Spotlight On Missions
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P.O. Box 878 • Conway, AR 72033-0878 • 501.455.4977 • www.bmamissions.org
Candra Barnett • Romania
Vine Primavara! Spring is coming! After a long winter, the flowers in my yard are blooming, and many spiritual seeds are sprouting at last! We are so thankful for all God did this winter, and are looking forward with joy to all He will do this spring and summer!
• Thanksgiving Celebrations — Fall brought Thanksgiving, both American-style and Romanian! The Romanian churches celebrate “Ziua Multumirii” — a day of thanks, one Sunday out of October. Everyone brings things from their gardens to represent giving back to the Lord for the harvest He’s given us. Pam and I were honored to help arrange the presentation of fruits and veggies, and we loved celebrating the special day with over 100 people at church that Sunday! We also celebrated American Thanksgiving with a sweet, nonbelieving friend. Please pray for this friend, Carla, as we continue to witness to her.
• Agape Leaders Retreat — This fall, we took some time to both spoil and train the hard-working leaders of Agape. We took three families to the beach to pray, rest, fellowship together and plan for the future. Through our conversations on this trip, our new discipleship groups were born. The Lord blessed our time, and we are so thankful for these families!
• Christmas Season — Christmas was busy as always, with ministry opportunities galore. We gave out shoes and food bags in the gypsy village, chocolate chip cookies to all our friends and church family and organized a kids’ Christmas pageant at Agape! We also soaked up time with the Risner kids, who came home for the month. It was so sweet to all be together again.
• First Small Group Meeting — We began our discipleship groups in January! We have split our church into three small groups that meet weekly to study the Bible and fellowship. On top of that, as their leaders, we check in on each member weekly to see how they are doing spiritually. Bryan, Pam and I are leading a group comprised of 2 families and 15 teenagers! It is a challenge to disciple so many teens, but we enjoy working to get to know them better and are praying the Lord will use this to grow them each in Christ!
Prayers
• The kids being here for Christmas was wonderful, but we miss them dearly. Pray for our hearts!
• For our church plant as we work on a meeting place solution.
• For many who are on the fence to fully commit to Agape.
• Cristina, my massage therapist who is a nonbeliever. Pray God will give me the right words to witness to her.
• For our upcoming ladies’ day event. We are asking all our church ladies to bring a nonbelieving friend.
• That God will bless Return Church plant (Brasov) and our gypsy ministry (Santandrei).
• That God will make missionaries, pastors, leaders and servants out of Agape kids!
Praises
• Every person from Agape is plugged into a discipleship group!
• Agape church plant just had its one-year birthday! God is so good to us!
• We had large turnouts for Thanksgiving and Christmas, and we pray that these new connections will be cultivated.
• Our church is growing in its knowledge of God and His Word. Pray now that we can encourage the church to be missions-minded.
• Summer is coming! We are excited and praying about many new outreach opportunities this spring and summer. Please pray with us.
• My Romanian language skills are growing. I’m back to language classes, hoping to become more fluent!
(candrainromania@gmail.com)
Romania Missionaries In Africa
What were your missionaries to Romania doing in Africa? We went to Africa to encourage our fellow BMA missionaries and friends, the Quillman’s, to remind ourselves of our own passion for missions and to ignite a love for missions in Agape church plant!
Though God helps us and delivers us through all kinds of trials, it is still a fact that the missionary life can be a lonely one at times. No one we come in contact with on a daily basis quite understands the kinds of things we face. That’s why it was such a blessing to spend time with our missionary friends, Sharon and Mickeal Quillman, on this trip.
While we were in Zambia, I was able to teach 168 kids who came to a children’s program at the church. What a huge blessing that was! Many of these kids know little to nothing about the God of the Bible, and it was such a privilege to share the creation story with them.
Life in Africa is so different from life in Romania, just as life in Romania is so different from life in America. My heart has always been on fire for missions. As I have spent the last five years in Romania though, Romania has felt more and more like home and less and less like a mission field. Visiting Zambia reminded me of my passion for the lost, and set me on fire again to come back to Romania and serve with renewed vigor.
