Envoy Group | africa sojournA meeting place for the support team of Brian and Jami Staples

If you’ve ever been to the doctor for “one of those” exams, you may have an idea of what we’ve been through the past several weeks. There are half a million people on this planet that now have our life history, our financial biography, our medical background since birth, and the temperature of our marriage, [...]

Hmmm…where to begin and where to end. So much is going on that it’s hard to know what’s relevant and readable. In the words of Julie Andrews: “Let’s start at the very beginning…a very good place to start!” Monday: I got a phone call from our agent this morning telling me that the facilitator in [...]

SLIPPERS They are sharp. My toes slide along the jagged floorsearching for a safe haven.One foot finds a smooth place to rest butwhen my weight shifts to release the other from its painful poisethe first slides into a crevice of bladed stone.It becomes a perpetual game, where the ladders are made of false hopesand the [...]

One of the vivid memories I have as a child was playing with a little, brown Fisher Price tape recorder. Mom bought me several cassette tapes (I think ‘Tom Sawyer’ was my favorite) that included the corresponding storybook. Whenever I would listen to a story, I knew when to turn the page thanks to one [...]

Over the past couple of weeks I have seen a million photos of the victims of Hurricane Katrina. An entire city, reduced to rubble and soggy lumber. For days thousands of people waited to re-enter the city and assess the damage. But when the doors were finally opened there was a common expression on every [...]

I learned something new about God this morning: He does have a Redneck side! There are very few occasions where I feel like I hear God loud and clear, but this morning He had a word for me and, I promise you, it was delivered with a rich southern accent that made Jeff Foxworthy look [...]

Thanks to so many of you who have been praying and sending notes these past several hours. It’s been a rough day but I think Brian and I can both say we are feeling the peace from your prayers. It’s possible it’s just shock, but we’ll welcome that too for now. I know many of [...]

“Better to have loved & lost,” say you“than to never love at all”.“You only learn to really fly,once you learn to fall.” Did you see the face of the one you loveddid you hold them in your heart?Did you imagine just one dayand know it a work of art? Did you suffer to receive themand [...]

They’re gone – we lost the boys.

The only news we got today was that our facilitator wants to make a few more calls before he comments. Hmmmm…how do you see the glass? If you are an optimist, you’re thinking “he just wants to be 100% sure before he tells us the good news”. For those of you more inclined to think [...]

We are still waiting. Our advocate in Russia is en route back to the U.S. so he has been unreachable. We don’t know what he managed to accomplish while there earlier in the day (if anything) but hopefully tomorrow we’ll get more information (assuming jet lag doesn’t keep him out of commission).We are so grateful [...]

If you came here looking for pictures and celebration, you’ll only find half. It appears it’s too early to post pictures, but we will celebrate nonetheless. A little over a week ago we received a referral for twin boys from Russia. Over the weekend we experienced a snag and although they “confirmed” with us yesterday [...]