“Do you not say, ‘There are still four months and then comes the harvest’ Behold, I say to you, lift up your eyes and look at the fields, for they are already white for harvest!” John 4:35 As I write today’s update, I am thinking of the arrangements being quickly made by the House of Blessing missionaries to make […]
MIDEAST UPDATE 7/26/2018 God’s Heart: The Harvest
As believers in the Lord Jesus Christ, we are well aware of the Great Commission found in Mark 16:15-20. This is a command for believers in Jesus Christ to reach the world with the Gospel of the Messiah, Jesus Christ. We find that Luke 10:2 calls Him the “Lord of the Harvest. ” The Master is given many names in […]
MIDEAST UPDATE 7/14/2018 “…and they did not love their lives to the death”
It goes without saying that for most of us, it is nearly impossible to picture for ourselves what the conditions really are where many missionaries serve in today’s world. This is certainly the case with the House of Blessing missionaries. The circumstances vary from place to place across the Middle East, but there are some constants. Every day is filled […]
MIDEAST UPDATE 7/10/2018 “Continuing Sage in Daraa”
In our last update, I mentioned that a large number of the House of Blessing missionaries in Syria went into the Daraa area due to the unfolding human tragedy resulting from the Assad regime retaking control of the area from the rebel forces who have been entrenched there for several years. There are widespread reports of indiscriminate bombings with […]
MIDEAST UPDATE 7/3/2018
In today’s update I would like to reprint an older episode as I sometimes do so that we don’t forget the great things God has done in the past in response to the prayers of God’s people. This story involves a number of House of Blessing missionaries, one of them being a man named Omar. This Omar however is not […]
MIDEAST UPDATE 6/27/2018 “Staring Death in the Eye”
It has been nearly two weeks since the last Mideast Update was written. As we have seen over the many updates, the conditions on the ground change from one day to the next. Recently, along with the normal update information, I provided some of the details of the military siege on Eastern Ghouta and the catastrophic consequences for the […]
MIDEAST UPDATE 6/15/2018 Greater Love Has No Man
As I begin to write today’s update, I think back to House of Blessing missionaries I’ve written about so many times…people like Omar, Same, Mufiedah, Fatwa, Sarah, Fatima and so many others. Then, of course, there is Pastor R, leader and founder of H.O.B. A question that could be asked is: “What motivates a missionary to continue doing what they […]
MIDEAST UPDATE 6/5/2018
I spent some time thinking back over the scores of updates written in the past six years and wondered how often they may seem repetitive to readers. Over these past handful of years there have been stories telling of the Bibles provided and distributed, many accounts of the souls reached, stories describing some of the horrors witnessed and experienced by […]
MIDEAST UPDATE 5/21/2018
Almost 2,000 years ago, Jesus made this promise to the disciples: “…you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be witnesses to Me in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth. Now when He had spoken these things, while they watched, He was taken up, and […]
A DIVINE PRIVILEGE
Very few people who sing the old hymns written through the years know the life stories behind the words they are singing. Quite often, what made these hymns so powerful and moving, was the pain and suffering the composer had to go through. It is these bitter experiences that are often the source of the greatest inspiration. Although God is […]