Pray for NEPAL

	Isaiah 49:6 “It is too light a thing that you should be my servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob and to bring back the preserved of Israel; I will make you as a light for the nations, that my salvation may reach to the end of the earth.” Pray for my team of 16, that we will work together and be sensitive to the leading of the Holy Spirit. Pray for our leaders, Kegan and John.
	Pray for the villages we will be stopping at, that God awakens the hearts of the villagers and gives them an understanding of the Gospel. Pray that we will be able to connect with them.
	Pray that God opens a door of opportunity for me to work with Nepali children.
	Much of the country is desperately poor – 42% live below the poverty line; only 15% have any access to electricity. Pray that they will look to God in their poverty and that he will provide for them in their need.
	Pray for people who are working to translate the Bible into a further 12 languages for Nepal. There are still another 83 languages without any translations of the Bible. May HIS Kingdom come to Lynchburg, Nepal and the ends of the earth! http://operationworld.24-7prayer.com/country.php?country_id=36

BOAST only in Weakness…for when I am weak then I am strong

I remember my mom asking me, “What do you want to be when you grow up?"

As a fourteen year old, I knew exactly what I wanted to be, “I want to be like the apostle Paul and travel around and tell everyone about Jesus. I NEVER want to own a car or a house or a TV.”

I had it all planned out. When I graduated college I was going to Africa and never coming back! I thought Americans were so spoiled. They indulged in luxuries such as Starbucks, running water, electricity. They had been fattened by consumption. I had boasted how I was going to live simply and look after orphans.

When the time came, I graduated college and headed to Africa…however, God had an important lesson to teach me: Boast only in weakness.

I thought I was going to Africa to make a big difference for God, however I had a distorted view of bringing God glory. In my heart I thought I was "better" than others. I had boasted about NEVER wanting to own a car or a house or a TV. I wanted to live simply. I was sick of luxurious America. Because I had boasted in all these things God humbled me and made me the very thing I condemned, a spoiled American living in Uganda. I missed couches, Starbucks and all the other luxuries of America. Through this, I have realized that many of these "luxuries" are a blessing and can be used for the glory of God. I can enjoy a Starbucks coffee, sit on a comfortable couch, buy a house for the glory of God and not as a "spoiled American".

In a few years I believe God wants me to go back to Uganda and live simply, but I need to do it with HIS strength and not out of pride or a condemning, judgmental spirit.

Lord, help us to never judge anyone, for with the judgment we judge others, we will be judged. May we never boast in our strength, but rather in our weakness and in Christ and him crucified.

Mission Trip Nepal 2012…

Dear Friends & Family Mission Trip Nepal 2012… Nepal has a population of 30 million and is in grave need of the Gospel. There are currently 348 unreached people groups! Nepal is 80% Hindu, 11% Buddhist, and 4% Muslim. It is one of the poorest countries in the world, as nearly a quarter of them live under the poverty line. Last fall I prayed that God would increase my faith. The very next week I felt the Lord impress on my heart to go on a mission trip. God opened the door for me to sign up to go to Nepal through Liberty University. Our team of 16 will be partnering with the International Mission’s Board where we will be trekking to the people, sharing the gospel, giving out Christian literature, prayer walking, teaching Bible lessons, and building relationships. I will leave May 16th and return June 19th. The last 3 weeks I will be working with the street children of Kathmandu. I also hope to connect with a ministry that is working with women coming out of the sex-trade. Please join me in prayer: "Prayer strikes the winning blow; service is simply picking up the pieces." S.D.Gordon PRAY....... that at least one person from every village we visit becomes a believer and that other leaders are sent to train and disciple them. for team unity and that we are able to connect with the Nepalis through the language and cultural boundaries. that God prepares my heart and the hearts of those I will be ministering to. for the last three weeks I am in Nepal as I will be working with a street children's ministry and women coming out of the sex trade. for lasting connections with the organizations I am partnering with. for safety and health as we will be hiking many miles to different villages through rough terrain Spiritual warfare that God unites our team of 16 to work effectively together. that all 348 people groups would be reached with the Gospel that God provides finances. that we seek first GOD's Kingdom and HIS righteousness. Looking at the church today, one might ask: Where is the God of the Bible? Where is the God of Elijah? The answer is simple: He is waiting for the Elijah's of today to call on him! My prayer is to be a present day Elijah, taking God at HIS Word, crying out to him to do great and unsearchable things that I do not know! If God so impresses on your heart to give of your finances for this cause, click here: http://www.luglobal.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=151&Itemid=186 Thank you for your prayer and support. Let me know how I can be praying for you! May HIS Kingdom come to Lynchburg, Nepal and the ends of the earth!

Sovereign JOY in God

Do you ever feel as though you are in bondage to the pleasures or distractions of this world?

TV, family, friends, ministry, school, exercise, food, sleep, work?

As Christ followers we are already righteous in Christ but are not yet perfected until the day of redemption. Although Believers are free from the condemnation of the law, sin nonetheless continues to dwell within, and all genuine Christians (along with Paul) should be deeply aware of how far they fall short of God’s absolute standard of righteousness.

Who or what is your enemy?

