THANK YOU, for your continued partnership in Phuket Thailand. We are very encouraged to have you covering us in prayer.Nancy and I were glad to see several partners in our recent six-week tour in Canada! Unionville Alliance Church, Southside Community (Milton Alliance) Church RockPointe Alliance Church, and Grand Centre Alliance Church.
NMC Think Tank Strategy GangThe main purpose for our six weeks in Canada was to join the National Ministry
Centre “Think-Tank-Strategy” meetings. This gang is brilliant, insightful, and so strategic when it comes to guiding our strategic plan to reach people for Christ! We are so glad to have these people to follow. We have had four applications for internships beginning this August. We are prayerfully considering two. Please pray for this acceptance process. Along with internships, four students have been accepted into JSEM for September 2024! This is the earliest we have had students apply for the deep dive discipleship semester. Spring Break Mission Trip in NYC! Over spring break 7 students and 4 staff MSU joined three other campuses to participate in urban ministry in NYC. In the mornings we attended trainings, and in the afternoons we went out to different campuses across NYC to share the gospel with students. Our trip also included a prayer walk through Central Park, attending church Sunday morning, visiting time square in the rain, trying LOT’S of great food, and spending a ton of time learning how the Subway works. Our campus split into two groups; one group went to NYU in lower Manhattan and the other went City College in Harlem. My group went to city college, and while I could tell you about the ministry there, I wanted to invite some of our freshman students to share their first experiences of ministry instead!
Spring BreakOver spring break, Clement, a fellow Destino staff member, and I got to take two students, David and Josiah, to the beach to do some beach evangelism. When I look back on my years as a student, I am so thankful that God used Cru to help me incrementally take steps of faith with him. It started with sharing the Gospel with dorm friends, then going to fall retreat for a weekend in a different city, then a summer mission for a whole summer in a different state, and eventually to trusting God to follow him overseas. I want to help my students have similar experiences taking steps of faith. They thought they were going just to share the Gospel, but what they didn’t know was that the Lord was stretching their faith and their vision (sneaky sneaky ). Small beginnings are beautiful. Zechariah 4:10 says, “Do not despise these small beginnings, for the Lord rejoices to see the work begin…” We taught the students a few different ways to start spiritual conversations. I was really hoping to see someone put their trust in Jesus and to get to baptize them, really lots of someones, in the ocean. We met person after person who was not interested to know Jesus. It was getting a little disappointing, even though I know successful evangelism is “taking the initiative in the power of the Holy Spirit and leaving the results up to God”. As we were heading back to the cars, all wrapped up for the day, we met two guys who were walking right by our car at the same time we were getting to it.
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December 28th was a special day for our family! Zachary and Allison were married at First Covenant church in St. Paul, Minneosta. Karl was able to officiate the service. Sue cherished her rolel as the Groom's Mom and Jonathan was a groomsman. All in all a great day. One more highlight, Zach's wedding fell exactly on our 38th anniversary! |
We are grateful for the good care she received and that she was able to attend the wedding!
We attended the Chrismas Eve service in the hospital atrium, lead by a Covenant pastor/chaplain.
His daughter, Erick Clauson is part of the Mexico missionary team.
was the prodigal sons and prodigal father. It was a special time of connecting with God's Word and each other.
Because you give and pray, we can serve in Mexico.
Thank you for your generosity!
God is good, all the time.
Karl and Sue
December & January Ministry Update
A lot has happened in the last couple months, but l’ll do my best to recap: Cru Christmas party, end of semester meetings, Christmas break goodbyes, a trip to Alaska to visit my boyfriends family, a trip home to North Dakota to visit my family, a trip to California for Winter Conference, students coming back, spring launch student dinner, our first weekly meeting, and restarting meetings with the girls I am discipling… did I get it all?
Cru Winter Conference 11 students joined our staff team for the trek down to Orange County for our regional Cru winter conference. While most of our students flew with us, this brave group chose to drive from Bozeman! At Winter Conference we listened to talks from different speakers, saw a dramatic production of the BEMA, did some initiative evangelism on the Long Beach piers, and had lots of sweet time to sit and worship the Lord. |
Pray With Us!
I would like to invite you to join us in praying for God to pour out his Spirit. Someone somewhere made a great map of every campus in the U.S. where you can “adopt” them in prayer. You can find the map here by clicking on this link. If you look at the map, you’ll see the darkest ones have two or more people committed to praying for those campuses. The light gray ones have one person. But the yellow ones have no one — and look at all the yellow ones!!! (Granted, no one who is committed to praying for them and knows about this map — hopefully there are people dedicated to praying for them.) As of right now when I’m writing this (02/06 at 2:39pm), there are 1,599 campuses adopted, yet 2,590 remain!! We’ve got 39% of all the campuses in the U.S. covered for prayer — would you consider joining us?
