Dear friends,

This year has been a very interesting year for Marie and me. Starting in the first part of January, on our trip down to Arizona, for our concert tour we had major problems with our engine in our 1997 Ford Expedition. Somehow we were able to make the Expedition limp into the Phoenix area. Our first concert was at THE CHURCH ON THE GREEN in Sun City West, Arizona. This church along with the men's group helped us financially to get our engine repaired. In February, my heart went into defibrillation and I spent three or four days in the hospital. In spite of these things going on we had some blessed concerts in ministry.

When we started home, in March, we wanted to go by our son's home in Sylmar, California. We parked under a bright streetlight right in front of his house, and some thieves decided to clean out our Expedition. They managed to steal almost $11,000 worth of our equipment. Fortunately our insurance company helped us replace a lot of what was stolen, but some of it could never be replaced.

July 24th Marie and I were on a camping trip with my son and his family, in the Coast Range Mountains of Oregon. That evening I had an accident and broke my back. At that time I did not know how serious it was, and refused to be taken to the hospital, until the next day, as I was extremely exhausted. On Thursday, Marie was driving our Expedition pulling a camper trailer heading towards Portland to take me to the hospital. I noticed as she was driving she was pulling to the left, but I didn't realize what was happening. Seeing that Marie was having trouble driving I thought it better for us to go home before the hospital. My daughter drove us both into the 'Emergency Ward'. Marie sat there in the hospital for six hours. Little did I know that she was having a stroke. The next day my daughter rushed her into the hospital. She has been in the hospital or a care center for almost a month, but now she is home. "Praise the Lord" she is recovering, can walk, can use all her limbs, and her mind is very sharp!! She is still having some short-term memory problems and getting confused but I see her improving every day. Another problem or challenge is that Marie has been diagnosed with breast cancer. Fortunately we caught it early, and will be required to have one more operation and then radiation and hormone treatments. The Doctors have a very optimistic view of a complete recovery. I seem to be healing fine, but still have a lot of pain sometimes. On Sunday, August 25, I did my first concert since the accident. What a blessing it was to me to be able to minister again. I did not have one pain in my back the whole concert, Praise the Lord!

After reviewing what I have just written in previous paragraphs, you would think that I would be discouraged, but I am so excited about what God is doing in our lives right now. Marie and I have a completely new relationship and that's very exciting. I'm now doing the accounting and 'bill paying'. I no longer want Marie to have the burden of scheduling concerts so somehow the Lord will need to give me mercy and grace enough to do that myself.

Marie has been taking care of me for all these years, tried her best to make it easy for me so that I could do the ministry. Now I have the honor and privilege of taking care of her and what a blessing it is. This whole situation is like the devil trying to make it bad for us, discouraging us from this ministry, and God turning it into a blessing.

I had planned on writing a short note, but it turned out rather long, but I guess a lot has happened and I wanted you to know that Marie and I are not discouraged in the least, but we are rejoicing in what God is doing in our lives.

With our love,

William & Marie Harness