This article was originally published in the December 2020 edition of ITMI Monthly.
We asked our partners to share some of the ways Jesus’ kingdom was advanced this year. We hope you are encouraged by their answers and the special messages they have for you!
LAZARUS YEZINAI
South Sudan
How did you see God adjust your ministry last year?
God has done great things in the year 2020. In South Sudan, we have seen the importance of being in Christ.
We were moving among people and sharing the Word of God, but in all this He has protected us from the virus, even though we were interacting with people. The pandemic created for me a platform to minister for God’s people.
It was a significant moment in my life and the lives of my family. God opened the way of ministry in a funny way. When government closed down the churches, we started to visit families and share with them the Word.
At the same time God gave ITMI Project Joseph and we created the hand washing and jerry can outreach where we do awareness about the COVID-19 pandemic in a Biblical way.
When COVID-19 covered the whole world people lost hope but God turned it to our good to spread His message to people who do not mind about God; fear of death caused them to accept Jesus Christ and their habits changed.
What accomplishments for the Kingdom did your supporters enable this year?
I thank God in first place for connecting me with His children overseas and I also thank ITMI for locating me in South Sudan and made me known to their partners to support me and the ministry God gives me to work in.
My supporters have enabled me move easily to do my ministry work with a motorcycle, and I can go wherever I am needed without fail. Secondly, my supporters have done great to me by supporting me with prayers and financially for up keeping or welfare of my family.
What would you like to say to your supporters?
I am very grateful to God for what He has done in my life and to my partners for the way they stood with me spiritually, morally and financially.
I am praying that God who protects, provides and blesses His people may protect and provide for you and your family and bless you abundantly. Scripture says, ''The hand that gives is more blessed than the hand that receives.'' Acts 20:35
May God bless your hands and your work and give you good health until your life here on earth is over.
VICKY WARAKA
South Sudan
What was a significant moment in 2020 and why?
At such a difficult time when churches are closed, people have been locked down but we are able to reach people in the market and streets. We preached via radios, prayed with and counseled people over the telephone.
They really appreciated the church for reaching out to them at this difficult time. Many people came to God. One of the ladies at the marketplace said she wished that the church would preach for them in the market because it has been months since they could go to church.
We also had a mission to Biali refugees camp, where we saw people from different churches coming together and they have been blessed.
This year is really a time of trials and flooding has affected most of the area in South Sudan and this has made thousands of people to be lonely and lose everything.
Our mission to Mangalla, north of Juba, South Sudan, was a blessing to the people because they have lost everything. Our Project Joseph outreach there was of great help to them because we prayed for them and now, others have started visiting them in large number.
We prayed with them and supplied different items to them. The Project Joseph has been a blessing to the needy people of Mangala and South Sudan at large.
What would you like to say to your supporters?
We thank you for being with us this year as we continue to pray and share the Word together. The total support for my family and the gift of solar light in our home made me able to reach others. Have a blessed 2020 as we look forward to 2021.
May God shower his blessing among all of you as we continue to pray for each other. Pray with us for revival. “Not by might nor by power, but my spirit says the Lord Almighty.” Zac 4:6b
ADRIAN AND EMA BAN
Family and Marriage Ministry, Romania
What is something you learned this year?
When I (Ema) embarked on a three-year faith journey as a doctoral student in the Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, Adrian and I prayed that I would use my study time wisely for the family ministry God has entrusted us with.
As the lockdowns began in Romania, my professor guided me through a few possible Bible passages to study in depth and find the biblical foundation for family ministry. Genesis 2:23-24, Malachi 2 and Hosea 1-4 and Ephesians 5:15-33 became my “companions” and yielded fresh perspectives.
“Be careful not to make the mistake to address Malachi 2:13-16 only from the (strictly) marriage and divorce perspective. It is so much more than that” – said my professor, which raised my interest to research deeper.
Indeed, it was the covenant with God the people were neglecting and refusing to obey, through their attitude towards marriage and family. Their disobedience of God’s Word was reflected in their lives and choices, especially pertaining to marriage.
Where am I being disobedient in my walk with Him? What is the root of my rebellion and frustration? What are some areas in which I “covered the altar with my tears” waiting for an answer from the Lord, yet knowing all along it is sin which keeps me away from Him?
Personal reflection always brings closeness to the Lord and spiritual growth.
What was a significant moment in 2020 and why?
After we led a two-day training at an evangelical church in Arad, Romania the lead pastor invited us to teach from our experience and interact with the individuals and families who would be serving in their church’s Counseling and Marriage Mentoring ministries.
