Transcript
I promised him I wouldn't embarrass him so I'm a man of my word you
know I'm not going to make these guys do a big talk or anything um totally
unprepared but you know part of my passion with Operation HOPE is not
just to go off and save the world and all this sorts of stuff and be the big evangelist I I believe that God's given
us a vessel as an organization that is able to take people people out onto the
mission field and my heart is for anyone who is here and anyone who's watching on
the video link is that this could be you it's not all about how much experience
you've got as a missionary or whether you're a big evangelist or or anything else because none of us are um it's it's
about what God wants to do in your life and how God wants to use you and so many
places we go and we we'll be in churches and the vast majority of people they never really step out and and fulfill
their potential because it's it's a lot more comfortable to to let someone else do it isn't he but I want to challenge
us today and say is God calling you to the mission field and so Nathan is
absolutely horrified that I've got him here this morning and making him speak
but if anything Nathan you know you be you don't like to speak publicly is not
an experienced Minister but how has it impacted your life to come on the last
two trips uh well yeah it's like you
go all the way out to Africa right mhm to experience something that's like with
you all the time which is cool cuz before I went on the first trip I was in very Christian I guess you have to fly
all the way out to Africa to like see it all like people being prayed for and
healed and stuff and being saved yeah which is cool so the experience that you
that you see and the things that you see there you just unfortunately at this time we don't see it on mass in this
country do we um you know without embarrassing him too much he was struggling the first time we went out
there with personal things of his own of his own thing and he was Finding himself as a young teenager as they do and
things you know teen needes he can go one way or the other can't he
and the things that he saw out there impacted him didn't he and I won't go any further than that H so I'll give him
a clap well done so Jill we lots of you will know
Jill yeah um the flag lady as she's
affectionately but you know Jill's been very faithful with the youth in that kind of Ministry for many years but when
it comes to preaching and all rest she wouldn't call herself an experienced Minister but yet God said to go and what
would you say Dill to anyone who thinks you know I'd love to go but I'm not really an experienced
Minister well go God can do uh anything of course it's it's all of God so as we
just step out and do something for him he is the one that takes it on really uh
and it's quite scary to step out we all know that uh and even this time it was
quite scary stepping out again in into new things uh that that we did there so
yeah it's just uh taking that step and being bold and uh just letting God uh
take hold of you really to do that um uh do you want me to say anything about
what what we did um well what what what one one one thing
one thing that I found uh the stepping out was um when we uh was was in the
Revival meetings at the beginning of the mission um we we've gone with the view
of praying for people and it's it's quite SC scary when Steve called us up
and said that you know we we were standing there and people have come forward for prayer and uh yeah to to lay
hands on people and uh pray for them and then to uh to see a brilliant result
when people he it was like you were God snacked really you know but but it just
encouraged you on it just encouraged you on to to to keep at it and to and to do
that stepping out really so that that's what impacted me really this time was
actually stepping out and doing something new praise God thank you Jill and you know what it brings you it
bring it brought Jill home with the passion to start doing it more where she is and that's a thing you know sometimes
you have to go out all the way to Africa just to see something that you're not
seeing where you are so that you can come home and say God why aren't we seeing it here let's see it here and
Jill's stepping out she went to the Christmas light switch on in to and was witnessing to people in ways that she
hadn't done before so praise God it's scary but got come amen amen and the
thing is that everyone finds is that when you're put in that situation you realize that God wants to use you just
as much as he wants to use anybody else I I remember um you know hearing from
various ministers about how God has no favorites he has no favorites so if
God's willing to do it with ryanard bonkey he's willing to do it with you what's the difference difference is the
calling maybe but you know when he when he leads us to go out even if that's only on a short-term mission that which
he did for someone else he will do with you so let's go on to the first slide so
I just wanted to touch base on something that happened before we got there you know some months before the trip or at
least weeks before the trip um we found that things were getting tough and those
who had signed up to come on the team all of a sudden were in all kinds of battles that they weren't normally
experiencing and I'm afraid that's the way it is when you step out and you say I'm going to serve God in a new way then
you find yourself in a new battle and the enemy wants to try and put you off and to stop you and stuff but it's at
that point where you either decide I'm going to quit and run um and never do the thing that you was going to do or
you you stand firm knowing that the victory is already assured and that can be the hardest thing to do but we have
to remind ourselves that we are fighting a defeated Foe and although it looks
like the storm is Raging he's going to lose and you can stand firm in that
knowledge and so God spoke to me he said I'm going to give you the largest group that you've had to deal with so far um
and it's going to be you're going to go into war there is a war but the wind but the battle is won
and so the lord gave me that word Warfare and told me stand firm I will do
it and you know there was no point in the process where God said now I need you to step in and take
over he said stand still I will do it and so let's click click on and what
happened many of you will know um with only weeks to go a few few short weeks
to go we finally realized that the the company we thought we were using to buy
everybody's tickets was in fact um a scammer and so we hadn't been approached
by these people we went on to Google we looked at the advertisements for flight
companies uh for commercial bookings we wanted to book everybody on the same plane and all of that sort of thing and
we we checked out the company The Limited company status we looked at their accounts we looked at the at all
numbers we we phoned up and we verified these things we did all kinds of things to check that this was legitimate and
felt really comfortable that it was but actually this was a scammer a scamming
organization who had set up a whole call center with people working as if it was
a legitimate firm and they were putting advert onto Google pretending to be a
legitimate company that does exist and then Fielding their calls before they
got them and keeping the money and so we found out that nearly £ , had been
stolen from the charity with only a few weeks to go and at that point I will
have I would admit we we we knew we were in a war but we kind of felt like we were losing it at that point sometimes
