Armenia - Day 4

A little cloud cover brought some welcome relief from the high temperatures of recent days. It also gave me the needed stimulation to venture outside this afternoon and to climb the mountain across the valley. The scenery is magnificent and I am constantly reminded that these were some of the first mountain peeks to appear following the great Flood.
The second day of classes went very well. I have now discovered that about five of the students speak English well enough to hold a conversation and many of the rest understand some. When in different countries, I have found that a good way of getting to know people is to simply say, “tell me how you became a Christian”. Then I try to listen attentively remembering the key events. It’s true that behind every face – there’s a story. I’m looking forward to hearing many more such conversation stories this week.
I don’t know what the architect was thinking when he designed the centre we are staying in. It has quite a unique shape (one set of stairs with no corners leading from a huge lobby up 5 floors). Also for the past 3 weeks another organisation has been staying in the same centre. They are a fairly large group of teenagers and as you can imagine they bring their own ‘extra loud noise level’ with them. It has been difficult for the CMLC students to study in the evenings and to get enough sleep, as it is seldom quiet in the house before midnight. CEF did not know about this when hiring the facility but things should be back to normal this weekend. Thank you for continuing to pray for us.

Armenia - Day 3

Today I taught my first classes. It was refreshing to stand in front of a group of 20 students, were the average age would appear to be in the mid 20's! I was really humbled by a sense of the awesome potential there is for God to use this group of people to raise up a new generation of Armenian children who will know and love their God. What a privilege it is to be here for a week and to be able to make such a valuable investment.

Armenia - Day 2

Today I was in the capital city Yerevan and it was 40ºc! I was the guest of Pastor Levon Bardakjian at the Evangelical Church of Yerevan. Two of our CMLC students come from his church. It was a wonderful service, the Pastor was so very supportive. He interviewed the two girls gave me 15 minutes to share about the work of CEF and another 30 minutes to preach (maybe it was longer - probably it was longer)! It was one of those messages were I left my manuscript and really sensed God the Holy Spirit carrying me along and prompting my mind with the things I should say. I consider occasions like these to be among the greatest blessings of the ministry. The service will probably be televised on the local Christian TV station.
I myself was blessed to meet so many beautiful saints and to listen to their stories. I even met Armine and George Manoukian who first started the work of CEF in Armenia back in 1991 (their son-in-law is the Pastor!). They attended the first ever Leadership Training Institute at Kilchzimmer in 1973! They now live in USA but they were on one of their many trips to this country. Over lunch they shared some of their amazing story of how God has kept them and used them to His glory to see a work established among the children of Armenia. I could have listened to them all day.
Later we drove around the city picking up students, and my interpreter, before driving back to the centre. Now we are ready for the week of teaching to begin.

Armenia - Day 1

I arrived in the early hours of this morning and was met at the airport by the CEF leader for Armenia and brought to our centre. The 20 students have just finished their practical week and they have been given the weekend off. In the afternoon, Terenik took me, his family and those of us who were around to see a nearby lake and the orthodox church at the top of the hill.
Tomorrow I will share about the work and preach in a church in the centre of Yerevan (Armenia's capital city). Then from Monday to Friday I will be teaching in the CMLC (Children's Ministry Leadership Course).

Happy 500th Birthday Jean Caulvin *10 July 1509

John Calvin
(Born 10 July 1509)

Read more about the signifigance of John Calvin in this online version of Tabletalk Magazine
This issue celebrates the 500th birthday of John Calvin by looking at his legacy. Contributors include R.C. Sproul, Thabiti Anyabwile, Richard Gamble, David Hall, Keith Mathison, Iain Murray, David Powlison, Gordon Reed, Philip Graham Ryken, R.C. Sproul Jr., Derek Thomas, and Gene Edward Veith.

