General Team Update

Just a quick general update on our team. The McGathy’s took off yesterday to return home. They had originally planned to return later in the year but decided to expedite the process a bit, since their family seems to need some time off the front lines to focus on their personal growth and family unity. Please pray for our team as we adjust to their absence. Both Chris and Julia have had a great impact on the team and on the community, so we want to make sure this transition goes as smoothly as possible.

Please pray, first of all, that the team’s pastoral needs would continue to be met. I know several teammates have had great emotional/spiritual support from Chris and Julia, so this is one of the primary ways they’ll be missed. And pray that the McGathys’ disciples and ministry contacts would not be lost completely. Some of the most important investments for us are their adult contacts, since we are mostly still working with kids. So we want to follow up with the adults often in the coming weeks and identify those that are faithful.

On a separate note, teams from 2 Houston universities will be joining us at the end of the week for a week-long training. Please pray that the right people would come, and that the Spirit would transform hearts through the training and equip people for the mission.

The mission trip to southeast Asia starts in 2 weeks and will last till the end of March. Soon after that is over Mario, Alejandra, Xavier and Catherine will leave to start the Los Angeles team. So in a couple months the Houston teams will foreseeably look like this…

Ranchester Team: Joe and Keri H., Zachariah and Hannah D., Susana, Chris Block, and Jerome

Salem Oaks (Los Arcos) Team: Jacob, Nicole, Lacey, Richie, Julio (and young internationals Hafsa, Kho and Sanjay).

Thanks again for all your support! Probably our biggest need in prayer right now is for more laborers in general. We see that refugees are flooding into many different U.S. cities. We have a heart to start mission teams in a few different cities, and the only thing holding us back right now is that we don’t have enough people, nor the right leaders, to start those teams. Anyway, have a blessed week!

Two Becoming One

As some of you may know we have a wedding to attend this coming Friday of two of our very own!

Catherine and Xavier will become one and it will be the start of a new season and chapter for each of them. In June they will be moving out to Los Angeles to start a team out there with Mario and Alejandra. Over the next few months there will be a lot of change for this couple, so please join us in covering them in prayer!

Pray for their marriage: unity, humility, growth in loving each other.
Pray Xavier would start to lead Catherine with excellence and Catherine would humbly submit to his leading and she would be and excellent helpmate to him, that Xavier would love Catherine and Catherine would respect Xavier.
Pray they grow in whatever ways necessary to prepare them for the move to LA.
Pray this marriage would be a picture of how Jesus loves his church, his bride.
Pray the glory of God would be magnified through this marriage!

We are so excited to see how God glorifies himself and expands the Kingdom through this couple!

Jehovah Witnesses in Los Arcos

Every Saturday morning Jehovah Witnesses come to Los Arcos. Usually there are 2-4 people, but this last Saturday was unusual. Chris and Mario went out in hopes to find and minister to the Jehovah Witnesses and they found that there were 12 people here getting ready to go out. Mario walked right into the middle of their circle and asked for one of their bibles. He opens to the book of John, chapter 1 verse 1. In the New World Translation it states that, "the word was a god." Unlike the Holy Bible which says, "the Word was God." He asks all of them why it says "a god" and none of them could give him answer. Mario wasn't desiring debate, but dialogue of who Jesus really is.

Please pray Jesus would give these people revelation of who he really is, God himself.
Pray Jesus would give us wisdom about how to dialogue with them.
Pray for supernatural opportunities and great faith as we continue to minister to them.

But if their eyes and ears will remain closed, please pray God would move them out and remove the distraction from his work of where He is moving.

Hey guys, just a heads up that we've added both Houston teams' goals at the bottom of this blog page. As was stated a couple weeks ago, both teams mostly stayed away from measurable goals this year in order to focus on daily/weekly practices that should help us follow the leading of the Spirit more effectively. If you get a chance we would love prayer for our teams to grow in these things and be faithful with them so that God can more powerfully reveal His glory in and through us. Thanks!

Discipling Sabbisua

About a year ago we were getting ready to start the Salem Oaks team, and we were specifically praying for some adults or young adults that would own the vision to make disciples and reach the nations. As you know, God answered that prayer by bringing us Kho, Sanjay and Hafsa, 3 international teens. Each one of them, today, is still faithfully a part of the team and making disciples.

But 6 months ago we really started praying for more faithful adults, and I believe now we’re really starting to see the fruit of those prayers. A couple adults we had been discipling, Man and Emanuel, have become uninterested and unfaithful concerning the mission, but we continue to see new opportunities each week. One of those opportunities is the couple we mentioned weeks ago, Mani and Dahn, which is a deaf family that has been pulling away from the Mormon teachings in order to follow Christ.

But we’re particularly excited for the work God is doing in a new Nepali friend of ours, Sabbisua. Chris McGathy is discipling Sabbisua’s dad, so I (Jacob) got connected with him through that relationship. Sabbisua is a 26-year-old with a wife and 2 kids. He called himself a Christian most of his life, but he didn’t understand what that meant at all. So when I shared the gospel with him and explained that following Christ means you have the Holy Spirit within you, he eagerly accepted.

Since going through repentance with him, he seems like a totally different person. He used to go drinking with his friends each week, was lazy most of the time, and was pretty short-tempered, but in the past month he has not been drinking at all, has been purposeful with his time as has been a man of peace. Every time I talk with him, he’s excited about the new person God has made him to be. He says even the people at his church view him as a totally different person.

Please be praying for him in the coming weeks. As I’ve shared the vision with him the past couple weeks God has placed burden on his heart to find a disciple, or at least someone that he can be investing in spiritually. Please pray that God would surround him with godly influences, draw Sabbisua into an intimate relationship with Himself, and would open doors for ministry all around him.

Jimmy and Tha

A couple weeks ago Zachariah, Jerome and I (Chris Block) went together to minister to a young Burmese man, Tha, and we were amazed by how the Spirit led us and opened doors during our time together. When we got to Tha’s apartment, his brother Jimmy answered the door. Apparently Tha had gone out for a bit, but Jimmy invited us inside anyway. As we talked, it was apparent to us that this young man was very much a ‘person of peace’, based on how friendly and open he was. 

We also got to hear a little about Jimmy's life while we were there. Apparently he had grown up in a refugee camp in Thailand like most other Burmese refugees here. He was a teacher back home, but here in the states he struggled to continue in education. Since failing his GED exam soon after arriving in the states, he has been spending his days working a minimum wage job 7am-3pm each day and then baby-sitting his brother's daughter Sophia in the evenings. Jimmy lives with his mother, sister, and brother Tha, along with Tha's wife and child.

After hearing Jimmy's story, Jerome shared with him the beatitudes ‎that Jesus taught his disciples. As we were teaching about Jesus, Tha came back home. We introduced ourselves, and he immediately joined in with us to learn about Jesus as well. Jerome began to share his personal testimony – how he had been living for many worldly things and eventually reached a seemingly prospered life. He shared how there came a point where God changed him and revealed to him the inheritance we have in Christ, which is much more valuable than earthly treasures. 

At one point Jimmy said that he doesn't know or understand the Bible well, but he would like to help us translate the Bible to other people for us. This is a huge praise for the team, since the Ranchester team in particular had been looking for Burmese and Karen translators. Overall, we could sense God was moving in both of their hearts and showing them that, while Buddha had a lot of good teachings, he is essentially lifeless and cannot redeem them.

Jimmy and Tha poured us fresh water before we left, and we felt the Lord speaking in that moment that the Spirit was working and moving in their midst. Please join us in praying that our friends, Tha and Jimmy, would encounter Jesus and receive Him with joy.