Many Christians might says, "Satan” is their enemy and rightly so…however…One of the greatest enemies overlooked in our lives is the flesh. So often we see the enemy as being outside of ourselves when our own flesh is the enemy! Let us not be ignorant of the power of the flesh in our daily lives.

1 Peter 2:11 says: “Beloved, I urge you as sojourners and exiles to abstain from the passions of the flesh, which wage war against your soul.”

Romans 6:12 says: “Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body, to make you obey its passions.”

Romans 7:14-25 “For we know that the law is spiritual, but I am of the flesh, sold under sin. For I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate. Now if I do what I do not want, I agree with the law, that it is good. So now it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me. For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh. For I have the desire to do what is right, but not the ability to carry it out. For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing. Now if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me.

So I find it to be a law that when I want to do right, evil lies close at hand. For I delight in the law of God, in my inner being, but I see in my members another law waging war against the law of my mind and making me captive to the law of sin that dwells in my members. Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, I myself serve the law of God with my mind, but with my flesh I serve the law of sin.”

Grace is God's giving us sovereign joy in God that triumphs over joy in sin. In other words, God works deep in the human heart to transform the springs of joy so that we love God more than anything else. (Piper)

Are we in bondage to the pleasures of this world so that, for all our talk about the glory of God, we love TV and food and sleep and money and human praise just like everybody else? If so, let us repent and fix our eyes like flint toward the WORD of God in PRAYER: O Lord, open my eyes to see the sovereign sight that in... your presence is fullness of JOY!-Piper and Augustine!

"Giving Our Earthly All"...The Life and Labor of Adoniram and Ann Judson

Ann Judson wrote of the death of their beloved child:

Our hearts were bound up with this child; we felt he was our earthly all, our only source of innocent recreation in this heathen land. But God saw it was necessary to remind us of our error, and to strip us of our only little all. O, may it not be vain that he has done it. May we so improve it that he will stay his hand and say 'It is enough.’[1]

Before setting sail to the golden shore of Burma, Adoniram and Ann Judson had a small glimpse of the arduous cross they were destined to bear. Were they willing to consent their lives to the exposure of the dangers of the ocean, to sickness, uncertainty, and every kind of distress, poverty, insult, imprisonment, and perhaps even a brutal death? Were they willing to abandon the life they new, the family they loved, in hope of seeing perishing souls saved from undying woe and gloom? Indeed, Adoniram and Ann knew this call would demand, no less than “their earthly all”. Their willingness to daily bear the cross of Christ and die to self was one of God’s strategic designs to exalt the fame of His Name among the Burmese people. Nearly 200 years later, the ripple effect of their faith still continues to drift into eternity as their graves echo the triumph of Christ: O death, where is your sting? Their lives continue to stand as a beacon that illuminates the mystery of how through Christ, death has been swallowed up in victory.

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[1] Courtney Anderson, To the Golden Shore: The Life of Adoniram Judson (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1956), 193.

A Spring of Living Water...Finding our Identity in CHRIST

Mandate for Women’s Ministry:

But as for you, TEACH what accords with sound doctrine…Older women likewise are to be reverent in behavior, not slanderers or slaves to much wine. They are to TEACH what is good, and so train the young women to love their husbands and children, to be self-controlled, pure, working at home, kind, and submissive to their own husbands, that the word of God may not be reviled. Titus 2:1,3-5

What is Women’s Ministry? “Women reaching out to meet the needs of others.”

This Saturday, February 5^th, we had the privilege of having a women’s tea! Monica Rose Brennan gave us a good word on finding our identity in Christ! She shared from John 4 where Jesus spoke to the Samaritan women and offered her a spring of water welling up to eternal life. This woman found her identity, fulfillment, and purpose in men. Jesus offered her complete satisfaction in Him. Many of us struggle just like this woman, whether it’s finding our identity through a relationship, or friends, or a job, or education, or church, or hobbies, or hairstyles, or clothes, or cars.

Selah:

LORD, I pray that you would strip us of a restlessness of finding our identity in other “things”. I pray you would form in us a solid, satisfied identity in Christ. Be our fountain of life! May we move with purposefulness and originality as we are enabled through the power given by this Living Water! Let us find a deep contented identity in You!

A Hunger for God

“Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied.” Matthew 5:6

God is the ultimate source of authentic righteousness. Those who long for Christ’s righteous character will receive this precious gift of true satisfaction. The enemy to this HUNGER for God is a desire for other things. We are so prone to keep ourselves stuffed with all the pleasures of the world, when God is the only One who can truly satisfy our deepest desires.

“What is at stake here is not just the good of our souls, but also the glory of God. God is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied in him. The fight of faith is a fight to feast on all that God is for us in Christ.”-(John Piper)

What we hunger for most, we worship!

SEARCH us, O God:

Are we in bondage to the pleasures of this world so that, for all our talk about the glory of God, we love television and food and sleep and sex and money and human praise just like everybody else? If so, let us repent and fix our faces like flint toward the Word of God in prayer. (Augustine & Piper)

Selah:

O LORD, open my eyes to see that in your presence is fullness of joy and at your right hand are pleasures forevermore! Psalms 16