As I returned home to Romania, I had a desire to share with my Agape kids and challenge them in a special way. I presented a few Sundays ago on my time in Africa and have challenged them to raise money for children’s Bibles to send to the kids in Africa. They were excited to help, and up for the challenge. Please pray for them as they learn more and more about missions and sharing the gospel with others.
As we returned from our time in Africa, we felt a desire to share our time and our passion for missions with our church plant here. We have spent the last few weeks sharing about Africa and missions, and even have a Romanian couple willing to return with us this summer! It is so exciting for us to see Romanians becoming excited for and interested in missions. It is our dream to see a missionary sent out from Romania by a BMA church one day! Will you be praying for this with us?
Prayers for Zambia
• There is a huge drought going on there — pray for rain and relief.
• Pray for Mickeal and Sharon Quillman, our amazing BMA missionaries there who are serving in mighty ways.
• Pray for Chabantu Baptist Church, that many churches will come from this plant and that God will be glorified in the surrounding villages.
Ways to Help!
• Partner with Agape Sunday School classes to help buy children’s Bibles for the kids in Africa!
• Donate to provide a scholarship for a Romanian to go on a mission trip!
• Spend specific time in prayer for a missionary to rise up out of Agape Church.
“But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth” (Acts 1:8 NIV).
(candrainromania@gmail.com)
Bryan & Pam Risner • Romania
What in the world happened to the Risners and their updates? Our writer (Melody), Lindsey and Landon graduated high school in Romania and moved back to America. It is one of many gaps we have had since our kids graduated and moved back to the States. We enjoyed having them home for Christmas and have missed them dearly since they returned to America (hard for me to call it their home).
In addition to Christmas ministry responsibilities and festivities, we celebrated New Year’s together, the twin’s 19th birthday, and my (Pam’s 41st) birthday.
There is something special about missionaries serving other missionaries. We spent a week serving the Quillmans and their ministry in Zambia. I’m not sure who received the greater blessing, us or them. We will share more in a future update.
Thanks to a generous sponsorship, our gypsy children in our two communities received new shoes and a Christmas gift. All the families in the two Gypsy communities also received food bags for Christmas.
We are very blessed to have young adults attend and be involved at Agape church.
We are a big, small group of 23 members. Our weekly attendance averages 18-20. As spiritual parents, our goal is to check in regularly throughout the week and encourage our group to read and study Scripture.
Is there anything sweeter than a children’s Christmas play? These kids worked hard and did a terrific job.
Praise Reports
• Agape Church Plant is one year old
• Agape is growing quickly in the area of discipleship
• Agape Church launched successful discipleship groups
• A baptism in December
• Attendance was great for Thanksgiving and Christmas programs
• The kids are in their second semester in college at Central Baptist College
• The kids were here for Christmas break
• Spring weather has arrived
• Our prayer and financial partners
• The opportunity to serve in Romania
• Ordained two pastors
• Agape Leaders’ Retreat
• Mission trip to Zambia
Prayer Needs
• Agape Church
• Meeting location to be resolved
• All attendees to fully commit to the church
• March 12 Ladies’ Event: connect non-believers to Agape
• To be evangelical: missions locally and abroad
• Summer programs
• Upcoming baptism service
• One more committed adult for us to apply as a legal church entity in Romania
• Salvation for my friends, Carla, Csilla, Ileana, Anette and Vivienne
• Peace with the kids being back in America
• God’s blessing on the Gypsy Children’s Ministry and Return Church (Brasov) Plant
(risnersinromania@gmail.com)
Michael & Laura Beth Strong • Minneapolis, Minn.
“But he said to me, ‘My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.’ Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me. For the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities. For when I am weak, then I am strong” (II Cor. 12:9-10 ESV).
