May 31, 2009
PRESIDENT
Term: Four Years (2009–2013)
(936 ballots cast — 469 necessary for election)
Gary M. Benedict — 870
BOARD OF DIRECTORS
Term: Four Years (2009–2013) or Two Years (2009–2011)
(936 ballots cast — declared election by plurality)
David C. Thompson 776 OA/M/E
Rockwell L. Dillaman 745 NA/P/OW
Timothy M. Bubna 737 OA/M
Timothy D. Crouch 665 OA/M
Donald A. Wiggins 654 OA/DS/P/E
Janet K. Howard 653 NA/R
Richard B. Pease Jr. 644 NA/L
Ronald E. Eastman 636 NA/L
Richard P. Mann 635 NA/E/OW
David K. Smith 614 NA/P/OW
Larry J. Carey 571 NA/P
John A. Thomas 548 NA/L
Joseph D. Botana 490 NA/E/L
Not elected:
Dennis L. Krajacic 441 NA/P
William L. Randall 383 NA/P/E/OW
J. Wayne Spriggs 332 OA/DS
Michael C. Gerhardt 312 NA/P/OW
Key: DS = District Superintendent, E = Educator, L = Layperson, NA = Not on Allowance,
M = Missionary, OA = On Allowance, OW = Official Worker, P = Pastor, R = Retired
C&MA BENEFIT BOARD
Term: Four Years (2009–2013)
Bill W. Lanpher — 798
Karen L. Davie — 783
Doris E. Nuss — 779
Jeffrey P. Brown — 777
Gary R. Reese — 765
Linda L. McClanahan — 753
COMMITTEE ON RULES
Term: Four Years (2009–2013) or Two Years (2009–2011)
(936 ballots cast — 469 necessary for election)
Robert B. Goldenberg — 845
Allen R. Biere — 842
F. Nevin Wiest — 842
Larry L. Long (2009–2011) — 836
COMMITTEE ON THEOLOGICAL ISSUES
Term: Six Years (2009–2015) or Four Years (2009–2013)
(936 ballots cast — 624 necessary for election)
Daniel R. Wetzel (2009–2013) — 822
David A. Denyer — 821
Ronald J. Morrison — 814
David G. Reese — 811
COMMITTEE ON COUNCIL ARRANGEMENTS 2011
Pao Her — 860
David L. Gilmore — 859
May 29, 2009
Harriette is 87, blind in one eye, and has emphysema. But that doesn’t stop her from the ministry to which God has called her. No longer does she believe she has nothing left in this life but to wait for death. No longer does she feel unproductive and useless. Harriette spends her days participating in a God-sized mission that benefits thousands of vulnerable women and children in one of the poorest countries in the world—Mali, West Africa.
Harriette attends Shelby Alliance Church in Ohio, where her daughter, Jean Viers began a ministry for the Koutiala Hospital for Women and Children in Mali. Viers and three friends started collecting baby clothes and supplies for the hospital before it opened three years ago.
Unleashing the Laity
As the small band of laywomen spoke about the Alliance mission in Koutiala, their passion for the ministry became contagious. Soon, the 60-member church became headquarters for a nationwide distribution center, providing medical equipment and basic needs for the women and children who would experience the practical love of Jesus from devoted C&MA international workers.
Harriette rolls long strips of bed linens into bandages that are used to wrap large wounds. She makes “mama packs,” which include knit caps, booties, blankets and other hygienic basics for newborns. Harriette also extracts hundreds of postage stamps from used envelopes for a stamp ministry that helps to support the Koutiala mission. And she keeps inventory of her production line. “Don’t tell anyone,” she told Jean, “but I’ve rolled 587 bandages.”
Harriette invited her friends to join the party. Now an average of 10 women contribute daily, knitting booties, caps, and making blankets. Hearing about the small Alliance church’s God-sized ministry, other Ohio Alliance churches have jumped on the bandwagon, even bringing their unchurched friends, one of whom provided 100 blankets.
