LCMC Blog [Africa Topic]

Lutheran World Relief Service Project Update

Mon, 24 Apr 17 00:00:00 +0000

At our 2016 Annual Gathering in Denver, Colorado, we partnered with Lutheran World Relief to assemble 8,228 personal care kits for people in need.

The staff of LCMC has received an update from Lutheran World Relief that the kits we packaged have been shipped to Angola on March 28, 2017 and should be arriving within the next four months.

Lutheran World Relief will be working with Hope for Angola to ensure that the resources will be distributed to people in need once they arrive. The organization is a partnership between several Christian denominations in Angola serving a population who lives on an estimated $1/day (US dollars) per family.

From Lutheran World Relief:

Dear Friends at Lutheran Congregations in Mission for Christ,

Greetings from Lutheran World Relief! We're so thankful for your partnership, and for your energy and enthusiasm for this ministry.

I'm excited to be able to share some details about where some of your items traveled in the last year. You may already have spotted in your online Tracker record that your Personal Care Kits have gone to Angola. Your donations departed our warehouse on March 28, 2017.

LWR's partner in Angola is Hope for Angola {HFA}. Founded in 2006 by Angolans living in the United States, the organization seeks to advocate and support sustainable community based development for the vulnerable people of Angola to ensure that all have equal access to basic human needs. This distribution of Mission Quilts, Personal Care Kits, School Kits, Baby Care Kits and Fabric Kits will reach an estimated 20,147 people in Luanda, the capital city of Angola.
These precious gifts will support refugee, asylum-seeking and internally displaced families as they work to establish sustainable lives in Luanda.

To learn more about this shipment, visit quiltmap.lwr.org and click on the country to view a report. We will provide updates as we receive information from our partner. Thank you so much for your partner ship 'in bringing hope to our neighbors in around the world. We thank God for you!

Continued blessings on your ministry!

Melanie W. Gibbons
Quilt & Kit Ministry Manager

LCMC Missions Forum Update

Thu, 11 Jun 15 00:00:00 +0000

If you are like me, you often feel overwhelmed by all of the negative and depressing reports of world events, as they affect our mission fields. However, I just received the latest mission update from the Augustana District (AD-LCMC), and I wanted to pass along a POSITIVE news update.

One year ago, the AD sent a 12 person fact finding team to visit with the Tabor congregation in Ethiopia. Out of that meeting came a partnership where the AD committed to supporting in various ways the tremendous mission outreach that the Tabor congregation already had in place, but wanted to expand even further into their neighboring Muslim areas.

In 2014, the AD raised over $100,000 and distributed $85,000 to the Tabor congregation for designated projects, or a 50/50 split of financial support to related mission projects of their choosing. Some of these mission projects included training and sending 39 evangelists to minister to the local people at 50 local community gathering mission centers, and beginning an agricultural mission to reach out and partner with local farmers in heavily Muslim regions.

Today's AD mission update newsletter reports that during the first quarter of 2015, an additional $15,000 was distributed to grow the number of evangelists to 46, add 5 farmers to the agricultural program, help purchase land to construct two more outreach centers, and more gathering mission sites in Muslim areas.

In addition, during the month of June, an additional $17,000 will be sent for continuing 50/50 support of the evangelists and farmers, as well as additional purchases of motorcycles and bicycles to assist the evangelists in reaching out to their local communities. The cost to support each evangelist is $600 per year.

The chairman of the AD Board of World Missions, Pastor Paul Knudson, reports, "The experience of the AD with the Tabor Partnership has been and continues to be a blessing beyond anyone's imagination. The Board wishes to extend its profound gratitude for all of your generosity."

Linked here is a page from last quarter's newsletter which gives a general summary of this positive partnership that is bearing much fruit for Christ's Kingdom. (Click Here for Article)

Your in Christ,

Jim Dix

Annual Gathering and MFTH Project Statistics Announced!

Wed, 29 Oct 14 00:00:00 +0000

Earlier this month, 1,012 people from around the world came together in Des Moines, IA for LCMC’s 14th Annual Gathering.

Throughout the year, the 833 congregations that make up LCMC came together to raise a total of $91,005.40 for our service project with Meals from the Heartland (13.75% more than our goal of $80,000). On the evening of Tuesday, October 7th, many of the people who attended the gathering met up at the convention center and assembled a total of 291,168 meals. [Watch Video]

During the Business Session of the gathering, Pastors Christopher Miller (Area 2) and Kenneth “Corky” Spitler (Area 5) were elected to the LCMC Board of Trustees. Pastors Nathan Hanson and Stephan Turnbull were appointed to serve on the Ministry Board.

Rev. Mark Vander Tuig announced the launch of the LCMC Prayer Chain, an opportunity for people to sign up to pray for all of the congregations in LCMC on a weekly basis. Click Here to learn more and sign up.

It was also announced that our 15th Annual Gathering will take place from October 4-7, 2015 at the Embassy Suites Hotel and Conference Center in Frisco, TX.

