LHI Newsletter Avalon Parkway Suite 400 Box 2950 McDonough, GA ISSUE 50 March 2017 Peru Update

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1 LHI Newsletter 2020 Avalon Parkway Suite 400 Box 2950 McDonough, GA ISSUE 50 March 2017 Peru Update We are glad to report that our church families in Peru have not been harmed by the recent severe flooding and mudslides. Though much damaged occurred in Lima and Trujillo where we have churches, our people were not impacted. Heavy rains are very unusual for these areas of Peru. Plans are being made for a team to visit Peru July Amber McClain will be the team leader. Visits are planned for Paita and Chulucanas, cities that have not been visited before, along with a stop in Lima to meet with our church family there. It appears that a Bible Conference will be held for adults along with classes for children. Haiti Update Pastor Lesly Bertrand sent a report recently expressing great appreciation for the financial help that was provided when the devastating hurricane went through the country last October. Over $12,000 was raised quickly by our membership and sent to provide immediate assistance to those in need. Pastor Lesly distributed 10,000 kg of rice and 4,000 kg of pinto beans, and 450 gallons of cooking oil. Three mobile medical clinics were organized in three villages which provided free consultation and medicine. Corn, green and red pepper and other vegetable seed was distributed to the people. In all, 10 villages who needed food and other supplies, received help. (Also see photo next page) 1

2 Food distribution in Haiti Pakistan Update Pastor Vaster Saajan holds regular prayer meetings when he visits our churches. To the left is a group in the village of Thekrivala; and below is a group in the village of Gojra. In April there are plans being made for a large multi-church prayer meeting. They are expecting several hundred people to attend. The LHI Board has authorized a special gift of $600 to help cover the cost of renting a tent, sound system and generator; money for advertising, and food for the conference. Please pray for the safety of those who will be attending this conference. 2

3 Africa Update Rebekah Martin recently heard from Linda, our coordinator of the work in Malawi and Mozambique, that there is a serious food shortage. The crops that will be harvested in April and May look very good, but many church families have been in a dire situation. With some available funds and two special gifts we have been able to send $8,500 to provide help until the crops can be harvested. As you know, below the equator, the seasons are reversed so they are coming to the end of their summer. Plans are being made to send a team to Africa, the end of May and through June. At this point visits are scheduled for Malawi and Mozambique. Kenya will be holding elections this summer and often there is violence leading up the elections so we may not be able to visit Kenya this summer. Pictured are students who attend the Twiga school in Kilgoris, Kenya. Twiga is Swahili for giraffe. About 25 kindergarten students attend the school. This school is free for students because of contributions made through LHI. It costs $150 per month to pay the teacher and feed the children. Some of these children have never attended school before, so the students range in age up to 10 years old. The plan is to add another grade each year so both kindergarten and first grade will be offered in the fall. Flag of Malawi Flag of Mozambique Flag of Kenya Minnesota Missions Conference The Minnesota Conference held a missions conference earlier this month. Among the speakers were Kim Laurent who was on the Kenya team last summer; Sarah Blanchard who recently returned from a trip to the Philippines; and Mason Landry who reported on last summer s UP project. The Conference is very generous in helping to support many mission projects. 3

