Closing a Chapter...

Greetings from Grand Rapids, Michigan! We are officially both back in the USA and during the month of July we enjoyed time with friends and family and spent time at Partners Worldwide’s office. We hope you have been able to keep up with us since our last letter through our e-mails and blog updates. By God’s grace we were able to wrap up our work and say goodbye to many friends and colleagues in Zambia.

As many of you know, the end of July 2010 marked the end of our time with Partners Worldwide and our responsibilities in Zambia. We were blessed to hand our position over to an African from Zimbabwe named Tinashe Chitambira (on the left).

He is married with three children. Tinashe will consult with our business and agriculture partnerships across Southern Africa. He joins Partners Worldwide with a wealth of knowledge and experience in the field of agribusiness. We met him through his role with Africa Works, an organization we partner with in Mozambique. He will retain his role with them, taking our partnership with Africa Works to a new level. They will now be our main implementing partner for Southern Africa. If you would like to continue supporting the work that we started, you can give to Partners Worldwide designating it for Tinashe Chitambira.

It was bittersweet to walk away from our ministry in Zambia, but we know it was the right time to hand it over. We feel called to begin a new ministry in Grand Rapids, Michigan and we know that just because we are not in Africa anymore does not mean our work for the Lord stops. We are excited about this next chapter and ask for your prayers as we make this transition. We moved into an apartment on August 7 and are enjoying our new home and neighborhood. Bethany has already been offered a position working in hospice social work in Holland, MI and she started August 23. Kyle is working in the operations office for a company called Same Day Delivery.

We thank you once again for the support you offered to us during our time with Partners Worldwide. We were never in need and we know it is because of the faithful prayer and financial support you offered to us. We hope to stay in touch with you and feel free to contact us if you would like to meet with us now that we are back.

We love you all with the love of Jesus Christ,

Kyle & Bethany

If you want to follow us in the future, you can find updates at: www.stobsingrandrapids.blogspot.com