Hi all,
I have several things to share this month, so first:
One of the exciting developments in the network is KWOWI – Kids Without Walls International. These are children which CWOWI helps support along with the house churches in those areas. For instance, in Uganda we have more than 650 affiliated house churches, which means in their midst are about 150 AIDS orphans and single parent homes. Some have designated part of their donations go to ‘Africa’, and on this page you can see some of the people involved.
In Uganda the CWOWI leaders started an orphanage and school with a feeding program. We are opening up sponsorship for individual children to our friends and partners, as well as making everyone aware of other projects in Africa (pig project in Uganda, goat project in Rwanda, school tuition/supplies needs in Kenya and Uganda, etc) In our network in Kenya the situation is similar, with children taken in by family/house church members.
We are listing just a few children at this time, though the full number of children needing support is close to 200 at this time. We expect the web site won’t be fully capable until later this summer, but for now please visit our web site and find KWOWI across the top menu, or copy this link:
https://churchwithoutwallsinternational.org/staging/1553/kwowi/
EU/Dutch conference is just around the corner!
I am SO excited to be able to visit the Netherlands once again and see friends who are able to travel to the conference June 4-6. If you’re in the EU or can get to the Netherlands for the conference, please register immediately and/or letting Wil and Ank know by an email at cwowi@solcon.nl
US conference October 7-9
Our US conference is October 7-9, Columbus Day weekend, and will be upon us faster than we realize. The link for registering is above. I encourage you to consider coming.
Our conferences are a mix of family reunion and meeting new people you instantly feel like you’ve known all your life, with deep worship, teaching, prayer for one another, Q&A, and the time to get to know one another. Especially if you’ve felt ‘all alone’ out there or wanting to meet others on the ‘same spiritual page’, please strongly consider investing in this opportunity to build relationships. Pray about it, see how the Lord can make the way. It will be a blessing.
Personal prayer request.
Our oldest son, Chris, lived at home his first 24 years, but has lived in a group home since 2004, and we have him home for an overnight each Friday/Saturday when not traveling. The company that operates several group homes in the area has had to close several homes due to lack of employees and not being able to compete in wages with other businesses in the area.
Because of this they are taking 4 including Chris from his group home, and moving them to another group home that is much smaller than where he has been these last 18 years.
Chris gets around with a self-drive wheelchair. It has a lever on the right side that he pumps forward and backward that propels and steers the chair – he can get around his current home very well! The new home is much smaller, smaller halls, smaller doorways, and smaller common area. It’s also along a busy street and we have big concerns about him rolling himself into the street or falling in the large ditches along the street. The aides have all asked the same thing – how can Chris move around freely in that new home?
Chris is high energy, talkative, never met a stranger – and he keeps busy in the group home by driving his wheelchair in a circuit from the common area, down the hall to his room, through the common bathroom into the adjoining bedroom of his house mate, then back up the hall – that mobility is SO important to him. The new home is much smaller and every aide says he won’t have that mobility once moved there.
By the time you read this Barb and I will have had a visit to the new group home and met with administrators – we anticipate several more meetings as we are not happy with their plans. Please pray for wisdom in all this, it is very distressing for Barb and me. Those of you who care for a family member who is special needs or infirmed, whether in your home or at a facility, know the continual burden in the back of your mind and the time involved – thank you for your prayers.
A quick note about the series this month: Restoring Purity
If you look online at the subject of Christian purity, most of what you’ll find is about sexual purity. This is not that. This series compliments last month’s series on Restoring the Sacred. Restoring Purity is about the heart of the Lord and His presence deep in our hearts and thoughts to work a life-long process. I get into some word studies that will change how you look at His efforts in our lives, and how we can be at peace in the process…two good series on ‘deeper things’ that can change how you look at life.
‘The devil made me do it’
For much of my 25 years in the auditorium church system and culture, the devil got the blame for anything wrong with life. We know that God the Father does not tempt, test, or try people with evil (James 1: 13). That left the devil getting the blame for anything not perfect in our lives, and for anything that went wrong in life. It was always the devil’s fault.
If someone didn’t get a promotion at work, it was the devil through the boss that ‘stole’ that opportunity. If someone was injured at work, it was the devil that caused it. If someone had a car accident, it was the devil. If someone couldn’t sleep, it was the devil. If someone was overdrawn at their bank, it was the devil.
What was lacking
What I never heard was ‘It was your fault’. I never heard, ‘Your actions caused this’ or ‘You did this to yourself’. I never heard; “You reap what you sow”. I never heard: “Accidents happen.”
I also never heard a sermon that we live in a fallen world and our bodies are going to dust, so things break down or suddenly don’t work anymore. No sermon taught me the cumulative effects of life over decades cause conditions and diseases mankind doesn’t have the answers for. No one ever said sometimes things just happen
I like to say it this way: Sometimes God isn’t in the event; God is found in our response to the event.
We all see governments failing, economies failing, and much uncertainty in the world. These things are out of our control. It does no good to blame the devil or to spend our days in speculation on social media. It is time to take responsibility for our own lives and look for the Lord in our responses to the events of the day.
I look at a couple of events in the gospels and can see the two sides in our day. In Cana when they ran out of wine, there was the side that was in panic, embarrassment, wondering what they were going to do. Then there was Jesus in the midst, doing the impossible. It was Mary, that one person, who stepped up to take her eyes off the natural and to the possibility of what God might do that changed everything. They went from lack to abundance just because one person looked to the supernatural provision instead of the circumstances.
The second incident is the feeding of the 5,000. Jesus saw the problem – It was late and He didn’t want to send them away lest they ‘faint in the way’. That means some of those 5,000 were thinking about the same thing – where would they get food, the kids were hungry, and so on.
John 6: 5-6 records Jesus asking Philip for ideas, to test him to see if he would think natural or look to the supernatural. Philip thought in natural terms. Jesus thought outside the box to see what His Father might have Him do to remedy the situation.
The devil is at work. But some things are outside our control and we just have to deal with things like jobs, economies, inflation and such. We can either panic like the hosts at the wedding, or the crowd wondering if they were going to faint on the journey home, or we can look to the Lord to do something no one else was thinking – supernatural provision.
II Peter 1: 3-4 tells us “All things that pertain to life and godliness have been provided through the knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ…” All things pertaining to godliness – the means you CAN grow up. You CAN take control of your emotions, thoughts, and body.
AND that which pertains to life – have already been provided. If we believe that, then when challenged with a need we take a step back, turn inward to the Father, and ask Him to reveal His provision, His way in this situation. There is great rest that results from remembering his record in our lives, calling to remembrance His faithfulness through it all, and how He always took care of us.
That record in our lives is important and vital to our rest and peace for whatever is before us. As He was back then, so will He be now. Rest in that.
Thank you for being in our lives!
Blessings and thanks for being part of our lives,
John & Barb, Brian & Amy.
