10 Prayer Requests For Our Medical Clinic Outreach

Image courtesy of Sura Nualpradid at FreeDigitalPhotos.net

This coming week (May 27th - 30th) we will be hosting a free medical clinic at our church as an evangelistic outreach. Healthcare in Cambodia is generally not too good, and many of Cambodia's poorest people do not have the money to obtain even substandard healthcare. God has laid it upon the heart of Bro. Bradley Edmondson, director of Medical Missions Outreach, to bring his team of volunteer medical professionals from the U.S. to conduct this clinic. His team will be providing the medical expertise and the needed medicines, and my team (our church and some other area missionaries) will be providing the translators and logistical support as well as sharing the Gospel. Also, a missionary friend from Singapore, Bro. Chantha Chhim, will be coming with his wife and children and a few of his converts from their new church plant in Singapore. We are excited about this wonderful opportunity to share God's love by meeting some of the physical needs of the people and pray God will open doors to meet the greatest need of all, salvation through faith in Christ. 

Here are 10 specific prayer requests for this outreach.

The Benefield's 2011 Furlough Video

This is the video that we showed on our furlough (fall of '11 through summer of '12). If you are a pastor or church member of one of our supporting churches and we did NOT visit your church on this past furlough, I hope you will take advantage of this opportunity to see a report on your investment in Cambodia. 

A number of people who saw this video last year requested a copy or a link where it could be viewed again or shared. Finally...here it is! We originally intended to post this video immediately upon the completion of our furlough, but technical difficulties prevented that from happening. Special thanks to my good friend, Adam Wood, for taking some time to help me figure out and resolve the problem.

Happiness is...

© Ivan Pheoktistov | Dreamstime Stock Photos

Happiness is...

Driving into a village on a Saturday afternoon and seeing kids lining the sides of the road, lessons in hand, waiting to be picked up for church.

Happiness is...
Hearing a bunch of children in the back of the van reviewing their memory verse on the way to church.

Happiness is...

Hearing the sound of rustling pages while preaching the Word of God.

Happiness is...
Having to wait a few extra seconds to start reading your text, because you have new Christians in the church.

Such As I Have Give I Unto Thee

During the month of January, I am teaching a series in Sunday School on "How To Lead Others To Christ." I'm thankful that on the whole, our church members are unashamed to identify with Christ. They are constantly requesting Gospel tracts to hand out, consistently bringing friends, family, and neighbors to church, and continually taking flak for their faith in Jesus Christ. However, when it comes to Christians being able to personally lead a soul to Christ, we need to grow. We have some who are very competent in that area, but not enough. 

Two Sundays ago, after I preached from Acts 8 about Philip and the Ethiopian eunuch, a good number of our people raised their hand in the invitation to express the following decision: "I have never personally led someone to Christ, but with God's help, I want to establish a goal this year to both learn how to lead a soul to Christ and actually lead someone to Christ." I would like to ask my blog readers who pray for our ministry to make this issue a matter of prayer in 2013. 

Interestingly, just a few days after preaching this message, I was reading a devotional by Charles Spurgeon and I came across this:

Year In Review - 2012

© Back_me | Dreamstime Stock Photos

I am trying something new. While I was thinking about writing a "year-in-review," I realized that I had already written a summary of my year...via twitter. And because twitter was written as the year happened instead of after it was over, I like the freshness of it. So I have taken selected twitter updates and repurposed them as a summary of what 2012 was like for our family and ministry. 

Those of you who use twitter and follow me may not want to spend time on this post, as it is all information you have probably already seen. On the other hand, for those who do not read our twitter updates, you may be interested in this "diary-style" perspective of our ministry. 

I am aware that there are many who do not use twitter, so let me give a couple of words of clarification. First, the reason every post is so short is because twitter limits the characters in a post to just 140. Second, when you come across symbols like @ and #, just ignore them. They are used by twitter users to connect with other twitter users. 

God gave us a wonderful year, and we hope our friends and family will enjoy hearing about some of the things they might have missed.

The Worth Of A Soul

"For what is a man profited, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul? or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul?" (Matthew 16:26) The implication of this verse is quite stunning really. You may gain all of the wealth, riches, and treasure that this world has to offer, but if in doing so you lose your soul, then you ultimately are the loser. That is the worth of a soul to one's self. But what about the worth of a soul to God? The soul of a man is worth enough to God that He was willing to give His most precious possession, His only begotten Son, in order to redeem that soul from Hell. The worth that God places upon a soul is undeniable and undebatable. But what about the worth of a soul to you and me? I mean, how much is it really worth to us in terms of time, effort, and money to see that a soul has had every chance to not only hear the Gospel, but come to Christ?

