Who I am in Christ

Starting to memorize Bible verses?

Here is a great list of verses about our identity in Christ from Freedom in Christ Ministries.

These are great verses to turn to whenever you feel down or don't know who you are or where you're going

Who I am in Christ

What won't we be able to do in heaven?

At a Che Ahn conference there were two things he said that really stuck out to me.

Of the different purposes that God created us for, which of them won't we be able to do in heaven?

- Worship
- Discipleship
- Fellowship
- Ministry (to members of the body)
- Evangelism

It's only Evangelism, sharing the good news, that we won't be able to do for eternity. We have only this life to do it.

Che Ahn also said, "If I talk to someone for more than fifteen minutes, I see that person as someone I need to share the gospel with."

Che shared that he always gets his hair cut a different place so that he can share with a new person each time!

Pray for us that we would also have this attitude. Right now, we find it difficult to share with many people we meet due to inadequate language skills, but pray for those who can speak English that we would be bold in our witness. May we may not be ashamed of the gospel, which is the power of salvation for all who believe.

• Pray for the two AC installation men who we gave tracts to yesterday
  

Praise & Prayer Update April 5th

Praise the Lord for the cloudy and windy weather we've had this week! In the states we are usually really happy for a sunny day, but in spring and summer here, since most days have blue skies and are HOT when the sun is out, we rejoice when it's rains or there's actually clouds giving us some relief from the sun.

Praises:

• H was able to give out personal cards containing Bible verses to 15 of her co-workers this week. So far, people have been touched to receive a personal card of appreciation, but we pray that they would not only feel encouraged but also challenged and inspired to seek God. May any invitations we receive for tea, lunch, dinner etc. be times where we can share the gospel.
  
• One Jesus film (in the local language) was given to the religious studies teacher. Since this teacher loves to watch movies, pray that not only would he watch it, but that the Holy Spirit would speak to him and lead him to the truth
• We have been able to pray together more consistently this week
• Two people have already responded to our need for language school support!
  

Prayer:

• Pray the Lord would help us manage our time so we can be strategic in reaching out to those around us
  
• Pray that those who received a card would think about their relationships with God and desire to know Him
  
• Pray that we would have access to easy to read native language versions of the Bible to give out. Currently there is a hang up with a local Bible Society which is blocking contextualized Bibles from being printed
  
• Pray that the Lord would provide the $4000 we need to do language study this summer. We are currently partnered with other workers in our area, but we are not sponsored by any organization. Wedding gifts allowed us to travel here, buy a car, and get set up when we first came.Our local salaries allow us to pay for all of our regular monthly expenses, but since language school involves living in another country, visa expenses, and course fees, we are not able to afford it on on local salaries at this time. Would you please pray and ask the Lord if you would be able to help us study language this summer?
  

Thanks for your prayers & support!

Looking Back & Praying Ahead

It’s hard to believe that we’ve already been married for one year, and that we’ve spent the past eight months overseas. There’s definitely been a lot of struggles and new experiences for both of us. Grocery shopping by rickshaw, driving on the other side of the road, teaching in a school, waking up to the call to prayer, various insects invading our kitchen,and trying to pray together when everything seems to be a distraction.

Over our spring break in March, we were able to go to the mountains and spend some time praying and talking about our vision for the next year. We want to focus on both knowing God and making him known; which is how we’ve found ourselves over here!

•  to share the gospel with the least reached

•  to love and serve Muslims

•  to love and serve in the nation we are called to

In order to fulfill God’s purposes there are several areas we feel that we should focus on in the coming year.

1) Learn the Language --> Language Classes
2) Be Tentmakers  --> Professional Development
3) Be Examples --> Personal Discipleship & Accountability
4) Build up the Church --> Fellowship, Training, Prayer
5) Be Forerunners-->  Study End Times, Prayer
6) Use Spiritual Gifts --> Practice, Study, Prayer
7) Share the Gospel --> Strategic Outreach, Friendship

While we were in the mountains, we checked out the language school that we had planned to go to this summer. We really feel that if we want to be more fruitful in this region then we need to be able to speak the local language. Since sharing the gospel and discipleship take place best in the heart language, we are limited with our current language abilities.

The language school is the best option in the region and is always totally booked in the summer. Since all the students who attend the school are foreigners, the prices were a bit higher than we expected. With both of us taking four classes a day for ten weeks our course fees amount to $2750. There’s no discount for people earning in a weaker currency!

When we add up all our expenses for the summer, considering that we will be full time language students, we come up $4000 short of what we can afford on our local salaries. That includes food, utilities, classes, travel, visas, and housing for the summer months.

Would you pray about supporting us financially this summer so that we can spend these ten weeks focused on language study?

In faith, we’ve already put a $200 down payment to secure our housing for the summer. Praise the Lord for providing an affordable apartment through a local pastor.

We are really looking forward to what God has in store for this summer and this coming school year. Please pray for us:

•  That we could finish this year well and be a light in our workplace

•  That we would focus our time and energy on living out God’s purposes for us

•  That we would continue to encourage, challenge, and bless each other in marriage

•  That the Lord would provide all the finances needed for our summer language study

Spirit of Death

"There was blood splattered all over the walls. Her neck was just hanging from her head; half off. Nobody knows why he did it. It was the most disturbing thing I've ever seen."

