Believing in the impossible makes it real.

That is Marti’s statement, not mine. She is the eternal optimist. I am more like Tom, the doubter. But in spite of myself, the Catch Ministry has become a real, viable, significant and completely functional Internet ministry. Praise the Lord!

Through the Catch we are becoming a touchstone and point of identification for Internet ministry to people around the world as well as in our own backyards.

While this grapevine process increases readership and has an impact on the way we spread the gospel, the Catch derives at this time its sole support from committed supporters and its function as a virtual community.

Present tense
Our heater gave out. Our furnace just burned up and while I thought we might go without replacing it by layering sweaters, Marti has wrapped herself in blankets and refuses to come out of our only bathroom, where she sits in front of a small electric heater while holding court online and by phone. Inspection revealed a crack in the inner wall (potential carbon monoxide hazard) and an inadequate duct system (including some dangerous asbestos) pieced together for over 60 years. Solution: throw in another $2,000 furnace like I did 8 years ago (we now know how long that will last) or choose an entirely new heating system for over $6,000 that will be safe and clean and good for the next 25 years. As a demonstration of my commitment to this house and a literal statement of faith I chose the latter. Marti is now out of the bathroom.

We didn’t make our 4th quarter financials. Throughout the year your gifts have adequately supported the ministry with only the fourth quarter falling short or at an $18,000 deficit.

Nor did our annual campaign bridge our 1st quarter responsibilities developed by a professional fundraiser. Our first quarter plans did call for an increase in expense for outsourced assistance but that is being tabled until after we gain your valuable participation. Therefore it is hoped you will continue to support our 2013 first quarter requirements to continue the existing ministry.

And – our house is up for foreclosure on January 8. We have applied for a loan modification and as we await the Bank’s response, which has stretched into months as further documentation has been requested, the foreclosure date looms. While we welcome any deduction in our monthly payment or interest rate (we are able to pay our monthly mortgage rate today), we must be prepared to provide the bank what we previously owe. Together with your contribution resting in an escrow account, a friend of the Catch offered out of nowhere a substantial loan at no interest toward the amount due. Another Catch member recently told us that as she sat down to write a check for $1,000, the Lord suggested she consider $2,000 and she followed His lead. Totaling these miracles together we remain $14,000 short of what is required before a January 8th foreclosure date.

Thus the urgency of this our final appeal of 2012. For those who want to read on there is a brief look back at 2012 and forward to 2013. For those who have seen enough and want to get out their checkbooks or donate online, now would be a good time! (Checks dated for December 31 will be receipted for the 2012 even if received after the 1st.) Don’t delay. There are only hours left for online donations. Checks can be made out to The Catch Ministry, Inc., and mailed to 1278 Glenneyre, Laguna Beach, CA 92651.

2012 highlights
As committed supporters and prayer warriors, you have made the Catch Ministry a viable significant ministry with overwhelmingly wonderful results. Some of the life-changing highlights include:
 
Seekers who tell us that they appreciate the Catch Ministry’s honest expressions of faith and its availability to discuss their questions. Atheists who donate.
 
Every day the Catch Ministry is looking to extinguish the gloom with the abounding light of Christ for numerous people throughout the world who are accepting the Lord into their hurting hearts – one person at a time.
 
Many, many disenfranchised believers are reacquainting themselves with the Catch Ministry’s Gospel of Welcome; connecting and in many cases for the first time to community churches; extending themselves into the marketplace and becoming available for Christ to rise among them, and assuming their responsibility with their neighbors, walking alongside them, listening to their stories while walking one another toward the light.
 
After first recognizing the poverty found in their own homeless hearts, our Citizens tell us that the Catch Ministry is helping them to treasure their families again by affectionately caring for those who are starving for love right under their own roof.
 
Countless hours are spent mobilizing our national network trained to provide immediate emergency assistance to those with urgent needs; handling crisis after crisis springing from untouchable topics, managing traffic in traumatized people, aiding women without homes, and standing by our hardened members needing first to separated truth from suppression. You are apart of these people’s journey to forgiveness. You confirm their restoration and, as invisible witnesses like us, you validate the reconciliation between the individual with the Lord and then the individual with his or her family, and then finally the individual with the body of Christ within a church setting.
 
I celebrate with you how far we have come.
 
A look to 2013
Newly identified Elder/Leadership
And I can honestly say we have only just begun. Our newly identified Elder/Leadership are holding the Catch Ministry accountable to the ways and means of the Lord and stretching us farther than ever before and as the Lord directs. In our unreleased 2012 Catch Ministry end-of-the-year report we will share the Elder/Leadership’s requests to all of us in support of expansion and its success.
 
All I can say at this time is I am confident you will welcome with us the Catch Ministry’s 2013 New Year and its continuing endeavors.
 
Do not lose hope
On behalf of the new Elder/Leadership and Marti, I ask that you prayerfully consider it a responsibility if not a privilege to financially support the Catch Ministry according to your capability, which includes its pastor’s daily needs. Your support allows the Catch Ministry a greater ability to focus on the ministry’s citizens, as in the following passage:
 
1 Corinthians 9:14 – “The Lord commanded that those who preach the gospel should earn a living from the gospel.” Simply put, this means that those who work in the ministry of the gospel should be free from having to earn a living by other means. (See also 1 Timothy 5:17.)
 
Therefore, I encourage those of you who have supported us in the past and already recognize the value of this ministry perhaps more for others than yourselves to continue to be generous and encourage other members to do the same. In doing so, you will set us free to minister without distraction.
 
Thank you for a year to remember the union of our spirit with the Lord’s Spirit to make us new persons in Christ – God’s grace from Christ for you and for us. God’s desire is for us to walk daily by His grace and freely return glory to Christ. In these pressure-filled times when we are called to keep the faith in dark days, may we stand for the truth amidst the forces of darkness. Amen!
 
Still believing in the impossible,
John and Marti