feet in the Andes Mountains. Don't feel too sorry for her, she did get other things and she really did want/need the weights to continue her rehabilitation. The Josefine House continues to grow every way but financially. We have taken in several new children recently. Moises, Natalie and Daniel are our new additions. Moises and Natalie are both Fetal Alcohol babies and would have been thrown in the river or abandoned to predators in a field if we had not taken them in. We just got Daniel this week. He is five years old, and didn't have a name until we got him. He is mute, sort of. His mother abandoned him because he was “different”. He makes noises but doesn't say any words. Look at our Photo Bucket page and you can see the personality this little guy has. He grins and laughs all the time, he just doesn't talk. We don't begin to think that we have all the answers for what all of our special needs children require. From Spin bifida, heart defects, cataracts, Downs Syndrome and Fetal Alcohol Syndrome, to a 73 year old blind man and a five-year-old little mute boy, we know that we are in waaaaaaay over our heads. But God does not make mistakes, He IS in control. He has put us in this place, at this time, to deal with these children. So we will trust in Him and do everything possible to show His love and grace to people that haven't seen that before. The Josefine House ran out of operating funds last week. A couple of days later, not knowing the financial condition of the orphanage, a church in Chattanooga gave us a very generous gift of $1500. Please pray that God will continue to provide what is needed to care for these children. February will see evangelistic medical brigades, my continued teaching of seminary classes, Ramona starting a ladies Bible study and another trip to the jungle. I will be helping some like-minded missionaries build an orphanage in the jungle about 17km outside a town called Puerto Maldonado. Their building site is 4km off of an unimproved dirt road, with only a path leading to the work site. This family cares for about 50 abandoned children, currently housed in MTW's Quechua Training Center here in Cusco. They outgrew the house they were using in Poroy, a town near here. I will help them with construction, water treatment, medical work, and a wild pig & boa constrictor problem. I LOVE my job! (Ramona has decided not to go on that trip.) Please pray for the financial needs of the Josefine House. It's project # 94721. Please also pray for the special needs of the children, that God will show us how to help them. Pray also for personal support account at MTW. We are #18100. Pray for the evangelistic and discipleship opportunities that God is directing us to. The jungle trips can at times be dangerous so please also pray for them. I have had to promise Ramona, our daughters and our grandkids that I will no longer metaphorically swing through the trees like Tarzan and will act my age. That may be the hardest job of all! Thank you for your continued prayer and financial support. We appreciate the sacrifices so many of you make in these difficult financial times to support our ministry. Lord Bless,
Rich & Ramona Wagner
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