Next, Ethiopians are taking a hands on approach to seeing their countrymen
come to Christ. Through the Kale Heywet (KAH-lah HAY-wah) church more than
four-thousand Bible colleges and five seminaries have been established. SIM
Missionary Tim Brannagan doing some of the training. “Between 1974 through the
early 90’s it was under a communist regime in which the church pretty much had to go
underground, and so there’s a real dearth of leadership, but now we’re training up a
new generation of leadership for the church there in Ethiopia.” Brannagan says these
Christians are committed to seeing that every Ethiopian hears the Gospel. He says it’s
not just classroom instruction. “We’re just as concerned with training toward the heart
or Godly character. And so, much of our teaching takes place out of the classroom
and having training take place on weekends and unreached people groups and on
different assignments that we give them to travel throughout the country.
News Archives
We begin today’s newscast in Moldova where Christian relief agencies are
essential to meeting the needs of the poor. Poor economic conditions in that
former Soviet Block Country means the government can’t help orphans and homeless
children. Mission without Boarder’s Moldova Director Christy Mocan explains. “The
government has a very low income because there’s no production going on. So, the
government is facing a serious cash flow problem. So, because of that, they are facing
a difficult time in meeting the needs of the orphanages for food.” Mocan says Mission
without Borders is providing food to help meet the need. He says that’s when they’re
able to share the Gospel. “For them, when they see our way of life, they say, wow! we
want to be like you. and, that’s when they become Christians. And, they in turn go
back to the orphanages and they become our missionaries.”
We turn next to war torn Liberia as many Christian organizations are gearing up
to help the needy there. Feeding Starving Children International is working with
the West African Children Support Network. The Network’s John Lykkin says while
food is needed, there are other necessities. “We have diverted our focus right now into
just providing the basic life sustaining necessities for most of these people. When I say
basic life sustaining necessities we’re talking about basic clean drinking water, latrines
and showers for these villages.” By providing for those needs, many hearts are opened
to the Gospel. Lykkin says they will be able to do this more easily in the months ahead.
“This was one of the milestones that was accomplished early this year. We have
managed to get non-governmental organization status for the West African Children’s
support network in addition to duty free privileges for any relief supplies that would be
coming in.”
United States Football fans are the targets of an evangelistic outreach. With the
playoffs underway and the Super Bowl right around the corner Sports Outreach
America is providing Super Bowl outreach kits for people hosting Super Bowl parties.
They contain a 12-minute video, Super Bowl edition Sports Spectrum magazines, a
planning guide and more. Over the past seven years the materials have reached more
than one-point-eight million people, leading more than 45-thousand people to Christ.
Meanwhile, for the second year in a row, a Christian relief and development
group ranks high among non-profit groups. International Aid of Spring Lake,
Michigan ranks 95th on the list compiled by the New Jersey based NonProfit Times
magazine. I-A also ranked as the 10th largest relief and development agency in the
country. Last year I-A supplied more than 74-million-dollars in emergency relief, which
opened doors to share the Gospel to the hearts of the hurting in seven major disaster
zones.
A relief and development agency is hoping to increase the number of children
they’re helping around the world. Mission without Borders’ Len Robinson says
they’re expanding their Child Rescue International program this year. Robinson explains
the project. “Typically Child Rescue International reaches the physical needs of these
children in institutions because often the emotional problems of children have a physical
result and so we’re trying to circumvent and sort out that problem. And then, we have
Bible teaching with what we call Christian outreach to the children by the volunteers
and a fostering program.” Robinson says as they reach out to these children they also
minister to the directors of these institutions. “Many, many directors come to us and say
what have you done with our children. They were violent, they were angry and (now)
there’s peace in the home, what has happened? And, we said, the difference is Jesus is
in that home now. And, through this we find many of these directors are becoming
Christians.” Robinson says you can rescue a child for 20-dollars a month.
We begin today’s newscast in the United States where the Federal
Communications Commission has made a decision that could impact all
Christian broadcasting. In granting a transfer of licenses between Pittsburgh T-V
stations, the commission restricted programming devoted to proselytizing, religious
exhortation and personally held religious views on the non-commercial educational
band. Karl Stoll is with the National Religious Broadcasters. “So, in essence what the
FCC has done is they have decided that they can restrict certain types of religious
speech, and we feel that’s unconstitutional.” Stoll says if the decision isn’t overturned, it
could trickle down to non-commercial radio. Back to the Bible’s Radio Director
Martin Jones is concerned. “Our focus is Bible teaching. It always has been and a lot
of our teaching is encouraging the believer, but we’re also encouraging people to come
into a personal relationship with Christ. So, yes, that would affect us in a great way
because that’s what we do.”The NRB expects the court or legislation to overturn the
decision.
We turn next to Indonesia where efforts continue to quell the violence between
Muslims and Christians that has claimed hundreds of lives in the past 10 days.
Compassion International’s Joe Harbison says thankfully, this latest eruption has not
affected them much. “We do work throughout Indonesia, but we don’t have any
projects in those areas affected. However, at this point in time, because of different
social and economic issues arising in Indonesia, there’s been tremendous upheaval.
One of the areas that we’re mostly concerned with is a situation that affects our
children in Timor.” Harbison says Timor’s mayhem temporarily suspended their
program, but the work of the Gospel continued. “We’ve had a complete upheaval in
the population in East Timor of the people who have had to flee. Compassion’s
response is to look to provide some kind of relief in the area of practical physical aid to
the children and families who have been affected. Since we partner with churches,
we’re also very keen to help them come through the crisis.”
An evangelical mission organization is helping the needy in Bulgaria during the
winter months. Mission without Borders’ Len Robinson says Bulgaria is one of the
poorest nations among the former Soviet Union. “In Bulgaria we are sending off a
shipment of tomato juices and various other food stuffs. And, we’re looking at reaching
2,500 children in orphanages through this winter and also another 2,500 elderly people
who live in institutions in Bulgaria.” According to Robinson the physical assistance isn’t
only about feeding their stomachs, but feeding them spiritually. “Our people are
standing by again to receive the goods. And, as soon as they’re in place in Bulgaria
we’ll reach to them with the Gospel, with Christian literature. In their time of need I’ve
seen God opening up Eastern Europe through their policies which have destroyed them
and now the Christians, I believe, are making the difference in that country as well.”
Elsewhere, Open Doors is announcing “Project Jade”, a major project to bring
more than 2 million Bibles and other Christian literature into China. Organizers
say they have never attempted anything this ambitious before. Bibles are in such short
supply that half of the estimated 60 million Christians in China have no Bibles and
thousands of pastors are without proper training.
