April 2008

Dear Friends in Christ:

Greetings in the name of our Lord. Dottie and I trust you had a blessed season of celebrating the resurrection of our Lord! He is risen indeed and His Name is being proclaimed throughout the world in power. Just to give you a quick update as to how deeply the power of God is working, here are our results through March, with one report yet to come from Ghana:

~ We have completed 5 overseas projects

~Preaching the Gospel in 177 venues to 41,088 people

~We have witnessed 16,630 people make first time

decisions for Christ in Ghana and India

~We have planted 2 new churches in India

One of our teams in Ghana has just finished a project deep in the bush where they preached 30 times to 7,847 people with 4,251 making first time decisions for Christ. I know that many of you that read our prayer letters rejoice with us but you can tend to gloss over these numbers. Here are a few of the testimonies that came out during the two week project:

"According to my mother, she got pregnant with me after she had visited a powerful fetish shrine and so from childhood, I was dedicated to these gods. I did not get a normal childhood because I was forbidden from doing many things. I could not play with my friends, if even I had any; I did not go to school because I was supposed to serve in the shrine all the days of my life. I wept a lot and asked questions but I was pacified with a lot of meat from sacrificed animals. Truly I felt dissatisfied but there was nobody to give satisfactory answers.

About a month or so ago, I was sent on an errand to a village but I had to stay the night because of transportation difficulties. In the night I heard some people preaching about a man called Jesus and I started feeling very uncomfortable. I could not go out to see the people and most of all; I could not ask them questions about this man called Jesus. However I did resolve in my mind that anytime I met them, I would definitely ask them those questions.

Tonight I happened to be around and watched the film from beginning. Every question I had in me has been answered and best of all I have dedicated my life and whatever remains of it to the Lord. I feel so relieved and cleansed that I do not believe I can go back to the fetish house. I am therefore traveling to an uncle who is far from this town so I can have some peace. Please remember to bear me up in prayer." This dear man was baptized and given enough money the following day to journey to a place about 300km away. He was also given references and contact addresses to call on for advice and help. His name and village is being withheld for fear of reprisal.

Rose Quansah, 48 years, is one of the leaders in the local church in Kokoben near Ajumako has this to say: " though we all do a sort of evangelism from time to time, but fail to lead our hearers to invite Jesus into their hearts by praying the sinner's prayer for their salvation. I thought it was the duty of only elders and pastors are the only people who are required to lead converts to invite Christ into their hearts. I thank God for the lessons I received in the seminar and I was motivated to do effective witnessing and lead people to receive Christ as their Lord and personal Savior. I will also encourage the church members to take this task seriously to get more souls won into the Kingdom of God".

Samuel Nkrumah, 43 years, said the Christian Life and Witness seminar organized in their church has helped him to understand that a Christian when he sins will break his fellowship with God but the relationship will remain the same as a child of God - but he will not enjoy the blessing of God has made available to him as well as the peace with God. He said some Christians use their freedom as 'born again' people to indulge in sinful activities. "I am happy to understand that God has made provision for carnal people to be restored back to the fellowship with God through prayer and confessing one's sins".

The volunteers who helped in this March project confessed that they have learned a lot from our team. They said our commitment at work has motivated them. On one occasion they were surprised to see us standing in the rain to pack our equipment. On another, they were surprised we did not abandon the project when two of our truck's leaf springs broke in a very remote village when we were also being beaten by the rain. They said they were touched about our sacrificial work and compared our trials to some of the sufferings Paul went through during his missionary journeys.

Thanks for enabling us to go forward with the Gospel!

We also want to say a big thanks to all of you who are praying for us and even giving to the needs that we have at this moment (our last six months receipts being down nearly 25% year to date).

As items for prayer, at this moment we only have operating monies for the Father's House orphanage budgeted through May. WE NEED $16,000 TO FINISH THE YEAR! Please don't ask me what we are going to do if it doesn't come – I don't even want to think about that possibility.

We have over 100 people in India and Ghana who look to us for their support – again, please don't ask me what we are going to do if support doesn't come – I don't even want to think about that possibility either.

We are now accepting new student applications at Harvesters Training College in India for the July semester. I don't even want to think about the possibility that the present students and the ones coming could be refused admission in July because of the lack of funding in one of the richest countries in the world.

Please pray about helping us. Please ask you church to consider putting us in their mission budget as some six churches have. We cannot let this great work of God decline, we cannot! It is a trust that has been committed to us as his followers.

God has and will continue to answer prayer for the needs of the ministry overseas; thank you so much for interceding on our behalf. We remain committed to Christ; indebted to the Gospel and grateful for your partnership with us.

Dottie joins me in sending our love to you all….Mack

I thank God every time I remember you. And I always

pray for all of you with joy. I thank God for the help

you gave me while I told people the Good News.

Philippians 1:3-5, ERV