Dear <<First Name>>,
Greetings from Los Angeles! This past weekend, the Lord has sent out His workers into His harvest fields! (Matthew 9:38) Tim & Lianne Kernan preached the Word in DC; Chris & Theresa Broom ministered to the Chicago Church; and DJ & Kacie Comisford, Ricky & Coleen Challinor, and Joel & Courtney Parlour led 163 college students in the LA Campus Ministries to participate in the Phoenix Desert Campus Conference! Here in the City of Angels Church, the Lord continued to add to our number as three were baptized – Marcos & Karla (Central Region) and William (AMS Region), as well as one prodigal son returned home – Albert (AMS Region)!
However, the highlight for those of us that remained in LA, was the greeting at the LAX Airport of Joe, Kerry, Luke & Alex Willis, who have moved to LA from Brisbane, Australia to train to lead the Sydney Mission Team! I will never forget the 70 of us singing to them as they came through customs, but Joe being so excited that he left their suitcases and jumped up on the railing to hug all of us! Truly, just as we sang to this awesome family, We Love [Them] With The Love Of The Lord!
Lou Jack Martinez – our Antelope Valley Sector Leader of the Central Region adds: "ANOTHER BAD DAY FOR THE DEVIL” IN THE ANTELOPE VALLEY! God has been forcefully advancing His kingdom in the Antelope Valley as – after our first 20 additions in a mere four weeks through remnant disciples joining us by placing membership and restoration from our former fellowship – WE JUST HAD OUR FIRST TWO BAPTISMS: MARCOS & CARLA GONZALEZ!
Particularly touching was the fact that Carla is the adopted sister of our sister LONA AGUIRRE, who hadn't see her for 11 years – having been separated by child services for over a decade – before they were reunited just three years ago! And for the past three years, “Big Ed” & Lona Aguirre have been reaching out to Carla and her husband Marcos! Well, now that the movement of God has returned to the Antelope Valley, both Marcos & Carla studied urgently to get right with God, AND TODAY THEY WERE BORN AGAIN! Additionally, our First Principles Class in “the AV” is busting at the seams, as we've been averaging 55 people per class, including 15 teens in the home of Clay & Rashima Erickson! OUR GOD IS AN AWESOME GOD! As we are reminded in John 4:35, “Open your eyes and look at the fields! They are ripe for harvest!"
And here’s more good news from around the globe…
Mike Underhill of Chicago: The Lord added three to our number this week, but first some good news from our Women's Day! Saturday, April 14th, was our Women's Day entitled,
The Promise. We had a full house and set a Chicago record with 252 women in attendance! That's 177 visitors that came along with our 85 sisters in the church! Our UIC Campus Ministry of five women had 23 visitors alone, and one sister, Dara, shared today at our leaders meeting about how God blessed her with ten visitors! The Spirit worked powerfully through the program, the vulnerable testimonies, and the powerful preaching of the Word by Theresa Broom. One woman, Mahogany, who had been met a year-and-a-half ago and was "stuck" in her Bible studies and un-surrendered to God, totally repented and counted the cost after Women’s Day and was baptized at our Sunday Service! I am so proud of and grateful to my wife Brittany, who worked tirelessly to make our Women's Day such an incredible event!
We're also so grateful to the entire Broom family. Today, Chris preached a powerful lesson preparing the church for the heart and mentality of being at peace through transition. It was an inspiring five point lesson on Philippians 4 ending with
"I can do all things through Him who gives me strength." Chicago will be sending out 21 disciples to four cities this summer: 14 to San Francisco, four to Boston, two to South Central LA, and one to Paris! So Chris' lesson met many needs!
The service was so heart-moving especially to hear the young Austin Broom (15 years old) leading the church in communion and contribution, KC sharing about his baptism this past Wednesday, and then with Gabriela and Mahogany finally being baptized at the end of service! To add to all the miracles, Anthony Franklin asked his girlfriend, Maria Cortez, to marry him! And she said, “Yes!” To God be all the glory!
Guillaume Bellamy: Greetings from Paris! The Holy Spirit is doing great things even before the arrival of the so awaited mission team! Saturday, Philippe – our talent full and creativesong leader – organized an evening of worship with the goal of gathering relationships from our former fellowship that wasn’t confident yet to come to church. Excitingly, 15 people gathered around this event, and by the end of the meeting all of the members of our remnant group had deep talks with the majority of them and try to persuade them to come to church on Sunday.
This Sunday, we were 14 at our service and it was one of our best services! The most interesting fact is that we are preaching and calling people to come back to
“wholeheartedly” following God Sunday after Sunday, and instead of being scared and not returning, people are coming back! I received an e-mail from Leila, a very close friend of Prisca this past week, and she wrote the following, “After nine years of being in a spiritual desert, you have been a spiritual oasis, and I can feel the love of God through the love of your group.” Those kinds of comments strengthen our hearts and encourage us to persevere.
