36 When he saw the crowds, he had compassion for them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd. 37 Then he said to his disciples, “The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few; 38 therefore pray earnestly to the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest.” (Matt 9:35-38 ESV)
Welcome to the first edition of Missional Monday! As Redemption Church, we believe that Jesus’ church is the hope of the world, and because of this one of our stated priorities is to Multiply Churches. Currently we are doing this by supporting the work of several church planters around the world.
My goal of getting this information out to you all is to strengthen the ties between you, the church, and the Church Planters and Missionaries we financially and prayerfully support. The Holy Spirit is moving and working but often times the work is hard and so we, as the body, need to keep these families covered in prayer, and, know that we are all laborers in the field in our daily lives. Below are a few updates and prayer requests from the field. You can also click on their name and see their profile.
Praise God that Ben’s Quechua studies are going well. Ben is going to do a test soon – please pray that he has made it up another level. He feel good and is working hard with 4 teachers in town. Please pray as he teaches Genesis informally to several people. Pray he can discover the misunderstandings they have, cultural points to be addressed and language areas that he needs vocabulary for. Especially difficult is the ideas that the original sin wasn’t ‘carnal knowledge’ i.e. sex, as the Roman Catholic church often teaches. Just the other day, a Quechua told Ben that the reason Cain killed Abel was that Abel slept with Eve. So there is some serious work to do. Another area is finding adequate vocabulary and examples to describe the Great Flood – Quechuas here are mainly from dry places and the idea of a global tide is pretty far off.
Praise God our Bolivian “god-couple”, Moises and Aleida, are doing well. They have been married now for 3 months! Please pray that Moises learns how to work well with his in-laws who make sandals from tires.
Pray for Sadie’s health. She has been working with a doctor bus has not received any answers yet. One symptom she has been struggling with is fatigue so please pray for healing for her and for the doctors as they try to understand the issues.
From a financial perspective, gifts are always welcome!
Our current plan is to return to Mozambique in July of this year. Along with continuing on with our previous jobs we are hoping to set up a training program to train new missionaries arriving to work in Southern Africa. On-site training has been a huge need as new people usually arrive without a good understanding of the differences of living there versus their home country. Until recently our team’s focus has been strictly serving missionaries working in northern Mozambique, but at a recent meeting our group decided to work regionally. This will allow us to provide appropriate training to missionaries from any organization coming to work in southern Africa. We hope to set up a basic car maintenance and mechanics course as well as a basic electrical & plumbing course. It is our hope and prayer that through these orientation courses, that we can reduce the turnover rate of missionaries serving in our region of the world.
Before we can return to Mozambique we still need to raise our personal monthly financial support by about $350. There are also several one-time costs that we have going in such as the airline tickets and documents. If you would like to join with us in what God is doing n Mozambique please go to http://www.wycliffe.org/Partnership.aspx?mid=D22D31 There is of course a significant cost for setting up the type of orientation program we are thinking about. It will take about $30,000 to be able to effectively set up all that we want to do for that program. If you are interested in donating to that project please let us know as the procedure will be different and not go directly to our family, but to our Mozambique branch.
Pray for Jon, Marijane, Aidan , Isaac & Ethan as they prepare to go back to Nampula and pray that they will raise the necessary funds to continue the Lord’s work in that part of the world.
Andrew and Amberlynne Claussen
Pray they are able to get their house built and are able to move in and begin the hard work of teaching the gospel and integrating into their new lives in the village of Danokit. Pray that the Holy Spirit would soften the hearts of the villagers in preparation for hearing the Word. They are also in need of a few supplies for their home. These can be found under News and Projects under their profile here.
Pray for continues outreach to the people of Micronesia as Amos and Heidi continue to reach out to the youth and women in their community as well as in the lives that Amos reaches and helps with through Pacific Missionary Aviation.
Travis Retherford
Travis is headed to Indonesia soon to assist the Claussen’s with their house building and installing the solar panel system. Travis is very close to his financial goal but not quite there, Please prayerfully consider supporting him, and the Claussen’s, on this trip. You can also help by purchasing some of the special 24V ceiling fans and light bulbs the Claussen’s will need for their house.
Karen McCarter
Karen, a member of the church, is going to Uganda with Palmetto Medical Initiative to be the hands and feet of Jesus by helping to distribute much needed health care to the people in the many villages in Uganda. The infrastructure is minimal and the need is great. People suffer from a wide variety of health issues, from what we would see as simple and treatable over the counter, to the effects from polio. To learn more about PMI, click here, or talk to Karen. She will have a table out in the Commons on Sunday morning soon as well. Stay tuned for updates! Pray that she will be able to raise the money to go and help the people of Uganda and pray for the health and well being of the people there.
If you have a great story that you would like to share on a Missional Monday, please contact Steve Mount.
Here is a simple way to help people in your neighborhood know about one of the best kept secrets in Duvall, Redemption Church – (a church without walls). We have 20 of these beauties available for you to use on your front lawn. We are excited about yet another way to bring RC to the attention of those in the valley.