you have to remind yourself of what God Said and sometimes you have to be reminded by others of what God said
because if I'm honest um I kind of lost my bottle at that stage and it became a
little bit too much and you know you you guys don't always see what goes on in
the background um when you have your little wobbles and your moments where you just think oh
this isn't going to work out this one and there are times when you're serving God and you think how can this possibly
work out how can God possibly turn this situation for good but we have to
remember that he always does amen and you know I I came to a point where the
thing that was bothering me the most is that as a charity we don't have a lot of finances and we didn't have this money
to give back to those those people so what was really affecting me the most was not that I'd lost my money is that
I'd lost other people's money and I had to go to them and tell them you know God
told you to go on Mission yeah you know God helped you fund raise and he's given you miraculous gifts well I've lost
them imagine and it really was getting me I there was several days there I just
wasn't sleeping and it it was just it was just worrying me out and um I came
to a point where I was just like we've got to tell them we don't know we had a emergency trustees meeting um and then
wisely one of our trustees Andy said look I believe we have to sleep on it don't go and say anything just yet let
us just sleep one more night and let's give God a chance and wow you know it's
always at the th Hour isn't it sometimes and um God came
and he met with me that night and you know I went I didn't even read my Bible
forgive me I didn't pray that night I didn't have some amazing time of worship
or anything else in fact I said to Lisa I said all God's been saying to me is it's fine he's got it it'll be okay and
I can't see how that possibly can be true anymore it's gone by the wayside it's just all gone wrong and I felt so
low and I said I can't even open the word because I just I just feel just flat and
I just went to bed at early I went at
I went to bed and went to sleep and that was it uh but I felt led to pray
one prayer before I went to bed because I know one thing if my experience of
life is not matching up to what God has said then my experience is the lie and what God Said is the truth so I knew I
was lacking wisdom in the situation and so I prayed as I was led to pray and I
said Lord you say in your word If any man lacks wisdom let him ask well I'm
lacking a lot of wisdom right now and I know I've got this wrong but I don't know how so please speak to me and I
just went to bed and I just left it with him and it's the it's the only time that
God's done this for me but he came to me that night and he I you know whether it
was a dream or what it was very real and he appeared to me and he sat with me and
he talked to me and I've never had that from Jesus I've never I don't get audible voices and all of this uh but it
it was exactly what I needed and he sat and he spoke to me but you know I've
often I've often dreamt of that occasion I thought if only the Lord would just sit down and talk things through with me
wouldn't it be wonderful well sadly he not willing to give much away because
you know at those times where you wish you could just talk it through with Jesus he's doing something in your life
and that's why you don't have the hold picture because you've got to have a bit of faith and push through and that's
where the victory comes and even though Jesus came to me and he sat with me and spoke to me he refused to give me the
full picture what he did is he reminded me of what he'd said that's all he needed to
do he said why have you stopped I said but lord I can't do
anything I've stopped because I've lost everybody's money and he said but why have you
stopped I told you I've got this it's okay Carry On And I said but Lord I've
lost everybody's money but I told you it's okay Carry On
and he just kept repeating himself I said but Lord how can I carry on he said just book the
tickets I said you're getting confused now you're like Lord I've lost everybody's money
how can I book the tickets he said just book the tickets and
left he's never going to give you more information than he will give you in your own personal quiet time because
that's the work he's doing in your life and if he gives you that that much information it's up to you to have the
faith to step out and so I went back to the trustees I shared what was happening uh they witnessed with it they
knew it was the Lord and they said let's give it a few more hours let's go and pray let's see what we can do personally
and let's see what God can do and by that afternoon the the two trustees I
was speaking to came back to me and they said we've got enough money to make it up we'd had a few gifts come in um bless
you some people from this church had given at that time but also some others
uh we needed about k of the eight and by the afternoon the trustees had come
back and said look he said I can give a bit I can give a bit my father can give a bit he said but
the it has to be Al loan he said we can we can supply the five gun we can buy
the tickets well it has to be alone uh and it has to come back and I went away and prayed and I felt the Lord say just
book the ticket it's not so I don't like to loan money on God's behalf you know if I
don't know how I'm going to pay it back but he he told me to do it so it was okay and we went we booked the ticket
um and we uh you know within hours we'd gone from everything being
completely destroyed eight grand in death having to cancel the mission give everyone the money back to having all
the tickets booked and the money was in the bank and it was such a blessing um
and I can say a lot happened since that point but as I stand here this day we
are not in debt amen amen God had his way everybody went the mission was a
success and the debt has all been paid God is good isn't he good let's crack on
then but I wanted to share that you know because the truth of the matter is it isn't easy no serving God isn't easy
it's you face all manner of Trials but what does it say over and over and over
again in the word of God it's to those who persevere that's what the word says to
those who persevere the Overcomers and such like and they're not the ones who are stronger than every body else
they're just the ones who cling on to God and let him do it amen so this was
our team um there was only three people on the team who had really preached before
in in any great number of times there's one lady who started to preach but experienced leaders and ministers there
was three and the rest were um were just called by God and it was such a blessing
um and I believe that's something God really wants to do with OP hope is to is
to give people an opportunity to grow and be stretched and and everything else and
so um we had six churches represented on a mission for the first time which was
such a blessing we had Andy with two ends that's my spelling ER there by by
the way Andy Max and Lauren um and Grace
uh three of them are from one family and Grace and they're all from a church called Brave Church in Manchester we had
Steve who is a Pastor Steve Brinley from Crossways Community Church in
Dartford uh then we had Walter from rdale new B Baptist Church then we had
uh Carol Tonio M from Cardiff fellow Welsh people um from Hope Church Cardiff
then we had Jill the flag lady from TN and then we had me Grace and Nathan
from BMA find the flag for barou amen and I
think what we're going to do just skip on to the next one um is this you are Gracie so Grace
