02 Oct Global Ministries Team Begins Fall Meeting

The Global Ministries Leadership Team begins its fall meeting tonight, Oct 2, and will continue until Friday, Oct. 4. They’re meeting at Gull Lake Ministries, a Christian conference center in Hickory Corners, Mich.

Two recent additions to the team are:

• Ruth Ralph, whose husband, Mark, is senior pastor of Mt. Zion UB church in Wayne, Ohio.
• Mark Wallace, executive director of Christian Horizons Global. He is a licensed UB minister in Canada, and is a member of the Mill Crossing UB church in Cambridge, Ontario.

02 Oct Gerlachs Getting Settled in Thailand

Bryan and Emily Gerlach arrived in Thailand in mid-September. The Gerlach represent an expansion of our work in Thailand. Although our Thai churches are located in the northern mountains, we are shifting our focus to the city of Chiang Rai.

Many young people who migrate from the mountains in search of jobs and education find themselves being lured into the drug and prostitution industries. Bryan and Emily will be part of a multi-national team providing housing, discipleship training, education, and job skills training to vulnerable young people.

But first, the Gerlachs need to learn the Thai language. For that, they will spend a year in the city of Chiang Mai, in central Thailand. They start classes today, October 2.

A week after arriving in Chiang Mai, the Gerlachs wrote:

We are finally getting adjusted to the time difference and feeling rested in the morning when we wake up. Our flights were incredibly smooth thanks to prayers from all over, and we have been blessed to stay in an amazing guest house about 15 minutes south of the city center. It has been a productive week taking care of a lot of ‘living life’ type details and getting to know some awesome missionaries and Thais too.

Right now our biggest goal is to find an apartment near our language school in the city. Global Ministries has asked us to live downtown, close to school, in order to really get into the Thai culture and life. (Where we are staying right now is pretty much missionary central.) We are both really excited about being close to the action and relying on Thais for friendship and support, but it comes with challenges too.

We don’t have many good connections downtown—yet–and the cost of living is just always higher in the city, so we will have a small place (studio or one bedroom) that isn’t as cheap as we were hoping. We know that the Lord will provide for us, though, and he has already. There is a missionary here starting a “Business As Missions” business which helps foreigners find a place to live, so we’ve already been blessed by his services tremendously.

Language school starts for us on October 2. We’ll be joining a class of three other students who have already begun their studies. We were tested for our own level and assured that we will fit in well with where the other students currently are. Undoubtedly there will be gaps in our knowledge, and other things that we already know that they don’t, so it will be interesting to see how that all works out.

Our first week was not an easy one adjusting to life here, but we’re confident that it is where God wants us.

Chiang Mai is a modern city with a population of about one million, including a lot of Westerners and numerous tourists . Chiang Rai, with about 200,000 people, is somewhat less modern.

Global Ministries is looking for additional people to go to Thailand—youth workers, people with business skills, persons with skills in the trades, and church planters.

The Gerlachs need additional financial support. They raised enough of their needed support to get the green light to go to the field, but could still use more supporters. If you’re interested in supporting the Gerlachs, please contact Global Ministries at [email protected].

(Read more about the Gerlachs here.)

01 Oct Pastors Tour of Haiti

Jeff Bleijerveld, Director of Global Ministries

During the recent Pastors’ Tour of Haiti September 9-16, the team was able to visit with 80 United Brethren members receiving training in small business development. Training of this nature is one of the best solutions to poverty as people are provided an opportunity, not a hand out.

The training was provided through a generous grant to our partners CH Global. The instructor, Eric Musee a Kenyan national, is the director of Go Ye Africa. Eric trains and coaches church planters throughout Africa, many of whom support themselves through small business. However, he had never been invited to Haiti before. The students were surprised at the similarities in their circumstances and responded well to receiving this training from an African brother in Christ.

30 Sep Four Sierra Leoneans Attended Ghana 2013 Conference

Delegates from Sierra Leone at the Ghana 2013 conference. L-r: Mr. Edward Jusu Jr., Mrs. Sally Conteh, Bishop John Pessima, Mr. James Abdulie.

Bishop John Pessima and three other persons from Sierra Leone Conference attended Ghana 2013, a conference on disciple multiplication in Accra, Ghana. It was held September 25-28.

This conference focused particularly on the African context. The first conference of this nature took place in Tokyo in 2010. Although speakers at this event were primarily from Africa, there were also speakers from Asia, Latin America, and North America.

The three persons joining Bishop Pessima are:

• Mr. Edward Jusu Jr., the youth and young adult national coordinator.
• Mrs. Sally Conteh, the Women’s Missionary Fellowship national president
• Mr. James Abdulie, national president of the Master’s Men International.

Global Ministries was able to assist these four delegates using funds from the Antioch Fund. The Sierra Leoneans paid for their visas and conference registration, and the Antioch Fund paid for their flights.

The fund is designated to assist our United Brethren international partners in missions and mission mobilization.

If you would like to make a contribution to this fund, send your gift to Global Ministries, 302 Lake St. Huntington, IN 46750. Indicate that your gift is for the Antioch Fund.