- Area Board Meeting September 22, 2007
- World Hospice and Palliative Care Day October 6, 2007
- Gospel in the Garden, Brookfield
- Phil and Pam Morgan, Lexington
- Bible Trivia Night hosted by Oakland Christian Church
October 27, 2008
- QVR Training with Carl Crabtree
- Sessions 2008 for Disciples Men
- Crop Walk to overcome Poverty
- Women's Spring Assembly Date - April 19, 2008
- Update from Carla Giger in South Africa
- Workshop Offered October 27, 2007
- Everything Must Change Tour
- Week of Compassion Update
*********************************
AREA BOARD MEETING
We need to hear from you by Wednesday, September 19, as to
how many are attending the Area Board Meeting September 22, 2007
to plan for lunch. Please call or e-mail the area office
(816)632-2237 OR nwareacc@nwareacc.org with
your reservation.
*********************************
WORLD HOSPICE AND PALLIATIVE CARE DAY
Comfort Care Hospice is presenting a workshop on October 6th.
This is World Hospice and Palliative Care Day. "Building and
Retaining Memories" is a free workshop and is going to be held
on Saturday October 6th from 10:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m. at Little
Blessings in Cameron. The focus of the workshop is "Remembering
the Ones We Have Loved" and will include various activities such
as a Memorial Tree, Saving Memories by Scrapbooking and
Quilting, and Home and Garden Memorials. If you have any one
interested in this we would love to see them there, we do ask
that everyone R.S.V.P.'s to 816.632.4411 or 888.925.6300 by
October 1st. Thank you for you interest in our program, Kiley
Sandgren
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GOSPEL IN THE GARDEN
The Brookfield Christian Church invites all to come share in
their Gospel in the Garden on September 29, 2007 from 6:00 –
8:00 p.m. A free will donation for 4th Quarter
for Jesus will be taken. Bring your lawn chairs and join
in this special evening. In case of rain will be moved
inside. For further information contact the Brookfield
First Christian Church (660)258-2253 or fccbrookfielddisciples@cebridge.net
*********************************
LEXINGTON FIRST CHRISTIAN CHURCH
PRESENTS PHIL AND PAM MORGAN
Lexington First Christian Church would like to invite all to
come to a full concert presented by Phil and Pam Morgan on
October 14, 2007 at 7:00 p.m. Come and hear this exciting
couple. For further information contact the Lexington
church (660)259-3324 or fcclexington@earthlink.net.
*********************************
BIBLE TRIVIA NIGHT HOSTED BY OAKLAND CC
The Oakland Christian Church will be hosting a
Bible Trivia Night on Oct. 27 at 6:00. Any church is
welcome to come. All that you need to do to attend is
bring a 5 member team and some food for the Hale Food Pantry.
There will be 15 rounds of 10 questions each that each team will
answer. The team with the most correct points will
$50 given to the charity of their choice.
*********************************
OUT OF THE DARKNESS PRESENTS
QVR TRAINING WITH CARL CRABTREE
The support group that Scott Killgore, pastor of Wyatt Park
Christian Church, facilitates for people who have lost a loved
one to suicide - Out of the Darkness - is bringing Carl Crabtree
back to St. Joseph for another session of QPR Training. A Word
document of the flier that will be sent to area school
counselors and churches is attached. It's free, with the costs
being covered by Out of the Darkness.
Thanks!
Scott
*********************************
Disciples Men: Sessions 2008
We encourage you to print and to forward the attached flyer
announcing Sessions 2008, a gathering of Disciples Men from
around the country. This year we are arranging bus
transportation and putting together a song-leading group for the
event. We have space for only 50, so, sign up early!
Spouses and adult children/grandchildren: A Sessions 2008
registration is an excellent Christmas gift he'll appreciate for
years to come. Instead of socks, why not make an
investment in his relationship with Jesus?
*********************************
CROP Walk to Overcome Poverty:
October 21@1:00 pm at the Riverwalk in St.
Joseph
I never did believe that my walking would reduce anyone's
poverty. All these efforts bear fruit but they do not, by
themselves, change the world. What these walks can do,
however, is to provide a context in which I can change. I
may not know how to eliminate poverty, but I know the One who
can. I may not possess wisdom or passion sufficient to
dedicate my life to eliminating poverty for all but I know how
to walk. Especially early in my journey to become a
disciple of Jesus, it was walks like this that brought me into
contact and conversation with hard-core Christ-followers, people
who let the gospel own them in ways that made their parts of the
world forever different. Because we walked, we talked.