The participants especially appreciated how “book knowledge” was combined with our real life experiences as their perspective on marriage ministry was enlarged. One thing we are passionate about and wanted to convey is how our own walk with the Lord AND personal marriage example draws couples who want to know how to have a healthy marriage in this digital age “to our door.”
We definitely see this a significant moment in our ministry, one for which the Lord has been preparing us all these years, a moment in which we were able to coach and disciple, and to further God’s Kingdom.
What accomplishments for the Kingdom did your supporters enable this year?
Support through prayer and financially is essential for ministry. So many time we looked back this past year and said, “we could have not done this but for the grace of God and the support of our dear brothers and sisters in the Lord.”
The life and ministry stories we shared above would not have been possible without this support! Thank you! We saw our ministry enlarge with the involvement in the lives of more couples who joined the Young Couples Fellowship Groups as well as the missionary journeys to Ukraine.
Yes, the pandemic made it impossible to visit again this year, but we are thankful for technology which allowed us to keep in touch.
What would you like to say to your supporters?
Thank you for being instrumental for our ministry and family! We know these are hard times for all of us, and we are so grateful to have the support of fellow believers who are Kingdom minded!
PIOTR AND KRYSTYNA ZAREMBA
Poland
How did you see God adjust your ministry last year?
Because of COVID, God redirected our ministry to a “hybrid” one. It means that we not only meet on Sunday. we also spread the Good News during the week on the internet through theological and Biblical encouragement podcasts, email, social media and zoom.
What is something you learned this year?
Turn every situation into your success, Romans 8:28.
I learned this lesson through COVID. It opened new ways of reaching out to the lost.
How did God provide encouragement this year?
At the beginning of March, we needed some funds. We had to upgrade our [electronic] equipment so that it could be self-operated if an operator got sick. And God provided it through ITMI.
What was a significant moment in 2020 and why?
First and foremost, it was the publication, both digital and regular, of our Polish Bible Translation second edition of the Bible translated by our team from Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek to modern Polish. It was significant because it means that we stay current and relevant to the society of those who to whom salvation should be preached.
What accomplishments for the Kingdom did your supporters enable this year?
Our supporters enabled us to stay “in business” by providing for the needs connected to our recent COVID time. Thank you for your support!
“Let us not grow weary of doing good, for in due season we will reap, if we do not give up.”
Galatians 6:9
PAUL AND MOLLY
India
How did you see God adjust your ministry last year?
Though many churches were sealed and closed for refusing to obey lockdown regulations, our church is open. Hindus are coming in masks wanting to hear the truth of our living God!
This time of pressing in and even solitude couldn’t happen without the virus. The Lord's presence has come in during this time and brought inner healing to us and our children for many injustices and evils they suffered when they were small children.
The lockdown reduced our rushing back and forth from church - it allowed us to have Sabbath days which is normally a great struggle, having a church, 23 children and a staff to lead.
It allowed us more time to disciple our family and other relatives and workers living on our land. God granted a time for our children to receive more discipleship, hands-on teaching and prayer.
In weeks where I greatly missed fellowship with other believers face to face, it was my own teenage daughters and younger sons sharing their thoughts on the goodness of God, their insights from our Bible reading and how He holds the span of the galaxies in His hand that filled the void.
I found I am beginning to enjoy rich discussions about spiritual matters with our children. What a surprising comfort from my good Father!
The greatest blessing of COVID is that the Lord allowed us to be together as a family and see great growth and progress in our family and in our main leaders as we met regularly on video calls with them. Oppressive visits from government officers stopped in the summertime and we have enjoyed the gift of peace as we work together.
Our church also has seen growth in depth vs numbers. The lockdown drastically affected our numbers - but the ones coming are lining up at 5 am, eager and ready to soak in the Word. Our leaders have a renewed sense of unity and revival in these uncertain days.
Souls are still coming to Christ and the Lord is advancing His Kingdom. Our main leaders, worshippers and volunteers have risen in their gifts and strengths. Their fervency in His Word and openness of their own struggles has invigorated Paul’s pastor heart.
What would you like to say to your supporters?
You are the fresh wind in our sails keeping us going, helping us give hope, education, clean water, training and the living Word to countless in loss and depravity as our economy worsens and countless suffer. Because of your support we can show the very mercy of God to our own children and continue to preach His Word.
