Dear Ones,


This is from the Tom Palmers. I say it that way because some of you may not know that there are 3 different Palmer clans in the ranks of Ethnos360. And we all raised our children in the mission, and by now some of them are well into grandparenthood. There is where it gets confusing.

We have had the privilege of having two of ours serve as members of the mission for a long time. One of those is not a Palmer by name anymore. Judy married Jim Burdett – and they are celebrating their 43rd anniversary tomorrow. Also, on that same day, Corinne will be 94 years old, so we’ll have a double celebration. All this proves what I said in our last update. God is faithful to us, even in this stage where we all are, “grey-headed.” Very soon, Jim and Judy will rejoice over the publication of the Dom New Testament. Congratulations!

As for Corinne, she plugs along just trying to stay balanced and keep walking. time, with assistance. If I make a page for writing and print the lines larger, bolded, and farther apart, she might be able to keep her fairly-well written sentences where they belong. She is determined to answer some letters, especially from some of our friends.
I say all that to say this. We are so happy to be here with Jim and Judy where she and I get such good care. They are not a hundred percent well themselves and tire easily. After all, all my kids are in their 60’s now.

Jim and Judy pace themselves, dividing their time between working in the Homes for Ethnos360 and caring for us. And believe me, they do a lot for us. Then, there is the youngest of us all. What would we do without Granddaughter Heather? Judy looks to her quite a bit, due to her past training and experience. Heather considers this as part of her ministry of caring for and helping others. The Lord seems to be enabling her also to keep up with her studies in her ongoing training in counseling. All this while she seeks to overcome the effects of Chronic Fatigue. But she is praising the Lord for steady improvement. Our son David lives here too, and he has just turned 65 and retired from truck driving. More family news later.

July was a month of medical appointments, mainly for me. Corinne did see our primary care doctor and he ordered complete blood work done so that he can determine what adjustment needs to be made in her treatment for high blood pressure, as well as borderline high blood sugar. We await that report. Also, both she and I are waiting for results of biopsies taken last week at a dermatology clinic. I have an appointment for one more check, an endoscopy. Those two appointments will complete a series of 7 different procedures done and images taken, all to make sure there is no sign of more cancer developing. My oncologist is pleased so far, and he cheerfully said, “I’ll see you again in 6 months.” Only God knows what is ahead, but we thank Him for these good reports. With that encouragement, we press on.

However, not at full speed yet. I have not heard back from the Hamtai church leaders about Jim Jora’s status. He is back in fellowship, but I need their approval and support so that he can go ahead with Bible translation work with me. Meanwhile, we will review some that we worked on before this pause.

We did have a crisis which was quite scary, but it worked out all right. My computer wore out and I am trying to get used to Windows 11 on the new one we bought with monthly payments. The old computer took everything with it, but we had two external drives for backup. One was for the most recent work he and I had done. I had help as we tried to bring all possible copies together. However, the drive with recently checked portions was deleted by mistake in the rescue operation. I panicked somewhat and prayed and asked you all for prayer. I looked at all locations hoping to possibly find copies of those portions, but some were still missing. The Lord reminded me that Jim Jora, Hamtai helper in PNG, probably keeps all our work on his computer. I called him on Telegram and asked him. Very soon, in came attachment after attachment of not only the latest, but all the portions we have worked on together! Praise the Lord.

If you have been praying for us, thank you very much. This is God’s work and what a privilege to belong to God’s family and to be members of His Work Force. Please continue praying:

  • That Tom will continue to be free of cancer.
  • But he may be getting Cellulitis
  • Corinne manages her hearing difficulty, but she is fearful of losing her eyesight.
  • For Tom and the family as they care for Corinne.
  • For Tom to be able to fit in the quality time needed to progress in the Hamtai Old Testament translation work.
  • That the Hamtai church leaders will soon approve of Jim resuming working with Tom on translation again.
  • As for our finances, many faithful people still help us out regularly, meeting our daily needs. There are some things somewhat over our budget.
    • We recently paid Tom’s January $1,500 hospital bill, draining our resources.
    • We just received an $875 hospital bill for Corinne’s 8-day stay last year.
    • We make monthly payments for $2,000 computer.
    • We make monthly payments for and paying off of several Credit Cards.

Rejoicing in Christ,
Tom and Corinne Palmer