Here is our great news!! Praise God! We are now in the new buildings! Since we came here in 2008, there have been multiple incremental moves from building to building, to keep ahead of the increasing patient load and to provide new services. On Thursday and Friday (January 19th and 20th) we finally made the big move. These new buildings house our hospitalization, urgent care, intensive care, three new operating rooms (badly needed) and a large delivery room (see lower left photo below). In some ways we feel like the children of Israel who have been wandering in the desert and now we are in the “promised land”. =) Still battles ahead but it is so good to be in the new territory!

Thursday (the 19th) we moved the sterilization department (see upper left hand picture) and got it up and running. Friday was a national holiday so as soon as the Doctors had finished rounds we began moving people; first from the recovery and intensive care areas, then from the delivery room. (Those in advanced labor did not have to move!)

When that had finished, we then moved the other inpatients over to their new quarters. We had administration, clean-up crew, nurses, the MK school kids and visiting team members all lending a hand. What a great event! By noon, much of the work was finished and we all grabbed sandwiches and salad together. By the late afternoon all the beds were cleaned and installed.

There were a few modifications made on the fly, but all it all the move went very well.  The staff seems very happy with the new buildings and quite proud of them.  Thank you for such a long period of prayer and giving that has culminated in this happy day …and new stage of progress in the work and ministry of the hospital.

PRAYER NEEDS:

We told you there was also some BAD news.  This is not concerning the hospital, BUT it concerns this country we live in, MALI.  There are rebel bands (who were mercenaries  in Libya fighting for Kahdafi) who have returned to the Northern part of this country with their weapons and want to take that region, and forming their own country.  They are reckless and well armed and have  attacked  the government military in at least 5 towns and taken some of them.   Malians are seriously concerned.   There have been demonstrations in various areas of the country demanding that the president act firmly against them and equip  his troops with better arms.   There have also been attacks on those of this ethnic group who live in other areas of Mali.  Please pray with us for the disarming of these rebels,  for a speedy end to this fighting and that the country would return to peace.  Pray.

Outreach: Teams are coming from the U.S. to help with a medical /evangelistic ministry to two villages!   These villages have had very little exposure to the Gospel.  Pray!  Your prayers are powerful.  These will be happening between February 27^th and March 5^th.

Baba, the boy who had severe facial disfigurement has had his surgery and is improved but part of the skin graft didn’t take and they will be doing another surgery.  Please pray for him, the surgeon, and for miraculous healing to his face.

“The Super Bowl is the most-watched program on TV every year. But many people don’t know about its dark underside: the Super Bowl, like other large sporting events, is a magnet for sex trafficking and child prostitution. It is possibly the largest sex trafficking event in the US. As more than 100,000 football fans descend on Indianapolis, sex traffickers and pimps will also arrive in droves to take advantage of the demand.”

To read the rest of this incredible article by Justin Holcomb (Pastor at Mars Hill Church and Executive Director of the Resurgence) please click here!

More than 75,000 church leaders trust BuildingChurchLeaders.com to keep them equipped, effective, and energized.

You’ll find more than 250 free articles on the site, helping you and your team stay informed of topics that affect the church. Church leaders like you, who have found help or inspiration and want to share it, write these articles. The site also features some of the most influential and respected church leaders today, such as Bill Hybels and Jack Hayford, as well as the trusted editors of Leadership journal.

What else can I get for free?

There are many resources that nonmembers can use to investigate the training tools and formats on BuildingChurchLeaders.com before deciding to order or join. They include:

• One of each of the 14 types of training tools offered on BuildingChurchLeaders.com on their free page.
• Interactive assessments – Help your leaders determine how they are doing and in what areas they still need to grow with these online tools.
• Hundreds of articles – Written by church leaders, for church leaders. Also find book excerpts and handy lists.
• Multimedia articles – These interactive articles not only provide text, but audio clips, videos, and/or practical, downloadable forms.
• Video and audio clips – These media clips are taken from various sources, including the multimedia articles, and can be streamed straight from BuildingChurchLeaders.com. Some are also available for purchase.
• Devotions – Use these with your leaders during retreats or meetings, or just before or after services.
• Recommended Resources – Lists of books, magazines, websites, and more to enhance your training experiences.
• Blog – Read the musings of top leaders and Christian editors on topics as varied as church conflict, stewardship, and pop culture on their blog named, “Off the Agenda: Conversations for Building Church Leaders.”
• Ask the Experts – In this interactive area, you will read what a panel of influential Christian minds, including Stuart Briscoe, Wayne Cordiero, Leith Anderson and others, think about some of the issues facing church leaders today.

Explore all of this content, and more, by visiting www.buildingchurchleaders.com!

Love In Action International is a Christian discipleship ministry that exists to restore those trapped in sexual and relational sin through the power of Jesus Christ. Through individual biblical counseling, support groups, custom Intensive programs, and Distance Counseling (Restoration Path), they seek to empower men and women to embrace their identity in Christ, posture themselves to receive God’s healing in their deep areas of emotional wounding, learn to meet their relational needs met in healthy ways, and make good choices that harmonize with their deeply felt moral convictions.

