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방백들은 애굽에서 나오고 구스 인은 하나님을 향하여 그 손을 신속히 들리로다.
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One Thousand Evangelical Churches in Ethiopia to Receive Funding, by Michelle Vu
(see below).
Mission News from Ethiopia, Mission to Horn of Africa
May 2003
Jong-Kook and Grace Eunhye Park, Jason, Anna
 
Ethiopia Map
Dear friends,
 
We send you greetings in Christ. We just had Ethiopian Easter, as their calendar is different from ours. During Easter we had a wonderful evangelistic trip to Gurage area. As Jason and Anna came home from Kenya for Easter vacation, we travelled down to Gurage together. We presented the gospel through puppet dramas in four areas. As it was strong Muslim and Orthodox region, this puppet drama was very effective to reach people there. There was no electricity and no paved road at all. The rain kept coming during our visit but the Lord brought many people to Christ Jesus by the strong message of the puppet drama. As we travel and teach at many places, we don't have that much chance to work with our children but this was really special family ministry. Jason and Anna understand what their parents are doing in Ethiopia and support us to continue our ministry here.
As this year is the 4th year of our ministry in Ethiopia, we now finishing this term and preparing for our home assignment. This time we plan to have short home assignment of 3.5 months for the sake of continuity and of Jason and Anna's education. We are very much excited to be going home and visiting our family, friends and churches, but we still like to come back to Ethiopia to continue our ministry.
While we are going home, I still want you to be with us in prayers.
1.             The Amharic translation of The Purpose Driven Church
The book, Purpose Driven Church has been translated into Amharic. This book is about discipleship and leadership in the church, which directs the church in its goals and purpose. After the book is printed we plan to hold a seminar with local church leaders so that we can use the book as a church ministry manual. If the fund allows for this, we hope to have a seminar before this year.
 
2.             The 42nd General Assembly of Kale Heywet Church in Ethiopia
JongKook had a great opportunity to attend the General Assembly of KHC from Feb. 25 to Mar. 1. This Assembly was held at Moyale near the Kenyan border (771 km from Addis) to encourage local churches there as well as to focus on evangelism in the area. Through the Assembly they all agreed to send their missionaries to neighbouring countries like Uganda and Tanzania.
 
3.             The churches in Borana
On the way back to Addis I visited several churches in Borana where I had done an evangelism program 5 years ago. There were lots of nice mosques on the streets and fields, but churches are gradually growing there. After the gospel came into this area peoples lives have been slowly changing. Many of the people were wondering how to find water to raise their cattle, as it was the dry season. The water is always the key problem in this area.
 
4.             The evangelists from Jimma and Bonga
I also visited Dilla Bible College where I met several students whom I had taught at Jimma Bible School 5 years ago. It was a great joy to see how Jonas and Hatamu from Jimma and two others from Bonga were studying, growing and being equipped with knowledge and experience so that they can reach others in their church and in their area.
 
5              The 17th church in Addis Ababa
The 17th church has been opened in Addis. By the help of Bole KHC church it had been planted at one of the rural areas in Addis. At last it has become an independent church. Even though the church building is little and covered by a vinyl plastic tent, the number of members is increasing. Now they have 70 members with 5 elected elders and 2 assigned evangelists. During the founding worship service some of the people gave offerings of their rings, necklaces, Bibles and even their jackets, which is the custom of offerings in Ethiopia. We are so glad to see our churches becoming independent and raising their budget by their own effort. And we pray that many of the churches may be plated in needy areas.
6.             Sending local missionaries into other area.
The Addis Ababa KHC church fellowship is eager to send their local missionaries into the unreached areas. Because as I Cor 9: 23 says, 'I do all this for the sake of the gospel, that I may share in its blessings', the Mekanisa KHC church held an evangelism programme for a month. On the last day of the programme they had a commitment to send three missionaries to the less reached areas. So the church encouraged the members to commit offerings for the budget so that three missionaries can work in those areas. One family is going to Wello, another to the Bale area, and the other to the Borana area. It was great joy for us to see the churches we are working with, growing in outreach and in evangelism as well as their initiative to send missionaries to other area.
 
7.             The final workshop for the Pastoral ministry
JongKook has been helping church leaders to strengthen the pastoral ministry in local churches in Addis Ababa. There was a final workshop to finalize the manual describing why they need pastors for church leadership, who are qualified to be pastors and what is the pastors role in church leadership. The committee has been working to present it to all the church leaders of Addis Ababa KHC churches. All the leaders discussed the issues that would be good and bad for the pastoral ministry. There was a good discussion and all agreed to accept the manual except for minor corrections. Now we have one more step to go and that is to decide how to develop pastoral training. It needs lots of prayer and energy to lead them into the new leadership paradigm.
 