It is one o'clock in the morning, and I can't sleep. I received word tonight that a cancer-stricken woman out in the village where we have a weekly ministry just passed into eternity. I am happy that 11 days ago she placed her faith in the Lord Jesus Christ for salvation, and I am thankful that her pain and suffering are now over. Several of us visited her this past Saturday while we out in the village, and she was in horrible pain. Since then our prayer has been specifically that God would just take her home quickly, and I am relieved in my spirit that tonight He did just that.

As I meditate upon this precious soul who has passed into eternity tonight, little memories keep popping into my mind. Little things that perhaps seemed insignificant at the time, but now in hindsight I believe they played a huge role in bringing this woman to Christ. Although I have known her for about nine years, I am unsure of her name. It is very common here in Cambodia to call someone by a familial title and not their actual name. I call her Ohm (an older aunt). Here are ten factors that I believe ultimately contributed to the salvation of Ohm's precious and valuable soul. Perhaps these thoughts will encourage someone to keep sowing the seed, keep watering the seed, and not be weary in well doing.

In Their Own Words - 2008 Video

This is the video that we showed to half of our supporting churches back in 2008. The churches that we did not visit in 2008 have not seen this, so I decided to post it on my blog. Although it is several years old, I praise God that the great majority of the faces you will see in this video are still coming to church, growing in grace, and serving the Lord!

We are right now working on our 2011 video which we will show in churches later this year. When our furlough comes to a close, I will post that video for our supporters who we do not get to see this time around. I also intend to post our 2005 video very soon.

Bible Memory Awards

"I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills, from whence cometh my help. 

My help cometh from the LORD, which made heaven and earth."     

Psalm 121:1-2

Next Sunday we will be presenting some awards for this past year's Bible memory efforts in our church. The awards include some new Bibles as well as some beautiful, framed Scripture pictures (one of them is pictured above), depending on how many verses each person said. I am always touched by how desirable these simple prizes are to our church people. Yesterday I bought two new kinds of Bibles that have just been printed, and I showed them around after last night's church service. Everybody loved them! One of the young ladies didn't say much or step forward to look at the new Bibles. When I asked her if she wanted to take a look, she sighed and said, "No, it will just make me sorry I didn't memorize more verses." I'm still waiting for the final list from my verse monitors, but when I get the final number of verses quoted, I'll include it in the next email update.  I'm looking forward to next Sunday when we will get to award these Bibles and pictures. This year's pictures turned out so nice that I wanted to share them with my blog readers. Enjoy!

Marks of Spiritual Maturity

I have been blessed in recent weeks and months to see some very spiritual behavior and attitudes in the lives of some of our church members. I have seen people who a few years ago were like a fragile, young plant needing lots of spiritual investment, now exhibiting the strength and stability of a mighty tree. In a recent post I showed a Biblical pattern for investing in people. The Apostle Paul went to the city of Thessalonica on his second missionary journey and invested himself in the people there. The Bible says he imparted not the gospel of God only, but also his own soul. I think it appropriate when considering "investment" to also take a moment to consider "the return". In Paul's first letter to the Thessalonians, he talked about his investment in them. In his second letter, he talked about the return on his investment. Notice what he said to them in II Thessalonians 1:3-4:

"We are bound to thank God always for you, brethren, as it is meet, because that your faith groweth exceedingly, and the charity of every one of you all toward each other aboundeth; So that we ourselves glory in you in the churches of God for your patience and faith in all your persecutions and tribulations that ye endure:"  

Paul was rejoicing and could not help but thank God for these precious people because of some things that he saw happening in their lives. When I read these two verses recently, I immediately thought, "Wow...that is exactly what I am seeing in some of our people!" Let us examine these three indicators of spiritual maturity that Paul raised.

Guest Preacher Series (Brother Waang)

Tonight's guest preacher was another of Bro. Ruppel's converts. Waang was born and raised in Vietnam, in an area that once belonged to Cambodia. The area is called Kampuchea Kroum (which means lower Cambodia), and the people from that area are also called Kampuchea Kroum. They typically speak, read, and write Vietnamese, although they are ethnically Khmer (Cambodian). Waang says that in the first 9 years of his life while living in Vietnam, he never one time heard about Jesus. The Ruppels arrived in Phnom Penh, Cambodia just a couple of years after Waang's family. A woman that Bro. Ruppel had led to Christ invited Waang's family to come to church with her. After Waang and his dad went the first time, Bro. Ruppel started going to their house to witness to them. Wang says that Bro. Ruppel went several weeks in a row, and although the dad had no interest at all in the Gospel, Waang (who was around 14 years old at the time) sat there soaking up the message of the Gospel.