Love in Action is passionately committed to helping people discover the truth about God and about who they really are in his son Jesus. In the safety and strength of God’s love men and women of all ages have found the courage to step out of destructive and life-dominating patterns of sexual and relational sin.

While Love in Action is based in Tennessee, they offer distance counseling programs (communicating via the internet) that are accessible to anyone. To see what programs they have to offer, click here!

_{All information taken from http://www.loveinaction.org/aboutus}

“Over the past several years churches faced warnings and possible legal action if they hosted bowl parties. Thanks to concessions by NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell, the NFL will not block religious organizations from hosting Super Bowl® viewing parties.” However, there are distinct rules that go along with hosting these parties at your church. For example, you are only allowed to host these parties on property that the church owns. If you are renting a building, public viewing is prohibited.

CopyrightSolver.com recently released a very informative article about these regulations. They were able to speak with a representative of the National Football League, asking specific questions about how to avoid committing copyright violations.

You can read this article online by visiting: www.copyrightsolver.com/articles/superbowl

_{All quotes taken from http://www.copyrightsolver.com/articles/superbowl}

_{Special thanks to Brian Gowing for submitting this article!}

David C Cook is a nonprofit organization dedicated to publishing and distributing leadership and discipleship resources to help Christians all over the world grow in their faith and pass it on to the next generation. They call this “DiscipleShaping“. They were established in 1875 by David Caleb Cook in Chicago, IL. Since that time, they have published numerous bestselling books from The Picture Bible to Crazy Love by Francis Chan, developed over ten lines of Sunday school curriculum, and published many of today’s most popular praise and worship songs through our music division, Kingsway.

As a ministry, they do more than just publish and distribute Christian resources. They partner with indigenous organizations to equip Pastors, Lay Leaders, and Sunday School Teachers with their materials in places like India, China, and Cuba. In some places (underdeveloped countries), they make them available at no charge. In others, (developing countries), they subsidize the cost to make them more affordable.

You are probably familiar with a Hybrid Car. This car runs off two sources of fuel: gasoline and electricity. For David C Cook the surplus that is made from selling resources in places like North America, Western Europe, Australia, and more, is the gas. That surplus is used to cover all overhead, marketing, fundraising, and administrative costs. When the electrical component kicks in they use donations from passionate people like you—combined with the surplus they have—to deliver life-transforming materials throughout developing and underdeveloped countries where people do not have access to or money to buy materials. When you donate to David C Cook, 100% of your investment is going directly to deliver a discipleship resource to somebody in need. NONE of it goes to a salary, a building, marketing, or administration.

To learn more about their international programs, go to DavidCCook.com/globalmission.

Dave is a ministry of regular people, like you, with a passion to transform lives around the world.

Visit them by going to www.davidccook.com!

 
_{All information taken from http://www.davidccook.com/}

Happy New Year! Grandfather Frost (Santa Claus) comes on New Year’s, and the blinking lights and decorated trees are called New Year’s decorations, so New Year’s Day is really the festive holiday around here. We as a family celebrated Christmas in quiet fashion on December 25, saw some teammates the next day, and then together put together some gift bags with treats and toys for the children who come to the church’s “soup kitchen” ministry.

We have plunged into the work here. Rob has now preached 10 times in the surrounding towns and also continues to visit believers and interested people in an eastern town with a national pastor and local evangelist. Lisa teaches Sunday School at the church, which is proving helpful to new visitors and attractive to unchurched families. On two occasions, Rob has taken two local believers and gone handing out New Testaments and making contacts among interested people in a few smaller towns. All of this is prior to starting English classes or Alpha course meetings!

Lisa continues to do the bulk of the work in homeschooling Johnny and Lydia. They are making progress in all of their subjects. Life for all three of them is certainly quite different from last year, when the kids studied at an international school! There are challenges, but on the whole, it’s working well. Please keep praying for both the kids and Lisa in regard to homeschooling.

We want to again offer a big “THANK YOU” to everyone who helped raise funds for a mission vehicle for us. We have already put the car to good use! Because it’s a small mini-van, it has been perfect for transporting both people and mall amounts of cargo. As it has 7 seats, it’s proved useful for bringing people to and from church. Its cargo space has held such diverse items as New Testaments, a large container of goat cheese, a computer desk for us, and stacks of bathroom tile. Also from the funds you helped us raise, we purchased some winter tires—and not a moment too soon, as this has been one of the coldest and snowiest winters people in the area can remember! Your investment has already gone a long way—thank you!

Praises

We are thankful for God’s hand of protection on blessing on us as none of us has been sick at all this fall or winter.

We are again thankful for the mission vehicle you helped us raise the funds for. It has been an invaluable ministry tool, and helpful personally as well.

We are also thankful for having two years of language study prior to doing the work we are doing. Without it, it would be very difficult to really teach or converse about spiritual things.

Please Pray

The children continue to express some sadness and frustration about leaving Skopje. Please pray for God’s shepherding touch on them and all of us as we change our day-to-day routines and tasks, build new ministry connections, and adjust to a new town

.Please pray for plans to offer English classes and Alpha course programs. Please pray that God would draw people hungry for the Truth to both programs!

_{“He who follows me shall not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.” (John 8:12, NKJV)}