is going to share three slides I've managed to talk her into doing a little bit more so it's not all me Ying out
yeah come on
Gracie bless you just like that yeah okay so um my dad asked me to share a
little bit on the mission so I've C made three slides for three different highlights um the first that we got to
do what I really enjoyed was praying and we got to pray for the sick in so many different places we did it in tent
meetings on the streets prisons schools colleges and um before we went out dad
did some videos on teaching and equipping for how to pray for the sick because there's a few of us on the team
that were so inexperienced and hadn't done it before and I've prayed part of a group and seen healing I've had my
experienced my own healing but I've never prayed to someone oneon-one and seen healing just me but we went out we
went in the meetings and they'd call forward for people to pray for the sick and like Jill was saying as scary as it
might have been dad said go like not just the experienced preachers go and lay hands go and pray for them and so we
did that and so many people for the first time saw healings um and so many
so many healings um there's too many testimonies to tell but um I for
instance one of them I prayed for a girl at a tent and she said she had chest pain and it was agonizing and she had it
for so long um and she couldn't go for an appointment so she didn't know what it was but it was just consistent and so
painful and so I laid hands and I prayed for her and afterwards I said how's your
pain now because I knew she had pain before um and she said to me she said for the first time it's gone she said I
can't feel it it's gone I'm set free from that pain and she just thanked me and off she went and it happened with
stomach pain it happened with knee pain leg pain head pain any pain every pain God was just healing all the time and it
was amazing um not just physical sicknesses as well we had some um like
mental struggles and heart pains and stuff and um there was one prison where they brought us forward to pray for the
sick and um us being a women we couldn't walk around and lay hands and communicate because it was a Men's
prison but we could stand where the guards are watching and lay hands and so we just did that and really like tried
to listen to the spirit and I got to this one guy and I was praying for sickness and I just felt the Lord say like he's got something in his heart
like he's got mental struggles and pain that kind of way and he was a tough guy he was quite old he's was really hard
and just kind of knelt and was strong and and um hard but I prayed and as soon
as I prayed that and was like Lord I just pray that you touch his heart and just help with the things that he's seen and the things that he's done and what
burdens he carries he just starts to break down down and his shoulders just dropped and he just started crying and
crying and crying on the floor before Jesus as he was just touching his heart and that really blessed me um next
slide so this was secretly one of my highlights one of my main main
highlights um evangelism something I've always wanted to do but never really had but we went out we used the Jad card
like Dad told you about on Thursday and um we just did two or so sessions on it
um got equipped with it and we just went out and the conversations were incredible um I remember the first time
I did it I spoke to a lady and I did the Jud with her and then I did the prayer and the Holy Spirit touched her and she
said this in his prayer and she gave her life and I just wanted to run and scream and shout I couldn't contain it because
it was so amazing that by just chatting with someone which I love to do by just doing the gospel and it's not even
something I had to come up with it was a Jad card but by just sharing and speaking to her she's given her life to
Jesus and I know how much Jesus has changed my life life and now Jesus is going to do that for her and it is just
amazing that we get to do that and so exciting um and there's such a hunger
for God there as well like my main problem rather than being so worried about rejection there was a few times
you kind of got rejected but the main problem was I'd be speaking to one person or three people and next minute
there's a whole crowd and I'm like do I start the Jad again do I keep going how much as everyone heard um they were just
so hungry for it and that was amazing um one quick testimony I was walking in the street and this
lady was walking past and I just felt a sto her so I stopped her I went through Jad the Holy Spirit touched her she gave
her life um and I said Thank you and chatted with her and and kind of left
her to go off her away but the translator had a chat with her and she said she's from hundreds of miles away
and she's a uni student and she was passing through the town on an attachment to do some presentation on
Carter freshness or something um and she said she was so excited she said that girl's from so far away and she was just
passing through on her way home and God met her right where she was and he met her through somebody that lived ,
miles away and came to the market on just some random day we'd never been in the market before and there was just so
many stories like the Holy Spirit was moving people were being healed set through free I was praying for a girl on
the market and the spirit of God just came on her and just felt the love of God and so the evangelism was so cool it
was amazing yeah next one
please okay so the children's ministry um the
first mission I went out I did a lot of children's ministry on this one we had two Sundays um one of the Sundays I was
at an event at a boy high school and then the other one was at a church where I could lead the Sunday school but
really the children's work was whatever we were if we were in the markets and we were waiting for evangelism to start you
could reach out to the kids you could love on the kids play with them tell them about Jesus pray and they're so
responsive and so lovely um um but on this particular day in Busia we LED
Sunday school um and I did a talk about pizza walking on water and related it to like troubles and suffering and if you
fix your eyes on Jesus you're walking you can do it but when you look to the left and the right and you see the storms it starts to come over you and
you get feared and and I just spoke a lot about that because I felt it was on my heart um and then I let my wonderful
friend take over and do a bit of a gospel message and I was just sorting out activities and this girl came up to
me and she was quite timid and and she said is okay if I chat with you I said of course she said she said I'm really
struggling and your message really touched me she said I'm suffering I've got exams coming up my parents have paid
so much money for them they're so key in my life but I feel like I'm going to fail them and I'm terrified and I'm trying to focus on Jesus but it's too
overwhelming can you pray with me and so I prayed with her and I spoke to her and and shared my pain of
exams and then I felt on my heart gather the children we had about and say what we've been talking about is quite
deep and I know so many of you have got so much suffering if you want pray come find me or my friends let's play some
games um and we went to play games but we ended up with about kids cured for pray and this is at the end so we ran
out of time really but they were just so eager to sh I had one one that was just
above seven years old and he came to me and he said can I stand in the gap for my mommy I said of course what's going
