From Small Ideas to God's Big Plans

Today, Wednesday, July 25th, our team presented the message of Jesus telling the parables of the one lost sheep and the one lost coin (Luke 15:3-10). The main point, really there are a multitude of great points, is those that don't place there faith in Jesus Christ are far more important in this temporal world than those arleady disciples of Christ. A doctor doesn't come to cure the healthy, but the sick (that probably sounds familiar). Thus, it is the lost that are the reason and the weight of the Great Commission that Jesus has called all his disciples to. Well, part of the lesson plan was to get the kids to put on a community outreach program for the local villagers and school friends. Our initial plan was to simply have the kids invite there friends to come to the orphanage to enjoy some food and drinks and play some games and develop relationships. In our minds during planning we were thinking maybe 10-20 kids would accept the invite. Well, the New Life Missions pastor of the Bantey Meanchey province, Pastor Navy, is currently in town and was made aware of the idea. Let me pause at this juncture and go back to mention another idea we had been tossing around while planning out the week prior to the trip. We thought it would be good if each of us team members shared our life story with the kids of the orphanage to give them some insight into experiences of our lives to impart wisdom to avoid the mistakes we made. Now, back to the present, Pastor Navy combined our ideas into a bigger idea. He wants us to use the building used for worship gathering and informed us to expect around 80-90 people to show up and for us to share our stories and essentially the gospel in our lives. Keep in mind these villagers are people who have probably never heard the Gospel, work all day to provide hardly enough food and water for daily sustenance, and live in what could be described as a bigger more permanent lean-to. After we, specifically; Mike, Maureen, and Amber, share our stories, Pastor Navy plans to have an invitation for all those present to accept Christ as their savior if they feel so led. So, all this is to go on Thursday, July 26th, around 2:00 PM Cambodian time, or 3:00 AM EST. We just wanted to shoot it to you all so that you could be praying for what could be a village changing experience for this "neighborhood" of Bantey Meanchey. Please lift up the villagers and kids of the orphanage in your prayers today asking God to work in their hearts and that they would hear and respond to the patient knock from Christ.