August Lift 2009
We are nine months into the 2X3 campaign. Many of you have been praying faithfully with us for increased fruit. How is God answering those prayers?
Remember the story of the Samaritan woman? The opportunity to reach a village was “on the way” – the disciples just needed open eyes to see the open door. As we are praying for increased fruit, God is showing us that the answer to those prayers is often closer than we think.
I’ve been asking God for the opportunity to expand the JV work into three more countries during these next three years. Two weeks ago I spent several days in Dresden, former East Germany, with Joel and Ellen Hopkins. The Hopkins are both Moody Bible Institute grads, and Joel is finishing up a master’s at Wheaton.
Look … at the fields (John 4:36)
We are nine months into the 2X3 campaign. Many of you have been praying faithfully with us for increased fruit. How is God answering those prayers?
Remember the story of the Samaritan woman? The opportunity to reach a village was “on the way” – the disciples just needed open eyes to see the open door. As we are praying for increased fruit, God is showing us that the answer to those prayers is often closer than we think.
I’ve been asking God for the opportunity to expand the JV work into three more countries during these next three years. Two weeks ago I spent several days in Dresden, former East Germany, with Joel and Ellen Hopkins. The Hopkins are both Moody Bible Institute grads, and Joel is finishing up a master’s at Wheaton. They heard about Josiah Venture from their professor (a former classmate of mine), their mentors (a former boss of mine), and a Google search (they wanted to use the name Josiah for curriculum they are writing). It looks like we were sitting at the same well! 
Pray for this fine couple – they would like to be on the field by the end of next year. God is calling more laborers into his harvest!
JV staff have led English camps for 15 years now. With 560 of these events behind us, you might say we know how to lead an evangelistic camp. But this year our team changed the entire direction of the summer program. Recognizing that most of the students entered the camp with very little information about God, they decided to focus on the “big story” of redemption – starting all the way from Adam, through the fall, flood, sacrifices, and then on to Christ. 
The style changed as well, from a “camp talk” format to a simple reading of the Bible stories and then asking and answering questions. This “story of God” is having a huge impact this year and every week I hear numerous testimonies of changed lives. The camps look much the same, but this simple change is bearing great fruit. “On the way” God opened our eyes to a new way of sharing the old message.
Mart Saar has known the gospel of Jesus Christ since he was a small child. Today he leads Koma, the JV national ministry in Estonia. As a team leader, Mart has been challenging his staff to regularly ask God for increased fruit. What Mart didn’t realize is that God wanted to start with him! For years he has not seen much result from personal evangelism, but in the last two months he has led four people to the Lord, including their babysitter, a 65 year old hitchhiker, and a young man named Reiner that he had only known for half an hour. 
In addition to this, by focusing on challenging people to repentance and faith, the fruit of their summer camps has tripled. This is good news in a secular country like Estonia, which is one of the least religious in the entire world!
We believe this is just the beginning of what God wants to do in answer to your prayers. Thank you for joining us in this vision to share the Gospel of Jesus Christ with the next generation in Eastern Europe!
Dave Patty, President, Josiah Venture