Empowered By an Extraordinary God
“God is spreading our ministry,” says Barb Powell, Jean’s friend and ministry coworker. “He’s taking us to multiple states to speak about the need at Koutiala Hospital, and people are responding.” Barb, who has visited the hospital four times, says the hospital staff stands in awe of such an accomplishment. “‘You are our David and Goliath,’ Dr. Dan (Nesselroade) told us,” Barb says. “He called us his American missionaries.”
Though Harriette and her senior coworkers may never see the results of their labors, they know God’s Word has been implanted in the souls of each woman and child that touches their handicrafts. At 87 years young, Harriette received her high school diploma—and through her ministry to the least of these, she has found her purpose to live.
Learn More
Visit the Koutiala Hospital Web site
What You Can Do
Pray that God will bless the ministry of Shelby Alliance Church with provisions above and beyond what it could ask or imagine. Pray that recipients of their labor of love will know Jesus as their Savior.
Donate to Alliance Great Commission Ministries
May 26, 2009
By Brad Reynolds, serving in France
Editor’s note: Brad and Tina Reynolds, Alliance workers serving in France since 1988, believe God desires the new French-speaking international church plant in Léguevin, France, to be “a house of prayer.” Freshly inaugurated this past weekend, Eglise Protestante Internationale’s theme verse is Mark 11:17.
On Saturday, May 23, the forecast was for high temperatures and rain in southwestern France. But severe weather did not seem to daunt the 68 invited guests who gathered to help inaugurate the new church plant-Eglise Protestante Internationale (International Protestant Church), in Léguevin, France-along with many of the congregation’s 45 members.
Because the newly rented facility has a seating capacity of 80, it was standing room only!
Officially organized in March 2008, EPI (French for grain of wheat) is a daughter church of the English-speaking Toulouse International Church.
International Outreach
England, Germany, Congo, Denmark, Holland, and the United States, as well as France, are all represented in this French-speaking international congregation. It is the fruition of nine years of evangelism and discipleship ministries, including marriage enrichment courses. (France, a mostly unchurched nation, is plagued with a soaring divorce rate.)
First New Church since 12th Century
A suburb of the exploding aeronautics capital of Europe—Toulouse, France’s fourth largest city—Léguevin has not witnessed a new church since a monastery was established there in the 12th century. It’s exciting to think that God has given EPI the opportunity to rent and renovate a worship facility in this historic, culturally rich community of 7,000.
Saturday’s inaugural festivity attendees included an official Léguevin government employee as well as French Alliance pastors and congregants from other area churches. The local priest was not able to attend, but he sent two individuals from his parish to represent the Catholic Church.
U.S. Construction Workers Attend
Because the worship facility had begun as an empty shell with no ceiling, floors, or interior walls, professional construction workers, as well as church members and friends, spent months renovating the facility’s meeting room and two small classrooms.
Among those doing renovations were three members of Trinity Alliance Church in Egg Harbor, New Jersey, who worked for nine days in February 2009. Some of the workers attended the inauguration, impressed by the believers they had met at the work site. Former marriage course participants also attended.
The president of the French Alliance Churches, Norbert Clément, delivered the inauguration address. Additionally, the worship team sang two songs that expressed the heart of this new congregation to be a house of prayer, based on the church’s theme verse, Mark 11:17. Refreshments following the ceremony provided a sampling of the various nations represented at the church.
Proclaiming the Good News in France
Now the real work can begin-proclaiming the gospel of Jesus Christ in one of the most secular nations in all of Europe. One event planned is for the day before Pentecost Sunday, when the church will hold a continuous prayer vigil-interceding in one-hour segments in the church’s prayer room-from 6 a.m. to midnight.
Eglise Protestante Internationale is the fruit of Alliance churches praying and giving. We are so thankful that we can live the call of the Lord Jesus together with you.
Learn More
Read about our work in France.
What You Can Do
In your prayers, praise God for the new church plant, Eglise Protestante Internationale. Pray that many in the Léguevin community will be drawn to attend the church and come to know the giver of eternal Life.
By Jessica Schaeffer, serving at Koutiala Hospital in Mali
Editor’s Note: “To a large extent, women in Mali are seen as property; they have few rights,” said Jessica in her April newsletter. “God has given us a wonderful opportunity to love and value women and children at our hospital.” Read how one such woman responded to the love of Jesus and experienced not one, but two miracles!