on he said he said my mom's really really really ill and we can't get a treatment and I'm she's going to die can
I stand in the gap for her I said of course she can and and I raised laid my hands on him and I said to all the kids
I said it doesn't matter how old you are how experienced you are let's all lay our hands and pray with our brother and
so we prayed for him we had kids that parents passed away fears struggling exams so much suffering that we can't
even fathom for these tiny kids to carry that burden and so we just got to pray with them and they were really
responsive and and yeah but I just wanted to share a few highlights and thank you all because of the support and
the prayer that you've given um this mission's been amazing I know my boldness and faith has grown my
relationship in God has grown and I've always had a heart for Mission but really it's just grown so much now I'm
so excited to just reach out and share the gospel and pray for the sick and I'm excited to go in future missions but
also what we're doing in barma fum and where we're going to evangelize for late night shopping which is amazing and I'm
just praying for that same hunger in Kenya to come to barma thank you so
much wonderful I think she could have finished off couldn't
she doing a great job Hallelujah Grace is seriously considering taking a year
out after a levels and uh getting more involved in God's Ministry and missions so let's
skip on to the next slide you know what isn't it so wonderful that someone who' never really
done evangelism our Grace she' never really done it at all and never prayed
for the sick or anything has come home so buzzing with so many testimonies what
does that say to us if he'll do it with Grace will he do it with you amen so
after arriving in Kenya we we because we rebook these tickets we end up arriving
some days earlier than we originally planned for the mission and I said to the bishop out there let's not waste
them you know um let's get let's get some more meetings going and so we
started these what they call Revival meetings where they just get everyone in the Church of an evening um and they'll
have a preacher and see what the holy spirit will do and um gosh be they said
oh we might just get a handful of people coming because there's exams on and there's this on and it's in the week and
blah blah the place was packed out every night um and you know what really impacted us was how many young kids were
coming straight from School straight from their exams into the house of God like teenagers just hungry for god um
the response was wonderful uh these kids were just coming from
school and just seeking God if you click it it should give a little
video these teenagers giving hearts to
Jesus and these were all secondary age schoolers all coming in you know they're
suddenly hit with the reality of life if they don't pass these exams there's nothing down for them they're not going
to get benefits there isn't any they they they're subjected to a life of
absolute poverty or progress depending on how they do at school what pressure
and you know each one of them kind of comes in and they know that a life given
to Jesus is going to be the best life but if they go off with their mates mocking about and drinking the home brew
and all the rest of it they're going to end up in poverty but if they give their hearts to Jesus and they live a proper
life and they apply themselves he's going to bless them they know it and so they come in large numbers it's such a
harvest let's skip on so yeah we did that every night during that first week
and it just were it just grew and grew it was tremendous time um and the team were just in at the deep end praying for
people right from day one and then what we what I did is I was training them up
in the time the spare time that we had with we were training people up with the Jesus at the door and we've got those um
we've got those cards here today that we were lacking on Thursday so those who
were here and they want to take one home H graci's got one but you may you may
remember the Jesus at the door picture and basically this is a tool for evangelism and we're proactively
training anyone in the church who wants to uh how to share the fa your faith
Within seconds or so and lead someone on to Jesus and we found that's really
fruitful especially over here you know like Grace was saying when you when you
go out there in in Kenya and you start to preach the gospel in the street rather than people walking away from you
other people start gathering around and you know what does it say The Harvest feel is white pray for the Lord
to send workers into the Harvest field and you know sometimes it's about it's about going where the Harvest
is yeah we want to see it where we are and we're going to push for where we are but also we want to go where the Harvest
is as well because if we don't go the Harvest isn't going to come in and so all we did on we had a spare day and we
said look what do you want to do and you know they could have said oh I want to go to the swimming pool or whatever and they said no let's go and practice Jad
so we went out into the street just for a short time and one after the other after the other we're just coming to
Jesus it was wonderful so let's skip on again oh
back think we' gone too far there don't we there we go yeah so on the Sundays
there were two Sundays while we were out there the team the of us split into two groups uh three groups sorry um and
so the three main preachers would go to a different church and they would preach the main message some of them would
assist him and pray him with the sick and that sort of thing and then the other side of the team would lead a
youth work at outside so there'd be like a meeting for the younger ones from children even up to secondary school age
um and they had a great time the kids are so so respectful and so well behaved
it's an absolute pleasure even I'm tempted sometimes to do youth work of course I resist you
know but uh but it's such a delight and everyone who does it just really enjoys it um and we find lollipops really help
don't they do yeah so let's skip on um this was just a
little bit of Comedy you can um we we managed to cap capture a picture of Andy
one of our trustees a pastor in Manchester trying to copy the African dancing and uh just look at the the the
horror on his daughter's face I cannot believe you're doing this to me dad
stop Meanwhile we're all laughing and videoing it so I we'll skip on okay so on the first Sunday I was
requested personally with such a great privilege because I've been going back and two for so long they're starting to
get to know me and stuff and they asked me to come and share a word at a kakamega boys school and so there was
, young people all in one room you can imagine In the Heat of Africa that
was a hot room and then they all started dancing and jumping around and it went up another ° so it was really tough
going but we went there last year um and it was evangelist Martin who comes out
with us we we gave him that meeting at that point and there were over there
were there were over half of them weren following the Lord at that time and over boys came to Jesus on one morning
and it was absolute Revival scenes it was amazing but what was truly great was
to go back I went and expected that they'd all have just gone the merry way
and we'd have to do it all again and um they were all going on with Jesus they
were all going on with the Lord they restructured the school setup they had
uh you within the kids they had disciples they had pastors they had evangelists and they were anointing the
