September 9, 2008
Pastor Ly Oudone, the France Alliance national church’s first missionary to French Guyanna, was killed in a work accident in Guyanna last week. He and his wife, Marie, had served the Hmong Alliance churches in Guyanne since 2003. Memorial services were held in his home church in Alencon, France on Sunday, August 31. His wife Marie and their five children will be moving back to France to live near their extended family. Pray for comfort. Pray for the children’s reintegration into French society.
September 4, 2008
About 200 Alliance believers participated in a recent church camp in Thailand. The theme, “Stand Up and Shine for Jesus,” emphasized reaching out to the lost in the surrounding community. “God moved in a mighty way during the worship,” said Alliance missionaries Ed and Sue Danneker. The service began with preaching from the biblical story of Gideon smashing the foreign altars and restoring worship to the one, true God. The worship leader invited people to come forward to ask forgiveness for any “foreign altars” in their hearts. “Within minutes, the entire front area was filled with people responding to the conviction of the Holy Spirit,” said the Dannekers.
In addition, 38 people were baptized during the camp. Members of three Alliance churches—Mahapawn Tri-County Church, its daughter church (Mahapawn New Vision Church), and another daughter church in Mahachai—attended the event. “Pray for all the newly baptized Christians,” said Ed and Sue. “Pray that commitments made at the camp will be followed through.”
September 3, 2008
For most Gulf Coast residents, Labor Day weekend was spent evacuating their homes in anticipation of a major hurricane. Preparation was unprecedented for the natural disaster, but Gustav, although causing widespread damage, did not deliver his expected knock-out punch. Alliance leaders in affected areas are praising God for His protection.
“We cannot have a good assessment until our workers are back in their areas,” says Southern District superintendent Fred King. “According to our New Orleans and Waveland teams, they expect to be home on Thursday or Friday.”
Alliance pastor Darren Sanford from Journey4Life Ministry in Gulfport said, “Flooding seems to be limited to properties along the gulf to mostly small businesses and a few large homes. Our ministry building, Freedom Hall, sustained minor damage to the roof.”
With the possibility of more hurricanes on the way to either the southeast coast or the Gulf Coast, CAMA, the relief and development arm of The Alliance, has set up a general hurricane fund to help affected C&MA districts if necessary. “CAMA has pledged $30,000 to assist in relief efforts upon receipt of a damage assessment,” says a CAMA spokesperson. If you would like to contribute to this relief effort, visit www.camaservices.org.
The Alliance Communications team will keep you updated as hurricane information comes in.
September 2, 2008
The following story from an Alliance worker in Africa demonstrates the boundless power of prayer and God’s faithfulness to intervene in the lives of those who are committed to serving Him.
After returning from a particularly trying venture into some remote villages for an evangelistic campaign, I received this letter from a faithful prayer warrior.
I have one of your picture/prayer cards in front of me on my computer desk and, from time to time, have prayed for you and for the challenging objectives listed on the back of the card. However, today was different. This morning while I was preparing my breakfast at 7:40, Ohio time, God’s Spirit clearly witnessed to my spirit, “Pray for them now.” I sat down and prayed for every aspect and possibility regarding your personal needs that I could think of, as well as the people and the ministry to which you have been called, asking God to make Himself real in every circumstance that could possibly involve you. I know our Heavenly Father was listening.
May I quote from A. W.Tozer’s, The Pursuit of God? “Wherever we are, God is here. There is no place, there can be no place, where He is not. Ten million intelligences standing at as many points in space and separated by incomprehensible distances can each one say with equal truth, God is here. No point is nearer to God than any other point. It is exactly as near to God from any place as it is from any other place. No one is in mere distance any further from or any nearer to God than any other person.”
Tozer further encourages us to think on these truths and “pray over them until they begin to glow within us.”
In Jesus’ love and mine,
Mrs. Jane Smith*, Ohio
I responded to Mrs. Smith to thank her for praying and to affirm that God’s prompting was timely. At the exact moment of 7:40 a.m., Thursday, July 3, it was actually 11:40 a.m. where I was. Two young male interns from the States accompanied me and my colleague, all of us shouldering 25 pound packs and facing a three-mile climb up a mountain. We were just entering a canyon with a waterfall running down it. We weren’t sure if we could scale the rocky path or not. We climbed up a series of nine vine ladders and slippery rock cliff faces. At times, it was pretty scary. We hiked from the valley floor, 985 ft above sea level, to the summit, an elevation of 3,300 feet. The trip took nearly five hours.
