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[__ Prayer __] I could really use your prayers right now. (update 11/10/03)

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J

Jack Lewis

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Our situation is that we have two kids with a serious congenital condition that could be life threatening if not handled properly. My wife was the one who was able to find the job with enough benefits to cover their medical costs, so I stay at home and homeschool our four kids. My wife is getting burned out with work, and although I've tried several ways of making extra money on the internet, I have only been able to get a little bit here and there. Earlier this year I wrote a novel, that everyone who's read, loves, but I can't get an agent or publisher interested in it. With the economy the way it is our income has slipped, but our expenses haven't, so we've been spending about $1000 more than we take in each month. What financial buffer we had has been dwindling, and in a month will run out. I just put together another online project that might make money (http://spelchek.com) but even if it does it would be a year at the most before it would even pay for itself, let alone provide any sort of financial benefit.

Our whole family has been waiting on pins and needles to hear from any of the literary agents I sent my novel to. If it were to sell, it would (conceivably) solve our financial problems. Meanwhile the clock is ticking. Today I'll need to go get our kids' medicine, over $100 worth, that we'll have to pay cash for since the HMO rigged our meds with high copays and only allowing us to get it one month at a time, which would leave us paying more than we would if we simply paid cash for a three month supply. And that's just one of the medicines they take daily.

I've been wondering what the Lord wants to teach me through all this, and one thing may be too share my prayer needs with others, which I tend to not do.

Generally we need pray for our financial situation as well as strength to trust in the Lord's plan. Specifically I'd appreciate prayer that the right agent would soon find the novel, love it, and quickly find the right publisher.
 
I know it is hard when you can't see what God has in store, even though you trust and know He has a plan. Funny how He takes us right up to that edge, but I believe it keeps us trusting in Him. He will not fail us and I believe (as I know you do) that He has a plan.


You and your family will be in my prayers!
 
Jack I will definitely keep you and your family in my prayers. God Bless.
 
O good God... once again I come before Your throne of grace asking on behalf of this family. Show Yourself as the great way-maker we know You to be! In Christ Jesus, amen

Deke
 
Hi

Always praying for you now and forever
:B-fly: :B-fly: :B-fly: :B-fly: :bday: :bday: :bday: :bday: :Fade-color :Fade-color :Fade-color :Fade-color :fadein: :fadein: :fadein: :fadein: :B-fly: :B-fly: :B-fly: :B-fly: :B-fly: :B-fly: :B-fly: :B-fly: :B-fly: :B-fly: :B-fly: :B-fly: :B-fly: :B-fly: :B-fly: :B-fly: :B-fly: :B-fly: :B-fly: :B-fly:
 
Thanks everyone. I hope you don't think this is some pat, smarmy response when I say, I can feel your prayers -- but I can.
 
Awesome! Thank you, it is a comfort to know that.

I was thinking of you last night as I was reading through Isaiah 54 again. Escpecially verses 11-13.
 
Update

I've been working almost non-stop at promoting SpelChek.com and preparing my novel. We decided to try to build up SpelChek.com and use it to promote the novel. I can get the novel converted to Microsoft Reader and Adobe eBook formats and sell it through Amazon.com and Powells.com as an eBook. We have to do a final, thorough proof read of the novel, then design a cover, and format it in the two versions. SpelChek.com is growing slowly, but I am still promoting it and letting message board owners know about it. The more I can get to use it, the more it'll be able to promote itself. I have the domain names ready to promote the book, and will also need to design them. The problem is time. I have about 4 weeks worth of work to do in one. We will offer the first three chapters of the novel for free on the website, then provide links to the two bookseller websites.

I've even prepared SpelChek.com for the eventuality of sudden growth. It's set up to smoothly transition to multiple servers if the traffic proves too much for the one I have.

It's still a frantic waiting game, with time running out.
 
I will continue to pray. I know God is in control, what a comfort that we can trust Him! :biggrin
 
Jack,

I've never been much of a "pray for the subject of the day" kind of person. My prayer life is scattered at best. But your situation compelled to to plead your case before the lord. My prayers are most definitely with you.

Do you need someone to design the cover for you? Publication design is what I do, and I'd be happy to donate my time if it would help you out.
 
Jack, how will SpelChek make you money? I visited the site but I don't understand the monetizing part.

:) Kelly
 
americanwahm said:
Jack, how will SpelChek make you money? I visited the site but I don't understand the monetizing part.

:) Kelly
Click to expand...

Every time someone uses it, it displays an ad. Right now 80% of those ads are linkexchange, which means for every 2 LE ads displayed, my ad gets displayed on some other site (promoting SpelChek). As the service grows there will be more people seeing the ads. When it gets big enough, I'll put ads for my novel into the mix. That way the service will grow itself as well as promote my novel. I will make money when people buy the novel. Right now it's slow (about 100 to 200 ads shown daily) but growing. I've had three boards join in the past two days. I've been spending half the day promoting it across the internet (mentioning it on message boards fro certain forum scripts) and the other half of the day proofing my novel (it's 150,000 words), So I've been very busy.

Also once the traffic has grown, I may be able to barter ads with other sites, showing their ads on SpelChek, while they show either SpelChek ads or my novel's ads on their sites. The goal is to get the word out about the novel. I'll provide the first three chapters for free so people can see whether they want to buy it. The trouble is we're facing a financial deadline and I don't know if the service will be able to promote the novel well enough to pick up the slack. My prayer is that the service will begin to snowball, and as more sites install it, more people see it, and even more people will install it, quickly so we can get the traffic up. We're really watching our spending and trying to squeeze as much as we can, but there's only so much we can do. The rest is in God's hands.
 
Jack,

My prayers for you, the family and your business venture. You are truely a good and faithful servant. I ask, in the name of Jesus, that God's will and blessings be upon you and your family.

:angel:
 
We've squeezed where we could and stretched thing out, but I'm looking at less than $1000 in the bank $500 in savings and at least $2500 in expenses for the next month. I've been working at both SpelChek.com and my novel at least 14 hours a day (up a 5am to bed at midnight). We lost our dog, Casey that we'd had for 5 years and the kids (okay all of us) are still grieving. Strep throat swept through the family and my 8 year old had to be taken to the emergency room. He was admitted to the hospital and he's doing better, but now we've got to go get an inhaler for him and some other medicine. Our HMO has rigged our medicine so that in most cases we have to pay for it ourselves.

If I completely abandon both my latest projects and go looking for a job, I might be able to find something, but that would mean we'd have to put the kids in government school, and with their health problems, it really scares us. Kids with these problems die in government school due to apathy on the part of teachers and school nurses. Believe me, it happens.

I don't know which way to turn, and the more we pray, the more problems seem to pop up. I'm so tired from lack of sleep and working all the time, on top of the strep, which is making my body temperature fluctuate between hot and cold, as well as simply feeling awful.

Please pray for us.
 
Oh Jack. You've been through so much lately. How awful about your dog and all the illness on top of your financial stress. I will pray that God will deliver you from this soon. You are in my thoughts and prayers.
 
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$5,080.00
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