Ron and Janet were honored to attend (June 25-28) the 124th annual meeting of the Evangelical Covenant Church of America as delegates for 1st Covenant Church of Grand Rapids, MI.  We were encouraged to see, for the first time in 8 years, the commissioning of long term missionaries – former Project Missionaries (Shims & Restrepos).   We were blessed to be present for the recognition of retirement for our dear friend and collegue Karen Benson (aka KB).  Below is a link to view video of some highlights. 

http://www.covchurch.org/am/2009/video-archive

We, with long term missionaries Karen Benson and Judy Dolan, were also honored to be consecrated for missionary service at the Ordination Service.  Dressed in black robes, we each received special stoles and new Bibles.  Also, having been already commissioned as long term Covenant missionaries years ago, we had the priviledge of laying hands on the 4 new missionaries who were commissioned at this annual meeting and were also consecrated in this service.  Thanks to the Covenant Ministerium and Dept. of World Mission for inviting us to participate in that service.