I would like to invite you to:
- To pray for one of the four campuses Destino is on in San Antonio (listed below),
- Texas A&M San Antonio
- Palo Alto College
- San Antonio College
- Northwest Vista College
- Texas A&M San Antonio
- To pray for one campus you know,
- To pray for one yellow campus you don’t know (from the CDOP map),
- AND invite at least one person to pray with you.
JSEM 2023
STUDENT REVIEW
Let me share a letter we received from a after JSEM 2023 student upon the conclusion of our semester.
Hello from Penang
I just wrapped up JSEM and wanted to share a little about my experience. My last month was amazing. I got to help build a playhouse for a local kid’s cafe as our JSEM service project which was a lot of fun. We had a graduation ceremony at the end of the program where we all gave little speeches about our time in JSEM as a whole. Speaking of which, God has grown me and taught me so much through the 3 months I had in Thailand and I wanted to share some of what I learned with you.
Firstly, God is good and he provides what we need. I experienced this when given the opportunity to attend JSEM in the first place; I needed funds and God answered.
Secondly, the Bible is one big story, not just a compilation of little stories. This JSEM course really opened my eyes to that reality and I now read the bible through a completely new lens. I have also become more disciplined in my bible reading through JSEM; as of now I am following a chronological reading plan of the bible and I have already learned a lot.
Thirdly, God is in control and he has our best interest at heart. Romans 8:28 says, " And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose." This verse has been really encouraging to me as it has helped me acknowledge that hardships and difficulties will ultimately refine me according to God's plan. I can't wait to figure out what exactly that plan looks like.
Fourthly, we are called to live for and serve Christ no matter what context we may find ourselves in. Since I grew up a missionary, I always had this notion that the best way to serve Christ was to move overseas and spread the gospel. While that is still definitely a good thing, JSEM reinforced the idea that we can serve God from wherever. 1st Corinthians 7:17 talks about this concept; "Nevertheless, each person should live as a believer in whatever situation the Lord has assigned to them, just as God has called them. This is the rule I lay down in all the churches''.
Lastly, I was blessed to have an amazing mentor over the 3 months in Phuket. He taught me a lot but something I learned from simply the way he lived was that we are called to live for the glory of God. I got to see practical examples of this from multiple staff members at JSEM and I am so thankful that God used them to pour into my life.
This was an amazing experience and I am so thankful for all your prayers and support. For those wondering what the next few months look like for me, I will be staying in Penang until February before moving back to Canada and working for a few months. I am going to study engineering at Red Deer Polytechnic and the UofA next fall.
Thanks again for everything.
JSEM Student 2023
This letter causes our hearts to rejoice and thank our heavenly Father for the opportunity to serve Envision, Global Ministry and JSEM.
We have received four internship applications and four serious inquiries for JSEM 2024.
| Prayer Points: 1. Pray for our students who attended Summer Missions and that they would continue to find opportunities to share their faith over the holidays. 2. Pray for a rejuvenating holiday time for us. Thank you for your prayers in the lead up to mission as they helped us engage well on mission. Pray that come next year, we can be on our front foot ready for what comes next. 3. Please pray for a producer/director to join our content creation team. We really need a full-time creator to help raise our amount of production. |
Merry Christmas!
Special Opportunity
December 2023
I can’t think of many other years I have experienced God’s transformative power as much personally and in ministry as I have this year. 10 students have put their trust in Jesus and begun a life-changing relationship with him. (One of those new believers, Francisco, is pictured below with me.) David, a student I’ve met with for two years, has grown, changed, and experienced victory over old fears and insecurities. Katherine and Jessica, student leaders at TAMUSA, have grown in confidence as empowered leaders. My friend Alex and I have witnessed God bring student after student at Palo Alto College to us who is hungry for Jesus and hungry to tell others about him. We meet under the same tree and God keeps sending more and more students.
Three faculty members there are teaming up to help launch and guide a Destino movement at PAC. One student, Joey, couldn’t decide if he should lead a Bible study on Tuesday, Wednesday, or Thursday, so he decided to lead one on Tuesday, Wednesday, AND Thursday. Another student, Orion, was reflecting on all the things God is bringing together and said, “This isn’t the end. This is only the beginning!” There is a mighty stirring here in San Antonio. Church leaders and ministry leaders are coming together to seek the Lord’s face in prayer. More and more, we are passionately crying out to God for his Spirit to pour out in our city among our college students. We are trusting that revival will break out here in town that won’t be contained to just San Antonio. We serve an awesome God. We are loved by an awesome God. |
Purpose
HOPE Church supports several missionaries who are spreading the love and hope of Jesus Christ locally, regionally, and all over the world.
Here, you will find newsletters and updates from these HOPE-supported missionaries. They will keep you informed about financial needs, prayer needs, praises and other information from the missionaries.
HOPE Church is an Evangelical Covenant church out of Grand Forks, ND. For more information about HOPE Church, click here.
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