Disbelief and shock

Two German women murdered in Yemen were Brake Bible College students. Anita G. (24) and Rita S. (25) were working at the Al-Dschumhuri hospital in Saada, Yemen as part of their summer internship. The hospital is run by the Dutch humanitarian organisation Worldwide Services. The women were taken hostage north of Saada on 12 June along with a German couple, their three children, a British engineer and a South-Korean woman. (At the time of writing, the fate of the others was still awaiting official confirmation.) The two women came from a Russian-German Baptist Church in the Gifhorn area near the city of Wolfsburg in Germany.

On Tuesday evening, the German TV news networks had this as their top story. The principal of the Bible College featured on many of the reports. While there is shock and sympathy in the secular media there are also many aspersions being cast which are only adding to the pain. The college has stressed that the women were not involved in evangelism but only in humanitarian work in a local hospital. If you understand German you can read the statements from the Bible College here.

CEF Europe has had a close relationship with Brake over many years. Many former Brake students have taken our Leadership Course at Kilchzimmer and are serving the Lord across the globe. As former students ourselves, we are also deeply troubled by the news of these murders.

Now the photographs of the women have been released to the press – their faces are very familiar! Through several visits to Brake Bible school in the last few years, I have gotten to know many of their classmates. I remember speaking for a long time to Anita in 2007. Now I am trying to remember the conversation... but I know I shared with her how God had led in my life and encouraged her to trust God for each step in her own life. She listened intently and seemed to soak in every word I was saying. She struck me as a young lady with a real deep desire to serve the Lord. Now she has paid the ultimate price. Today Anita and Rita are in the presence of the Lord. We don't understand why but our God knows best (Phil. 1:21).

Please pray for all affected, especially the families, friends, school colleagues and staff in Brake.

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News report from the German Evangelical News Agency IDEA in English

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Discovering the Black Forest

Pentecost Monday is a public holiday in Germany so we took advantage of a special train ticket deal to go and explore some of the Black Forest.

Another weekend

Friday night JYC (twister, smelly socks, new muscles and Bible study)
Saturday - school outing to the local bird park
Sunday - church (we eat together every second Sunday)

4.5 on the richter scale

At 3.39 am this morning we jumped out of bed screaming. As the children came running into our bedroom we instinctively knew that we had just experienced our first ever earthquake. It was scary! It's not uncommon for this area to have minor tremors but this was certainly above average!
The bed shook and it was over in less than a second. The noise was a loud, deep rumble, like many lorries driving through the house or someone using a power drill with hammer action.
This morning I checked the website and confirmed that it was indeed a tremor that could be felt within a 100 km radius. When we put on the news, we discovered that they have pinpointed the epicenter to the town of Steinen. Heard of it before? It's the town 7 miles from here where we go to church and where God has been really blessing recently. Maybe I should have titled this post "Church causes seismic waves in Steinen" :) Steinen actually is the German word for 'stones'. Well the stones were certainly moving this morning!
At this time, no damage has been reported. We are thankful that it wasn't worse. In 1356 a huge earthquake destroyed the nearby city of Basel.
Listening to the reports coming in, most local people here were woken by the quake, but simply turned over and went to sleep again. Everyone is talking about it but they don't appear to be overly concerned. The authorities have said that aftershocks can not be ruled out.

"Gott ist treu!" 50 years Bibelschule Brake

Since its foundation in 1959 under John Parschauer, Ernest Klassen und Heinz Weber, Brake Bible School in Germany has trained over 1,800 people many of whom are serving today in over 60 countries worldwide. Claudia and I graduated in 1999 and we both look back with thanks for the privilege of spending 3 years living and studying at this wonderful place and to be a little part of this history.
The missionary exhibition, which this year was held outdoors, proved to be a great success. The beautiful spring weather and circa 2000 visitors provided the perfect backdrop for meeting old friends and catching up with what God has been doing in our lives.
Some of the current students are interested in joining CEF. Pray that the conversations we had with them over the weekend will be used of God to direct them to the next step.