kids to minister to the kids and they had a whole setup like some schools have prefects well these had a whole
Committee of different types of Ministry for the kids to do with the kids and
they were being led by the chaplain and they' just gone stronger and stronger with the Lord and yet we still saw
hundreds of them come to the Lord the ones that had been missed out but um but the majority of them would just going
great guns so that was that was a great privilege and they've asked they've asked us each time we go now to go
minister with them uh at that school so the next next slide
please okay so our days during that week so once we got past the Sunday the main
week of missions we're incredibly busy some some people are saying a bit too
busy but I I like to get things done if I can maybe I need to have a couple of breaks in there but um yeah they were
taken up with visiting our orphanage doing work with the orphanage uh onetoone evangelist is becoming a real
big part of what we're doing not everybody is a preacher and that's okay
but everyone's to give account for their faith so we're teaching both our teams
those who are not preachers on our team and the church in general uh how to
really effectively show their faith on to one and that's actually bearing more fruit than some of the other stuff that
we've done like the tent missions and things um we were doing Outreach you know street preaching we were doing the
evangelism truck um we're doing prison ministry uh we we were invited into
colleges and poly Technics and universities and things and then tent attent meetings of a nice as well so
busy days so we'll just skip on to next slide so the first Sunday afternoon we
went to see the orphanage I've told you about the orphanage before on our last
occasion um basically if you know anything of the story of George Muller
he was famous in this country wasn't he for for founding all of the orphans and he looked after them by faith and all
the rest of it and at that time uh even in the UK kids were living rough in the streets and it's hard to believe
nowadays you think surely not and that I think when George Muller was around there was up to at any one time there
was up to , children in prisons in the UK with
men and women prisoners uh simply because there was nowhere to put them and such was the
social Care Network in those days and Godly men like George Muller and and
women of course but and and politicians it was the Christians of this nation
that started the NHS that started welfare systems that started all of the things that we take for granted came
from the church and came from passionate people and you know this guy Bishop was
doing a crusade in kakamega and there was all these kids younger than Josiah's age six seven years of age living rough
on their own on the streets being abused in multiple ways to censor that
you can work it out yourself um by and even with addictions and all
kinds of things being just totally used and abused and he gave this this alter
call and boys came to the front and gave their lives and he he's convicted of God and said what am I going to do I
can't just send them back on the streets so he took them all home you do as you do he didn't tell his
wife till he got there he took them back to the church he gathered the Elders of the church he
said we've got a new ministry um but you know very quickly they realized they had
to do this legitimately they went to the to the government and and they set up it took a lot of work a lot of time a lot
of expense but they set this up as a proper orphanage home and they've been looking after these kids um ever since
now the problem is they never they had some support from the Midlands and um
the church had a problem with a split I think or something and like a lot a lot of their support dried up and then all
of a sudden Co hit and it just died off all together and he's really been
through the mill over over the last couple of years uh to the point where they've thought about closing the
orphanage on many occasions and the only thing that has sto them is the fact that they know the kids would be back on the
street there's nowhere for them to go there's no provision from the government at all um if the church doesn't do it it
doesn't get done and um and he's just scraped through and and we uh people in
Operation Hope and people linked with us have helped where they can and we've just about manag between all of us to
keep it open but we know and we believe you know one of the things that really impacts you when you go on these
missions is how many kids are still in the streets and they just sat there of a
night when you're going in for a nice meal in a restaurant and they're sat on the curbside with a pot of glue sniffing
glue just to get their mind out of it so they can go to sleep and face whatever
Horrors they face that night these are kids younger than
primary school age you know uh it doesn't seem to be with the girls so
much they the the culture forces them to look after those but the boys are just
abandoned just abandoned and my passion and my heart is how can we keep going
over there and leave them kids in the seat and come home to our fancy houses and everything else and I just can't
can't do it and even this time we were going out into the streets trying to feed them and it was causing riots they
were coming and fighting each other and attacking each other for to grab that bit of food that we had a banana or
whatever it was and the thing is here we have a legitimate ministry that's legal
that's accountable that's being run properly over many years and because
we've never managed to raise up the funding to cover the ones that are in there you can't expand it we they've
been given by a church money and they bought it a big plot of land and they've got architectural drawings to build an
orphanage for a kids and it's just sat there for the last few years as an empty field and we've and we're
struggling just to get bits and bobs for these kids so you know my passion is to get these kids fully funded get sponsors
running for them and then start bringing more in as quickly as we can because they're just they're just perishing out
there in the streets and it's just horrendous you can't you can't go and not be impacted and you know but once
you see it it drives you to do things that you that you would happy not to do before Walter who came out with us once
he saw the way things were he just thought oh my my sister runs a Tik Tok
selling business back home and he says let's just do a video telling them what we're doing and maybe they'll share it
and he said yeah we get quids it's something and so the they were selling
things on Tik Tok didn't even know that was a thing like um it's completely Beyond me you know and uh but they were
selling beauty products and all of this stuff on Tik Tok of all things and anyway they shared the little video of
me just talking about what we're doing and Walter just came on and said you know if anyone wants to help you can
help and it'll get past and we'll while we're here we'll see that % of it
goes into this building and within a couple of days they raised
quit amazing and these none of these were Christians they were all in the
world but they could see that there was actually something there that could guarantee that the money was going where
it's supposed to go and we could one thing we can say is that this side we don't take any Administration there's no
hidden charges or anything that anything that's ever given to these kids goes to the kids and we cover the transfer costs
and everything so it all goes to them so so if God puts it on your heart to