Since I last shared, God has been doing quite a few potentially puzzling things. For one, we experienced two break-ins in two weeks and a third attempt a week after. Over $6,000 worth of electronics and equipment were stolen. We lost everything we use for our worship services, outreach concerts and family movie nights. Bobby (you likely know that name by now) and I walked in on the destruction after the second break-in when we came in the building for the weekly Friday morning prayer meeting. I’d be lying if I said it didn’t really impact me. Honestly, it hurt. It caused significant pain in the moment. I couldn’t think of how we would move forward because our services are on Saturdays and there wouldn’t be time to get everything back up and running. But God…
As I shared about the break-ins, we saw God do something amazing. We had brothers reach out to encourage us. We had people who wanted to help us. Today, thanks to a generous church, we have almost all the money raised to replace the equipment. We also had a couple of dear brothers from FreedomWorks, the place I volunteer each week leading Bible studies, contact us and surprise us with a system we could use until we got our own. We didn’t want to lose this system, too, so I rented a storage room offsite and packed it away. We went back to the hymnals and sang in acapella. God blessed us as our people got to show how much more valuable God is than anything we lost. It was almost like nothing was taken. The impact on our service was so much smaller than I thought it would be, and it was one of the first times I got to hear all our people singing (maybe the music is too loud)! I can only praise God for the way He turns losses into great gain.
The Twins and my father had birthdays — their birthdays are all on the same day. Laura, Bobby and I took the kiddos to an indoor playground, and we celebrated with family. God blessed the time. I love seeing how the kids are growing, but I also hate it. It goes too fast.
We also had a couple of major business meetings. We had one of the first non-unanimous votes ever. This vote was on adjusting our budget to lower expenses due to the limited amount of funds we are receiving. The group was about half and half, with some wanting to take the cuts and the other half wanting to continue without taking the cuts. We ended up voting on praying about it for a month. This was a blessing to experience. The next month, we took up the old business and discussed what God was leading the church to do. This time we had a unanimous vote in favor of the cuts.
Our meeting last month addressed another hard issue — church discipline. We had a list of members who are not actively engaged in meaningful membership for various reasons. I shared the work Isaiah and I had been engaged in to call the old members back to join us and take part. I then asked the church to vote to remove the members unless there was reason to leave them on the rolls. Again, we had a divided group. Instead of moving forward, I asked the group to reach out to the missing members on behalf of the church and meet again this month to vote on what to do rather than divide the church. We had a unanimous vote to take this course of action. Since then, we have seen three members return and do so consistently. We look forward to others doing the same in the near future. We also saw an increase in volunteers at our weekly service.
Business meetings are important to me. I see them as another gift from God to disciple our people. We get to teach biblical wisdom on matters that impact our people in their own homes and at work. My hope is our people will grow in this wisdom and become even better equipped to glorify God in how they oversee the responsibilities He gives them in and outside the church. We work on financial wisdom, like budgets and planning events. We work on prioritization principles due to our size and limited resources. We work on doctrinal issues like membership. We work on practical theology like how to live out the things we believe. And in all of it, we learn to do these things by faith rather than by means that come from some source other than the Word of God.
What we have seen is that God is able to take the things Satan and his demonic forces would love to use to end our work and instead use it to grow our faith and increase our love. We have seen Him take us through loss and potential division and use both for increasing our unity and faith. He is a faithful God!
Please pray for us, as there are several other challenges going on internally. We have some people going through some really hard things, as you are probably also walking through with your people. With most of our group being new believers, we are doing our best to be involved in the lives of our people to help them face these challenges and mature in their faith and character. We can’t do near what we would like to do. We need prayer for our people to overcome sin they are now fighting.
We also need prayer for ongoing needs, long-term needs, to accomplish the work God has here in Minnesota. We need prayer for ongoing provision. We need prayer to continue to add partners that get church planting in hard places is very profitable for the kingdom, but also requires significantly longer time frames than some other locations. We need co-laborers who are mature and able to come and walk with members who have the gifts to grow into future leaders, but need to grow in sound doctrine, character and their skillsets. This is especially true for the women’s ministry. Only my wife, who is also limited due to needs at home with our many children and her own health, has been a Christian for several years.