4 Marching for Missions in Russia Throughout the month of March we have been praying for our various fields, pastors and brothers and sisters around the globe. Please take a moment to read through this and pray as you go. Our brother Maksim is a lone pastor, evangelist and missionary in Russia and to Russia and the surrounding countries. He also is doing on-line marketing, keeping up a website and correspondence, as well as traveling on weekends. Looking at an average week of Maksim s, you will see the need to hold this dear brother up in prayer on a regular basis. Monday through Friday he works a full day in a local hospital helping as they need him and he meets and ministers to patients. Twice a week after the hospital he goes to a children s home for several hours to do sports with the kids. Once he gets home in the evening he is on his computer corresponding with people that have reached out on our website or his group page (a sort of Russian Facebook that currently has over 52,000 subscribers on his One God page) and making telephone calls with those people and our brothers and sisters who are scattered around Russia and the surrounding countries. He is also proofreading all of the translations that we have done before they are published to make sure all the Bible verses line up and he makes any needed tweaks. He usually goes to bed around midnight or one. He does this five days a week, week in and week out. Saturday and Sunday he travels by bus or train, often overnight, to near-by brothers and sisters to encourage and study with them. Every other weekend he is a Big Brother to Sergei, a boy from the children s home. Please pray for strength and wisdom for Maksim as he pastors the scattered flock and works as a missionary and evangelist, as well as all of the other ministry he does for the sake of the kingdom. Please also pray for our church family scattered throughout Russia and the surrounding countries. Pray for their protection under new laws and for those living in Muslim countries. Pray that they would continue to grow in truth and in righteousness and that they would be lights to those around them, even if they cannot verbally share their faith. Please pray for our brothers and sisters living in Muslim countries, Zhanna, Tatyana, Elona, Igool, Fyodor, Alisa, Pyotor (Peter), Ludmila, Vera. Pray for protection for our brothers Aleksander, Sergey and Boris in the Ukraine as the war rages on around them since Please continue praying for brother Uli as he is caring for his mother-in-law and daughter after the car accident. Pray for him to have strength and for their health to improve. Pray for the other brothers and sisters in Russia (Uli, Bogdan, Oleg, Natalia, Margarita, Tatyana, Valentina and Sophia; and our brother Simon in Georgia.) Praise God for all these (continued next page) 4

5 Marching for Missions in Russia (continued) brothers and sisters and for those yet to come. We have baptized believers in 8 countries: (Russia, Ukraine, Kazakhstan, Georgia, Kyrgyzstan, Azerbaijan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan). May God continue to lead people to Maksim or put him on their paths if they are seeking God or are open to hearing the Good News of God s coming Kingdom. Maksim thanks you from the bottom of his heart for your prayers and generosity to make his work for the kingdom possible. He always says that we are a team! If you could drop him a short note, that would be great. He is always encouraged by a few words from his brothers and sisters. Feel free to write in English, he will translate it. He will also respond back in English when he gets a chance. If you don t hear from him right away it is because he is very busy corresponding with people who have questions. He still really likes hearing from us! His is: unitarian_christian@ro.ru God bless you and may we together bring Him honor and glory in our obedience to Jesus command to go make disciples until the end comes. Tracy Zhykhovich Marching for Missions and Gift Catalog Churches have received resources this month to assist in highlighting Church of God mission work. A prayer calendar was distributed with a prayer request for each day of the month of March. Bulletin inserts were provided each week. The first week focused on Peru. The second week on the Twiga school in Kenya. Third week Haiti and the fourth week Russia. Each church has also received additional copies of the gift catalog listing many financial needs in our mission fields. We invite all of our members to consider what they can do to meet some of the needs presented in the catalog. Over $100,000 per year is collected and distributed to meet spiritual and humanitarian needs in the fields that have been developed over the years. Many individuals and groups have already selected items from the gift catalog. Thanks for your response. Contributions can be made online at coggc.org; click on donate now or they can be sent to the address below. Additional copies of the catalog are available by contacting: LHI, Box 2950, McDonough, GA dkrogh@atlantabiblecollege.com 5

