Reasonable Service

Please pray for Madiba Bay Baptist Church as it seeks to start a new church here in iBhayi (Port Elizabeth).

This will begin to take place next month as we begin outreach in the area of the new church plant. The area is called Wells Estate. Several people from Madiba Bay have been providentially moved to that area and will be immediate attenders of the new church.

The most essential thing that we need is prayer. I know we can knock on doors. I know we can preach. I know we can sing. But what we can’t do on our own is cause genuine life change in people. This is where you come in thousands of miles away. WE DESPERATELY NEED YOU TO PRAY!!!

We don’t want to plant churches. We want to cause a movement of church planting!

Read the following to understand the difference:

Perhaps this is why Church Planting Movements are devoid of goals to start ten or twenty additional churches in a country or city. Instead, these churches are satisfied with nothing less than a vision to reach their entire people group or city—and eventually the whole world! As each church realizes that it has the capacity and responsibility to reproduce itself, the numbers start compounding exponentially.- David Garrison

Prayer is the key to this.

Here are some specifics on how you can pray:
1. Ask God to give me and the other leaders wisdom
2. Ask God to send us more aspiring young men to train
3. Ask God to give us a great harvest from our outreach
4. Ask God to bless our new discipleship on c.d.

Madiba Bay Baptist church is still in its infant stages but its time to give birth. We will continue to work at building Madiba Bay but the necessity of another light source is vital.

We want to plant a number of churches here in P.E. and move on. Kentucky Fried Chicken has reached P.E. with their secrect recipe. There are around 15 KFC’s in our city alone!!! The Xhosa people do not refer to fried chicken as fried chicken they call it “Kentucky!”

Ask God to allow us to start 10 to 15 churches in this city and move on.

We are really small right now and I know the only way that things are going to grow is through God’s help.

If you would commit to pray for this need please send me an e-mail letting me know so that I can let the church know that there are others around the world praying for this church plant.

We arrived late Wednesday night into Port Elizabeth and have finally gotten our internet setup and can communicate.

Thanks for your prayers for our travels as everything went very smooth and the kids did fantastic!

We are trying to get settled very quickly and get back to work.

Thank you

Article by The Associated Press

As it hoped for, South Africa has seen a boost to its economy by foreign visitor spending before the World Cup and during the group stage of the tournament.

According to Visa’s new cardholder spending data, spending by international visitors in South Africa on Visa-branded payment cards exceeded $176 million, up 65 percent from the same 25-day period in 2009. The number of transactions from June 1 to June 25 was 1.3 million (51,000 per day on average), up 74 percent.

The data indicate the United States, United Kingdom, Australia, Brazil and France have been the strongest contributors to tourism spending, accounting for 47 percent. More than 90 percent of spending was in typical leisure and business travel categories: accommodations, restaurants, retail, auto rentals and air travel.

I found this article on news24.com, a South African news provider and thought that it was interesting coming from mouth of a Xhosa man.

A senseless tradition?
by Xhosa Guy
2010-06-24 13:23

Over 30 young initiates have died due to illegal and ill-run circumcision schools in the Eastern Cape. This isn’t a new thing. This is actually becoming a norm come every winter as the long-standing Xhosa tradition is seeing itself at cross-roads with many questioning its very existence.

For Xhosa people it is a rite of passage that every young man should embark on to see himself progress in society. The tradition was supposed to be a time when a young men is taught how to be a responsible member of society, how to grow from being a boy to being a man.

I happen to be a Xhosa man and went through the very thing and it was amazing for me. I went through the process after finishing my Matric exams having just turned 18 in the summer of 1997. Then the incidents weren’t as prevalent as they seem to have become in the past decade.

That said, every time I read the headlines – and progressively more and unwarranted each year - it just seems like nothing is being done to curb the rise in deaths of young boys due to this tradition. These deaths have made circumcision into a barbaric tradition that fails to protect the very people it supposedly wants to make better.

By now I would have thought that people would get the idea that sending a 13-year-old to these schools is to say the least dumb. I would have thought that the Xhosa-speaking community for whom this is an important tradition, would seek a way to see the preservation of this tradition by ensuring proper engagement from the Eastern Cape government in making certain schools of this nature adhere to the best health standards and that a relevant initiation school going age is set at an age where a young boy is of legal age to consent to the practice himself.