This is a paraphrase from a conversation I had with one of my friends this week. I called her to see how she was doing, and she told me the gruesome story of how her husband's aunt had been murdered by her own servant. Living in an upper to middle class section of the city, an incident like this came as a shock to the family. Nobody knows why, but the servant (hired about a month an a half ago) attempted to chop off the aunt's head with an axe. The blade was too dull to make a clean cut, but he succeeded in cutting into her neck enough to kill her.

A second servant had gone out for Friday prayers when the murder took place. When the second servant arrived, he saw the aunt partially decapitated and the other servant running away. He caught the murderer and called the police and family. My friend was one of the first to arrive at the scene, even before the police had come.

Are you wondering why you did not see this story on the news? If this had happened in the US or Europe it surely would have been in the papers. But here, these kind of unnatural deaths happen all too often. I wrote another blog before about the little blurbs about gang rapes, killings, and other horrendous crimes that come in the back of the paper where almost nobody bothers to read them.

As I reflected on this crime, I felt that there must be a spiritual reason behind the high frequency of unnatural deaths and heinous crimes. My friend's aunt who died was only in her early fifties. It reminded me that we are engaged in a spiritual battle. Over here, I feel that we are deeply entrenched in territory the enemy has held for thousands of years.

Oh Lord, even though many times it seems so hard to pray and to press in, help me to intercede for the peoples of this land. So many people die unnatural deaths every day, and most of them have probably never heard the gospel. Lord, help me to be intentional in sharing the Word of truth. Empower me with boldness. Send more laborers for this harvest over here, so that all may hear the truth that is the power of salvation to those who believe.

Praise & Prayer Update March 11th

Praises:

• D and a friend went to a city in our province (3 hours away) to do some outreach training over the weekend. It seems that the training was well received. Please pray that those who attended would feel a burden to be intentional in reaching the lost.
• H is finally driving! She was able to go out shopping this weekend and hand out some literature in the local language. Pray that we both would want to sow the Word abundantly, even if it may not always be well received.
  
• We have both been able to share more with people at our workplace. Pray for the student who D will be giving the Bible to this week.
  
• Electricity! We have had 20+ hours a day of power which has been a blessing in school and at home.
  

Prayers:

• Travel - We will be leaving the country on Saturday to check out a language school for the summer. Pray that we will focus on the Lord during our vacation and that He we will also be intentional about sharing with the different people we meet during the journey. It will take 1-2 days of travel to reach our destination.
  
• Platform - Please pray for us as we make decisions about what we'll be doing professionally next year. We need the Lord's guidance as well as his provision for the proper visas.
  
• Strategic Outreach - We heave been feeling burdened to be more focused on sharing and being strategic with our time. Pray that the Lord will give us his plan and method so that we may bear fruit in this land. May we not only think of our friends and coworkers but may we have vision to see multiplication of faith among the people groups of this region.
  
• Laborers for the Harvest - There are 180 million people in this country who speak over 60 languages. Most foreign organizations in the country focus on mercy ministries, and while those efforts are much appreciated we are not seeing many people come to know the Lord and follow him. In short, we are not seeing much eternal fruit in this field. Even if there may be foreign workers in a village hospital (which would still be rare) there may not be an active witness of the truth. Pray for more workers who are willing to be bold, creative, strategic, and full of the Holy Spirit to come to this land. Pray that those of us who are here would not get bogged down in the mundane or neglect to focus on what's going to make an eternal difference.

Ten Plagues of Egypt compared with End Times

I've been comparing the 10 plagues of Egypt with the 21 judgment events (seals, trumpets, and bowls) in Revelation. I found it interesting how God shows his power and his authority over the magicians in Egypt progressively. He doesn't just start off with the final plague but he gradually builds up Israel's faith and the Egyptians fear of him. Check out this chart that I made to look at the way God judges Egypt and how the people respond.

• Notice that at first the magicians can reproduce the miracles done by Moses and Aaron. I prefer to dismiss the idea that the power of darkness can do miracles, but this is something we see clearly in Scripture. Compare Revelation 16:13-14 - "And I saw, coming out of the mouth of the dragon and out of the mouth of the beast and out of the mouth of the false prophet, three unclean spirits like frogs. For they are demonic spirits, performing signs, who go abroad to the kings of the whole world, to assemble them for battle on the great day of God the Almighty."
  
• Even the false prophet spoken of in Revelation 13 can perform signs and wonders. "It performs great signs, even making fire come down from heaven to earth in front of people, and by the signs that it is allowed to work in the presence of the beast it deceives those who dwell on earth, telling them to make an image for the beast that was wounded by the sword and yet lived." Revelation 13:13:14
• Sorcery is one of the most prevalent sins at the end of the age, "The rest of mankind, who were not killed by these plagues, did not repent of the works of their hands nor give up worshiping demons and stone and wood, which cannot see or walk, nor did they repent of their murders or their sorceries or their sexual immorality of their thefts." Revelation 9:20-21
  

There are many other observations and comparisons we can make with the end time judgments. If you're interested in studying this more, consider the following questions:

1. Are leaders usually warned of coming judgments and told why those judgments are coming?
   
2. Do the first plagues affect people directly (ie making them sick, causing them to die) or not? How does this compare to the seals, trumpets and bowls?
   
3. When in the judgment series of the ten plagues does God separate his people and keep them from the effects of the plagues?
   
4. How does the separation of Goshen compare to the sealing of the saints in Revelation?
   
5. How do the people of Egypt start showing their fear of God toward the end of the plagues?
6. How can we tell demonic miracles from God's miracles so that we are not led astray?

If you'd like a pdf or word file of the chart just send me an email titled "Ten Plagues Chart."