God is working in Germany and Romania!

This past week has been full of blessings for our WorldReach mission team. We were in Germany last weekend with a group of Romanian believers who have a desire to reach German speaking people. Historically, Romanians who immigrate to other countries are intent on maintaining their cultural ties to their Romanian background. This includes the establishment of Romanian speaking churches. The challenges come as they place roots in their new country and begin establishing their families. For instance, the children of these German resident Romanians are educated in the German schools and can only proficiently read, write and speak German. While they speak Romanian in their homes, it is not their heart language. Also, as the families develop friendships among the German speaking people, they cannot invite them to attend worship services and other church activities due to the functions being held in Romanian.

This group of believers desires to be great commission Christians. In order to reach the people in their Jerusalem they must do it in the German language. Although a small group, they are a determined group. Our time was invested in discussing their plans for this large step forward, encouraging them to move forward as God leads, and praying with them for God’s guidance. We believe there will be a wonderful surge of reaching the non-believing German speaking people as a result of these fully devoted followers of our Lord Jesus Christ.

In Romania, our team has seen God gathering His harvest. The first fruits came in the airport in Bucharest,Romania as we were in route to our final destination. We met a Romanian woman to whom we were delivering a package of clothing at the request of a Romanian believer in America. The man who we were first to meet could not make it, so he asked his sister to meet us. Our time between flights was comfortable, but did not allow us an excess amount of time for delivery. While we waited on one floor of the airport, unknown to us, our contact person was on another floor. Such can be the pitfalls of transoceanic communication.

With little time left before we had to go through security screening and make our way to our gate, the lady finally realized where we were and came to meet us. She spoke passable English, but I sensed I needed to speak with her about Jesus and wanted to only do it in her heart language. I spoke through my interpreter and team member Benjamin Stanescu (a Romanian-American who coordinates WorldReach teams in southern Romania) and asked her if she were to die tonight does she know for certain she would go to heaven? She replied she didn’t know and immediately began to weep. God had prepared her for that encounter. His Spirit was drawing her to Himself. There, in the check-in area of the Bucharest airport, she repented and believed the good news.

We are currently in the Oltenia region of Romania where we are daily ministering in the villages. Economically, these are some of the poorest places in Romania. Scattered throughout are villages inhabited by gypsy’s, who tend to be the poorest of the poor. While the children do attend village schools, most of the older people are illiterate. Yet in the midst of all this poverty, God’s love is shining through.

As we walk through the villages stopping to engage people in the gospel, they respond. Others are invited to the evangelistic meetings that are held at night in their village, and they attend. Still others, as the gospel is preached, come to understand God’s love, their sin, and His provision for their salvation. Just in one village yesterday – Thursday – there were seventeen who repented and were born into the kingdom of God.

We ask you to continue to pray for us as we finish our time here Sunday evening and begin our trip back to the states. Pray for those who have yet to hear; that they will respond when they do. Pray that we will be an encouragement to the believers in the area. And pray for the health of our team, as we have faced a few challenges that could limit our ability to minister.

As always, we thank you for lifting us up before the Lord as we continue to join God in what He is doing in Oltenia Romania.

New opportunity to plant a church in Germany

A WorldReach team leaves for Germany on Thursday. They will be working with a group of Romanian believers in the Frankfurt area who want to plant a church to reach German speaking people. This is not the usual desire of Romanian Christians who immigrate to other countries. Their normal practice is to establish a Romanian speaking congregation.

Like many immigrants, the Romanians are quickly assimilating into the German culture due to their children being in the local schools. As the second generation Romanians are born and educated in Germany, they read, write, and speak German, but can only speak Romanian - with very little ability to read and write it. Discipleship for them must be done in German. Likewise, evangelism among German school mates, neighbors, co-workers and acquaintances cannot be done in Romanian.

This is an exciting opportunity and we are privileged that God has revealed to us what He is going to do and invited us to join Him in it. Please pray for this new endeavor! We will keep you advised of specific prayer requests, praise reports, and updates as we GO!

Are you one of the few with a Biblical worldview?

Thirteen years ago the Barna Group completed a survey that focused on American adults who had a biblical worldview. For the third time since then, they have once again surveyed adults to determine any trends that may be developing. The survey results indicate there is no appreciable change in the percent of American adults that purport to have a biblical worldview now than there was thirteen years ago. I guess you may say this is mixed news. On the one hand, it means there has been no slippage; however, on the other hand it means there has been no progress.

First, let me define biblical worldview for you as used by the Barna Group. In order for a person to have a biblical worldview they must believe that absolute moral truth exists; the Bible is totally accurate in all of the principles it teaches; Satan is considered to be a real being or force, not merely symbolic; a person cannot earn their way into Heaven by trying to be good or do good works; Jesus Christ lived a sinless life on earth; and God is the all-knowing, all-powerful creator of the world who still rules the universe today. If someone believed all of these six criteria, they were considered to hold a biblical worldview.

The survey indicates only 9% of all American adults hold a biblical worldview. Again, this has not changed in the past 13 years. The survey also indicates only 19% of born again Christians hold a biblical worldview. That’s correct only one in five born again believers attest to their belief in all six criteria. Are you surprised?

Let’s look deeper. Less than half of the born again believers believe absolute moral truth exists. Just 40% of them believe Satan is real. And more than half of the born again believers hold that a person can earn their way to Heaven by trying to do good works. Are you getting the tragic picture yet?

Let’s look at adults aged 18 -23. The survey indicates that less than one-half of one percent of this age group holds a biblical worldview. That’s right less than one-half of one percent.