6 Minutes of Board Meetings The Lord s Harvest International Board met on the campus of Atlanta Bible College in November. Below is a summary of the minutes of the meeting. The meeting was called to order at 8:45 a.m. by chairperson Rick McClain. Present were Andy Cisneros, Rebekah Martin, Rick Mc- Clain, Scott Millard, Kim Raper, Tracy Zhykhovich, and David Krogh. Rick opened the meeting with prayer. Tracy presented devotions regarding the importance of Bible truth. L to r: David Krogh, Rebekah Martin, Andy Cisneros, Tracy Zhykhovich., Scott Millard, Kim Raper, and Rick McClain Finances The Oct. 31 financial report was reviewed. David clarified several items on the report. Scott and Kim moved that we put a notice on mission applications stating that travel funds that are raised beyond what is needed will be redirected after three years if not used for another trip. Motion carried. Kim will contact people who have gone on trips with unused funds to let them know that if they are not planning on serving on another team, that the funds will be redirected. It was noted that a payment to the General Conference in the amount of $2,500 to help with LHI overhead will continue. David will check to make sure that the operating procedures include a transfer each year at the time of the LHI meeting to cover the cost of travel and other operating costs. Country Reports Malawi and Mozambique Rebekah presented There are about 300 pastors/churches in Mozambique and 125 in Malawi. We will let people know that we are looking for people who have an interest in serving on a short term team. These people should be invited to join the country team of the country they are interested in before going on a trip. There was a discussion of the need for more fund-raising efforts. It was suggested we could encourage a special donation box that could be placed in a church lobby. At our summer conference we could ask people to contribute to a fund to provide money for conferences to be held in other countries so they can have a conference. It was suggested that we need to get our youth involved in projects. The church involvement team will promote projects in local churches. It costs about $2,000 for a church building in Malawi and Mozambique and $3,000 for a church 6

7 Minutes Continued: building in Kenya. The church involvement team will promote mission activities in local churches. It was suggested that we prepare a DVD or CD asking each church to raise money to build a church in Africa. We would like to know how many US churches would undertake such a project. We could also ask every church to provide a bicycle for a pastor so that every pastor in Africa could have one and a Bible for every family that can read. Tracy and Andy moved to approve a trip to Malawi and Kenya, possibly May 29 to July 15, Motion carried. Kenya Rebekah presented Martins feel that it would be preferable to have a different supervisor oversee Kenya than the same ones who oversee Malawi and Mozambique. There is a request to build a Kenya Church of God headquarters/church building in Maturu. Scott and Andy moved to apply for the fall 2017 Church Builders appeal to fund this project. Motion carried. We will wait to tell Kenya of our approval for this request until we see if the Board approves the fall appeal. If the Board approves our application, we will request that the Kenya people match what comes from the appeal. Rebekah and Tracy moved that we continue with our policy of building three churches in Malawi and three in Mozambique each year, and if more money comes in than is needed for these 6 buildings, that additional funding will go to Mozambique since there are so many more congregations in Mozambique. Motion carried. Andy and Scott moved to build two churches in Kenya this year one in the north and one in the south. Motion carried. Tracy and David moved to provide $750 for the annual Theological Conference in Kenya and $750 to assist with the annual Theological Conference in Peru. We will ask the annual United States Theological Conference sponsored by ABC and Restoration Fellowship to take on the project of raising this $1,500. Motion carried. Andy and Rebekah moved to continue to provide rent for four churches in Kenya with a total of $145 per month. Motion carried. David offered prayer for the Africa work. Russia - Presented by Tracy Scott and Rebekah moved to continue support for Maksim of $3500 every 3 months which includes monthly support of $1,000 and additional funds for Bibles and to support Maksim s involvement with the Big Brother program. Motion carried. Andy moved and Scott seconded to provide $2,000 per year for Maksim to travel to visit members. Motion carried. Rebekah moved that we send $2,640 for translation and printing of Focus on the Kingdom magazine and other articles and to try to find twelve individuals to pay for a month. Tracy seconded. Motion carried. Peru/Nicaragua presented by David In the course of discussing the Peru work, Andy mentioned that the Up Project leadership is interested in the involvement of their youth in international work. It is the feeling that Peru might be a reasonable place to explore for the first place to send a team. Someone from the Up leadership will plan to go with the next team to check out possibilities. (continued next page) 7