Remember the wonders he has done, his miracles . . . (1 Chron. 16:12).
A couple months ago, Bafo Coulibaly was brought to the hospital by her brother-in-law, Pastor Enoch, one of our chaplains.
Her husband (Pastor Enoch’s older brother) wept when he was told that there was nothing we could do for her . . . she had an inoperable cervical mass. She and her husband had been very resistant to Enoch’s faith for many years. But after her consultation that day, Bafo listened as one of our nurses talked to her about Jesus.
Bafo went to stay at Pastor Enoch’s house with pain medicine we gave her to help relieve her discomfort. Dr. Dan Nesselroade told Enoch that only Jesus could heal Bafo; the only thing left to do was to pray.
So Pastor Enoch prayed, and he prayed for a miracle. God gave him two!
The Miracle of New Life
Two weeks later, after years of resistance to Jesus, Bafo prayed to accept Christ. A month after her initial consultation, she returned to the hospital. When Dr. Dan examined her, he found only a small lesion where the mass had been!
Bafo was smiling, saying that her pain and symptoms were gone. Dr. Dan discussed the possibility of doing a radical hysterectomy, but decided to wait two more weeks to see if God would complete the healing work He had already started.
Another Answered Prayer
When Bafo arrived the day of her scheduled surgery, her exam showed that she had been completely healed and was no longer in need of surgery.
I passed a smiling Bafo on my way to the hospital last week. I marvel regularly at God’s miracles and wonders as He provides for the needs of the hospital and as He works in the lives of the people around me.
Thank you for your part in His work here too, as you have sent me, loved, encouraged, supported, and prayed for me.
What You Can Do
Join Jessica in her request for prayer for Bafo’s spiritual growth. Also, pray for courage as she returns to the village-that God will continue His work in her life and in the life of her husband and the rest of their family for whom Pastor Enoch has prayed for and witnessed to for years.
May 22, 2009
Rev. Elwood A. Mann, a retired official worker who served in the Northeastern District for 43 years, passed away March 28, 2009. He was 86. Mann pastored six churches in the district from 1950-1987.
”It seems the district is quickly losing pastors of Elwood’s generation, but their legacy and godly example of committed humility remains with us,” said District Superintendent Dan Miller. “They will be missed-Elwood will be missed.”
Mann was predeceased by his wife, Elspeth, in 1985. He is survived by three children, six grandchildren, and four great-grandchildren. Two sisters, Edythe Dunning and Marilyn Martin, were able to join Mann’s family before his passing. “We prayed that God would grant him one more day until we could get there,” said Dunning. “God gave us that day with our brother.” Memorial services were held April 1 in Niagara Falls, New York, and gifts to the Great Commission Fund were accepted in lieu of flowers
Ralph Winter, founder of the U.S. Center for World Mission, developer of the Perspectives on the World Christian Movement study program, and long-time Alliance partner in missions and friend died at his home in Pasadena, California, Wednesday, May 20. He was 84. Winter, who battled with cancer, was surrounded by family and friends at the time of his passing.
Winter’s relationship with The Alliance dates back to the 1960s, when he recognized The Alliance as one of the few mission agencies encouraging missionary work by overseas churches, and doing it right. His groundbreaking academic on missions, Perspectives on the World Christian Movement, is required curriculum for Ministerial Study Program students in the C&MA’s Church Leadership Academy .
A “modern day William Carey and Hudson Taylor,” as described by one friend, Winter lived his entire life to bring the gospel of Jesus and the Kingdom of God to every last people group on the planet. In his admiration for The Alliance, Winter said, “In the United States in the last half-century, no one denominational mission board has a better record in starting mission-minded overseas churches than The Christian and Missionary Alliance.”
May 21, 2009
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
LOUISVILLE, Ky. – In obedience to Christ’s command to love their neighbors, members of The Christian and Missionary Alliance (C&MA) will be mobilized to four locations throughout the city to assist local charities in caring for Louisville’s hurting and needy. This unique opportunity to be the hands and feet of Jesus will coincide with the C&MA’s May 26–31 General Council at the Louisville Convention Center.
