Worldwide Activity Report -- May 1997
FAR043 - GP

Copyright 1997 by The Family

         "Go into all the world and preach the Gospel to everyone, everywhere," Jesus told His followers. Every day, in nearly 80 countries, Family missionaries share Jesus' message of hope and love with many thousands. Following are some highlights of their recent activities and experiences.

Second harvest
From Gabriel, Morocco
         As part of our preparation before moving from Western Europe to a Muslim mission field in the CIS (former USSR), my wife Luz Angela and I decided to make a three-week trip to North Africa to gain more experience in sharing our faith with Muslims. I also hoped to renew contact with some friends I had not seen for many years. I joined the Family in my late teens, after which I lived in the Maghreb* for nearly two years, and spread the Gospel in Algeria, Morocco and Melilla, a Spanish administered city on the Mediterranean coast of northeast Morocco. Imagine the shock on my old friends' faces when they opened the door and saw me -- 18 years later! (* Region of northwest Africa comprising Morocco, Algeria and Tunisia.)
         One person we visited was Alfred. For several years after I left the Maghreb, we had stayed in touch. I had sent him newsletters about our work, and he had written back. Then we lost contact. I was surprised at how much Alfred remembered about me from those newsletters, and even more surprised to see what an impact the Family publications I gave him back then had had on him and others.
         Alfred introduced us to some friends of his -- a young couple with four kids -- and we stayed with them during part of our visit. Until recently, both parents had had drug problems and been in jail. Then they met Alfred, who gave them some of our publications and led them to receive Jesus. They quit taking drugs, and their lives took a dramatic turn for the better.
         And they weren't the only people that Alfred had been ministering to. In a different home every day, he meets with a group of believers to sing Family songs, pray, read the Word and have communion together. In the face of mounting Islamic fundamentalism in North Africa, this group actively shares their faith and leads many others to receive the Lord. They receive some persecution from both Muslims and Catholics, but even some of their critics have come to admire them. The local bishop, for example, told them that their three-day-a-week jail ministry is the only good thing that happens there.
         In the Parable of the Sower, Jesus explained that "he who received seed on the good ground is he who" -- like Alfred -- "hears the Word [of God] and understands it, who indeed bears fruit and produces: some a hundredfold, some sixty, some thirty" (Matthew 13:23). We were amazed to see what had grown from the little seed of faith planted in Alfred many years ago! One plants, another waters, but God gives the increase! (1 Corinthians 3:6,7).

Wrong turn, U-turn
From Carl, Hungary
         We received an interesting letter from a girl in Poland who had written in response to receiving a Family-produced poster; we now correspond with her regularly. Like many other teenagers today, she had taken a serious wrong turn in her search for spiritual things. Here are excerpts of her letter (translated from Polish):
         One of my friends gave me a copy of your poster about the Endtime, the reign of Satan and his ultimate defeat. Right away I knew where I was at: I was going straight into the Devil's pit.
         My name is Magda, and I come from a family who believes in God. Every Sunday we go to church and sit in a pew together. Anybody would think we are a perfect example of a loving Christian family, but that couldn't be further from the truth. My parents quarrel constantly. I felt lost and didn't know what to do -- and that's how it started.
         One day while walking with a friend, we went into an interesting little shop, with lots of amulets, signs and symbols. Soon I walked out of the store with witchcraft jewelry hung around my neck. A few weeks later I got myself some more "tools" and started casting my first spells.
         Little by little it grew until I was spending all of my time in witchcraft -- either casting spells, or reading books to learn to do it better. I believed that every person has power, and I wanted to learn how to use mine. I sat in a dark room for hours and hours trying to make others do my will. I was so blinded that I didn't even realize what I was doing was evil. People around me started calling me Witch because I often talked about things before they happened. But one day those occurrences scared me -- really scared me. I was proud of myself and my power, but at the same time I was afraid of it. Was there any way out?
         Then I read one of your posters and decided never to touch witchcraft again. I got rid of my books and jewelry, and today I thank God for rescuing me. I had been searching for a way out, but never thought about Him. And all the time, He was there waiting for me!
         I want to be on Jesus' side, no longer on the Devil's, but I am still very weak. I have nobody else to go to, so I'm writing to you. Please help me! -- Magda