8 Minutes Continued: David and Rebekah moved to send a team to Peru in July/August Motion carried. We will consider Nicaragua and Ecuador as new fields for LHI to oversee because of Edwin Mauricio s contacts in Ecuador and Alex Davila s work in Managua. Pakistan presented by David Tracy moved and Kim seconded a motion to continue support for the eight churches in Pakistan in the amount of $366 per month plus occasional funds to buy Bibles. Motion carried. Tracy has had contact with Amir who lives in Lahore, Pakistan. He took the Systematic Bible Study course. She is exploring his understanding of the Bible and finding out more about the ministry that he is doing. We will continue to connect with him and Shahzad, another Pakistani from Karachi who has taken the Systematic Bible Study course. Andy offered prayer for the work in Peru and Nicaragua. Rebekah prayed for the Russia work. Kim offered prayer for the work in Pakistan. Haiti presented by Rick David and Tracy moved to continue $1,500 per month in support. Motion carried. We will explore the possibility of funding another building with money that was raised from the Church Builders appeal and money contributed by the Pine Grove Church. Or perhaps we could make the money available to replace the church building that was destroyed in the hurricane in October Scott prayed for the Haiti work. The meeting adjourned at 5:30 p.m. Tuesday The meeting opened at 8:45 a.m. with devotions by Andy. He talked about why do we do what we do. The Board reviewed how to set up Zoom meetings and also how to access our photos in Dropbox. We will deposit in Dropbox a file with contact information about each field leaders names, address, what support we are sending, and other helpful information. We will also include other LHI documents such as an application form, personal reference form, etc., and copies of policies adopted by the LHI Board. There was a discussion of the work of the Search team. Tracy is the leader of this team. Most of our fields resulted from people finding us. We want to be proactive in looking for people who believe like us and see if they would like to partner with us. There are two groups we are trying to reach: unchurched, non-christian people; and Christian people who don t know the truth. We need different approaches for each group. We were able to connect with Maksim in Russia by Skype to thank him for his work. Andy shared a disciple summary document which is good material for people to study who go to serve in foreign fields. Andy is the head of the LHI Education Team. (continued next page) 8

9 Minutes Continued: Andy shared about the Up Project they are planning two trips in 2017: a team to New York on their own. These would be adults who have been on Up teams for several years. Chris Lucas will be a part of this team. They will receive evangelism training with Vince and Sean Finnegan. There will be 15 on this team. These are all people who are out of high school. The other team will be led by Andy. They will go to help Pastor Scott Perciful in Oklahoma with the new work starting there. Up will also sponsor several weekend leadership training events in several areas: Blood River, LA; Guthrie Grove, SC; and South Bend, IN. The goal of UP is to go international in A member of the Up team will plan to go to Peru with our team in 2017 to explore if this would be a place to send a team in Kim prayed for the Up Project. Church Involvement Team We need to determine the best way to communicate with our churches to provide information, solicit funds, offer prayer requests, etc. Scott is the leader of this team. We definitely want to do another gift catalog for this Christmas and for next March. Kim, Josiah Cain, and Amber McClain will work with Scott to produce this quickly. The meeting was adjourned with prayer by Rick. Respectfully submitted: David Krogh, Secretary Addition to meeting minutes: Nov. 11, 2016: Kim Raper shared: Kim Laurent and I promoted a campaign to raise funds to build a kitchen structure ($500), utensils ($50), and a playground ($800) for the school in Kenya. We would also like to commit to $50 a month for food from remaining funds from this campaign. We would like to commit to $70 a month for the teacher as well, from Kim's remaining funds after her summer trip. Moved by David Krogh and seconded by Rebekah Martin to add this as an approved project of LHI. Motion carried. Addition to meeting minutes: Nov. 14, 2016: Jeremy Martin shared: I've been sponsoring a number of girls in Malawi to go to school in the amount of about $400 every 4 weeks with some excess occasionally that gets put into other areas (Bibles, orphans, etc). I'd like to continue this project. Moved by David Krogh and seconded by Kim Raper to add this as an approved project of LHI. Motion carried. Mailing List If you know of someone who would like to receive mission updates, they can receive it electronically by or by regular mail. Please provide their name and appropriate address to: dkrogh@atlantabiblecollege.org or by calling