sponsor a child in Africa then think about the the the orphanage in kakamega
I'll move on okay and so then during the mornings
as I said we were doing Jad we went into the marketplaces uh and we were just witnessing one to one you could go into
these vast there would be these vast Market centers you know all the clothes that you put in the recycle bin back
here they just be stall after store after stall of all these clothes that um
peanuts say Get N A Max for couple of quid you know amazing yeah but anyway if
you don't get sidetracked shopping you get the opportunity to witness with these precious folks and what what what
we found very quickly is that if you go to someone with your card and start witnessing one to one all timidly you'd
have a little conversation and it might be okay but if you just shout it loud and proud big crowd gathers around
what's this strange white person doing here and they're very inquisitive you know and they come around and all a
sudden you're preaching the gospel to instead you know and we had such a great time and this is Tony from Cardiff who
you know wasn't experienced as a minister and even on that first day in the market this guy hobbles over with
the crutch can hardly walk leads him to Jesus and says oh can I pray for you the
guy gets healed is waving crutch walking down the road praising the Lord and it
was just it was just such a continuous blessing there our gel in the middle
pring a heart out and it's just such a a privilege to see people who might just
sit on a chair in church every every week actually out there doing it and seeing the same results as anybody else
gets so let's skip on again um one of yeah my main highlight was just seeing
the way that everyone in the team just thrived by Leading people to Jesus and
um you know I I was thinking when I introduced the training for Jad that maybe half of them wouldn't really be
bothered and they just like Meander around the markets and hide probably says out of the
corruptness of your own heart you're judged doesn't it yeah but um you know every one of them said
I'm here I may as well have a go and not all of them were sold on the idea and
you know you know all the rest of it but once they started to learn and started to practice they were just buzzing they
were just having such a great time young Max I think is or um and he said
no I'm not just going to stand by and watch D I'm going to have a go and went into a market and led a Muslim man to
Jesus you know and it was genuine um so praise God uh yeah that's our Grace in
the middle this is Grace from Brave church and manchest this was a time where Andy had forgot his insulin stuff
for his diabetes and he said I've got to go back to the hotel room and uh collect it and we had five minutes and we saw
these these shops uh to one side there was all these people shopping I said oh
Grace let's have a little walk over there jumped out with the Jad card and I
said does anyone want to hear a little a little thing about Jesus and they all just gathered around and there was
people give the lives to Jesus such as the Harvest such as the Harvest and
they're all waiting desperate to hear and they're just waiting for someone to go and hint hint n wink so let's move
on that we also went to the markets with the evangelism truck we chose to use a
smaller one so we could access the smaller marketplaces so it was like a big pickup truck and we've got a big PA
system on the back and we hired this this YouTube dancer they love YouTube dancers and S singers out there have um
they're like many celebrities over there and you can hire them for the week to follow you around and they'll get up and
sing and dance and make a great show and you'll just have crowds of hundreds of people gathering around and then we'll
stand up and preach a gospel to them and it's terrifying but wonderful um but people you know who'd
never had a go were willing we didn't force any everybody to do this but those who were willing had a go and we helped
them and quit them and train them and they were just just had a great response uh people were just coming in large
numbers and giving their lives to the Lord and um and then the the rest of the team would just Meander around and pray
for the sick and they were just seeing people getting healed left right and Center so let's skip on
there yeah and then one of the mornings we went into this big farm prison I think I told you last time that ah the
prison systems are so basic um and they don't Supply a lot of the personal
hygiene things that we just require as a minimum standard for example the women don't get sanitary wear which is kind of
a must um and the men don't even have a bar of soap you know so they'd have
nothing to wash with just just water and so when we go they'll they'll just about
allow us in there it's it takes a lot of red tape they they're very funny about letting you in and where you can take
pictures and all the rest of it um however one of the musts that we do have is that
we bring something for the prisoners and so we have to bring at least a sanitary sanitary we or a bar soap for every
prisoner and and there could be like of them you know so it's a big thing but it's such a privilege because
they'll gather the guys around and then you get to just you get to give the the best news in the world to the most
desperate people in the world you know um and so that was really fruitful it was a blessing and we saw a great
response but the only picture we were allowed to take was outside and it was mostly staff and the team but we had a
few prisoners that they selected to to take a few pictures so uh we'll skip on
to the next one okay and so this was um poly
Technics we the they have these big sort of colleges and poly Technics and um
some of them if they if they did really well at school could go to university but a lot of others would go to like
practically based Polytechnic Coles like we used to have here where you could learn a trade you know sewing machines
or or building or whatever it is car mechanics and they're really useful really great
institutions um but they would literally allow us to set up their stage in the
ground and gather all the kids out and stop the studies for the day where they
come and heard the gospel and the response was was just wonderful um you you can see on the the bottom picture
here this was some of our you youth um but in the background that large building was a hospital and we didn't
know until we started but as as I'm there preaching the gospel to these kids
uh shouting rather loud as I tend to do um I get I'm getting nuds from behind
they're saying everyone's hanging out the windows in the hospital and I turn around and they are
they're all hanging out the window was listening to the message and so when we gave the response turned around and gave
another response and all giving the lives out the window in the hospital and we were praying for the sick and then
shouting prayers for the sick at the hospital and um they were saying wave to
us if you've been healed and there was all these people coming waving out the window you know so God's just amazing
you just see things and you just I was walking down the road the other week and dropping my car the G and I was thinking
about this and I was thinking these are just things you'll remember when you're years of age you know these are just
not ordinary things and God is so willing to move when we go out you know
five times in the Scriptures it says go to all the nations and one of what what
we want to do in Operation HOPE is take advantage of the fact that the world is getting so much smaller and you know as