One last prayer request is for our membership class. We have five new potential members, with at least one being a young man who was saved at a recent service. We recently met to work through the roughly four-hour class. Please ask God to give clarity to the attendees and continue to grow our unity around the purpose and plan He has for this church plant.
Thank you for your prayers and your partnership in the gospel ministry.
Also, I am trying to figure out how to get to the national meeting. I am the clerk for the Baptist Publishing House and would prefer to be there in person, but I would also like to meet with anyone who God may be leading to find out more about the ministry here and how you can partner. Please email me at mike@nnccmpls.com if you would like to set up some time to meet.
One area I want to put out there where we need short-term help is in regard to surveying the neighborhoods of North Minneapolis this summer. This would be impossible to do in the time we have available this summer if we end up limited to our small group of members, but with a few churches coming out to lock arms with us and take the task on, we could definitely accomplish it. We would also like to start feeding some specific groups around our part of town and could use partners to help us accomplish that for a year or two. Thanks for praying about how you might be able to answer the call to make disciples and plant churches in Minnesota.
Siripong & Jessie Yaebeang • Thailand
We noticed that there was a guy selling idols/Buddha images on the stand of the road in front of our neighborhood. The moment I got there, he tried to show me what he had. The most expensive one he had cost several thousands of dollars for one piece. I gently but firmly told him that I am Christian, that I worship God, not idols, and I just wanted to talk to him. He was very friendly, and we got to speak for several minutes. I left him two gospel tracts (with our contact information) and encouraged him to read them, which he said he would. Please pray for this man (and many more who give their lives to idols). A small conversation and encounter like this remind us of the great need for the gospel here.
It’s been a while since we shot some videos answering some questions that people have asked, so recently we took the time to record some. I addressed several important question.
In our last update, we asked you to pray for a lady named Anne, that has been coming to our church. She’s still coming every Sunday! She has also been reading the Bible and other gospel-centered materials we gave her. I started meeting with her during the week (along with another member from our church) to talk about the gospel. We plan to do this for about a month or so. Please pray that the Lord will open her heart.
This past month, two church members took the next step in their service by leading the adult Sunday School! This may be a small thing for churches already established and full of gifted men/women, but this is big for a new church plant like ours! As I was helping them get ready, they seemed to be most concerned about the end, where members could ask questions about the lesson. I encouraged them that they would be able to answer if they studied/prepared the lesson, and I will also be in the room to help them. Both did well, and I’m thankful they are willing to serve in this way, in addition to the other areas where they already serve.
I recently started on my next writing project, which I’ve wanted to do for some time — the parables of Jesus. I will cover two main things — the fundamental understanding of the parable and the studying of several parables. Lord willing, I hope to finish most of it, if not all, by the end of this year. It’s a bigger project, but I’m excited to study and learn from Christ’s parables. Please pray that the Lord will give me wisdom and strength.
We took a road trip during the week to meet up with my family up north. Though it was brief, we were glad to see everyone in my family (except one of my older sisters). It was especially nice to see and spend some time with my dad. But after we got back to Bangkok, his condition got worse, and he lost a lot of blood and was taken to the hospital. While he was waiting to go to the hospital, he called me with the realization that his time could be near. We are thankful for each day the Lord is extending for him. I appreciate your prayers for him.
We were thrilled to welcome four Burmese students at our church recently. They study at a university not far from our church. For three of them, it was their first time ever at a church. Interestingly, two of them know some Thai since their hometown is close to the Thai border. I got to visit with them before and after church. We also invited them to our house for supper one evening to get to know them and see how we can best serve them. They told us they have been living here for almost a year and this was the first home they had been invited to in Thailand. It’s our honor. Please pray for them while they are here and for their home country, Burma. Several parts of this nation have been going through some really tough times recently.
