God got me a job!!!

Hey Everyone!

Hopefully my blog posts will be both closer together and shorter. 

School is coming very quickly to an end. I have 40 days left until graduation. It is super exciting, but also very intimidating because of the amount of things that I still have left to do. 

The trip to MMS over Spring Break went very well. We had safe travels to and from and while we were there we got a lot done. I really appreciated the hospitality that we received while we were there. I most especially enjoyed being with other missionaries and mission minded people. I was able to get a lot of insight into what the next few years will be like for me. 

The newest and greatest news from my end of things is that God has blessed me with a job! I am going to be working for William's Aerial and Mapping starting this summer. I will be flying and working on Cessna 206's which is possibly the airplane that I could end up flying on the mission field. I will be working 3 weeks on and 1 week off which will give me opportunity to spend a lot of time back home in Montana. 

There are all kinds of great things about this job. One of the best is that I will most likely make enough money to pay off my debt in 3 years. My timeline goal is 5, so this sounds awesome to me. Also, with the 3 on 1 off schedule, I will have the opportunity to visit churches and people and build the relationships necessary to start raising support for going to the mission field.   

Please pray for me in the next few weeks that I can be successful in my studies and finish strong. Pray for my future plans that they will be blessed by God and that everything will go smoothly. Also, I am making some big decisions in my personal life and I would ask for prayer in that area that everything I do will glorify God. 

Thank you all so much for your prayers,

God Bless.

Joshua-Luke O'Connor

Spring 2014!!!! Graduation is coming!!!!!!

Blessings to all of my friends and supporters in prayer,

It's been a long time since my last update, and I apologize for that. It's my senior year and life is as crazy as it can be. I'd catch you up on everything that I have done in the last few months, but that might be boring because it has mostly been school.

A really important note, though, is that I got my commercial multi-engine certificate. This was the most challenging so far, and I count it as my greatest achievement to date. This was right after I was able to travel with the flight team to the Regional SAFECON competition, where we placed first. I was able to place in a few events as well. 

This semester I really loaded myself up with responsibilities, and so far I am surviving, but it is only by God's grace that I have not self destructed. I have 20 credits, a job, three extra curriculars, and I am currently on Spring Break getting to facilitate a missions trip. I am about to finish up my commercial single add on. I have a couple more flights left. Then I get to start flying in the school's Cessna 206 for some missions training. I'm pretty excited about that. I'm madly studying for my Oral's and Practical's (O's and P's), which is my (16 hour) exam to get my Airframe and Powerplant License. Graduation is in less than 60 days and senioritis is kicking in.

I have been applying for jobs this semester, and trying to determine what I am going to do this summer and after college. I have a total of 54 job applications out and only a few leads so far. One though is really hopeful. It is a flying job doing aerial survey that would allow me to live in Montana. My goal after graduation is to get my debt paid off in five years. This is a fairly aggressive goal, but I have to have that out of the way to get onto the mission field.

This semester I got to fly with Mike Bunn who is a Missions Pilot that does Technical Evaluations (TE's) for JAARS. It was a consult flight to see how I am doing as a pilot and if I am on track to being ready for the mission field. It went very well and he was able to give me some really good tips on ways that I could improve myself as a pilot. The issues for which he commonly sees people fail TE's, I do not have. God is so good to give me this encouragement. I still have work to do, but I'm on track.

I'm sorry this is going long, but here are a few ways that you can pray for me. I need prayer to finish strong and do well. I am currently facilitating a missions trip to MMS (You should check out their page here to see what they do http://www.mmsaviation.org). Please pray for God's grace in our work and for His glory to be foremost in our thoughts and actions. Pray for safety in travel and while we are working. Some specific things for the next few weeks are prayer for good weather and good skills to finish flying, and perhaps the biggest immediate one is success and favor while doing O's and P's. Please keep me in your prayers while I continue to look for employment. 

Thank you all so much for your praying for me and supporting me with encouragement. God has been so good and He is constantly showing that to me and proving is faithfulness. There have been so many instances of that this semester. I graduate on May 3rd, so the end is in sight!

God Bless!