Guest Preacher Series (Pastor Sakaun)

Tonight was the second night in our series of guest speakers for our midweek services, and we greatly enjoyed having Pastor Sakaun and his wife, Samaat, with us. This precious couple was led to Christ 11 years ago by Bro. Rodney Ruppel.  Sakaun was a soldier for 20 years (up until the time of his conversion) and Samaat has been a school teacher for 28 years. Before Bro. Ruppel met them, Samaat had heard a little bit about Christ from a cousin who was saved in the refugee camps in Thailand during the Khmer Rouge era. She had read small portions of the Bible, but knew virtually nothing about Christ. Then in 1999 Samaat's cousin invited them to watch a Christmas play at the New Hope Baptist Church (Bro. Ruppel's church), which at that time was just a couple of years old. They came and watched the play, and afterwards Bro. Ruppel asked if he could come to their house and tell them more about Jesus. They agreed, and shortly thereafter he was on his way.  The problem was...their house was a long way from Phnom Penh!  Samaat says, "I told him that he didn't have to go all the way out there...that our house was far away from town, but he said that compared to the trip from America, he was sure it wouldn't be too long." 

Guest Preacher Series (Kuonaro Keo)

This past Thursday in our mid-week Bible study we were privileged to listen to the preaching of Bro. Kuonaro Keo, a fellow missionary here in Cambodia. This was the first of 7 guest speakers who are scheduled to preach between now and Thanksgiving in our mid-week services. Lord willing, I will give a brief overview of each week's sermon and also take advantage of this opportunity to introduce you to some great men of God with whom I am honored to serve the Lord.

The Choices Of Life

I'm very excited about a new series we have just begun in our Sunday School hour.  The series is called The Choices of Life, and is a chapter by chapter study of the book of Proverbs.  As depicted by our  poster above, life is about choices.  Choices about friends, relationships, money, bitterness, alcohol, greed, forgiveness, anger, lust, obedience, child rearing, marriage, and many other topics must be made every day.  Every day, another choice.  Every choice, another consequence.  Often people want a certain destination, but fail to make the right turns in life to reach that destination.  

With God's help, we want to teach our people to live their lives by the wisdom that comes from God and His Word.  Last Sunday we handed out a small picture like the one above to each person to remind them of three things: to come to Sunday School each week, to read their Bible each day, and to make wise choices every day.

We had a great start to the series last Sunday, and plan to stay in this series for 8 - 9 months.  In addition to the weekly outlines of each chapter, we will also be periodically distributing bonus handouts on such topics as:

      -the four main characters in the book of Proverbs

      -the marks of a wise man

      -the marks of a foolish man

      -the battle for the simple man

      -the three calls of wisdom

      -a list of things that are said to be "better"

      -lists of God's wisdom for various situations

      -a list of Biblical proverbs that have a Khmer equivalent

      -and other practical handouts

Eating in Cambodia

We get asked this question all the time:  "What do you guys eat over there?"  I suppose every missionary probably gets that question.  Since we just had a church potluck, I decided to take this occasion to talk about what we eat in Cambodia.

In case you hadn't figured it out yet, those are chicken heads in the above picture.  Last summer when my parents and cousin came over for a visit, the church all worked together to put on a wonderful welcome meal for them.  I took this picture while the ladies were preparing the meal.  They made chicken curry, which is one of our favorites.  Now, I really don't care for the way they do some things (like letting pots simmer for hours under a bird-filled tree or cutting up all the meat and vegetables while sitting outside on the ground), but the finished product is usually really good.  There are numerous Khmer foods that are absolutely delicious!  

But I know when someone asks, "So, what do you guys eat over there?" they are not really asking about the delicious foods.  They are usually asking about the bizarre and strange stuff.  There are plenty of those things here!  There are deep-fried tarantulas, duck embryos, crickets, grasshoppers, blood soup, fried sparrows, and a host of other lovely choices:)  In the past I have had some people not believe me about some of these things.  

Well, it just so happens that the Travel Channel did a 45 minute program recently about the bizarre foods of Cambodia.  If you have the time, I encourage you to watch this program.  I think many of you would really enjoy it.  Besides seeing the foods, this is also one of the best portrayals of Cambodia I have ever seen with regards to the people, the traffic, the religion, the markets, etc.  It is really well done.  Click here for part 1.  On this part you will see the tarantulas being caught, cooked, and eaten.  