Because of your generous giving we have helped around a thousand in crisis during this economic hardship - from our own believers and widows to families in our pastor fellowship who don’t have the means to feed their own families to slum areas in the city and the untouchables’ village - a nomadic hunting people group not far from our farm outside the city.
We pray for wisdom to continue to give aid, hope and mercy as we enter into a new year with many restrictions from our government.
DAVID AND TARU KUMAR
Deepam Women and Children's Center, India
How did you see God adjust or change your ministry last year?
The COVID-19 pandemic created a lot of disturbance in our regular ministry activities. The government ordered educational institutions to shut down until further notice. The situation began to go from bad to worse.
The impact of the lockdown was heavy on the poor, the families of all our school children were badly affected.
Most parents are day laborers and won’t have food unless they work. They soon ran out of whatever little savings and food they had. We began to see the pressing need for food for our students and began to pray the Lord would provide for us to help the needy.
God heard our prayer and brought help through a contact of ours who surprisingly emailed saying she wanted to help the families of our school children.
She did this twice. Then we needed further help, and we again looked to the Lord. God did answer our prayer, this time through ITMI. You jumped in with stable help in April 2020.
Since then we have been doing food parcel distribution in the Modi Road slum, for impoverished pastors and other needy people.
We greatly appreciate Steve Evers, our leader. Though he lives in the US, his heart, mind and spirit have been with us. We believe the conversations we’ve had with him have been God’s leading us as to how to help suffering people.
Many pastors called us and said how timely this help was. Many pastors live in rented houses and were not able to pay the rent, electricity bills and some were not able to buy medicine. The help you sent met different needs of pastors and the need for food for the poor in the slums.
Our conversation with Steve even led us to honor 92 police men and women who had risked their lives to maintain peace and order during recent riots in the Modi Road area.
It was amazing to hear the police officer second in rank say “these are Christians they have come here to share the love of Jesus Christ and to appreciate us for our efforts to keep peace and order in our area.”
What accomplishments for the Kingdom did your supporters enable this year?
I firmly believe that the supporters are partners, they are equal partners with us in everything we do in building the kingdom of God. Our supporters have enabled us this year to do totally new things which we never did before.
Our supporters enabled us to provide food kits to the suffering slum dwellers, to rural, unfunded pastors and to the needy believers in their congregations.
This ministry has resulted in new people being added to the churches of some of these pastors. Most of these new believers received our help in times when they had lost all hope. Many people said to pastor Jayaraj “we see God walking in you.”
I have no idea what else the Spirit of God will achieve for the kingdom of God because of the sacrificial giving by our supporters, but the name of the Lord is glorified wherever the help is reached. I must make a mention that, because of our supporters, by God’s grace we have food on our plates, our family’s needs are being met, our ministry is strengthened and new doors are opened for our ministry.
What would you like to say to your supporters?
We cannot imagine the ministry without the helping hands of our supporters.
With all our humility from the bottom of our heart we thank every supporter for the significant and sacrificial giving to quench the hunger of the poor and meeting various needs of rural pastors and my family as well.
People have lost jobs, families are forced into difficult situations and many are surviving by taking loans and heavy debts, but we thank God for our supporters every time we have food on our table. We are humbled for the caring spirit of our supporters.
May the Lord our God bless them abundantly, we pray that they will continue to stand with us in this ministry.
GERHARD AND ELMANE LE ROUX
Onseepkans Mission, South Africa
What is something you learned this year?
During the past year, we learned in a new way what our Lord Jesus meant when He said that we need to be the servants of all. We realized anew how important it is to serve those who come in contact with us.
We gain trust and respect by reaching out to those who lost a loved one, those facing challenges and need advice, or those who have physical needs such as food. As we build relationships by serving, the Lord opens doors for us to reach people in ways that would not have been possible otherwise.
We saw the Lord work in the lives of some of the people who attend our church services. One of them struggled with alcohol addiction, but the Lord set her free!
What accomplishments for the Kingdom did your supporters enable this year?
We are thankful to supporters who assisted us with funds to install irrigation so that we could bless families with fresh vegetables on a weekly basis during the winter season. We are also grateful for the privilege to be part of Project Joseph.
This provides wonderful opportunities to witness about God’s love and faithfulness as we distributed food parcels to needy families. We were also able to provide opportunities for young men in need of work to work in our mission’s date orchard.
Working with the young men provide us opportunities to witness to them and to build into them spiritually.
What would you like to say to your supporters?
Thank you for assisting and supporting us through the past year.