Since I usually preach through books in the Bible (i.e., I’m now preaching through Ephesians), I rarely get to preach a topical message. But this past month, I had one particular Sunday that was appropriate to pause from studying Ephesians. So, I preached one precious attribute of God — His love. In this message, I invited our people to behold 12 biblical characteristics of God’s love (i.e., it’s a Trinitarian love, an eternal love, the highest love, an electing/sovereign love, the holy love, a sacrificial love, a jealous love and 5 more!). It was a tremendous blessing for me to meditate and teach on these attributes.
I encourage you to study and meditate on the attributes of God (or preach/teach at your church, if applicable). There are several helpful resources out there on the attributes of God — Show Me Your Glory by Steve Lawson, Knowing God by J.I. Packer, The Attributes of God by A.W. Pink, The Knowledge of the Holy by A.W. Tozer, The Holiness of God by R.C. Sproul, The Sovereignty of God by Jeffrey Johnson and Knowing the Living God by Paul Washer.
A few days after I finished my ninth-grade year, I hopped on my motorcycle called a “Honda Wave” and left my small village to pursue an unknown journey/future in Bangkok. That was March 2004, and this month marks 20 years! From March 2004 to March 2024, a lot has happened, with countless stories and memories (both good and bad). Looking back, one thing I see more clearly than anything else is the grace of God. I’m thankful for Him and people God placed along the way to display His grace, which included many of you. May His grace be with you as well. Twenty years later (and counting), God is still working — and so is that motorcycle!
Thank you for taking the time to read this update. We love hearing from you, and it’s always a great encouragement. So please feel free to write me and/or Jessie at thailand.forhisglory@hotmail.com. Grace and peace to you and your family!
AJ • Reaching the 10/40 Window
Editor’s Note: This missionary’s name and ministry location are not being shared for security reasons.
Wow! I can’t believe it has already been two months since I returned to my training location. Thank you for your prayers back in January as you prayed for safe travels. It was an eventful travel day for sure! After three flight cancellations and several delayed flights, I finally arrived with another classmate at 11p.m.
It was a great transition reconnecting with local friends, friends on campus and getting back into the routines. I have come to really love the city where I am living. It is so different from where I grew up, but has felt more and more like home as time passes. I especially love visiting the beach and reveling in God’s creation as I do homework.
Time passes so quickly. As I am excited to come home and see family and friends, I have absolutely loved my time here and often tear up at the fact that we only have two months or so left. Please pray for me as I try to make the most of the time God has given me here.
Quiero Agradecerte Dios in Spanish means “I want to thank you, God!” It is a song we sang at church recently and resonates so much with how I am feeling right now. God has given me so many incredible new experiences this semester and so many new friends!
I have learned how to make tortillas and sweet pumpkin (dulce de calabaza) with local friends. Flour tortillas were on the top of my bucket list and my language helper (who is a cook) graciously taught me how to make them. They are so simple and easy!
This semester we got to choose a local Spanish church to get involved in. I asked several of you to pray about this decision and thank you for doing so. It has been such a joy to get to know the people at my church. It has been so uplifting to worship in Spanish, try my best to understand a Spanish sermon (our pastor speaks really fast) and get involved with the young adults and the women’s ministry. We are always encouraged to push into our unbelieving friends here, which is great practice for the next context when there may or may not be believers, or a church, within reach. I cannot help but give thanks to the Lord for the brothers and sisters in Christ I have met while here. Just yesterday, I was at a jóvenes (youth) meeting with some friends from church and I couldn’t help but tear up during the prayer as I realized that I will one day be worshipping around the throne of God with these brothers and sisters.
A few weeks ago, I got to go on a road trip with my roommate and her local friend to a city about two hours from us. They were running a half marathon, and I went to be their cheerleader. It was so exciting to get to know another city and hear the interesting history behind it. At one point, the population of this city was over 80% Chinese. Nowadays, there are not that many Chinese, but they did leave behind some amazing Chinese food, which we did get to experience! I recently had the privilege of attending a youth rally with my local church friends. We had a devotional, then did some community service projects, ate lunch together and closed with an amazing time of singing and preaching. On the way back, we stopped at the beach for some coffee and pizza!