My youthful passion was blessed by exposure to seasoned wisdom
from transformed lives. My sense of guilt about my
participation in poverty's prevalence was lifted by ambling with
people in a variety of ages and stages who also wanted to be led
by Christ. On October 21, Nate and I will be singing with
Voices of America , so I cannot walk with you this year. I
do hope that some of you will take this or another opportunity
to simply walk and talk with people who want to follow Jesus
into the community, determined that one day every person will
have what they need to serve and to lead with us. BR-H
*********************************
DATE FOR WOMEN'S SPRING ASSEMBLY
Spring Assembly will be held in Odessa this
year on Saturday, April 19. Plan now to attend and "Dare
to Dream!" together.
*********************************
MAKING QUILTS
The Brunswick FCCLA is making quilts to be
sent to Walter Reed Military Hospital as their service project.
Beth Warren the pastor of the Oakland Christian Church is their
Advisor. Each wounded service person who enters Walter
Reed Military Hospital rceives a handmade quilt. Quilts
are received from all over the United States. The FCCLA's
goal is to send 75 quilts for the soldiers this school year.
The students became interested in this project when a serviceman
from Brunswick was wounded and sent to Walter Reed. They
wanted to help people like Pat. Pat Scrogin the man from
Brunswick will be speaking at the Veterans Day Assembly at
Brunswick this year. The students are working on a very
special quilt to be given to him.
Each quilt cost approximately $15 to make and the students are
raising funds to help with this huge undertaking. If you would
like to make a contribution to help with this project you can
send it to Beth Warren, Brunswick FCCLA Advisor, 1008 County
Road, Brunswick, MO 65236. They also can use gifts
of batting, and fabric. As always prayers for the success
of the project and for our service men and women are always
needed.
*********************************
UPDATE FROM CARLA GIGER IN SOUTH AFRICA
Greetings,
Spring/Summer has finally
arrived!! South Africa has seen an unusually hard winter and we
are excited about the days being warmer. It snowed a
measurable amount for the first time since 1982, in Johannesburg
.
As tempted I was to really complain about it, I couldn't help
but think of the thousands of people in Soweto who live in small
tin shacks, and wonder how they were coping. At least, I
have electricity most of the time, and can sit by my space
heater in the evenings. (No houses have central heating.)
Bridgman has been going
extremely well. Although the strike ended, in June, is
still affecting us. The kids went back to school in the
middle of July. Now to make up time, they have extended
their school day to 3 pm (instead of 1:30) and some schools are
also going on Saturday. The high schools students were the
hardest hit, as there is a national exam, that they must pass to
move to the next grade, regardless of how much time they miss
and whether or not the school gets all of the material covered.
Since the strike ended, there has been an increase in people
going on strike.
Some of these strikes have lead to fuel shortages, and have
forced me to find alternate routes to Bridgman to avoid being
caught in the middle of it.
Aftercare has been going well.
We are in our third term. We have made adjustments to the
program each term, and I think we are finally finding a program
that we all are comfortable and are able to more effectively
reach the kids. The kids have been responding well.
Usually I write these updates from home, but I found a bit of
time today to do it at Bridgman, and as I write this, I have
kids around me, wanting to watch me type on the computer.
They are so fascinated, even though they have computer time of
their own.
During the last two months of
GASA we have seen some highs and lows but we are currently at
our highest point of the program. July was very
challenging for us. Several of the girls faced some major
issues in their lives, some of which included: a 14 year old
living all alone had someone try to break into her backroom in
the middle of the night, one girl lost the only surviving adult
in the household, one girl's mother tried to kill her aunt, and
another girl has admitted to using drugs and really wants to
quit, but is fearful of going to school and being around her
friends because she doesn't think she is strong enough to
withstand the peer pressure. One of the GASA members, was
also abducted by a boyfriend on her way to a GASA meeting.
She was held for a few days, and was finally released. She
has since moved out of the Zola area, to a safer place away from
him.
Unfortunately, we lost her from the program as she is too far
to continue coming to meetings.
After such a challenging
month, I have continued to be thankful for a month like August.