8.             Sunday School Teachers training
Grace has finished training Sunday school teachers at Geja and Keranyu KHC churches. These churches have lots of Sunday schools out of the church. There are so many children around the church, but many of them are not able to come to the church program as their parents are not Christians or their place is far from the church. So some of the church members open their homes for Sunday school during weekdays. In each church 24 teachers were trained for 12 weeks to have basic teaching knowledge and teaching methods. Grace has trained more than 100 teachers in the past 2 years in Addis Ababa. She gradually visits each church to follow up the trained teachers how they are doing at their church and what she can help children's programme. As many of them don't know how to serve God in the church, we need prayers that church leaders can encourage young people and church members how to find their gift and to develop it in their life.
 
9.             Ladies Bible Study
The English Bible study group is growing. There are 2 groups meeting twice a week. All of the ladies are faithful to come and to study English and Bible together. Two ladies, Senadu and Mastewot are taking an entrance exam to go to theological college for the next school year. I pray that our ladies will be greatly encouraged through this Bible study to serve other ladies in their community.
 
Please pray that:
1.             the people in the famine area will be helped by the appropriate food distribution.
2.             pastoral leadership will lead churches into the growth in their ministry.
3.             the Gurage churches will be strong in evangelism among Gurage people.
4.             Jason and Anna will be healthy and safe in RVA.
5.             our family will have a good time during home assignment from 9 May to 28 August.
6.             we will be ready for the next term of ministry and be sensitive to the needs of the churches we are working with in Ethiopia.
With great thanks,
JongKook, Grace, Jason and Anna Park
*  *  *
 
One Thousand Evangelical Churches in Ethiopia to Receive Funding

http://www.christianpost.com/article/missions/1822/section/
one.thousand.evangelical.churches.in.ethiopia.to.receive.funding/1.htm##

Sunday, Oct. 23, 2005 Posted: 11:23:00AM EST

One thousand evangelical churches along the western border of Ethiopia will receive church planting funds as a result of the successful completion of a two year project to secure sponsors.

Dr. Blair with 1,350 Ethiopian missionaries (Photo: Blair Foundation)

Dr. Charles E. Blair, founder and president of the Blair Foundation, announced on Aug. 31 that funds to plant 1,000 churches in the unreached region of Benishangul-Gumuz, Ethiopia, bordering Sudan, had been secured. The project, called the ¡°Ethiopian Call,¡± was officially launched on Sept. 1, 2003 and originated from and was supported by the region¡¯s born-again president, Yaregal Aysheshim.

¡°He (Aysheshim) said ¡®I¡¯d like a thousand churches.¡¯ It wasn¡¯t our idea but his,¡± said Blair.

¡°[We decided] if we could get a thousand churches in these villages and require each of the missionaries to reach two other villages, then a total of 3,000 villages making up this region would all have the opportunity to learn about Christianity,¡± he added.

The ¡°Ethiopian Call¡± is a project that helped raised a thousand $1,850 grants for church planting in the Benishangul-Gumuz region of Ethiopia. The amount of $1,850 will help sponsor the establishment of one church in Ethiopia including a full year salary of $50/month to the native Ethiopian missionary ministering the church, a study Bible for the missionary and for new converts, four training sessions and materials to construct the church.

¡°We wanted the common man in America who never had an opportunity to support a church in his life – an orphan yes, but not a building out of mud or tin or whatever material available in that village – to take [for example] 1/3 of a church and give 1/3 of the $1,850 with two other donors,¡± said Blair.

¡°We brought this [project] down to the common people.¡±

The project had initially posed great challenges when Aysheshim explained to Blair that the people of the region were 2,000 years behind the rest of the world and 1,000 years behind the people in other areas of Ethiopia. The people of the region do not wear clothes and they do not go to school but instead hunt and fish to survive.

¡°I¡¯ve been traveling the world over 50 years for missionary works and that is one of the few really, really unreached people group in the sense of knowing what Christianity is about,¡± noted Blair. ¡°They call these people in this village – in this area – the forgotten people, not in a spiritual sense as we would use the phrase. But just forgotten in that it is hard to get there, they are next to the Sudan border and they are people that withdraw.¡±

Yet despite the odds, the project has been successful and was well received by the people of the region. Since April 2005, deployed missionaries have reported 24,863 new converts and 446 of the 1,000 church buildings completed or under construction. The churches are built on land grants by the government according to the constitution of Ethiopia, which grants land for a church building (of any religion) after 25 adults without a place of worship testify their faith.

¡°It is a piece of security in a troubled world, in a poor world where all the land is owned by the government,¡± commented Blair.

He said that the ¡°Ethiopian call¡± had been ¡°one of the greatest experience of my life in the sense that when you do something for people that can¡¯t do anything for you, it brings the greatest satisfaction that mortal man can experience.¡±

The Blair Foundation is currently in the midst of identifying the needs for a new project of building the only hospital in the region¡¯s state capital which will begin construction within the next six months.

Michelle Vu
michelle @ christianpost.com
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