Lastly, our dear sister Patricia – she is the “Esther” of the group – began to study the Bible with one of her friend’s, Nadia. The sisters of our remnant group are fired-up to open the Bible with non-Christians once again in order to help people to discover our Savior. Please pray for Nadia and for additions to our group in the weeks to come!
Carlos Mejia: Greetings from DC! This weekend has been filled with many joyous events! We started Friday night with our Going Away Party for Jared & Rachel McGee, as they leave this week to become missionaries in Santiago, Chile! The impact they have had in DC was evident in the heartfelt and tear-filled sharing of all the disciples! They are our first missionaries to leave DC, as we will be sending a total of three to Orlando and nine to Santiago! Please pray for Jared & Rachel as they are about to be immersed in Spanish to learn, as Victor Senior would say, “God’s language!”
Our Saturday continued with more joy as the disciples witnessed Rafi & Nyah be married as sold-out disciples! This “love story” has encouraged so many disciples, as last week we were able to hear Nyah's testimony at her restoration, and also, we were privileged to witness the baptism of Rafi who comes from a Muslim background. God fulfilled Nyah's dream to marry a sold-out disciple as this wedding had been planned for months. She was willing to give-up everything for Christ (Luke 14:33) and put her relationship with Rafi on the line and put-off the wedding, but God prevailed and this love story began with Rafi & Nyah getting "married to God” first.
Our Sunday service was amazing as Tim & Lianne Kernan, our fellow "Crown of Thorns Leaders” for the Paris Mission Team and the present leaders of the South Region in the City of Angels ICC, were here to preach and inspire the disciples and talk about Special Missions! Lianne shared her life and how so many of her family members became disciples due to "missions money" from other churches. We are all inspired and convicted as Tim preached a sermon entitled, Heroes Needed! He shared about Nehemiah and his heart to be a hero for God and how we also need to be willing to be heroes for God! Tim's preaching was awesome! We were so convicted about Tim's heart to “go anywhere, do anything, give up everything” to ensure the gospel is spread to every nation. Thank you to the South Region and the City of Angels ICC for allowing Tim & Lianne to be away for a few days!
The day ended as we witnessed yet another Howard University student get baptized! Our new sister in Christ, Kalan, made Jesus Lord of her life! Our hearts are full! “The Lord has done great things for us, we are filled with joy.” (Psalm 126:3)
Ron Harding of Portland: Greetings from the birthplace of our movement! With an attendance of 184, our Campus Day proved to be one the greatest services in our three years in the Rose City! It was so exciting to have at church Brittany Lukins’ childhood friend from the Mainline Church of Christ – Brandy. Brandy called Brittany two weeks ago saying that she needed help with her relationship with God. Brittany challenged Brandy to come and visit for the weekend, so Brandy came last weekend, spent the day with the disciples on Saturday raising money for special, then came for Easter Sunday. After two days, Brandy openly confessed to Brittany that she had never lived the life she was watching the girls live and that she needed to be baptized as a true disciple. She did the L&D Study today and wants to be baptized by next Sunday!
I’m so proud of our PSU Campus Ministry. Not only have they grown from six to 17 since Dustin & Amanda arrived last fall, but they put on a powerful service for the entire congregation today! Dan Upshaw, JB Firman and Chris Green led the congregation to sing powerfully. Erin Corbin blew everyone away with her vulnerable and moving testimony at communion. Then, Dustin preached the Word like a seasoned evangelist, teaching us how to be “great in God’s eyes!”
Then, we saw one of those once in a lifetime moments with the Green family. The stage was filled with 13 people, who all contributed to this modern day miracle. Chris Green shared with tears, Mikey Matthis – who was just restored last week – shared from his heart, then Ted & Kathy brought everyone to tears as they shared about their son as Jonathan Green was restored to the Lord! Then immediately following his restoration, Jonathan and his mother partnered together to bring his wife into the light as they baptized Patricia into Christ! We are humbled that God continues to bless us with growth and powerful miracles! To Him be all the glory and honor!
Jake Ramsier of Honolulu: Aloha from the Islands! This Sunday, there was joy in the Honolulu Church, as we gave our Special Missions Contribution! We remembered those who sacrificed for us and were honored to sacrifice for others. Our offering surpassed our 15X goal and totaled $39,640! Thanks and praise be to God!
Tim Butakov of Novosibirsk: Greetings from Siberia! Last week, our brother Slava Kononenko was restored into God’s family, and his wife Marina was baptized as a sold-out disciple of Christ on the same day! Slava & Marina have been married for two years and they have a very convicting story to tell.
