Charessa Koonz, Director of Christian Education “Evangelism is a Family Affair”: Children are natural evangelists. And children are members of a family. Together, a family can demonstrate through their actions and words what it means to be a member of the larger family – God’s family. How do we send families to go and be disciples? How do we lift up the importance of being grounded in the Word? How do we train up our children and adults so that freely sharing the Good News a simple and everyday activity?  This broadcast focuses on the family.

Rev. Lloyd Gaines, Mission & Ministry Executive installed: Rev. Andrew Okai as Chairman/Mission Developer; Mr. Orlando Flahn, Co-Chairman; Mr. Joseph Davis, Secretary General; Rev. Suah Deddeh, Program Chairman; Rev. Jacob Harris, Chaplain; Mr. Gorvego Fahnbullah, Asst. Chaplain; Mr. Timother Tiampay, Fiancial Secretary; and Mr. Dante martin, Treasurer.

Two new Ablaze! Circuit Grants are being awarded.  One  to Bethany, Alexandria VA for a special outreach program through scouting and the other to Crossway Mission, Norfolk VA to help with rental for worship and gathering space. This grants are possible because a portion of unrestricted Ablaze! for God’s Mission gifts are returned to Circuit Mission projects.

God invites us to pray without ceasing for the work of the Holy Spirit throughout the lives of all people.  Currently we have 1580 people who are committed to this ministry. If you are interested in joining this effort, contact prayers@se.lcms.org.

Catawba County Hispanic Mission, in partnership with St. Stephen’s and Circuit 16 and 17 congregations hosted a Sunday afternoon soccer event last week so that members from both communities (Hispanic and St. Stephen’s) would get to know one another. Mission Developer Brandon Martin has been coordinating community soccer games on Sunday afternoons. As a result, he has been invited to several birthday parties and family celebrations. These become the opportunities to nurture Christian relationships and share the joy of knowing Jesus. He, too, is working on growing an Hispanic Outreach Team and work with this core group of individuals through prayer, Bible study, cultural learning and team organization. Send words of encouragement to Pastor Martin at bmartin@ss.lcms.org

At the end of August, Jordan Lutheran Mission held their first public event selling water at the Lazy Daze Art Festival in Cary, North Carolina. They set up a display in the shuttle bus line and watched as more than 20,000 people came by the booth to enter the festival. Mission Developer Mike Merker writes: “As the sun beamed down on the crowds one person in our group started to offer sunscreen to the crowd. It was a beautiful act of service. Hours later people turning to their cars thanked us for our kindness expressing how that one act had changed their day.” This mission outreach team continues to reach in the community with activities and words that reflect the love that has been given to us through Jesus Christ. Pastor Merker requests prayers for the families and individuals making the bold step in faith to join the launch team for Jordan Lutheran and that God would raise up a full time worship leader to join our staff. Let us join him in these prayers. If you wish to send him a word of encouragement, his email address is: pastor@jordanchurchnc.org

Join with me in giving thanks to God for the 6 adult Baptisms that will take place at Charlotte Hmong Mission this Sunday, October 26. Vicar Danny Xiong (pictured above) writes with great excitement that following the worship service a dinner celebration will be held to welcome these new members to God’s eternal family. May God overflow in their lives so that their words and actions will point many to God. If you would like to send words of encouragement to these new brothers and sisters in the faith, please send a note to Vicar Xiong at zamdaniel@yahoo.com

Praise God for the generous hearts of his people! We continue to move closer to our goal of generating $6,000,000 for new mission work. Already more than $5,400,299 has been pledged or received by congregations and individuals. It’s not too late to participate in this mission funding effort. Contact Cindy Hilewitz at chilewitz@se.lcms.org for additional information and resources.

God invites us to pray without ceasing for the work of the Holy Spirit throughout the lives of all people. Currently we have almost 1500 people who are committed to this ministry. If you are interested in joining this effort, contact prayers@se.lcms.org.

Posted for Rodney Smith from St John’s in Springfield Va.

A couple of weeks ago I got an email from Alan Butterworth who is a missionary with Apple of His Eye indicating he was going to be the DC area on 5&6 October and was looking for some fellow Christians to evangelize on the National Mall that Sunday afternoon. I still don’t know how he got my address so it was definitely a God thing as the experience proved very rewarding. I passed on the invitation to my friend, Jerry Lucas, from Bethany who was delighted to join us. I was also able to connect with someone from Prince of Peace who was interested in ministering to his Jewish neighbors but was unfortunately out of town that weekend. We discovered that another member of PoP would be joining our expedition to complete a foursome.

Alan stopped by St. John’s Saturday afternoon on his way from the airport and got to meet some of our congregation at the Oktoberfest. We met again Sunday afternoon to carpool down to the National Mall. It was crowded as usual but the Lord provided us a parking space right in front of the Natural Science Museum on the first time around. Due to the convergence of pedestrian traffic there our two teams of two were able to hand out many tracts asking the question “What do you think of Jesus??” and engage in meaningful discussion and receive prayer requests from some.

It was an experience that will help me with our own local outreach. We hosted Alan that night and were able to hear his wonderful story of going from the son of a New Age Guru to Christian missionary to the Jews. He also joined us for the first part of the SED Ablaze! committee meeting, an additional blessing. While our congregation is focusing on Spanish Language outreach I plan to keep them in my prayers. More information on this wonderful ministry can be found at: http://www.appleofhiseye.org/Home/tabid/711/language/en-US/Default.aspx but the following excerpt gives an overview:

“The call to the church is to make disciples of all nations, including The Lost Sheep of the House of Israel. Most Christians today have Jewish friends and acquaintances through work, school and even inter-marriage. Sadly, the majority are stymied in sharing their faith. Our role as a mission society is to help your congregation go and grow in their personal witness so that others will come to faith in Jesus as Messiah. Since 1996, we have a positive track record in fulfilling that role as a Recognized Service Organization of the LC-MS”