Dear Friend,
"Sing to God, you kingdoms of the earth ... " (Ps. 68:32)
The voices of praise were lifted up in songs of celebration in
Gitega town as the first graduating class of our Burundi Bible training center
rejoiced together with many guests and friends from the vicinity and even as
far as from Kenya and Tanzania. Seasoned church leaders and planters after
years of training were blessed and embarked into outreaches of their
communities and beyond on July 5 graduation. This is a fruit of years of the tireless work of EAPTC Tanzania. Our initial dream of African reaching Africa has become an obvious reality from a latent possibility.
In August, EAPTC national leaders in Africa gathered up in
Lilongwe, Malawi for a week of missions retreat. The spirit of unity and
cooperation was held up high as they put their heads and poured their hearts
together to discuss more effective ways to reach Africa as a team. Lilongwe
Restoration Calvary Church, the host church of this event, has been raising
$6,000 USD to buy a land to construct a church facility. Church members have
managed to raise $2,000 by this time but still stand in dire need of extra
$4,000 by February. Should you need a place for end year donation, kindly
consider making it toward this meaningful, long-lasting cause.There have been a series of massacres of non-Muslims in Kenya near the Somalia border. Militant Islamist extremists began launching deadly assaults on civilians as a revenge on Kenya for having sent a troop to Somalia to side with the U.S. counter-terrorism operation. The situations have become serious as of late. Pray for Kenya in this turbulent season.
EAPTC has now set out to be intercontinental in its operation. As soon as our missions trainings were concluded in Seoul, Korea, I visited a C-group to encourage our national leaders serving in that populous ethnic group and to team up with them to teach at our new Bible training centers. Thanks to God’s grace and their faithful works, the schools are now on foothold in several anonymous locations for C-group. We praise the Lord for this open door for expanding God's kingdom and reaping a great spiritual harvest in Asia.
The work is obviously growing and expanding. From Africa to Asia, God is moving! Please remember that your prayers and supports make it possible. As the Psalmist declares, the time when the nations of this earth will sing to our Lord and Savior for His Calvary love is coming. Please continue to stand and run with us in this call. Truly, the Lord has done much through you and me, but the best is yet to come!
On a personal note, thanks to your prayers that I recently
finished my PhD research on the impact of missionary training on intercultural
readiness. Our own Missionary Candidate Training (MCT) has been scientifically
validated effective through this research. Your ongoing encouragements in this
journey kept me going on to see the finish line. Let us keep moving forward
together as we now envision God to raise an army of cross-cultural gospel
workers from all corners of the earth for the last world harvest!
Sincerely,
Paul Lee (& Eunice Jaeun)
Director, EAPTC International