House Fellowship Christmas Outreach & Borneo Mission Trip

New years greetings from Indonesia! We had a wonderful trip to the central part of Indonesian Borneo. It was the location of our Jesus festival back in 2015. This time we were invited to minister in a Christmas outreach service. It all started as one of the pastors there was dining in a restaurant and while there she met a woman who had received a miracle during the Jesus festival back in 2015. As a result we were invited to do this Christmas outreach service. We had a great time ministering the word of God and praying for the sick.

From all that happened during this trip, what stayed with me the most was our visit to a village with Joko and Anna where we met a family from the Dayak tribe. The Dayaks still practice pagan beliefs like worshiping and sacrificing to spirits. Their ancestors were head hunters. We heard many fascinating stories about their lives. It’s had to go into all the details here. There are still a big group of them that need to hear the gospel. I asked Joko why the local Churches have not reached out to them until now. The answer I got was shocking. The Churches do not want to do any more evangelism. They have enough members to take care of. So there are whole villages that are still waiting for the gospel while the church is in her comfort zones in the city. That was heartbreaking to hear. We are of coarse in the early stages of putting a Jesus festival together in their area for July or August this year. More details coming in the next newsletter. Please pray for our ministry plans in Borneo.

House Fellowship Outreaches

Our house fellowships are there to teach the word of God on a regular basis and make disciple for Jesus. We are doing weekly and bi-weekly meeting of the regular basis in two locations. From time to time we also do outreaches to the surrounding villages as well. For Christmas, we had a miracle outreach service attended by many new people. Several of them came forward to receive healing and there were notable miracles. Wherever the gospel is proclaimed there will always be miracles and deliverance. Another outreach we did was to bless twenty families with Christmas food packages. This was a door to door outreach accompanies by a short gospel message and praying for people’s needs.

When the new year had arrived, literally the next hour after 12 midnight, we packed our bags and went on a road trip with our house fellowship leaders and their families. It was a blessed time of fellowship and bonding for our leaders. One of the towns we visited was the location of one of our Jesus festivals back in 2012. Last month we also celebrated the fifth year since house fellowship ministry started on a regular basis.

Some Personal News

Esther, Ben and I are healthy and doing well. Ben is in his sixth month of homeschooling. We are using the Abeka curriculum. He is starting to read simple words and sentences already. He makes it really easy for us. I am getting ready to renew my Canadian passport which will expire in April. I have not yet decided when to visit Canada this year. It will most likely be just me coming alone because of the finances. We are getting ready to send out donation receipts to all that donated last year. Those of you who donated through CanadaHelps website, you will get your receipts from them. Our ministry van (on the right) has been a huge blessing. It’s been just over a year since we got it. Unfortunately, it was almost stolen twice. It is by the grace of God we still have it. The first person managed to break into it but could not start it up to drive away. It happened in the middle of the night while we were out of town for ministry. There was another break in again the other night. They managed to remove one of the side windows but ran away when the alarm went off. We just finished repairing the window. Please keep praying for God’s protection.

As I come to the end of this newsletter, I just want to thank you for your faithful prayer and support through out 2018. We had a victorious year advancing the gospel in Indonesia. My goal this year is to increase our Jesus festivals to four, plant more house fellowships in other towns, do more village outreaches, and one more thing. Within the next two years, I have a goal to start a missions school that will train Indonesian believers and send them out to reach least reached people groups. Please pray about this. This will require having a building big enough to house and train students and then we need to support them while they go out into the missions field. We might start by renting a building for the missions school but eventually my goal is to buy land and build a place of our own.

Thank you for taking the time to read our latest update. Please keep remembering us in your prayers. We wish you and your family a blessed year ahead.