I will leave you with some encouragement from the book of Acts. We have been slowly making our way through this book in class this semester. In chapter 5, the apostles are arrested and brought before the council (again) for preaching the resurrection. After they were threatened and beaten, their response, similar to that of chapter 4, was pure boldness given by the Holy Spirit. “Then they left the presence of the council, rejoicing that they were counted worthy to suffer dishonor for the name. And every day, in the temple and from house to house, they did not cease teaching and preaching that the Christ is Jesus” (Acts 5:41-42 ESV). Not only did they continue preaching Christ despite the council’s threats, they rejoiced for their suffering. They were rejoicing that they were counted worthy to suffer dishonor for the name of Christ. That is my prayer for myself, my friends, my family and my fellow students here — that we would all not lose sight of the worthiness of Christ. May you be filled with the boldness of the Holy Spirit to proclaim His Word!
Join with me in praying that I will be able to discern teammates, a location and a people group to serve among long-term and for God to lead me to a family to stay with during our homestay week in April. Also join me in praising God for the new experiences He has been giving me with local friends and for my church family here. (arkslp@protonmail.com)
Mickeal & Sharon Quillman • Zambia
Mwatambulwa ku Chabantu Missionary Baptist Church! I say this almost every Sunday morning and during our weekly Bible studies. Mwatambulwa (Mwah-Tom-Bull-Wah) is a Citonga (one of the 72 languages spoken here in Zambia) word that means “you are welcome here.” Chabantu, the name chosen for our first church plant, is also a Citonga word that means “all of the people.” Our heart is to bring all the gospel to all the people, no matter where we are, and these few words in Citonga are a constant reminder of why God has brought us here to Zambia. Everyone is welcome to receive the free gift of salvation and be discipled, regardless of who they are or where they are from.
God has blessed us to work within two tribal chiefdoms, Sekute and Musokatwane, with 20 different villages. We currently have around 10 village headmen and one senior headman who regularly attend our Sunday services or one of our weekly Bible study groups.
We began another discipleship class on Tuesday afternoons at the beginning of March. We are going through the “Our Doctrine” workbook the Baptist Publishing House has made available on its website. If you haven’t visited their website lately or used their resources, I urge you to call Jordan Tew and let him share the available resources. This is an unpaid endorsement, but I will accept coffee.
You may wonder why we are taking the time with new believers to go through doctrine. For me, this is one of the essential teachings all believers should know. It is not just about why you are a Baptist or part of the BMA, etc., but what do you believe and can you articulate your beliefs to others? Just this month, we have been able to really dig into what the Bible says about who God is, what the Trinity is and what we believe about the inerrancy of Scripture. II John 1:9 talks about abiding in the doctrine of Christ. How can we abide in something we have never been taught? I have been overwhelmed with joy about the number of new believers attending, and our group continues to grow each week! In addition to new believers, we have five men attending who are also being trained as pastors to help plant additional churches and lead Bible studies.
As I mentioned pastoral training, we have five men who have a calling on their lives to be pastors and church planters within the local villages. We are utilizing the 10-book curriculum entitled Bible Training Centre for Pastors, which begins with “How to Study the Bible” and continues from there. This is a multi-year “seminary-type” course for men who do not have the opportunity to attend a seminary. This training is designed to aid called men of God in preaching the Word and pastoring their flock.
When these men finish the fifth book in the course, they will start training another man from book one. This allows us to train and equip pastors and build multiplication of disciples into our church DNA from the start. In addition to pastors being trained and discipled, we also have several laymen and women who will begin going through Bible Training Centre for Leaders with the same emphasis on beginning to disciple another person at the halfway point. We believe this helps us fulfill Paul’s instruction to Timothy in II Tim. 2:2.