Slava was baptized in 1994 in our former fellowship with a dream to evangelize all nations in our generation. But unfortunately in 2002, when everything in the church started to change, Slava walked away from God, because of compromises and sin in his life. In an attempt not to lose his spiritual experience, Slava began to attend meetings of different denominational churches believing that he could be a disciple of Christ anywhere. According to him, he faced there with a number of false doctrines based primarily on religious traditions, not Scripture. After many unsuccessful attempts to come back to God in these circumstances, Slava realized his need to be in a group of fully committed disciples of Jesus. During this period, Slava also met his wife, Marina.
According to Marina, she had never been a believing person. Though Slava was not in the church and not living as a disciple of Christ, he did not cease to influence Marina for the Lord. He tried to explain the First Principles of Christianity, which he remembered from his conversion. When Slava & Marina first came to the meeting of the Novosibirsk ICC, Marina still did not understand much about God, but with all her heart wanted to be with Him. Marina immediately showed her good and serving heart, and started to help our sisters in decorating the hall. Over the next two weeks, Slava & Marina carefully studied the Bible together with disciples, paying special attention to change their lives in accordance with the Biblical challenges they were receiving: “Watch your life and doctrine closely. Persevere in them, because if you do, you will save both yourself and your hearers.” (1 Timothy 4:16)
It was amazing to see how Slava & Marina took difficult and radical decisions to change their hearts for God. As a result, Slava fully restored his relationship with God, his discipleship, and his desire to evangelize all the nations. At the Sunday meeting, he shared very sincerely the story of his baptism, and how subsequently he left the Lord. He was asking for forgiveness from God and from the disciples and expressed his thankfulness that they did not leave him, but helped him to find his way back to Jesus’ church. He said with conviction, "This is the church I was baptized in!" At this same meeting, Slava’s wife Marina confessed that “Jesus is Lord” and a few minutes after his restoration, Slava baptized his wife into Christ! And let all glory be to God!
Anthony Eckels of Orlando: God has exposed and purged the sin from our camp for the last couple weeks! The result has been joy, strengthening and a forged unity. God blessed us this past weekend, as we had another successful Special Missions Car Wash, a Walk-a-thon and a Sushi Night Fundraiser! We were also fired-up to have the Hurey's visiting from DC, as we diligently worked to find them a home on the westside to move here on the Orlando Mission Team! Jessie's sister, Sendy Clerzeau, who attended our Women's Day, was baptized into Christ on Sunday! Jessie's five-year-old niece has been attending church with her. She loves Kingdom Kids so much that she told her mom that she can't miss church because she is a “Kingdom Kid!” Now her mom wants to study the Bible with Jessie as well! Please pray that we can blow out our Special Missions on May 6th!
Jay Hernandez of Hilo: Greetings from your brothers and sisters here on the Big Island! God continues to bless us in many ways. We are excited for our Special Missions Sunday coming up next week. Some have already given theirs including our lone teen disciple Savannah Directo. Today, she turned in her Special Missions and gave 50 X, not the 15 X that was expected. (2 Corinthians 8:1-7) She truly is an inspiration to me, and the hard work she doing is an example to all here in Hilo. The Directo family was also honored this week as Chris, one of our Shepherds in the church, was honored as “The Teacher of the Year” at his school. The Directo family is truly a great example to all of us as they are a hard-working and a very dedicated family to God. We love you all! God bless!
Vic Gonzalez Jr. of Santiago: Greetings in the Lord from way down here in the Southern Hemisphere! As the Mexico City Mission Team prepares to come train in Los Angeles, the Lord has blessed one of our mission team members with a family member being restored to the Lord! Jenny Perez was restored! Jenny is Peggie Farrell's little sister. Brandon Ferrel, Peggie's husband, was serving as a Mainline Church of Christ missionary in Guyana when he met Peggie – a Mainline Church of Christ member. They later were married, and Brandon was met by Steve Ranga in Suriname, where he recommitted his life to Christ and joined the ICOC.
After moving to Lexington, Kentucky in 2003, he was very disheartened by the lukewarmness in his own life and his church. Interestingly, as the evangelist there began to slander our dear brother Kip, the Spirit prompted Brandon to go online searching for other churches. The Spirit led him to Upsidedown21.org, where he found refreshment and with the fear of being "in a traditional Church of Christ environment," he planned his move to Portland, Oregon! After being in Oregon, his wife was asked by my awesome mom to study the Bible. After studying with incredible women – such as Denise Bordieri, Megan Matthews, Letty England, and Connie Underhill – she was baptized as a disciple!
