Ministry Newsletter

Dear Friends:

I returned home three days ago from a 12-day trip to Colombia. Thank you for praying for me during that adventure. It’s not easy to be gone from home, but I’m grateful I can invest in people in so many different nations. Colombia is struggling at the moment because the country is moving toward socialism, and the economy is weak. And yet I found incredible spiritual hunger there. Please pray that this special nation will not become another Venezuela or Cuba!

Thanks to the generosity of our donors, our overseas projects are being completed one by one. Below you can see Esther Saleem and some of the women in our ministry in Pakistan. They came out one day to see the construction of the women’s empowerment center, and they offered to move some dirt that day! Our monthly outreaches continue there, with more and more women receiving food assistance as well as Bible study and prayer.

Please take a good look at the faces of some of the women in our Pakistan center, below. Many of the women we minister to there have been abandoned by their husbands, and others are in abusive situations. Please pray for them. Our directors, Susheel and Esther, are doing a great job training them to discover their identity in Christ.

While Esther disciples the women, Saleem has been gathering some of the young men from the village to disciple them as well. I am so proud of Susheel. You can see below the guys he’s been training. He is translating my book “Let’s Go Deeper” into Urdu and teaching it to his disciples.

Below you can see some of the girl students we are helping in Moi’s Bridge, Kenya, at Life Mission School. Not only are we paying for the school fees of 72 girls, but we just built some new toilets for them, and soon we will be building some new classrooms. The girls in the photo below are standing in front of the new restrooms. Thanks to your generosity, we are keeping the girls in school and protecting them from female genital mutilation. This is changing a generation!

Below you can see that construction continues on our new school and women’s empowerment center in Kagoma, Uganda. This is an extremely poor area where girls are ignored and often forced into unwanted marriages with men twice their age. We are so grateful for our partnership with Pastor Paul Wandera, who is working tirelessly to complete this project. We need about $30,000 to finish these buildings so that girls can enroll in school.

This week, women from Rio Hondo, Guatemala, came to our women’s center there to take a cooking class. They learned how to make quesadillas that can be sold in food trucks. The woman with the baby is Ana Ester Paz, one of our three directors. When she was a little girl, I started visiting this community. Now she is leading this ministry!

Below you can see the small team I worked with in Colombia this month. Karson McCullen is a young man from Mount Olive, North Carolina, who has asked me to mentor him in missions. This is his second trip with me and he loved visiting Colombia for the first time. Dr. Nori Menendez joined us when we arrived. She has been my translator and colleague in Colombia since I first visited Barranquilla in 2010. During this trip we did ministry in Barranquilla as well as Bucaramanga.

In Baranquilla we hosted our sixth Hombres de Valor men’s retreat at a camp on the outskirts of the city. It is such a joy to invest in these guys because they are so hungry for discipleship. At these retreats we pray for the men to be free from the machismo mindset so they can love their wives and treat them with respect. We also deal with tough topics like anger, sexual purity and father wounds. The Lord moved powerfully, and many men were filled with the Holy Spirit.

One highlight of this year’s retreat was having several men from the Wayuu region of Colombia. This is an indigenous Indian tribe that speaks a language called Wayunaiki. The man in the photo below is a Wayuu who is holding up the Wayunaiki Bible, which was just recently published for the first time after years of translation work. The men in this tribe struggle a lot financially, but donors helped us cover their transportation costs. They were so encouraged and refreshed so they can continue reaching their people with the gospel.

Below you can see some of the men at the retreat during a time of worship. The Holy Spirit was so present with us, assuring the men of the Father’s unconditional love.

For me, a personal highlight of this retreat was meeting this young man below, Cristian Fonseca, a construction worker from Barranquilla. He told me at dinner on the first night of the retreat that he came to get right with God. That evening after my message, Cristian came forward and gave his life to Jesus. We have been texting ever since, and he is growing in his relationship with God every day! He is the age of my youngest daughter.

After our time in Barranquilla, we flew to Bucaramanga and began working with the group of pastors you see in the photo below. They are the organizers of an effort called “Clamor por Colombia,” which means, “Cry out for Colombia.” They have been organizing prayer for their nation because of the political and economic crisis. It was a joy to serve with these leaders. After six days with them, they have asked me to come back next year to host a men’s retreat similar to the one we sponsored in Barranquilla.

It was 19 years ago, during my first trip to Bogotá, Colombia, that I heard someone say the word “Bucaramanga.” As soon as I heard the word, my spirit leapt inside me and I knew the Holy Spirit was showing me I would go there one day. It took a while, but it was such a joy to preach in multiple churches in that city last month. I spoke at pastor’s training conferences as well as revival services—and many people were filled with the Holy Spirit in those meetings.

I also spoke at a large Christian school. Below you can see some of the students who responded after I preached a message about Daniel and his three brave friends who stood for God when everyone else was bowing to an idol. These students made public professions of faith in Jesus. And this brings me the greatest joy because I know the seed of the gospel was planted in the next generation in Colombia!

In September I will be hosting two Bold Venture events, one for men (in Chicago) and the other for women in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Below you can see the poster for the Chicago event. This is the first time we have ever sponsored an event there. If you know men near the Chicagoland area who need a time of spiritual refreshing, please share the details with them. Registration is open until September 12. You can sign up at boldventure.org.

The women’s event in Tulsa promises to be special! You can see the poster below. At the women’s event we challenge women to discover their gifts and callings and step into all God has for them. I hope you will consider joining us! Registration is at boldventure.org.