On Friday, May 29 from 1–4 pm Alliance volunteers will sort and package essential items, donated by Alliance staff members and congregants, for distribution by the Kentucky Refugee Ministries to needy refugees who have been legally admitted to the United States as victims of war or persecution because of their religious or political beliefs. Other volunteers will pack donations benefiting The Center for Women and Families, which provides help for women and children who are victims of domestic violence.
The third off-site project will minister to newly arrived internationals to the United States who receive needed services through the International Christian Center of the C&MA. Volunteers will distribute flyers inviting these people to church. Others will be involved in hands-on ministry at the Wayside Christian Mission, working in the kitchen, sorting food and clothing, and making needed facility repairs in one of the mission’s shelters. The Wayside Christian Mission remains one of Louisville’s key lifelines for many who would otherwise be alone and destitute.
“I find it fitting that we are taking this occasion to branch out into the great city of Louisville, where our founder, A. B. Simpson, pastored his first church in the United States,” says Dr. Gary Benedict, U.S. C&MA president. “His heart was to show Christ’s love in tangible ways to the people of this city. It’s gratifying to know that, more than 130 years later, our hearts beat with the same rhythm and resonance that solidified our founder’s vision to offer hope to the hopeless.”
The Alliance is a fellowship of evangelical believers joined together in local churches, dedicated to fulfilling Christ’s command to make disciples of all nations. The Alliance has a thoroughly evangelical doctrinal statement and encourages believers from diverse backgrounds and theological traditions to unite to complete Christ’s Great Commission.
CONTACT:
Mark Failing, Assistant to the President
The Christian and Missionary Alliance
Ph (cell): 719-660-2876
E-mail: failingm@cmalliance.org
www.cmalliance.org
# # #
May 19, 2009
By an Alliance worker serving in Guinea
I saw him sleeping on the ground beside the road in the middle of the day, flat on his stomach, with his little legs stretched out behind him.
His arms were his pillow as the sun burned his head where he slept while the Mercedes and SUVs whizzed by, unseeing and uncaring. I drove by too.
Dying on the Street
What in the world would I do with an orphan boy, homeless, bedraggled and dirty? After all, there was a cup and a piece of bread by his head where he lay. Someone had taken care of him.
But I slowed down, pulled over, and stopped. Of course we couldn’t keep an orphan boy, but I could at least take him to the orphanage by our house.
I made a slow U-turn and parked across the road. But as I walked toward the boy, I realized that something wasn’t right. This was NOT a small boy needing a mom’s touch.
The dirty, leathery feet attached to those pencil-thin legs were the size of a man’s. He looked like a victim from a World War II concentration camp. A fragile, bony skeleton dressed in clothes that were doing little to cover him.
This was a very, very sick man looking death in the eye. I tapped his back to wake him up and asked him his name. When he opened his dry, caked, and cracked lips to speak, the effort was so painful to watch.
“Rocky” was lucid and in his right mind. Sick and unable to work, he had no place to stay and no money for medicine. He had been on the streets for three months.
After this explanation he stretched his hand out, palm up, opened in supplication: ”Can you help me?”
Resignation
He looked at me with his eyes bulging out of his sunken eye sockets. I looked back and sadly shook my head “no.” He slowly withdrew his hand and closed his tired eyes, resigned to his fate.
I turned away and walked back to my car with tears streaming down my face. What in the world could I do to help a homeless man [likely] dying of AIDS?
Returning
I started my car, drove a ways, and then did another slow U-turn in the middle of the road. Driving up beside the man, I got out and helped him get into the car. He was too weak to stand, neither could he walk—but together we did it.
His one hand was trying to keep his too-big pants from falling off his bones; the other hand was holding on to a filthy sheet, his only possession in the world besides the clothes on his body and the fetish around his waist.
The stench filling my nostrils was nauseating, but the pain in my heart was even more overpowering. How did he come to this? My heart was breaking for this man.