long as you don't get hit by scammers you can buy a ticket and you can go to any part of
this world as if God's willing to pay and you're willing to go you can go all over this world and share wherever the
Harvest field is um and still come home and it's not you know back in the day
they'd travel six months by ship just to get to a place like this um so let's
skip on to the next one so there's me doing a response with
some of the kids and there's me turning around and preaching to the hospital and you can't see on this but they're all
waving out of the window there's even a guy if he was up a like a mobile phone Mast or a radio M or something and he's
waving giving his life I'm like hold on mate don't fall off at least get the
prayer done first come on but people are just willing to hear
you you know and to be honest with you you know a lot of the local pastors will say that the fact that we just come all
that way and that we're white is a novelty it's a real novelty and people
will just stop in the street and listen simply because well they can't remember
the last time they all white face you know and in The Villages they might never have seen one and so you are a
real novelty factor and they want to know what why have you come all this way what is it you've got to tell us and
what you know we get so many opportunities that other people just don't get and the Harvest is ripe so if
we don't go we don't reap so let's skip
on next one yeah so each evening on this particular Mission we got our little
tent out it's about sea um you can see in the in the pictures there uh the
temp I just love temp missions you know the the the atmosphere and the fruit is
just awesome and you know you know the Africans they just love to worship they love to sing they love toce and they
love to get all Jill's Flags out and do the coner around the village you know and and all the rest of it and Jill's
normally at the front of the line with them dancing around and and we have such an amazing time and so many come and
receive Jesus at these tents that we just we just love it's a costly thing um
all the things that are involved with it but but so fruitful and that that little church in that Village you know it was
only small but the the numbers were just in the hundreds who join that church in one week and it's so fruitful um and
they're being followed up well so that's great and that was what we did every evening and so one of the preachers
would preach yeah and um and then the team would just descend at the end and
just Minister praying for them for the sick and we you tend to have all kinds
of people manifesting demonic things from Witchcraft and one minute you're
praying for somebody's bad back the next minute they're slithering on the floor like a snake or or something and it
takes people by surprise but we warn them and stand by them and and and then
they realize that the power of the name of Jesus is all powerful and um and people are getting
set free they're getting wonderfully set free and healed and and everything else so we'll skip
on okay yeah so I tried to make it a little bit condensed with the slides
there because I wanted to give a bit of time for for grace and and the others but you know what is God saying to us
next as a mission okay I believe that I I believe this is a word for the church
as well I shared it on one of the Thursdays wasn't it um dorm wasn't so good that night or it
wasn't here but um I believe the Lord is saying that it's time to push that we
feel tired and sometimes you know it's e it's easy just to take your foot off the
gap a little bit and just and say you know we've achieved a lot and God's doing good things and it's nice and but
I feel the Lord saying let's double the efforts let's double the efforts and when I come home from Mission that's the
last thing I want to hear because you know you know I had to stomach bugs and
all kinds of things and you're tired and you just want to switch off but actually
no you know he gave us our biggest team of inexperienced people who really grew
and and saw Great Harvest and he's give us Vision you know what when the local
church in Africa saw what we could what that tool was bringing to their Outreach
and then we started getting them to do it and it was working for them too um
they want us to go over and get whole churches of a few hundred people at a
time training them up and sending them out um and so that the Harvest just
continues when we come home you know um and so we want people who will just come out and and work onetoone with the
church as well and discipling the church one of the things that's really impacted me is that they the they you know they
do all these pastors conferences but what what they really need as well is just to gather the whole church together
and teach them discipleship and get them strong in the Lord because I tell you what they face
so many more challenges than we do and they need to be steady fast so they
don't fall away you know and so we want to go over there we want to teach the church to reach out and to be strong in
the Lord we um so yeah I'm thinking let's do it at least try and try and get
out there three times next year um one of the things God's put on my heart in
the summer is to do a dedicated youth trip um I think Jill might be a little
bit old for that one I don't know not sure of the age limit just yet
but um no see seriously young person came from Brave Church in Manchester and
her dad is one of the youth leaders there and he he's saying look let's get the whole youth team and get them out
there let's let's take loads of kids that are sat on the knife edge with the
world thinking which way looks more appealing and get them out uh and get
them on the mission field and so I I want to take maybe I don't know
young people teenagers from to
maybe uh and get them out there get them praying for the sick get them preaching the gospel and get the others
saved uh and bring them back on fire you know so that that's in the summer but
also a couple of trips throughout the year I would be March and October or some close together like October
November at the end of the year I'm not sure how it's going to work out yet but to do at least another two where it's
all welcome yeah um just people from different churches um yeah so they'll be
open to everybody our passion is to see how far God will allow us to go this
year and just just ask for growth you know and see what God will do it can I I
felt that this mission was was a real Battlefield because if the if the enemy had to won the day and it the only way
he can win is by convincing us to stop because we've already won God's won the
day but if we just listen to the wrong voice and stop what we're doing then we
lose out don't we and if I'd have just said or I've had enough I'm getting no sleep here this is no fun this is no
life I'm going to find a way to give everyone the money back and just jib it
this year we'll do it again next year we'd have missed out on so much and the
reason the enemy was attacking so hard was because God wanted to bless so much
and now we've just seen six churches come together for the mission field and
and see great things and they're all going on buzzing to the churches saying let's go again and why don't you come
with us um and so we want to we want to see what will God do with that you know I want to see I want to take some of you
guys out there why not and you know what let me just say don't let finances be
the reason I say it time and time again but like these folks on here none of them had the
