Saturday, January 21, 2012

January Update

But you will receive power when the Holy Sprit has come upon you; and you shall be My witnesses both in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and even to the remotest part of the earth. – Acts 1:8


I (Justin) remember a phone conversation between Amy and me while I was still in Sudan. Amy was excited because she had just heard about a ministry called “People Teams.” People Teams is basically a bunch of people in Kansas City who, realizing that there are so many countries and ethnic groups represented right here in our neighborhoods, decided to start training people and encouraging local churches to mobilize to start reaching the nations right here in Kansas City with the good news of Jesus Christ. Antioch Bible Baptist Church, which is the church where Amy is a member, decided to get involved in this, so Amy joined the team. To make a long story short, they researched some people groups and decided that Antioch’s focus would be on the Sudanese people located in Kansas City.

Amy mentioned People Teams quite frequently when we were on the phone, and even brought it up on my ride home from the airport when I got back home. For months she’s been casually mentioning to me that we need to get involved, but with the wedding, seminary classes and support- raising, I was kind of slow to come on board. I knew that it would be fun and a worthwhile ministry, I just didn’t’ know how much more time we would have to do it.

Well, after months of waiting, adjusting, and…dragging my feet, Amy and I started going out with Tim and Vanessa from Antioch once a week just to see who we could meet. There are churched Sudanese people here and we know where to find them, but we want to have relationships with the ones who are lost, and find opportunities to share Christ with them. Will you pray that God uses us to reach Sudan in this way as we await his provision for us to return? My experiences in Sudan are a good entry point for conversations, but when we start talking about serious things like the gospel, things will get a lot more difficult.

The support raising is going better than we could have expected. In January we were able to reach our fast-track goal and were hired as “Temporary employees” for four months while we finish raising our commitments. We’re at 42% of or monthly goal, God is providing in amazing ways!

Thanks for your prayers!