We Made It!

We have been back a month from our trip to South Sudan and many of you know Mama Sabet went to be with the Lord. She was an amazing lady who had battled with cancer for the past year. Our family are so blessed and comforted by many of you sending us encouraging words and messages. God’s timing was so perfect for Suzy, Hannah and Rosa to visit, with Mama passing away the day before they left Africa.

Mama’s new beginning meant a new beginning for our family as we fulfilled our promise to her to love and care for her 14 grandchildren by stepping up our support for them. It is so comforting to be part of God’s family, I feel safe, secure, loved, accepted and provided for. Mama was really asking us to do that for these precious ones.  So our goal is to find sponsors for all of them so we can provide a safe and loving home, send them to school and meet their basic needs for food and clothing. Thank you for standing with us to meet this need.  We have half the kids sponsored already.

Here is Hannah with her 14 cousins (and a few extra’s who couldn’t miss a chance to pose with Hannah). All the children have a very special place in our hearts. For information on sponsorship, email Rosa at info@indeedandtruth.org.

“Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who according to His abundant mercy has begotten us again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to an inheritance incorruptible and undefiled and that does not fade away, reserved in heaven for you, who are kept by the power of God through faith for salvation ready to be revealed in the last time.” – 1 Peter 1:3-5

CHE!

art of CHE (Community Health Evangelism) is teaching the Word in the villages using a method of bible storying called ‘Simply the Story’ (STS).  An area we outreach to, called Pagol, recently received its third STS training with 28 people, representing five churches, in attendance. Our pastors spent 3 days strengthening and encouraging these church leaders who are using STS in their programs.

Pastor Santino shared a testimony of a lady who attended this workshop. Since her previous training, Sarah Alual memorized the story of Jesus and the storm while being on the boat. Sarah then went from home to home in her neighborhood and told the story to her neighbor and as a crowd gathered to listen to her, five people came forward to receive the Lord as Savior as a result. That’s what you call transformational ministry! This is our heart and so exciting to witness South Sudanese being used by God to minister His love to their own people.

God is Faithful!

We have seen a few IDP’s (internally displaced people) in Tonj and one family got our attention. The seven year old daughter was severely malnourished and her 2 year old sister was refusing to open her eyes, possibly as a result of measles.

We sent out an email prayer request and Dr. Jono shared in devotion about the power of God to heal. Our entire clinic staff laid hands on Abuk and finally, after 1 month she is opening her eyes and seeing. Her family were so excited to show us God answered our prayers and our South Sudanese staff were so blessed to witness the power of our healing God first hand.

We are blessed to be a part of a power and a work that is greater than us, it’s about Jesus only. Please pray as Sabet returns to USA this month. Pray for our family as we transition back into life together after 9 months of separation. Pray for Dr. Tom as he leaves for 2 months to cover our team while they rotate for their break. Pray for the Wilson’s as they travel to Europe to attend a family wedding and for the Macleod family as they hold the fort during this challenging rainy season. We are already experiencing high patient numbers due to malaria.

The Macleods Return!

Steve and Larne Wilson arrived along with the Macleod family and Jono’s youngest brother Anthony. All are from New Zealand and we are excited for the vision the Lord has given us for this next year of serving together in South Sudan.

Churches Adopt CHE!

CHE (Community Health Evangelism) is a big topic on our agenda and the Macleods really want to be involved in helping that program to keep going in the villages. We have 10 CHE centers around the Tonj area and we are praying for 10 supporting churches to each ‘adopt’ a center and commit to pray for our CHE program in that village. As we link our partnering churches with these villages our hope is that they can visit, get involved, train CHE’s and make key relationships on the ground building on those relationships year after year. Our team will spend the next few months collecting data from the clinic patients about the challenges and needs the community are facing in their homes as well as recording which villages do not have churches etc. This will help us determine the direction our CHE program should go and the areas we should reach out to first. From there we plan to start with three villages that we believe the Lord will clearly show us. We are planning a Training of Trainers (TOT1) 5 day workshop for our entire South Sudan team and if you’d be interested in learning more about CHE, attending a TOT1 training and receiving your TOT1 certificate we welcome you to join us. You can contact us for info.

God is Working Here!

Meet Yar Achol and her son Chol. Our pastors met her in the clinic when she came out of total desperation.

She had visited over 10 witch-doctors to get healing for her son, of which none worked and she run out of things to sell, so the Lord brought her to our clinic. Our doctors suspect the child has hydrocephalus. Surgery is not available in South Sudan and without it he may die. We shared with Achol about Jesus and she believes He brought her to us. After much counsel she decided to ask Jesus to be her Savior. Since praying the child has not had any seizures which were a regular occurrence. She said she now has peace and is not afraid of what will happen to Chol.

“Be still, and know that I am God: I will be exalted among the heathen, I will be exalted in the earth.” – Psalm 46:10

The Container Arrived!

PRAISE GOD! The much awaited container has finally arrived safely in Tonj. It was a troubled journey, starting with port strikes in Los Angeles, corrupt customs control in Kenya, more delays at the Uganda border waiting for calculations and payments of import duty to South Sudan and then it was in storage for the past nine months in Juba due to the rainy season, poor road conditions and erupting insecurity. It finally left as part of a UN convoy to ensure added safety on the road for the shipping company.

It arrived here in Tonj the last week of February things damaged and missing but most of the important items made it to us. We are so grateful to everyone who donated items for our house, the medical clinic and for the compound. As we unpack we are praising God for each item and thanking Him for the person that gave it.