Photo galleries from the Annual Gathering, downloadable copies of our 2014 Book, and presentation notes from our Keynote Speakers are now available at our website. To view any of these materials, Click Here.

Videos of our speakers will not be available until later this winter. We will announce via E-Newsletter, blog, Facebook and Twitter when these videos have been posted.

Lutheran Church of South Sudan's Emergency Plan for Equipping Faithful Leaders

Mon, 16 Jun 14 00:00:00 +0000

I ask that you focus your attention on the immediate short term appeal from Pastor Jordon Long, President of the Lutheran Church of South Sudan (LCSS).

The LCSS is a new church with no walls. Most of its members worship in tents, huts, or open spaces. and they have no educational materials written in their indigenous languages.

On March 14, Pastor Jordon was able to communicate with Eric Swensson and update the current situation for the LCSS. Around the area where Pastor Jordon lived, about 2000 people were killed. It became necessary for him to leave that area. The Christian College where Matthew Riak was at when the violence started had one security guard killed before it was taken over and still remains a military post. Generally, the people of the LCSS have scattered, and are in hiding in the bush or have fled across the border to refugee camps.

Pastor Jordon will be staying in a refugee camp just across the border from South Sudan in Ethiopia. In the midst of all this chaos and despair, Pastor Jordon sees great opportunity to minister to the many desperate people around him in these refugee camps. He says the one thing that would be most helpful to him would be Luther's Small Catechisms translated in their native languages. He knows this would be the most useful tool he could have to bring the Gospel of Jesus Christ to so many people in need of Him.
Think about that!!! Pastor Jordan did not ask for money, food, water, shelter, or safety from harm, but for Luther's Small Catechisms to help him minister to the people around him in the refugee camps.

Currently, the LCSS website lists only four American friends and partners. They are: LCMC, the Augustana District of the LCMC, the Institute for Lutheran Theology (ILT), and the Disciple Ship.

The ILT has been in discussion with the Lutheran Heritage Foundation (LHF), and they currently have the catechisms translated into the proper native language. They are willing to work with us to get them to these refugee camps for Pastor Jordon to use. The books cost only a few dollars each. The LHF has a group going to Ethiopia at the end of April, and can help arrange for these catechisms to get to Pastor Jordon.

So, the timing of this appeal is immediate.

Please consider individually, or as a congregation, donating a few dollars to:

LCSS Catechisms
910 4th Street
Brookings, SD 57006

The North American headquarters of LCSS is at the Institute of Lutheran Theology, so please send any checks to LCSS in care of ILT. 100% of your donation will go to the catechisms.

If you have any questions, please contact Eric Swensson at (914) 712-5440, or ejswensson@gmail.com. He is also a member of the LCMC Missions Forum and will see any post that appears there.

Thank you, and count your blessings, and at least consider praying for all of God's people in South Sudan.

LCSS Seeks Translated Copies of Luther's Small Catechisms

Tue, 25 Mar 14 00:00:00 +0000

Blessman Ministries Plants First LCMC Congregation in South Africa

Wed, 26 Feb 14 00:00:00 +0000

Later this month, we will be planting the first LCMC Church in all of South Africa. We will be calling Pastor Matt Shields, who is just finishing up his schooling at Luther Seminary.

The church will be in a rural country school house building that has electricity, running water and an outdoor toilet. It is a gathering place for our rural farm area, is the voting polling place, and has a soccer field where nearby farmers gather on Sunday afternoons.

There is no other church of any denomination for several miles, and there are hundreds of farm workers in our area who do not have vehicles, so they have been unable to attend church. This area definitely needs Jesus.

Please pray for us as we walk down this new path. We are in immediate need of chairs, musical equipment, hymnals, a cross, signage and praying for a church bus to bring many more people to church.

For more info:

Website: www.blessmanministries.org
Phone: (515) 343-5920
Email: office@blessmanministries.org

Book Offering for Ethiopian Seminary to Take Place at Annual Gathering

Thu, 16 Aug 12 00:00:00 +0000

"Ambassadors for Christ" is the theme of our 2012 Annual Gathering, and those attending the event are all invited to take part in becoming just that.

The seminary of the Mekane Yesus church in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia is in desperate need of books for their students. To help out, LCMC is welcoming an offering of books from our members at the Annual Gathering to be given to that seminary.

If you have books on any of the topics that pastors, church leaders, and church musicians could use, and you are willing to part with, please bring them along to Denver this October. All kinds of books are welcome: theology, church history, worship, church administration, Lutheran doctrine, Luther’s works, church growth, evangelism, Biblical interpretation, commentaries, and any Biblical resource books, etc.

The offering will take place on Tuesday, October 9, 2012 at 11:30 A.M. during the “International Focus” with Professor Abdi Tadesse from the Mekane Yesus seminary.

We will be taking an offering for shipping costs as well.

This is one of many ways that we can directly partner with the church in Ethiopia.

For additional ideas, Rev. Dr. Gemechis Buba presenting a breakout session on the Ethiopia connection during the Annual Gathering as well.

We hope to see you all there!