Guest Preacher - Evangelist Dave McCracken

We were blessed this past week to have Evangelist Dave McCracken preach two nights in our church. He and his wife, Nancy, were passing through Cambodia to see their long-time friends, Ray and Sharon Shull, and Bro. Shull graciously "loaned him" to us for two nights.

Since it is a rare treat to have a guest speaker like this pass through our area, we invited some other missionaries to bring their families and/or some folks from their church and join us for the services. What a wonderful time we had! We averaged over 90 people each of the two nights. The singing was phenomenal both nights as we sang encouraging hymns like Revive Us Again, All Hail The Power, and Power In The Blood. I absolutely love to hear our people sing, and when we added the people from several other churches, it was even better than normal. Bro. McCracken paid our combined churches a real compliment when he said he wished he could take the whole group back to America with him to show some of the Christians there how it's done!

Guest Preacher Series (Rodney Ruppel)

Last Wednesday night was our final guest speaker in our recent series. We have really enjoyed having these various men come in and preach, and we ended the series with my very good friend, Missionary Rodney Ruppel.

I love Bro. Ruppel's testimony, because it exemplifies the true 180 degree change that should be affected in a person's life when they come to know the Lord. Rodney was not raised in church, but when he was about 12 years old, his dad decided he needed to get his kids in church. After trying out different churches, he settled in at an Assembly of God church which Rodney didn't seem to mind so much. The reason...the pastor's son listened to all the same rock music that Rodney loved.  Not long after they started going there, Rodney's dad took him to First Baptist Church of Bridgeport, pastored by RB Oulette. Rodney did NOT like that church! He says it seemed like the pastor was preaching directly at him. After going there for awhile, the Holy Spirit convicted his heart and he finally trusted Christ as Savior. 

Guest Preacher Series (Brother Proh)

God gave us another wonderful and challenging time in the Word of God tonight. Our guest preacher was very special to me because, unlike all the other guests, he was not yet saved the first time I met him.

When Proh was a teenager, his niece tried to tell him the little bit she knew about salvation and Jesus Christ. She told him that if he did not get saved, he would go to the Lake of Fire. Proh laughed. He said he knew that wasn't true, because lakes are supposed to have water in them...not fire. Three years later, one day he was inside his house in Phnom Penh when he heard someone speaking really bad Khmer to some people outside his front door. That someone was me! January of 2001, Brother John Kenderdine and myself started going out a couple afternoons a week passing out Gospels of John. John had only been in Cambodia for 8 months, and I had been here for 2 months. I could say almost nothing in Khmer, and John's language ability wasn't that great yet either. But we were just both so anxious to get the Gospel out to people that we went out and did the best we could. It was during this time that I came across Proh's house and invited him to church using my extremely limited and "really bad" Khmer! I believe he was the 1st adult that I ever got to come to church!

Guest Preacher Series (Ray Shull)

Last night we had Missionary Ray Shull as our guest speaker. Bro. Shull and his family spent a couple of years helping in our church several years ago, so this was a reunion of sorts for some of our long-time members. I was so glad that Mrs. Shull and their daughter, Becca, came with him too. Besides preaching, Bro. Shull also sang a special with his wife at the piano, and did a tremendous job! Our folks love special music, so this was an extra treat!

Bro. Shull was raised in a Christian home in Stockton, California, and was saved as a young teenager. After high school, he attended the Pacific Coast Baptist Bible College where he graduated in 1980. Over the next 20+ years he served as both a pastor and an assistant pastor in 4 different churches in Washington, Idaho, and California. The majority of those years was spent in Mariposa, California where in addition to serving as assistant pastor, he started and administrated the Christian school.

Guest Preacher Series (Adam Wood)

Last night was the 4th week in our guest preacher series at church. We had the opportunity to hear Bro. Adam Wood, who is one of the newest missionaries in Cambodia. He and his wife, Alison, have 6 children. The Woods have been working for the past two years with the Ruppels, and Adam is currently working on a concordance for the Khmer Bible. This has been a huge project, but it will be a help to many when it is completed. Also Mrs. Wood has taught piano lessons to a number of people here in Cambodia, including our three oldest daughters. We are very glad to have this family serving with us in Cambodia.

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.