We were returning from a trip to a valley that was formerly untouched by the gospel. The day before, we had hiked into the valley and distributed some Scriptures, both printed and on cassette. We did not receive a warm welcome and sold no Scriptures. We gifted the chiefs of both villages and our host for lunch with some Bibles, and we were able to explain the gospel to three men in one village and a group of women and children in another. We spent the night with the chief. We suspected that this valley included members of a strict sect of the predominate religion here. We surmised that perhaps word was out that we were to be avoided.
I have to admit that the trip was a bit discouraging. I even began to question God, asking, “Why did you grip my heart with this valley these last two years only to have such a cold welcome on our first visit?” We asked ourselves, “Was this trip a success?” The enemy was whispering to me, “See, you and your foolish thoughts. You only went down there because it seemed adventurous. God didn’t tell you to go down there. You didn’t find any people of peace. And you returned with four backpacks filled with Scriptures!”
We reminded ourselves, however, that success is not found in numbers or the quantity that we achieve for God. No. Success is found in being obedient to the will of your Father in heaven. And that is exactly what we did. We were a success! From the bottom of a remote valley with several hundred lost people to the fragrant kitchen of an elderly intercessor in Ohio, success found us.
There is no place where God is not, and on July 3, 2008, at 7:40 in the morning—God was there.
*Name changed
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During a recent outreach, a team from Messiah’s Lighthouse, a Metropolitan District C&MA Jewish congregation being planted by Abe Sandler, distributed 24,775 tracts proclaiming Jesus as the Messiah. Sandler also is the C&MA national evangelist to Jewish people.
“Twenty-six Gentile believers and six Jewish believers stopped to talk with us,” said Sandler. “They want to receive our newsletter and material to help them witness to Jewish people. Some would like to visit Messiah’s Lighthouse, the congregation we are planting in New York City.” The teams also received some phone calls and e-mails in response to the outreach.
The third annual Awake O Israel evangelistic campaign took place from August 18–22 in New York City, home to more than 2 million Jews. Volunteers spent the five days on the streets and in subways and parks, handing out tracts and witnessing to all who stopped to talk to them. “As each day passed and the team became more experienced and more prayers went up, we gave out more tracts and had more conversations and got more contacts to follow up on,” said Sandler.
One young man, a Gentile, prayed to receive Jesus as his Savior. “Three unsaved Jews and ten unsaved Gentiles gave us their names and addresses and said they wanted to hear more about Jesus being the Messiah and Savior,” said Sandler.
Despite hostility from the Jewish community, some religious Jews accepted the group’s tracts and read them. “As we headed out to our site one afternoon, William read our shirts and said, “I’m Jewish but don’t know much about my heritage. Can you help me?’ We let him know that we could and that we would share with him that the Jewish Messiah is Jesus,” said Sandler. “He readily gave us his name and address.”
David, a member of the Awake O Israel team, was on a subway platform as the group was returning from giving out tracts. A Hasidic Jewish man, ultra religious, was standing near the team. David felt the Lord “push” him over to the man, who couldn’t help seeing the message that Jesus is the Messiah emblazoned on David’s shirt. David began a conversation with him and was able to witness to him. “To our amazement, he did not turn away or cut him off, but allowed David to talk to him,” said Sandler.
“We sowed a lot of seed, it is being watered with prayer, and we are trusting God for fruit. I am now in the process of following up on all of the contacts with appropriate literature and phone calls and setting up visits with the unsaved contacts,” said Sandler. “Please continue to pray as this outreach is ongoing. There is a veil over their spiritual eyes, and only the Holy Spirit can remove it. Pray, pray, pray!”
For more information about Jewish Ministries and/or help in witnessing to Jewish people, e-mail AWAKEOISRAELJM@AOL.COM or call 215-676-5122.
Dr. Philadelphi Dembele, along with his wife, Rachelle, and their 11-month-old daughter, Christine, arrived at Bongolo Hospital in Gabon on August 18 to begin a five-year residency program in general surgery under the Pan-African Academy of Christian Surgeons (PAACS). “Coming from Koutiala Hospital for Women and Children in Mali, the couple’s humility and love for Christ already have opened the hearts of our staff,” says Dr. David Thompson, who is the Alliance field director as well as PAACS director for Africa. Thompson teaches the residents and assists them in surgery three days a week. “Under (Alliance missionary) Dr. Keir Thelander’s leadership, the PAACS program at Bongolo has grown to five residents.” For more information about PAACS, visit: www.paacs.net.
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