Without your support it would have been impossible for us to continue to build the Lord’s Kingdom here in Onseepkans. May the Lord richly bless you and grant you a blessed Christmas season.
IONEL LOVESCU
Casa Dorca Children's Home, Romania
How did you see God adjust or change your ministry last year?
2020 has been a trying year at Casa Dorca because of the pandemic. I know everyone can relate to that. By mid-summer we all needed a lot of encouragement.
As an orphanage ministry, we serve many emotionally unstable kids and teenagers, and because of this they are prone to making bad choices in life. Showing God’s grace as we attempt to improve their behaviors is an important part of our ministry.
Under normal circumstances, this is mentally taxing on our staff and we rely on the power of the Holy Spirit and your prayers in our lives to show grace and love to broken lives every day; enter COVID-19 and quarantine into the mix.
After a few months of normal lives interrupted, the behavior of the teenagers became much more difficult. Additionally, behind the scenes, Casa Dorca had lost a lot of financial support that we depend on, due to the pandemic.
The tax on the staff’s mental state was dangerous. In this time, we needed encouragement. We trusted that God would provide as He always has, and so we asked God to provide. The response that we got was an incredible encouragement.
Many of you stepped up to fill the gap financially. This gave us a big morale boost when we needed it most. The staff can now work without the stress of not knowing if they will get paid.
We can serve without the stress of not knowing if we can adequately provide for the kids. Most importantly, the Lord’s provision emboldens us by the knowledge that we are in His arms and under His will in our ministry.
The encouragement and reduced stress continues to give us the extra emotional capacity to continue showing the love of Jesus to a group of kids who continue to struggle with their behavior under the restrictions of a pandemic.
What accomplishments for the Kingdom did your supporters enable this year?
God used our supporters to enable us to continue serving and loving the fatherless. Without the financial support from our sponsors we would not be able to function as a Christian orphanage showing the truth of Jesus to these kids.
Kids that would otherwise find themselves in a state-run orphanage where destructive behavior is not discouraged and the Gospel is not present. Because of your generous support these kids had a loving environment at Casa Dorca during the pandemic.
They also had several amenities to help pass the time that few orphans would have the privilege of enjoying. Some supporters donated a trampoline, an above-ground swimming pool and a green house.
Thanks to the greenhouse, we had abundant peppers and tomatoes and savings at the market. Additionally, the children were provided with new, quality school clothes at the start of the school year.
The kids are aware that these things are provided to them by sponsors because the sponsors love Jesus. We pray that these things not only bless the kids with fun, but also with the love of Christ.
What would you like to say to your supporters?
Our days at Casa Dorca are constantly filled with gratitude for our supporters.
We know that nothing we do would be possible without God’s provision through our sponsors. When we asked for more financial support to fill the gap, our supporters and new supporters stepped in to make sure our ministry could continue.
We want you to know that your financial support, no matter the size, has a direct impact on our lives at Casa Dorca. We pray that God pours blessings into the lives of our supporters. We know that your reward in heaven is great for what you have selflessly given here on earth.
RICHARD AND BROOKE NUNGESSER
Bread of Life, Poznan International Church, Poland
What was a significant moment in your ministry and why?
Richard became pastor of the Poznan International Church in 2002. It has been through the ministry of this small, international church that we have seen God move in amazing ways.
A couple years ago, one girl at PIC named Faith told us that her dad is a pastor in Zimbabwe and would love to connect with us through Bread of Life!
After a couple years preparing for it, we finally set up the time for Bread of Life to connect with Zimbabwe —and, then, wouldn’t you know?! Covid hit the world!
Yet, through it all, Bread of Life was still able to connect with Zimbabwe and begin not just 1 project - but multiple projects. While the world was shutting down, God was opening doors for our ministry to expand! During Zimbabwe’s most dire moments of lockdown, Bread of Life was distributing food to widows, widowers, and orphans.
It always amazes us how a small, international church in Poznan, Poland, can continue to impact the world for Jesus - even in the midst of a world pandemic!
This was especially significant for me, Brooke Nungesser, because, as we returned to Arizona for our son, Max, it was as if God said, “Now, here is your time, Brooke —your time to do the other work I have set out for you.”
His timing has always been perfect in our ministry —and a world pandemic, and our travels across the world, shows me that God’s timing was even perfect in our new beginnings in Zimbabwe.
What would you like to say to your supporters?
Thank you for always being an amazing instrument of God in our lives. Every prayer and donation you make is significantly affecting God’s kingdom, changing hearts, nourishing souls, saving lives!
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