Doug and Karen Conkle

About Us › Our Family › Locate a Worker

Prayer Letter/Ministry Update

Look to the 'prayer requests' below for the latest news.
We are now centered in Banfora, Burkina Faso where we spent our first years of ministry from 1978 to 1994, working to reach the unreached people groups in this area. We left in 1994 to work in administration and then setting up a church planting team in Senegal. Now we are back to our first love, church planting!

Our purpose for being here is to focus on those large centers and surrounding villages that still have no gospel witness. We are doing this with our Burkinabe colleagues as we know that we are only here for the short term; they will be here for the long haul.

Present focus:
The Dogose people who still have very few believers.
Radio. The Alliance station is located in Banfora and our goal is to get the message out to the far edges of the country where the Dogose and Senoufou people groups are located.
Village Church Planting is a church planting method that works well, especially where there are not enough trained pastors. It is only in the French language so Karen's goal is to get it in the trade language so it can be used widely and effectively.
Roofs and wells. Two wonderful ways of blessing the Church and showing God's love to the people of Burkina.

Our children:
Ruth and Chris are attending Boone Alliance in Iowa. Shawn and Becky and children are working with CAMA in Segou, Mali. Matt and Rachel and children are working with the C&MA in the middle east. Abby and Brian have been appointed to Guinea West Africa after language study in France next fall. And Ben is in med school.

Living the Call,
Doug and Karen

For thirty-six years, we have been supported by the Great Commission Fund; the consistent giving of Alliance people all over America. Thank you for faithfulness!!!

Prayer Requests/Answers to Prayer

Thank you for praying!
Last week you prayed with us about the evangelism and church dedication at Madiaso. One young man came 40 kilometers on his bicycle to help with the evangelism! He was one of the young men who were being pressured by their uncle (see 8-14 Update) and is still following Jesus!
Starting next Monday, we will be with an Envision team from the Riverside MN Church who have come to partner with us among the Dogose. We will be in Ouo for four days putting up a church shelter in Loge where the believers in Ouo are doing a new church plant. We will be showing the Jesus film in the evenings and hold a well dedication for the well given by the Riverside church. The highlight will be a baptism service where eight of those being baptized are new Dogose believers. Please pray for effective communication of the Good News, good health for all and that the rains will not keep us from the open air evangelism.

Mangodara H.S. Praise the Lord, land was given in an excellent location. Now pray that we find the funding for this project. Burkina has one of the lowest literacy rates in the world. Less than 30% can read. In Mangodara, of those that are blessed to have attended elementary school, only two in five get to continue on as there are not enough schools. Pray that this school will get the funding needed.

Yao and his wife were baptized last month along with six others during the evangelism in his home village. What a testimony to those friends and family who saw him before while he was under intense demon oppression! Now he has found freedom in Christ!

Moses: Fear of ancestral repercussions keeps Moses, the village leader, and many others from leaving their animistic practices. Yet, he knows Jesus holds the truth and has given some of his own land for a chapel. Will you pray that Moses will be courageous and accept Jesus? His wife and mother are already believers.

On a personal note, our youngest daughter and husband, Brian and Abby Lindsay, will be commissioned as International Workers to Guinea at the C&MA Council this week. For all of you who have prayed for our children through the years, thank you.

Other praise and prayer requests:
Radio work; We are still working on increasing the strength of the radio signal to reach into some of the the ?least reached? areas of Burkina. However Pastor Pierre in Mangodara shared that the digital files of the Gospel of Luke and Music in Dogose on SD memory cards that can be used with cell phones have gone viral with many people requesting to copy the files! Thanks to you who have helped with our workspecials.
The new wells are very much appreciated. In kwere the well is across the street from an elementary school where there is no well so the children all come for drinks in the church yard. What a testimony!

We still owe $610 for our vehicle and are praying for God's provision.

Your prayers do make a difference! Write and ask for regular updates via email: dkconkle@gmail.com

Burkina Faso

Share