money they didn't have the money they just announced in the church so that they felt they were to go and they were
praying and just left it with God what uh the three from Cardiff came along at
the last moment there was two weeks before I was meant to book these these tickets that we got frauded out of um
but as far as I knew we had two weeks to go and they came along and they said we want to go God told us to go and I said
well we we kind of need the deposit last week and then we're booking the tickets
in a couple of weeks how' you where' you sit financially and none of them had a
penny and so you know the the the the the the amount for a single person was
, quid last last time we went um and
the flights actually went up cost of living's increasing not going down and
you know that may have to slightly increase a little bit next time but the point is this that times that by three
it's a lot of money and they're all in the same church that's that's not got lots of money in itself so you know
you'd think oh come next time you know give yourself a year and save up and all that's but
no we believe that God wants to do things in us through faith before we go
that will manifest in the miraculous when we get there that's how God works
he puts you in an impossible situation that that you can't do anything about then he does the miracle that gives you
the faith to so that when you go out you've got the faith to pray for the sick and everything else and the I said
okay if it's God we'll know you'll have to deposit in a couple of weeks let's pray and let's walk by faith and we put
out on our newsletter as well where they were going and we we received some donations for them but the majority of
it just came miraculously through their letter boxes and all kinds of things and
they had the deposit um I think of half the money within two weeks just quite
miraculously and we just thought right that's it we'll book the tickets and we'll walk by faith with them and you
know it was only a few weeks then until we were going and and it all came in
with days to spare it didn't always feel so comfortable but what I'm saying is that
everyone who received that calling from God and said Yes actually I believe God
wants me to go and stood on that and said I'm going God provided so you know
the the question is Lord do you want me to go not can I save up in time can I
afford it yeah and if God wants you to go what God orders God will pay uh so it
can be easier to go with one or two I I found with these trips if I just went with a another Ministry leader an
evangelist Summit and we just went out hit the ground running just the two of us and did lots of meetings it can be
like easy and hassle-free and Hest it but that's not the vision that God's given us as a Ministry God's told us to
scoop as many people up as we can and take them to the mission field and in
doing that the churches that they leave behind are going to be BL when they come back and it's going to it's going to
bear fruit in the UK I believe that so let's just skip on so how can you be
involved with Operation HOPE uh first and foremost we have a newsletter that
goes out sometimes frequently sometimes not so um and we have a what so you can
just sign up your email and receive that newsletter and pray for us when when
things are happening or when we need prayer we also have a what WhatsApp group for those who are real dedicated
prayers and they want to they want to pray through every little thing that we we're doing so we'll send it tends to be
really busy when we're on a mission and then fall quiet when we come back um or
and then get busy as we're building up to another one um so you can be involved with those two things that you know um
we want to invite you to pray about joining one of our teams five times like
I keep saying in the word it commands us to Go Make Disciples of all Nations so a
short-term mission trip will one transform your life I can guarantee that
every single person that I've ever took on a short-term Mission has said
categorically it's changed my life and they've come back differently and it's
changed their Ministry and it's impacted their church and their family and their
community so a short-term mission trip will change your life your Christian experience both home and abroad um so
think about it pray about it is God calling me support Operation HOPE if
you're blessed and you're able to do it um we're constantly facing difficulties
with finances but God always makes a way if you wanted to bless us um by becoming
a sponsor that's great um if not pray for us um if you can't go
here's a thing we want to do with different churches you know there's probably lots of young people that would
really benefit from this mission on lots of old people too that maybe haven't got the confidence to step out in faith
haven't got the finances and haven't ever really walked by faith before but but God still wants them to have that
experience and we saying if you you know if you have the finances but you don't
have the availability to go or the calling to go could you enable someone
else to go um and you know my first ever experience with missions was when I was
years of age and I was sitting on the fence going to church on fire for God some days and not
so much on others and looking at what the world had to offer and somebody came up to me in church and they said they
were leading a mission out in Zimbabwe and they said somebody has approached us and said God's told them to pay for you
to go on this mission trip uh do you want to go away and pray about it I said
no I want to go why would I pray about it God might
say no no I want to I want I was a young fell being offered a free trip to Africa
I was going um if God told them I I'll take their word for it you know and um
but you know that completely transformed my experience as a young man it it
shaped my future fut it shaped this ministry it changed everything for me
because someone heard God speak that I want that person to go and I've enabled
you to to fund it for them and they they obeyed God so think about it um set
up the other way you can be involved is to set up even just a small regular gift
towards the upkeep of those kids in the orphanage anything we get goes separately in a separate saving account
and goes direct to the kids and as I say we'll cover the extra transfer fees and
things and everything you want to do in that sense will go direct to that Ministry we're just a channel if you
like um and that is that thank you very
much may may I just say I know I said it at the start but can I just say thank
you so much for standing with with us for encouraging me to keep going when it
didn't feel like it was going to pan out for giving out of your own Pockets to
help encourage me to keep going and blessing us um some people are not here
who really gave generously and I want to bless them for that because it was that
encouragement that enabled me to keep going you like it says in the scripture about Moses where he had to hold the
staff up and they would win the victory but he couldn't do it on his own and his brother and sister came and held his
arms and the Victory Was Won and I kind it kind of felt like that with this this time I couldn't I couldn't have done it
on my own but people came alongside our trustees and others and I just want to thank you as a church and those who are
listening on the video for praying for us for paying for us for supporting us
for encouraging us because this is a result of that and I don't think we could have done it on our own at all you
know bless you would someone like to pray for us
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