In the release of this information, George Barna had this observation, “There are several troubling patterns to take notice. First, although most Americans consider themselves to be Christian and say they know the content of the Bible, less than one out of ten Americans demonstrate such knowledge through their actions. Second, the generational pattern suggests that parents are not focused on guiding their children to have a biblical worldview. One of the challenges for parents, though, is that you cannot give what you do not have, and most parents do not possess such a perspective on life. That raises a third challenge, which relates to the job that Christian churches, schools and parachurch ministries are doing in Christian education. Finally, even though a central element of being a Christian is to embrace basic biblical principles and incorporate them into one’s worldview, there has been no change in the percentage of adults or even born again adults in the past 13 years regarding the possession of a biblical worldview.”

The Great Commission is for us to go into all the world and make disciples of Jesus Christ; teaching them all that Christ has commanded. If we are Great Commission Christians we will not only hold to a biblical worldview, but we will teach it to others…including our sons and daughters, our grandsons, granddaughters, nieces, and nephews. To do anything less is to be disobedient to the task to which we have all been called.

Do you have a biblical worldview? Are you certain? Are you teaching it to others, beginning in your own home? On a nationwide basis, we are not impacting our culture. To do so, we first need look no further than across our breakfast table, then across our street. If God will revive us to see people as He sees them, then we will love them enough to teach them about Him. In so doing, we will see a nation transformed by a biblical worldview.

For the complete report from the Barna Group, click here.

Update and prayer requests from New Orleans mission team

This post is from guest blogger Sarah Doss, a member of the 3/8-15 New Orleans mission team:

Hello from the bayou...

Since setting out Sunday morning from Athens with a group of 19 college students we have seen the Lord do some great things. For our first few days of ministry here in the "Big Easy" we have been working on two homes that were damaged by Katrina over 4 years ago and are still not livable. We are partnering with an organization called the New Orleans Dream Center, a ministry in the middle of a low-income part of downtown New Orleans that specifically focuses on outreach. The next few days we will be trying to finish up some work in the homes and visiting inner city schools in support of an outreach program.

As we continue in this ministry, we have several praises and prayer requests. We covet your prayers as we continue to serve the Lord in this city that seems spiritually dark and ask that you join us in praying that the light of the Lord's glory would shine into this dark place. Our desire is that Christ would receive the praise due His name in this place.

Praises and Prayer requests:

Praise the Lord that a local man, Stanley, accepted Christ in the park this [Wednesday] afternoon. Please pray for Stanley in his new walk with Christ. Pray for the team as they go tomorrow (Thursday) to meet with him again and share some discipleship tools with him.

Praise the Lord that He is providing divine appointments, please pray that He would yet supply more and that we would be prepared and faithful to speak His words.

Pray for Miss Ruby and Miss Florence. These are the two older ladies on whose homes we are working. Both of them have been out of their homes for 4 years and been swindled by local contractors who did the sane to many during the aftermath of Katrina. Please pray for Miss Florence's salvation and for encouragement for the both of them. Pray that we would show them Jesus in our service.

Last, please pray for our rest and continued protection/safety. Pray that we would be sensitive to the Holy Spirit's leading in our interactions with others.

Thank you for being on mission with us in New Orleans.

...we thank Sarah for her agreeing to provide team updates and encourage you to be part of what God is doing in New Orleans by joining the many who are engaged in praying for them.

God speaks...and disciplines me...in Peru

Being involved with God in what He is doing around the world never gets boring. Whether it is visiting in the home of someone in the Athens area, or in the hut of someone in another country, obeying God by faith brings with it the opportunity to witness Him at work and for Him to speak to me.

While recently in Peru I witnessed a unique level of commitment by God’s people to be involved with Him. Not only did He use it to speak to me, but it was a time He used to discipline me.

As our WorldReach mission team prepared to go into the Andes in southern Peru, we informed that we would lead discipleship sessions on consecutive Saturdays. One session was to address leadership. This was to teach biblical principles of leadership, especially as it relates to discipleship of the believers and developing future leaders within the local body. The second session was to provide evangelism training and address doctrinal issues. Not denominational issues, but orthodox Christian beliefs and how the kingdom of the cults preaches a gospel other than that laid out in the Bible.

The town used as our base of operation for the training is in a valley at about 9,600 feet above sea level. The villages surrounding that town are at elevations above 13,000 feet. What we did not know is that those who were to attend the training had to walk down from the villages…a trek of three hours. As if this is not enough of a show of commitment, the trek back up the mountain after the training takes five hours. That’s right; the people attending the training sessions had to walk eight hours a day in order to be part of the training…and they did it both Saturdays!

Talk about a hunger for God’s word; I have never witnessed such a desire to be discipled. It was humbling. I thought of the times in my life that I would think it inconvenient to have to walk a few minutes in the rain because there was not a parking space any closer to the church entrance. Times that I sloughed off going to a Bible study because I would be late and too embarrassed to walk in after the class started.

Christ spoke to me in Peru as I watched the people stream in from the villages nestled among the majestic Andean peaks. He reminded me that His commitment to me extended to the suffering of the most heinous of deaths to be invented by man. He reminded me that His commitment to me was not one of convenience, but one of obedience to the Father. The hardships I have faced pale in comparison to what Jesus suffered as He was beaten – the flesh being torn from His body; as He was stripped bare; and as His hands and feet had spikes hammered through as He was lifted up upon the cross.

It was a time of repentance for me. I had to repent from the casual level of commitment it takes to call Him Lord, and recommit myself to living a life that demonstrates He is my Lord.

I thank God for allowing me to go to Peru, witness first hand true commitment, experience God’s love as He brought the conviction of my sin to my attention, and receive His forgiveness as I confessed my sin to Him.