These deaths are senseless; these boys are not dying for some great cause. What does a 13-year old know about being a responsible citizen anyway? I know I didn’t!

What has transpired in the last decade has made this tradition nothing more than a senseless, over-glorified process that has lost all its meaning and values to the people it supposedly is of importance to.

We always say culture is supposed to evolve, where does this leave tradition and customs of a people that put so much pride and value on, despite their outdated methods?

I am not suggesting that the tradition needs to be scrapped, but an intervention needs to happen soon, to ensure this tradition does not go down in history as one of the causes for people to view African traditions as barbaric and to do that, we need to change the way we do things.

Allow room for change, look at what isn’t working and make sure we do not constantly repeat the mistakes over and over again. I mean, what’s so complicated about that?

Our oldest son turned four! He actually turned 4 yesterday but I am just putting it out today since we are actually celebrating it today!

Finishing up Coleman’s book, The Master Plan of Evangelism, here are some highlights from his chapter titled Demonstration.

As you seek to lead, train, and disciple people you need to keep in mind the practices that Jesus implemented.

1. Jesus DEMONSTRATED what we wanted His followers to do.

He prayed in front of them. He gave them a model prayer and commanded them to pray.

They saw God praying to God. There is no doubt this made a huge impact on them, helping them to see the need for prayer in their own lives.

2. Jesus showed them the importance of using scripture. Jesus was constantly quoting scripture. His life was in complete agreement with scripture. He was not against what the Bible said in the Old Testament - He was fulfilling it.

3. Soul winning
4. Class - Jesus made life His classroom. All the situations, circumstances, failures, and successes of His disciples were used as opportunities to teach them and make them into men of God.

Coleman - “It is good to tell people what we mean, but it is infinitely better to show them. People are looking for a demonstration, not an explanation.”

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We just finished a tremendous missions conference in Curwensville, PA.

Community Baptist Church and Pastor Hogue are very unique. They truly seek to keep missions at the center of the wheel. It is not just a ministry but it is the reason for all the other ministries in the church at Community Baptist church.

Thank you Community!!! This wonderful church has paid to send Deputation Director Tony Howeth to South Africa to teach in our Bible institute and preach at Madiba Bay Baptist Church.

Read the verse below:

II Thessalonians 2:13,14 – “But we are bound to give thanks alway to God for you, brethren beloved of the Lord, because God hath from the beginning chosen you to salvation through sanctification of the Spirit and belief of the truth: 14 Whereunto he called you by our gospel, to the obtaining of the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ.”

According to this verse He chose us to be saved because he called us by His Gospel, we believed the truth and were made Holy by the Spirit.

II Timothy 1:9 – “Who hath saved us, and called us with an holy calling, not according to our works, but according to his own purpose and grace, which was given us in Christ Jesus before the world began,”
He saved us and called us not by our works but according to his own purpose and grace, which were given to us in Christ before the world began.

In other words, off in eternity past, God could see who would accept Christ, who would have ears to hear, and would believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. Salvation was given to them in eternity past.

The fact that God chooses us to salvation does not make us more special than others. It simply means that He, in His omniscience, knew who would accept and believe the message of the Gospel and they are the “chosen in Christ.”

The word we, as humans, need to keep in mind is evangelize. We are not “all knowing” therefore our job is to propagate His Gospel and let it enter into the ears of those that God knows will believe.

“Let no man therefore judge you in meat, or in drink, or in respect of an holyday, or of the new moon, or of the sabbath days:”

In other words Paul is saying dont let people judge you because of what you eat or drink or in regard to the observance of annual holy days, New Moon Festivals, or weekly worship days.

The key to Paul being able to say this is found in verse 10 - “…and ye are complete in Him (Christ)…”

All of the ceremonial law was fulfilled in Christ. Those things were a shadow of Christ. Christ came, died, and rose again and now we are complete in Him, because He completed EVERYTHING. We don’t worship Him through rituals, particular meats, or on specific days. No, He lives in us, we are His tabernacle and are to offer up worship, sacrifice and praise everyday!

Don’t fall under the ordinances (ceremonially) of man when it comes to worshipping God. Worship Him directly. We don’t worship through shadows anymore we worship the “Body which is Christ” (v.17)!!!

AMEN!!!