Walker’s Mission in Panama

Tuesday afternoon, we joined the team from Crestwood Presbyterian Church (Richmond) in an outreach at one of the children’s homes.  The stories of how kids wound up there were somewhat gutwrenching, but the team shared its drama and message with them as well.

We spoke with a young boy, 14 years old, who was in the detention home because he had been snagged by the police for robbing people.  When I spoke with him longer, he was stealing in order to provide food for his family.  It was clear that the Lord was touching his heart during the drama and message from the teenagers, and in our post drama conversation, he offered his life to the Lord — receiving God’s forgiveness for his actions (the state will be another matter).

The team also got to know a young woman from Somolia, separated from her family — who all had been killed in the fighting.  She was smuggled out of the country, but when she landed in Panama, she was promptly captured, arrested, and because she is underage she was sent to this home.  Her companions on her journey were thrown in a Panamaian jail while immigration figures out what to do with them.

Each story at this orphange is unique, and uniquely sad.  I’ve been there before, but it doesn’t get easier hearing the stories of each child as to why they are there.

Join us in Prayer and Support

Continue to pray for our ongoing work of our family in Panama.

Continue to pray that we increase our levels of monthly support to keep working in fulfilling our calling here.

Consider joining our monthly Support team or make a special gift to help us continue?

Keep up with our news and get instant updates by clicking here.

We have started working with a new church plant here in Panama.

While we are not yet meeting on Sundays, we’ve been meeting as a leadership team for several months praying for our neighborhood (Corregimiento De Bella Vista,  Church planting in Our Context), building relational connections with people, and even celebrated a baptism in our pool (Why we do this).

Beginning in late July, we’ll begin meeting in a house on Sunday afternoons.

Partnering with a missions team.

This week, a missions team from Richmond Virginia helped us with a park outreach and some other street outreaches.  They provided the dramas, brought us some literature to distribute and it’s been a blast having them.

The goal of our partnership was to help us make contact with people.

Saturday’s Park Outreach

We are in rainy season here, so for nearly 30 days, we had been praying for a dry afternoon.  Yet in God’s sovereignty, we experienced a thunderstorm about 2 hours before our outreach was scheduled to start.

This caused a skateboarding festival in the park to be delayed for hours.  The end result is that instead of families being in the park, we had nearly 200 young skateboard enthusiasts.

That was our audience, but once their games resumed after the ramps dried up, they had their attention elsewhere.

We made meaningful contact and conversation with about 10 people.

We learned about the skating subculture here, and I had conversation with some 20-somethings about their faith and about their struggles.  We are making follow-up connections this week working at recruiting these new contacts into our weekly bible study.

Brenda ran some crafts for the smaller children that eventually arrived and served as translator for the team when they spoke.  Here, one of the young people is giving a personal testimony about their faith in Christ, and Brenda’s translating for them.

Personal Joy

Part of the joy of ministering as a family is watching my kids serve as well.  Brandon’s fluency in Spanish has grown to the point where he could provide some translation work on a conversational level.  Watching him serve that way brought joy to this dad.

Anakarina and Brandon both were distributing literature (Who would deny taking stuff from a kid?) and helping out with the crafts and dramas.  Anakarina played the lost sheep during an improv skit.

Join us in Prayer and Support

Continue to pray for our ongoing work of this church plant.

Continue to pray that we increase our levels of monthly support to keep working in fulfilling our calling here.

Consider joining our monthly Support team or make a special gift to help us continue?

Keep up with our news and get instant updates by clicking here.

A friend of mine said this the best in his most recent letter to their supporters:

I really do not like sending out urgent pleas for help – it is rather humbling.

But I am so committed to doing this work that God has called us to and we are all seeing such wonderful fruit that is giving glory of Jesus Christ that I am willing to ask for help.

First from God and next from all of you!

I know that humbling feeling.  I’ve been wrestling with God over it for a few weeks in my own prayer time.

As we step into June, our work here faces a shortfall in its monthly support, as well as short term project needs in the next 60 days.

The global economy affects our work, much as it may have affected you personally.

Praise the Lord for Sufficient Provision

We give glory to God for how He has supported us through his people and the work of EvangelismCoach.org since we first moved here 2 years ago July.   The work here has been sustained for nearly two years without pleas for urgent support.

We’ve seen

• Timely gifts,
• Hallway offerings
• Offerings at events
• Paid speaking engagements,
• Online Book sales (How to Welcome Church Visitors)
• Several supporters join our team monthly – without being asked.

We’ve seen the end of our bank accounts and timely last minute provision out of the blue to sustain us a few more months.  We can give story after story of last minute provision from surprise sources.

We can also promise you that living by faith this way is also very hard on the intestines – the body still feels the stress, even if the mind is at peace in trusting God.

So many of you believe in and support our work that has taken us into 4 different countries (with a 5th one coming this August) to give evangelism training in two different cultures.

As you have walked with us via our newsletter or intercessors list you’ve heard how we’ve seen

• People come to faith in Christ,
• Some healings, both physical and emotional
• Church members refreshed and encouraged to share their faith
• Several kairos moments of ministry where the Lord has used us to advance His kingdom

We can tell lots of stories.

Learning from Paul

When Paul went to Corinth, he worked alongside Aquila and Priscilla, making tents and doing ministry on the Sabbath. Once Silas and Timothy arrived, he was able to devote himself full time.

Paul didn’t start full time in his new city.  Instead, he had to establish his base of support, either from his business, or from another form of support.  In this case, I think he was able to grow his business to the point of handing it off to someone else to manage.

Paul had to be bi-vocational for a while, before being able to be full time in ministry.

This is the season we are in now – building support and building our business to the point of setting us free to minister full time here in Latin America.

The Reality of the Present

While we have seen sustaining provision to cover our immediate expenses, we’ve not yet had enough to set aside funds for future needs that we see coming.

We have some urgent project needs connected to us being here that we simply have no savings to cover.

We are asking God for provision and look forward to being able to tell stories of this provision.

We’re working at trying to use our business to generate revenue but the economic climate of the US has canceled all my speaking invitations at least through October.

What you can do

We need

• to expand our monthly support base and
• A generous outpouring of gifts in the next 60 days to meet some urgent needs connected to us being here.
• Invitations to do paid evangelism training in regional conferences.

Here is what you can do.

• Give thanks for all the gifts that God has already sent and pray for His blessing on all those who enable this work through prayer, participation and giving.
• Please pray that we will have wisdom to be good stewards of every penny and ask the Lord to move people to give.
• We need to pray in an average of 3,000 a month just to keep everything going.  5,000 a month would be ideal to help us save for August 2010 and not be in this situation again next year.  And every gift helps!
• So please pray for provision in the form of regular monthly small gifts! Each one makes a huge difference and we are so grateful for all those who already do give like this.  Your dollars go much farther here in terms of buying power for groceries and fresh fruits.

Here is how you can act

1.  Download and print our partner response form

You’ll need a PDF reader to view it.  Print it out and stick it with your devotional materials as a prayer reminder of what God might be calling you to do with us.  Whether you choose to donate or simply pray for us, still print this out.  You can print and distribute to mission committees and prayer groups.

2.  Donate.

• By Credit card: Automatic recurring contributions or make a special offering by visiting our support page.  I’ve put up a video screencast to show you how.
• By Check: Mark your gift for the Mission to Americas.  Make check payable to PRMI and mail to PRMI, P.O.Box 429, Black Mountain NC 28711

We need people to join our monthly team as well as one time gifts.

Our desire

We long to see the church in the Americas equipped to do the work of evangelism.  We invite you to join with us as you are called and empowered by the Lord to do so.