All the training and discipleship we are doing now is laying the groundwork for another church plant in the near future as God leads. We will begin the weekly Bible study in this new village area this month. I have met with the local headman and received permission and a location to meet under a huge shade tree! These men and women we are discipling will provide the leaders and teachers as we continue to bring all the gospel, to all the people. (Chabantu)
Pray with us that God will break the stronghold of witchcraft in one of our local headmen. His wife is a new believer and is being treated poorly for following Jesus and attending services. When she attends Bible study or church services, she is not allowed to eat at home that day and is locked out of their home to sleep outside, but she is still attending.
Also, pray for food within the villages. The drought over the last three years has caused a food scarcity. Many are only getting one meal per day consisting of boiled ground white corn (Nshima). The government has just opened its emergency grain stores.
We also ask you to pray for the future of the Baptist Missionary Association Bible Institute. We are preparing a place where all the students can come on a regular basis for their training, while giving us a place to land so we aren’t driving four hours every day.
Currently, we need a battery-powered projector, a battery-powered portable sound system and a portable screen for the projector. (pastorquill@gmail.com)
Doug and Diane Lee • Philippines
Today we are faced with many challenges, and with every challenge there is a decision that must be made — “And we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another. For this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit” (II Cor. 3:18 ESV). But God says, “I pour My very Life into you, and all you have to do is receive Me.” Then, it seems the challenges disappear, and there is victory!
Second Semester Begins — Each semester begins with Orientation and Prayer Day! The students divide into prayer groups to pray for the new semester, the students, staff, faculty and special prayer requests. It is a spirit-filled time which prepares the hearts and minds of everyone for a new semester. Afterward, the students have “Brigada.” In Illongo, this means “Clean-Up Time.” Everyone pitches in to work and clean up the college campus grounds and buildings. There is always a spirit of unity as they combine work and fun to get the job done!
• World Mission Day — Dean of BMA Bible College (BMABC) Marie Jan Samson shared the following concerning involvement with BMA Global’s World Mission Day: “BMABC joined the concerted effort of raising funds for missions in our corner of the world! February 27 was set aside as a special day to promote and do our part. It was a wonderful service filled with encouragement from the Word of God through the school president, Dr. Doug Lee and beautiful songs by the BMABC choir, led by Jefhen Kish Balboa and our BMABC male quartet. The students have been saving their money and an offering of P15,500 (approximately $275 US) was collected for the BMA of the Philippines Missions Department. To God by the glory!”
• Every Tongue, Every Tribe, Every Nation! — To prepare our students, who are our future Asia-Pacific missionaries, the BMABC hosted a Cross-cultural Training Seminar on the campus. Some of our graduates have already committed to a calling to go to other Asian countries and, using the example of Paul, going as “tentmaker” missionaries. They will enter with work visas, start a ministry and eventually plant churches. We have gifted pastors, teachers and workers, who are capable of learning languages and merging into other cultures easily. BMA President Dr. John David Smith gave words of encouragement and wisdom, along with BMABC Alumnus Melanie Bliss who is now living in Australia.
Pastor Vincent Ferrer and Pastor Gil Gasataya led the conference and taught our students how to adapt to living in a different country with diverse values, beliefs and customs. A healthy adjustment to culture shock and to the physical, social and distinct mindsets of another country can make a difference in the success of the mission work. We will do a Part II soon, with training in communicating the gospel to these nations. Pray for our students as they use this training to carry the Great Commission to other countries.
• College Week — The students used the cross-cultural theme for their College Week activities. They dressed in costumes depicting different countries and learned to cook the special delicacies from each country. They studied the culture of the land they represented. Some of the activities were basketball, volleyball, storytelling, talent contests, Bible drills and the Amazing Race! It culminated with the crowning of Mr. and Miss BMABC.
• Lifeword Director and BMABC Student Installing Online Facilities — A big thanks to Lifeword Asia Pacific Director Pastor Pete Etabag and our student, Nicu Caballero, for the installation of online equipment at the Bible College. This will enable us to reach prospective students in other parts of the country through live streaming. Paired technology and training allow us to extend the borders of BMABC to those in distant places. (edouglee70@gmail.com, dianehusserlee@gmail.com)