Life's Healing Choices in Middle East!!!
Success!!!! Thank you Lord for Your leading us thru this time. Thank You for the many seeds that were planted in Your name!
Thank you so much for praying with us and for our team in our travels to present LHC to Egypt, Jordan, Palestine, Israel, (Bethlehem, Jerusalem), and Kuwait. God did and continues to do amazing things. Many seeds were planted.
See below for a small sampling and some specific answered prayers.
Leadership for me as the team leader to lead my team well and lean on Christ as the ultimate leader of our group- We had very minor illnesses with a few team members but all of them came at times after the work needed to be done. Thank you personally for helping me as the leader to lead our great group of servant hearts on this journey. We had great chemistry and amazing work accomplished.
– Prep time leading up to trip- thru May 11th- We were all extremely prepared and God provided a great view to see Him at work
– Health of our team leading up to and thru the duration of the trip- Craig and Angela got some pretty nasty head colds. Three of us, Craig, Don, Rodney had sore throats most of the time there and then Don and Luanne had stomach stuff lingering. But all of them were manageable and God pulled us thru it.
– Safe Travel to and from- Angela and Larry coming a day later than rest of team- We had great safe flights. Don had to get creative with his pillow cause we had to catch some sleep on the floor of the airport. :)
Larry did lose a very important bag on one of the flights that had a laptop and all his notes for the conference. The enemy was trying hard to discourage him. After seeing how God used his story and teaching it made much more sense afterward why he had so much trouble.
– Preparation for teachers and small group leaders- All the personal stories and personal application came across very well and God used in a huge way.
– That the testimonies being shared would penetrate the hearts of all those in attendance.- All reports we have and continue to receive back indicate incredible blessings and many hearts touched.
60 in Jordan: Israel, Iraq, Jordan, Palestine, are some that will be in attendance
120 adults and in Egypt in attendance- Actually doubled expected attendance to 220 and had to shut down registration due to no more room!!! Amazing!!
The last day we were there we did a "nail it to the Cross" only we used stones instead of rocks. The emotion and love that was seen at the Cross was so heartfelt and genuine. I cannot even begin to describe it in words. The Holy Spirit was very present.
– Safety for our team and all those coming to the Conference while there especially with the turmoil going on in the M.E. right now- God protected us each and every step of the way!!
– Safety for those traveling from other countries- Everyone made it safely without incident!
– God’s wisdom to intercede- “But, our culture is different” Those are the words day one and two we heard from many. Then to “maybe it can be different here. Maybe we can share our stuff.” God is taking a culture that did not believe it was possible to share our stuff with and changing their belief that they don’t have to keep their stuff inside any longer.
While we were there 12-15 leaders were called up to the front to be introduced as new leaders for upcoming CR’s to be birthed out of this. Many of these folks had attended the Syria trip last August. Much fruit came from that first conference and now much fruit will come from this trip.
Talk about overwhelming to see them up there and to be able to pray for them. Wow! God is big!
We also saw a large group of young adults standing outside the worship center one evening praying together, holding hands (unheard of in this culture) praying and worshiping together. Their prayer? ‘We want to be the next generation that will change how things have happened over many decades. May we be the generation of strength and courage to change how we deal with our stuff.” Change is coming!!!!!
– Team Unity while in the 15 days time together.- I can speak from my own experience and then the team debrief we had. Incredible unity and team spirit! What a blessing.
We met some amazing men and women while there.
Here are a few amazing men and women from the area. We were so blessed to meet them.
– That we would be prepared spiritually as a team with the Full Armor of God- We had every inch of armor on and it showed in how He guided us thru each step even when we were very tired.
– Protection for our families left behind while we are away- Again, God took care of that too with all our families being taken care of!!! Yeah God!
– That we would have a constant reminder in our walk that He is the one in control and not us.- Many reminders thru out as the issues coming to us were so overwhelmingly huge. Abuse, rape, drugs very rampant in Jersusalem and Bethlehem, pornography and unhealthy habits stemming from that, anger, fear, and on and on. Only He can be in control of that. It is amazing how no matter where you are in the world, we are more similar than you think.
– That God would change us while on this journey.- We all walked away better people after seeing and experiencing what we did. All of us challenged to continue our walk in Him.
How cool is it to see Life's Healing Choices in Arabic being used man mile away!?!?!? VERY COOL!!!
– Life’s Healing Choices will be used as a tool to present the gospel and penetrate the Middle East in huge ways. Ultimately lead more to Christ and His healing power.- Several groups already started since leaving the Middle East. God is already spreading this message of hope thru LHC and life’s are changing as we speak. YEAH GOD! Many CR step groups and Life’s Healing Choices groups are being birthed across the Middle East as a result of what He did the past two weeks. People get ready!
We also had some play days to see some incredible history. We saw the Great Pyramids
and then rode camels across the Sahara Desert to the Sphinx (Sp?) Wow! Very cool. We also learned that De-nial is not just a river in Egypt.
We saw some incredible Mosaic art as well done by hand many many years ago.
Isn't it great to know that know matter where we live we all can worship our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ!? All of us are broken, all of us matter and He has the power to help us recover and One, Jesus Christ gets the Glory for all He does in our life.
Imagine a view standing in the footprints of where Moses was once standing on Mt Nebo, where he looked out into the promise land before the Lord took him away. To your left about 200kil you will see The Sea of Galilee, straight ahead where it flows into the Jordan River where Jesus would be baptized, to your slight left off in the distance, Jericho, a little further left in the distance, Mt of Olives, and then to your left the Dead Sea. Wow! Such amazing history.
Thank you so much for your prayer covering while we were gone!!! Please continue to pray for our team for Physical, emotional and spiritual as we go thru reentry now. God bless all the great CR leaders who stayed behind to manage our own CR so that we could go and share the Good News thru Life's Healing Choices to our friends in the Middle East. More photos to be posted on Facebook from Don and Craig who were our primary photographers for the trip. Good stuff coming.
For more information or questions about how to get into a CR near you. Contact Rodney at 479-659-3679 roholmstrom@fellowshipnwa.org
TO GOD BE THE GLORY, GREAT THINGS HE HAS DONE!
ReplyDeleteHE goes above and beyond all that we can ask or even imagine!