Welcome to Inside Reach
All four teams are in DTS in Columbus, Ohio.
What
REACHers Are Saying…
We asked some REACHers at the end
of their eleventh week of training to share some details about their
outreach country and what they will be doing.
Spain Team
Lydia, Jake, Larry, Andrea (TL), and Brian
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Brian shares…
“Here are a couple random facts about Spain. Spain's
currency is the Euro. Currently 1 Euro is worth around
$1.50 USD. Spain's population is around 45 million people. The
city Granada means Pomegranate in Spanish. In the winter it can rain up to
20 days in a single month. The tooth fairy is not recognized in Spain.
Instead, they have a tooth mouse named Ratoncito
Perez!
While 76 percent of the population of Spain identify
themselves as Christians, only about 15 percent of those who identify
themselves as Christians attend church weekly. Along with that, 19 percent
of Spain's population identify themselves as nonreligious. The Church has
become associated with tyranny and bigotry, which causes Christians to be
despised and rejected. Also the different denominations in the Church do
not cooperate due to mistrust. Instead of Christianity, Spain is turning to
foreign cults. There are an estimated 300 active cults, 30 of which are Satanists.
Another huge problem in Spain is that roughly 300,000 people are addicted
to heroin and cocaine, leading to a major AIDS epidemic. Around one million
students are largely unevangelized. Something
that we can praise God for is the amazing outpouring of the Holy Spirit on
the Gypsies of Spain. One third of the Gypsy population in Spain has made
personnel commitments to Christ. In fact 60 percent of all evangelicals in
Spain are Gypsy. There are some prayer requests for Spain. They are really
hurting in personal relationship with God. Since they are so closed to
the Church in Spain, all we can really do is just show God’s love to them
and give them a new view of God's church.”
Jake writes…
“When team Spain arrives in Granada we will have a wide
array of possible outreach opportunities. At this point in training we are
planning on doing several of them though they are subject to change.
Granada, Spain is not only a popular tourist destination but
it is also a prominent college town. (Granada's population increases by
approximately 80,000 during the school year.) Our team will be working with
a campus organization called Agape, the United State's equivalent of Campus
Crusade for Christ. We also may have the opportunity to work with a local
church and youth group. Other opportunities include teaching English
and practicing conversational English with groups who meet at local
tea/coffee shops. Much of our outreach will be centered around
friendship evangelism and building relationships with University students,
a growing Muslim population, and the people we meet and come in contact
with as we go about our daily schedules. Granada is an area that is
influenced by a lot of different beliefs and many have never heard the
Gospel. As our relationships with the people of Spain deepen, we hope to
exemplify a Christ-centered life and hopefully introduce the Gospel to our
friends and answer any questions that they may have.
Our last month in Spain will be spent in Malaga. Malaga is
in southern Spain, located on the coast of the Mediterranean Sea. While
there we will most likely be involved in the starting of a coffee house
ministry. In addition to all of this we hope that we will be uplifting, encouraging,
and helpful to the long-term workers already serving in Spain.
There are many things that we would like to accomplish as a
team. However, we are remembering that ultimately we need to be open to God
and to go out and serve in whatever capacity that He calls us!”
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Middle East Team
Andy, Sara (TL), Micah, and Rachel
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Rachel writes…
“Wow, we are to
the last days of DTS and it’s almost time to head overseas. It is amazing
how time has flown by. I will definitely be going away from DTS with many,
many good friends and tons of memories.
So, what will our
time overseas entail? For the first two months we will be living in a city
teaching English through tutoring to students. The plan is that as we each
tutor our student, they will in turn, teach us their language.
Hopefully, our whole team will be able to learn some of the
language. That would be awesome. One thing that will help in
learning the language is the plan for us to stay with host
families. We two girls would stay with one host family while the guys
would stay with another host family. At the end of the two
months, we will head for one week northwest to another city. We'll be
working with a friend there who has put on several dramas for the
community. Our last months will be mostly back in the first city, but we'll
also do some traveling, probably taking a week to do sightseeing.
For those who may
be wondering, we will be eating very well. We have tasted the
food from our country several times and it has been delicious. They
have wonderful bread, meat (lamb and beef), veggies, cheese, Baklava
(an awesome honey dessert), and lots of tea. A favorite pastime for locals
is to sit around drinking strong tea together as you share good
conversation. I am sure we will be doing this often, which I look forward
too. I am excited to see what all the next six months will hold
for us as we see new places, make new friends, and just
experience another culture. May our Father be with you as He will be with us.”
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Zambia Team
Andrew (TL), Toby, Jesse, and Jordan |
Toby writes…
“Zambia is a landlocked country in south-central Africa.
Zambia has a population of about 11.7 million people and the official
language is English, but there are a lot of tribal languages that are still
used. In the past 100 years, Zambia has been devastated by HIV/AIDS which
has caused a lot of problems for the country. Children are the ones that
have been affected the most by HIV/AIDS because it has made so many of
their parents die at fairly young ages. As a result, 48 percent of Zambia's
population is 15 years or younger and many of them are orphans.
When we go to Zambia we will be working with a Christian organization
that runs a school just outside of Kitwe (the second largest city in
Zambia) called Beautiful Gate. The school is used for orphans and street
kids that have no way of gaining an education without the efforts of organizations
such as Beautiful Gate. The kids come to the school to learn English and
about the Christian faith. While we are there, a big part of our outreach
will be toward the children. We will also be having outreaches in the
surrounding community which is very poor due to the poor economical
situation in Zambia. Also we will be trying to start self-sustaining projects
for the school to help them both financially and so that they can better
provide for the children. One of our main goals will be to build
relationships with the people and share our faith with them. Because
of the poverty in the area the people are taught a gospel of blessing. We
will be going to share our faith and lives with these people for nine
months I hope the Lord will work through us and them and advance the
kingdom of God into this world even more.”
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Thailand Team
Nathanael, Jackie, Richard, Samantha, Danielle, and Elisha (TL) |
Elisha
shares…
“About 50 percent of Thai people work in agriculture. Many
families make very little profit and are in debt to investors that charge
ridiculous interest rates. Poverty often leads young people to leave their
families to find work in Bangkok. We will be living right outside of
Bangkok. Prostitution is a huge problem in Bangkok, as many people
already know. They say that about 2.8 million people are involved in
the sex industry in Thailand (including 2 million women, 20,000 adult
males, and 800,000 minors under the age of 18). There are about 65
million people living in Thailand, and less than 1 percent of them are
believers. The huge majority are Buddhist.
We will be moving on December 1st and starting Thai language
school right away. A month after that we will start teaching English in a
local school connected to a wat (Buddhist temple).
This will take up a lot of our time during our nine-month
outreach. We will also have many other opportunities throughout
the year, such as volunteering for a daycare or volunteering for
a ministry to people involved in prostitution. Our main focus
will be just building relationships with people, (whether it be with the kids we teach, long-term workers, or random
people we meet) so please pray for our Thai to come along well.”
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Prayer Requests:
*Pray
for the teams as they finish this last week of DTS.
*Pray
for the participants as they spend a week at home over Thanksgiving, that
they would have an enjoyable, relaxing time with family and friends.
*Pray
for safety for the teams as they leave for their outreach locations on
December 1.
*Pray
for the teams that they can make quick, smooth adjustments when they arrive in
their outreach country.
A heartfelt thank you to all family,
friends and supporters of our 2009 REACHers. Thank
you for liberally sowing good seed (time, energy, finances and prayers) into
their lives. May the harvest be plentiful!
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