Sadly, after the leadership of the Portland Church decided to abandon God’s new movement and be autonomous, Brandon again "fled for his spiritual life." The Farrells’ missionary hearts led them back to the mission field, as they came to Santiago, Chile to help the Sullivans in September 2009. Brandon is currently our web-deacon here in Santiago. The Lord has blessed the Farrells’ hearts, as their precious daughter Amanda (13) will now be a missionary trio with her parents, as they will be part of the base of sold-out disciples in Mexico City! Pray for the Santiago Church, as this week, we eagerly await the arrival of the McKeans, Mejias, McGees and Albert Wagers! ¡Ponte Las Pilas!
Luke Speckman of Phoenix: Greetings from the Valley of the Sun! We were joined by the Campus Ministry of the CAICC for our Annual Campus Conference this weekend entitled, Here Am I! It was an incredible, life-changing event with powerful preaching and awesome fellowship! To get things going, the AMS Region of LA baptized William after the Friday evening session! Today's worship was so inspiring! We had our largest attendance ever with 360! DJ closed out the conference with a convicting sermon entitled, Here Am I, Lord Send Me!
After taking up our Special Missions Contribution last week, today over $8,400 was given, which is double what our weekly pledge is! We closed out the service with two incredible baptisms! The first, Tayvon, is a student at the ASU Polytechnic and the fifth brother to be baptized on that campus this semester! The second baptism, Christa, was particularly touching as she is the daughter of one of our Shepherding Couples, Chad & Rae Lynn. Christa (23) grew up as a “Kingdom kid,” who left Chad & Rae when she was 14 to live with her biological dad. There wasn't a dry eye in the fellowship, as Chad apologized to Christa with many tears for all his mistakes he made in his parenting. Today, we witnessed a family reconciled in Christ!!
A huge thank you to the McKeans, Comisfords, and the City of Angels Church for supporting our conference! And a very special thank you to all of LA’s Region Leaders and Campus Leaders who either brought or sent their campus students!! We love you all!
Bill Hamilton of Charlotte: Greetings from the Queen City of the South! "He who finds a wife finds what is good and receives favor from the Lord!" (Proverbs 18:22) Today was a great day in the Charlotte Church, as we had the chance to witness our first engagement of two beloved disciples: Christopher Carrothers & Patricia Mendez! It was truly heart-moving for all in attendance, as Christopher got down on one knee and proposed to Patricia by the water at the beautiful boardwalk in the university area of Charlotte! We are so grateful and proud in the Lord to be part of God’s SoldOut Discipling Movement!
Andrew Smellie of New York City: "So at that time the entire service of the Lord was carried out for the celebration of the Passover and the offering of burnt offerings on the altar of the Lord, as King Josiah had ordered. The Israelites who were present celebrated the Passover at that time and observed the Feast of Unleavened Bread for seven days. The Passover had not been observed like this in Israel since the days of the prophet Samuel; and none of the kings of Israel had ever celebrated such a Passover as did Josiah, with the priests, the Levites and all Judah and Israel who were there with the people of Jerusalem." (2 Chronicles 35:16-18) Greetings from the saints in New York City! The Lord was truly glorified today as we witnessed both a powerful service and the joyful celebration for our 2012 Missions Contribution!
Immediately following our worship was a PARTY to celebrate the offering of our 2012 Missions Contribution! After meeting in our school auditorium, we all moved over to the nearby cafeteria that had been decorated for our party aptly titled: "LOCAL MISSIONS JUBILEE CELEBRATION!” I have not been to a party like this in a long time!
After I shared the Good News Email reporting from around the Kingdom all that our God is doing, we got down to business! We had great food (coconut rice & jerk chicken); great games (musical chairs); great prizes (to hold up noteworthy examples in the church of faithful & creative fundraising); and a DJ (Niko) who was fantastic!!! (He also came to church and loved it!) From the Cuban Shuffle/Electric Slide to Salsa to Reggae, the music was on fire! Special thanks to Tia Taylor and Kwaku Sarkodie for doing a great job to help organize this outstanding event! I was personally encouraged by the fact that almost all the visitors who came out to church with us stayed until the party ended three hours later! Even Danny, the custodian of our building who has been studying the Bible, joined in our celebration and danced with us! Who says Christians don't know how to throw a party? Let's all rejoice for what God is doing and will continue to do throughout our new movement as we all look forward to the Day we shall rejoice with the Lord! (Isaiah 25:9)
Dearest brothers and sisters, please be praying for Elena and me as we take-off tomorrow for an 11 day missionary trip to Santiago, Chile and Sao Paulo, Brazil. (Due to our time away, there will not be a Good News Email next week, but on April 29th, we will resume again.) Thanks for your willing hearts so evident in the baptisms and the missions contributions to “obey the commands of the eternal God, so that all nations might believe and obey Him – [and] to the only wise God be glory forever through Jesus Christ! Amen!” (Romans 16:26-27)
Much love,
Kip