“It is written, ‘Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and him only shalt thou serve.’” – Luke 4:8

It is interesting to me that our family has not been able to return to South Sudan and the entire time we have been ‘stuck’ in USA, our house in South Sudan was ‘stuck’ between building phases, mostly due to insecurity. With the containers arrival we can now complete the final phase of building and when our family returns we will have a ‘new’ home to move into.

Clinic Testimony!

Eight months ago, in the middle of the night, Angelina Arop walked an hour, breathing though every contraction, just as she had been shown during her pre-natal check-ups. This time it wasn’t a rehearsal, she was in full labor and hoping to make it to In Deed and Truth Ministries’ medical clinic. Our professional medical team were ready for her and after much encouragement and prayer, Angelina safely delivered her baby girl, Adut. Clinic chaplain, Pastor Judah prayed with her and shared with her about trusting her child in the Lord’s care. He reminded her to get vaccinated and to bring the child to us and not a witchdoctor should she have any health concerns.

Recently, Angelina noticed a deformity in her child and on seeing one of our community health workers (CHW) in the market, she asked him about it. CHW Emmanuel Akol encouraged her to bring the baby to the medical clinic. Dr. Tom, clinical officer Simon and Snr. Nurse Annie, who assisted in her delivery, checked Adut and all agreed she needed an immediate surgery. The government hospital has recently started performing surgeries in Tonj and were able to help her. The surgery was successful and she returned to our clinic a week later to thank God for his protection. She explained she would have gone to the witchdoctor a year ago but now she trusted Jesus, and asked him to be her Savior!!

Suzy Going to Africa!

When I said goodbye to Sabet in August I had no idea it would be months before our family would be together again. After another lengthy phone call to immigration with the same “your case is under review”, I chose to officially become a Floridian! We can no longer put our lives on hold, our ministry needs are demanding our input and attention. So until Agum has her citizenship, we will commute as necessary to South Sudan. This April, I will be going to Tonj to see my husband, welcome a new family joining us for 6 months and possibly longer, spend time with the Macleod family and plan for their next term, work on reconciling the Africa book keeping, Lord willing spend time with Sabet’s mum and the children, find two full-time carers for the children, write profiles for each child and look for committed long term sponsors, sort through the container and give some input on finishing our house. It’s a lot of ‘stuff’ to do in only 4 weeks, so I am taking some helpers, my daughter Hannah (she’s so excited and I’m so proud that she has worked hard to raise her own support) and Rosa Ewing, who has recently joined our ministry stateside, and has a desire to understand all areas of our work so she can better serve the ministry. Please be in prayer for our trip, for security in country, for our health, for Jed and Agum as they remain in Florida and for all we need to accomplish in a short time.

Dr. Tom’s Back!

The people of Tonj are rejoicing that Dr. Tom is back! Oh, how they have missed the ‘kawaja’ cycling along the dirt road. Patients missed his silly jokes, villagers missed chasing him on his bike and coworkers feel like their family member returned home.

It is a testimony to our Lord Jesus that even though we treat our patients with modern medicine and have trained doctors on hand we also completely rely on Him and his healing power. Our clinic is limited in lab testing and equipment and asking for wisdom when making a diagnosis is critical.  Offering prayer and counsel is an important part of our treatment and we have our trained chaplains on hand to share with every patient. The alternative is for them to go to the local witchdoctor so we take seriously the opportunity to present the gospel message to them. Many of our patients come from villages several hours walk away and their visit might be the only chance to assess them physically and spiritually. From each visit we get a picture of what is happening out in the villages; food or water shortages, outbreaks, and if they have a church. This information can help us determine the best place to do our next CHE (Community Health Evangelism).

The Jesus Film!

Pastor Santino is one of our trained chaplains and He uses the Jesus film to make God’s Word come alive, especially in the villages where people are more isolated and there is a high rate of illiteracy. During the Christmas break Pastor Santino took the responsibility to reach out to an area we had never been to before. It was directly after counseling a patient in our clinic that had come from that region. He showed the Jesus film in nine places; three of them were markets, three homes and three churches. An astounding total of 4,161 people watched the Jesus film and 426 of them responded to the invitation to receive Jesus as their personal Lord and Savior.

With security in our area getting worse, there are a lot of hostilities between clans in the villages around our town. God is faithfully using our pastors to meet the lost souls in the villages where a lot of these clashes begin.

One man was completely transformed after watching the Jesus film and sharing his heart with Pastor Santino, who counseled him and prayed with him. He confessed he wanted a peaceful life but all he has known is fighting and retaliation, never had he heard a message of love, grace and forgiveness.  To be accepted by Jesus brought this man to his knees and he laid down his weapons long with his heart.

Security Update!

“Pure and undefiled religion before God and the Father is this: to visit orphans and widows in their trouble, and to keep oneself unspotted from the world.” – James 1:27

The BIG question we keep hearing, “Is peace possible in South Sudan?”

Last August there was a peace signing between the rebel leader and a reluctant President after pressure from the international community.  Recently in January, South Sudan’s president dissolved the nation’s 10 states and created 28 new states! This left the country very tense as people tried to work within these new systems. Now the President has announced that his former vice-president, who he fired in 2013 and was leading the rebels, has been reappointed as his First Vice President. They seem committed to the peace treaty but it is still early days. The government army continues to be accused of attacking opposition bases in violation of the permanent ceasefire agreement.

This constant insecurity does make our mission work harder but it also opens the door to share with people who have a need for true peace, which we know can only to be found in Jesus Himself. Opportunity surrounds us and that is exciting. This is our prayer: Pray, the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into His harvest.” (Matt. 9:38).