This past month we have literally been all over the map: Bulgaria, Canada, US, France, Switzerland... This is largely because we have been saying good-bye to our children. As of last week we became empty-nesters. I flew to the US with Gabriel and then we drove to South Dakota, where he is now enrolled in the Freeman Academy for his final years of High School. Then I flew back to Geneva to meet up with Sarah and Tirzah who joined us for the Christian Workers Conference in Annecy, France. After a lovely week together we put her on her flight to Boise, Idaho, where she hopes to find work and help her sister with the new baby.

Good-byes are a regular part of our life here in Cyprus. Everyone who moves here is hoping to go somewhere else eventually. This past month we had to say good-bye to two wonderful families in our church, one Iranian and the other Brazilian. In such cases we try to remind ourselves that they are not leaving us so much as we are sending them on to fulfill God's will for their lives. In this way we always want to be a missionary church, making disciples and sending them along to God's great harvest. This also means that by now we have former church members scattered all over the globe. When Gabriel and I traveled to the US a couple of weeks ago, we arranged to have a long lay-over in Vancouver BC, where we spent a lovely afternoon with dear friends from Iran.

 

Now that we're back in Cyprus we have our work cut out. For the past few weeks we have been setting up the Barnabas Community Center. Things are coming along well. It is open every day 4-9pm now and people come in to meet up with friends and have a coffee. We hope to host more community events there once the school year gets started. In the meantime our weekly Bible studies continue. Our hope and prayer is to better connect with the local community on a daily basis and not just meet for church once a week.

This coming Sunday we will start our two-week Barnabas Discipleship Program up on the northern coast. We have 14 people lined up to attend from Iran, Iraq, Uzbekistan, Turkey, Nigeria, Israel, Kazakhstan. One recent addition is a gal code-named Esther who reached out to me on Facebook. She was asking for prayer as she has received death threats from her very conservative family members. Turns out she has been a secret believer for seven years, never been in a church, only follows online Christian programs. She was thrilled when we invited her to join the upcoming Barnabas Program, however for the past four days we have not been able to contact her at all. Pray for Esther.

Finally we would ask for your prayers for the At Risk Women Program. We are planning on bringing two new ladies on board, a persecuted gal from Iran and the other an earthquake victim from Antioch, Turkey. A couple of the other girls have also graduated and are moving on. One in particular, Faroo, a real gem, has been in charge of the bottom floor at the dorm. She finished her Master's degree in Nursing and was hired by a hospital in Germany. All she needs to do is appear at a German Embassy to receive her work visa. Unfortunately she is having a difficult time trying to access a German Embassy as she cannot go to the south of the island and the one in Afghanistan and Iran are closed, and she needs a visa to travel to any other country. At this time the plan is to go to Pakistan but securing an online visa will be difficult. We appreciate your continued support and prayers or these dear souls.

 

PRAYER REQUESTS:

• Pray for the upcoming Barnabas Discipleship Program
• Pray for the At Risk Women ministry with girls coming and going.
• Pray for our children, biological and spiritual, that they might walk with the Lord.

We are grateful to be able to count with your prayerful support especially with the crazy life we live. We hope and trust the Lord is honored in our partnership in ministry.

 

Blessings, Jerry and Sarah