I took him to the nearby hospital and left some money with my doctor friend to take care of his needs. And then I drove home to my two-story house with a nice bed, clean sheets, and a refrigerator full of food.
It was a difficult day.
Learn More
Check out our work in Guinea.
What You Can Do
Pray for “Rocky” to find comfort, peace, and eternal life in Christ. Pray also for our field workers in Guinea, and across the world, who often meet destitute people who desperately need to know their heavenly Father cares.
May 18, 2009
By Brett and Sheri MacLean, serving at Koutiala Hospital in Mali
Editor’s note: Just 77 percent of Malians live on less than $2 a day, about the cost of a day’s hospitalization in Koutiala Hospital. Bargain-basement medical costs like this, however, are often affordable only because of generous donors’ gifts.
As we turn off her baby’s oxygen, Isa’s mother starts to bawl and runs outside so that she can hide her tears. Isa’s dad sits stone-faced.
He has asked for days to be allowed to take his premature baby home. We have refused. Today, he says that they are leaving regardless of what we say.
No Money
Why is he doing this? Doesn’t he realize that his son will die within an hour of turning off his oxygen? We have even removed Isa’s oxygen to show his father Isa’s struggle to live. Nevertheless, the father says that they will be going home.
When our Malian chaplain pulls Isa’s father aside, he soon discovers that they have no more money for medical care. Today, all of their money has run out.
Pricing a Child’s Life
Sadly this is life in Mali-having to let your child die due to lack of funds, even when the price of oxygen is just $2 per day and hospital care is an additional $1.
Can you even imagine having to put a monetary value on the life of your child … much less at a cost of no more than a cup of StarbucksTM coffee?
Yet families here are accustomed to this. In fact, children die so frequently that Malians don’t even have funerals for them because the expenses are too much. Funerals are reserved for those who have at least reached their teenage years.
Generous Donors Give Life
One of the most frequent greetings offered to parents of a deceased child is “Ala ka balo ta segi a no na” . . . ”May God give you another child to replace this one.”
In my opinion, a more appropriate greeting following the death of a child would be “I’m sorry your baby died because you are poor.” Although these words are not spoken, it is unfortunately true.
Thankfully, Isa didn’t have to die. Because of faithful donors’ gifts we were able to tell his father that we would cover the rest of his hospitalization costs. Now Isa is at home, growing and doing well!
Isa, by the way, is the Arabic word for “Jesus.” Isa’s father is a teacher of the predominant religion here, yet he was so amazed at the care that was given in Jesus’ name, and the miracle of his child’s life, that he named his son after Him.
Learn More
Check out some of our videos describing our work at Koutiala Hospital, where women and children’s medical needs are absolutely staggering.
What You Can Do
Pray for Isa and his family to know Christ, the giver of eternal life.
Your support of Alliance Great Commission Ministries allows dedicated international workers like the MacLeans to continue their work-offering new life to the hopeless in Jesus’ Name.
You can also give to the Koutiala Hospital Benevolent Fund. (This designation will go toward assisting other impoverished families like Isa’s who have no money for their children’s medical care.)
May 14, 2009
”The Metropolitan District has been hit with a powerful flood,” says Bruce Terpstra, district superintendent. “We have a flood of new church plants!” Terpstra, who couldn’t explain why this phenomenon is taking place, reports 20 church-planting proposals submitted to the district during the past six months, with 15 in progress.
”The district has a strong DNA for church planting,” says Terpstra, “and one reason [for the increase] may be a new funding strategy of matching contributions from the local church.”
Regardless of the reason, it is obvious that God is at work in the Metro District. One church started with an Alpha course dinner, attended by 101 people. The following week, 60 adults attended the dinner along with a table full of teens who showed interest in the Lord.
Most new church plants are daughter churches, but one non-Alliance church asked the Metropolitan District for help. “They were planting a daughter church,” says Terpstra, “and had not done it before.” After meeting with district consultants, the mother church decided the daughter church should be an Alliance church, and the unique partnership is bearing fruit.
“It seems like a week doesn’t go by without another opportunity washing up to our door to plant another church,” says Terpstra. “The only explanation that can be given for what is happening is that God has opened the floodgates.”
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