I certainly don’t know if you use a budget for yourself or not and what you think of the process, but when you’re a Wycliffe missionary, the whole matter of budgeting can get pretty complicated.
Wycliffe members are responsible for raising all of the funds that they’ll need for life and work in their ministries. Typically, the only funds that are raised by the mission itself are for large or special projects. Good examples of these are the Last Languages Campaign and individual projects that Wycliffe takes on. (Yes, do go and check them out – you don’t really think God’s going to let a little thing like the economy get in His way, do you?)
My main point is that Wycliffe doesn’t pay us a salary. But they certainly don’t leave us hanging in the breeze – they’re a very caring mission. To make sure that we’re financially sound (nothing’s secure, mind you), they estimate how much we need to live on – including taxes, Social Security, retirement, health care, etc. – and set that as our support goal. Now it’s very easy to write “they” and make the whole thing sound simple. But “they” truly are multiple people in several places, each person having a little piece of the budget puzzle. One must gather the pieces to assemble the puzzle. That’s where we are right now with the Germany move.
We’re decided on sending the boys to a local school, so we know that we don’t have to account for tuition. Katherine’s pretty sure that a local health insurance plan will be a better option for us than the one offered through Wycliffe, but we need to be certain of the details and costs. Our tax status will change overseas, and estimating taxes is always fun. (Everyone groan together, please.)
So please pray that we’ll get these numbers put together reliably. We don’t want to be wrong in either direction.