In July, we focused on womanhood. At the end, we came up
with an idea that the girls invite one woman who has influence
their life, to do a special thank you. The girls wrote
poems or thank you notes for their guest. I could have
never imagined the way that God was going to use such an event.
In the next meeting after our big event, we sat debriefing about
the impact that it had. One girl invited her mother, and
they had not been speaking for a couple of weeks. Since that day
they are healing their relationship. Sanele (GASA member
who attempted suicide, and mother attempted the next day) also
brought her mother. Sanele told us how her mother tells
everyone she sees now about what her daughter did for her, and
has been showing off the poem that Sanele wrote for her. (I
remember back in February, when I was struggling a lot with
Sanele and her mom, and could not even imagine then how God
would work things out. Thanks for your prayers for them.)
The stories continue, but mostly, this event brought a lot of
trust in broken relationships. Many mother's did not trust
their daughters that they were coming to GASA every week, and
thought that they might be out on the streets hanging out with
boys or their boyfriends.
It is really hard for me to
imagine that I have been here almost a year already. My
contract was extended through the end of September 2008, and I
will continue to be working at Bridgman and with GASA during
that time.
With regards to the BASA program, we are struggling a bit.
Even though there was a lot of interest in the program, most of
the boys, 4 weeks in, joined a rugby club. We decided that
it would be in the best interest of the program, to stop the
training part and have informal meetings until the beginning of
the year, when the boys might be able to make a more serious
commitment.
Prayer Requests for upcoming events:
*At the end of the month I will be moving to a new cottage,
about a mile away. After a break-in in December in the
main house, and an attempted break-in in May, we decided that it
was time that I move out of my cottage.
The new cottage is attached to the house of a couple,
whose children have recently moved out and gotten married.
They seem like a very sweet couple and look forward to getting
to know them better.
*UCCSA General Assembly: I have been asked to do 3
different workshops at the General Assembly on the GASA/BASA
programs. We will be traveling down to the southern coast
of South Africa for the General Assembly, and will be there from
September 19-26.
*I will be taking the GASA girls on a retreat at the end of
October. Please pray for preparations and final planning.
*I am also going to start leading a bible study for high
schoolers at Bridgman on Thursdays. Please pray that God will
draw the group of people He wants to join, and that I might be
sensitive to His direction.
Blessings,
Carla
*********************************
2007 Healthy Communities Summit
Friday, October 26, 8:00-3:30 pm
St. Joseph Civic Arena, St. Joseph , MO
Dr. Ruby Payne, author of A Framework for Understanding
Poverty -- a powerful tool for understanding the effects of
poverty on children and adults, is the keynote speaker at this
summit. For more information contact Deb Powers at 816-271-4185
or 880-447-1083 or deb.powers@heartland-health.com
********************************
Workshop Offered
You are invited to attend a special workshop, October 27,
2007, to be held at First Christian Church, 4th and Pine,
Cameron , MO. Danny Stewart will lead participants in
"Creating a Safe Environment for Churches to Dream and to Grow."
Christian Church Foundation Vice President, Kirby Gould, will
focus on "Funding Miracles Through Long Term Giving.” Churches
grow when their people are well equipped for servant-leadership
in community mission, when their people, practice vibrant
spirituality, and when good stewardship is partnered with good
accounting procedures that fosters trust and the entrustment of
greater gifts. Both Danny and Kirby will share stories of
congregations that have practiced good stewardship with
Kingdom-building and disciple-making results. Both seminars will
be offered twice so all would have the opportunity to share in
both. A light lunch will follow (donation).
The schedule:
9:30 AM - Registration and coffee
10AM to !0:25 AM Setting the stage for Dreaming
10 AM to 10:45 First round of the two seminars
11AM to 11: 45 AM second round of the two seminars
11:45AM to 12:15 PM Dream sessions for Area and for Individual
Churches
12:15 AM Light Lunch and fellowship.
NW Area Pastor, Doyle Farmer, is organizing the event and
registrations will be handled through the NW Area Office:
nwareacc@nwareacc.org or 816-632-2237.
*********************************
Everything Must Change Tour
“Everything Must Change Tour” 2008 with Brian McLaren will be
in the Kansas City Area April 25 and 26, 2008. The early
bird registration rate of $79.00 is good through Sept. 30, 2007.
With the registration get a free copy of the book.
Go to
http://deepshift.org for more information about the
tour and how to register.
*******************
WEEK OF COMPASSION UPDATE