Dying man finds faith and a will to live!
From Maggie, Mexico
         The last time Augustine and I saw one of our friends, who is a pastor, he shared the following story:
         One of his parishioners, Joel, was in the hospital, dying. While praying about his next visit to Joel, the pastor suddenly remembered a cassette tape we had given him -- a collection of comforting Bible verses set to music, entitled "Fear Not!"
         He took the tape to Joel, who liked it so much that he asked his nurses to play it over and over again. "The words of those songs brought him back to life!" the pastor exclaimed! By the time we heard this, Joel was out of the hospital, back to work, and telling everyone about how the Lord raised him from his deathbed.

A life worth living -- and sharing!
From Larissa, age 17, Russia
         We are close friends with a few families from a village nearby, and they always want to know more about the Bible and the Lord. My fifteen-year-old brother Tim and I have stayed with them several times. This month we stayed almost a week.
         School was in session, so Tim and I went to school with them. When their teachers found out that I was a native English speaker, they asked me to teach English. I taught up to eight classes a day!
         One of the teachers also arranged for Tim and me to visit an orphanage in the village. The teens we were staying with came along to translate and see firsthand how we conduct our programs in orphanages. We acted out stories for the children, and prayed with them to receive Jesus as their Savior.
         My friend Lena, one of the teens who had come along, commented, "It's wonderful to be able to make others happy with the Lord's love!"
         "Yes," I answered, "that's what makes life worth living!"
         That week over a hundred people prayed with Tim and me to receive Jesus, and we had a great time with our friends.

Follow the leader -- Jesus!
From Crystal, India
         The other day, while praying with Timmy about where we should go for our outreach ministry, a vivid picture flashed in my mind. It was of an unkempt, unshaven old man, sitting up in a hospital bed, reaching out with a painful expression on his face! However, since it had only been a couple of days since we last visited the hospital where we sometimes minister, we decided to witness elsewhere. Our day didn't go well at all, and we returned home disappointed.
         So the next day when we prayed for our outreach and the Lord again brought the hospital to our minds. We felt He was leading us to go there, so off we went. We took 500 Family posters to distribute, instead of our usual 200, and had a heaven of a time passing them out and encouraging the patients.
         We were nearly finished when we walked into a ward and saw the man I had seen in the vision the previous day. At first I didn't recognize him, but as he reached out for a poster, suddenly he had the same expression on his unshaven face, and his eyes were full of pain. When I stopped to talk with him, he buried his face in the poster and cried. "My Jesus came to me," he said over and over. "Thank you!"
         This experience taught me a big lesson: The Lord knows who most needs to receive His love through us, and He will take us to them. We just need to be ever ready and willing to follow His lead.

Words like no other!
From Esteban, Chile
         Eliodoro is a cripple who sells candied apples and other sweets on the street. He gets around on a hand-operated tricycle. One morning he received a To You -- With Love! tract from one of us, and I met and talked with him later that day.
         "I've been an atheist and a communist activist all my life," he told me. "For five years I had to live underground to avoid prison. Recently, however, I've been wondering if there is a God. Since I work on the street, I have read tracts put out by every denomination and group, and my room is full of books on philosophy and politics. Still, I had never read anything that moved me as much as this! These few words have changed my life! Who wrote it?"
         I explained to him that the text of the tract was a message from God, which someone had received in prophecy after praying for a special message for people just like Eliodoro.
         "It's God speaking to you and loving you personally," I told him.
         At that, Eliodoro became very excited, opened his life to the Lord and hung on to every word I said! He asked me for more material to read, so I gave him some other tracts and encouraged him to read the Gospels, especially the Gospel of John because it contains so many words of Jesus.
         Another life touched and transformed by God's love!

         The Family is a non-profit, volunteer organization. Each of the activities you have just read about was made possible through donations from businesses, associations and concerned individuals. If you would like more information about The Family, or if you would like to help sponsor Family volunteers or projects, please contact us at one of the addresses below:

Web: http://www.thefamily.org/family
E-mail: family@thefamily.org


Copyright (c) 1998 by The Family