7th Anniversary of Good News Baptist Church

This past Sunday the Good News Baptist Church of Phnom Penh, Cambodia, celebrated its 7th anniversary.  We had a wonderful day!  Some of the highlights included: 7 new converts getting baptized, meeting in our brand new auditorium, presenting awards to 36 people who said all 12 of the monthly memory verses last year, and having a guest speaker on Sunday night to kick off a four night revival meeting.  Here are a few photos from the day.  

This first picture is of part of the crowd that was there for the morning service.

Our New Theme

The 7th Anniversary of the Good News Baptist Church of Phnom Penh was the second Sunday of February; however, due to our remodeling project we postponed it.  Now that our project is 95% complete, we will be celebrating our church anniversary tomorrow.

One of the things that we do on our church anniversary is to present a new theme for the year.  I wanted to briefly share our new theme with you.  The theme for this year is:  "Prayer Is The Key!"  The verse at the bottom is Luke 11:1 which says in part, "Lord, teach us to pray."  Yes, that entire section in the smaller font is "Lord, teach us to pray."  In English, 5 syllables.  In Khmer, 21 syllables!

God has been laying this theme on my heart for a very long time.  Our church has many good points, but the area of prayer is one area which our church has much room to grow.  From the pulpit to the pew and from the pastor to the people, prayer is the key to every problem of life.  In this new year, we will be establishing some new times of corporate prayer as well as encouraging and equipping for growth in the area of private prayer.  Tomorrow night's service will kick off a 4 night revival meeting.  My good friend, Rodney Ruppel, will be preaching for three of the four nights (he had a previous engagement on Monday night, so I will be preaching that night).  Please pray for a good turnout, but more than a good crowd, please pray that God will do a work of revival in every heart, beginning in my own.  Also, please pray for Bro. Ruppel as he preaches, that God would use him in a great way.

Auditorium Project Update #4

This will be the final update on the auditorium project, because thankfully, we are getting close to being done!  Last week we spent the week sanding, painting, installing curtain rods, and making and hanging curtains.  I did not take many pictures last week, but did get a few pictures of the nearly finished auditorium Saturday night after setting up for the Sunday services.  Let me hasten to say that the two different ceiling heights as well as the lighting in the church made it difficult to get pictures which are a true representation of what it looks like.  It looks much better in person than in these pictures, but I wanted to at least share a couple of pictures for those of you who have been praying for our project.  All of the church people are just as pleased as can be with the finished product.

Auditorium Project Update #3

Last week the electrician got all of the electrical wiring done in the auditorium.  It was good to have lights, fans, and a piano yesterday for the services (above).  This morning our church folks came back in to get the interior painting started.  Most of the sanding of the walls had been done the first week, while the hired crew was tearing down the middle wall.  However, we had one very difficult part remaining: sanding the ceiling.  Half of the auditorium has about a 14 foot ceiling, and the other half is about 7 feet.  The new half of the auditorium (which was the landlord's living room) has not been painted in many years, so the discoloration was quite pronounced.  It required intense sanding.  I am thankful for the folks who came to help today.  Here are a few pictures of our day.

Auditorium Project Update #2

Last week was a BUSY week!  Our hired crew worked hard all week on knocking out the wall to expand our auditorium, installing a new door, and doing all the finish work (brick, cement, tile, etc) which is part of a job like this.  In addition to the hired crew, we had about 15 of our church people plus my family working hard on other aspects of the project.  We had to scrape, sand, prime, and paint the exterior wall of the church.  That was a lot of work, but every one worked together and got the job done.  Let me share a few photos from the week.

Auditorium Project Update #1

After nearly two years of searching for a bigger place for our church, God opened the door recently for us to do some remodeling and rent more of the building in which we currently meet.  This morning at 7:00 we got the project under way!  

The remodel includes knocking down one side wall of our auditorium in order to add the landlord's living room (which is on the other side of the wall) into our current auditorium.  This will result in a 100% increase in space!  The project also includes repainting both the inside and the outside, as well as many other cosmetic improvements.

Instead of saying a lot in this post, I just want to post some pictures from our day today.  The church and our landlord are splitting the cost of hiring a crew to do the demolition work as well as the more technical work we cannot do, but our folks are all excited to invest their own labors as well.  Today we had eleven of our church people show up to help!  

My own children have been as excited as anyone else about this project, and they were a big help today too.  If there are too many pictures of my kids in this post...sorry!  I'm not only a missionary, but I'm a dad too:)