Baja Christian Ministries Update and Prayer Letter 11/21/09

Dear Prayer Partner,

Our compassionate and awesome God continues to send loving teams to serve in the ripe harvest fields of Baja with us!  We have two teams starting in with us today and two more starting Monday. Before I share about these teams and ask for your prayer coverage for them allow me to share a bit about last weekend. Last weekend the Boy Scout troop # 695 of Irvine, CA, Hope Christian Fellowship of San Gabriel, CA, Malibu Presbyterian Church of Malibu, CA, and Cislo & Thomas of Santa Monica, CA, served with us. In total we had more than 170 people bringing blessing, hope, and the salvation of Jesus to many!  

Malibu Presbyterian and Cislo & Thomas teamed up to build 2 houses and one church building, along with engaging in outreach, children's ministry and evangelism! Malibu Pres has been a long standing partner of ours even before we founded Baja Christian Ministries 18 years ago. We thank God for all the blessing they and their members have brought over the years to the poor in Baja and to this ministry to help keep it sustained. The past weekend this hundred plus team really hit a home run!  BCM's David Angulo produced a gem of a video that captured some of their experience, synced to Newsboys amazing song, "Something Beautiful", from their "Go" album. Enjoy: 

Psalm 40:1-3 states, "I waited patiently for the Lord; And He inclined to me and heard my cry. He also brought me up out of a horrible pit, out of the miry clay and set me feet upon a Rock, and established my steps. He has put a new song in my mouth--Praise to our God; Many will see it and fear, and will put their trust in the Lord."  I love this scripture verse and can very much relate to this testimony and kindness of our great God's salvation...  

BCM staff member, Tony Jacobs, has produced an inspiring video synced to Hannah Ford's powerful song, entitled "Psalm 40". I wanted to share it with you. Again enjoy:

Newsboys Ministering in Outer Space:  Rebekah Brisnick, wife of Randy Brisnick, mission specialist of the Alantis Crew, who is due with their baby any time, arranged with mission control in Houston to wake up the Alantis crew in outer space with Newsboys' beautiful song, "In Wonder", from their "Go" album. Hear a short part of that song and communication from mission control to Randy Brisnick in outer space here: 

http://www.cfnews13.com/MediaPlayer2/MediaPlayer.htm?video=000TPYQxWakeup_111920090858&cat=Space&title=Wakeup:%20Flight%20Day%204

This week we have four teams serving with us starting today...

Mariners Church: A team from Mariners Church of Irvine, CA, led by Gina Hansen and Lyndsey Porter, is building one house and doing outreach in the surrounding community. I wanted to share with you a past Mariner's Baja video produced by Albert Evangelista, and was pleasantly surprised to find it was synced to Newsboys, "In Wonder",  the song I just mentioned in the above report. Whether in outer space, Baja, or elsewhere our great God and His majestic creation is "Full of Wonder"!   Enjoy: 

The Crossing Church team of Costa Mesa, CA, led by Scott and Cyndi Vestal, are roofing a house, doing food and blanket distribution, and evangelism and Bible Purple Book ministry with our evangelism tag team. Please pray that a large harvest of lives would turn to Jesus and start the discipleship process through engaging the Spanish Bible and Purple Book given to them. I will be heading down to join them after sending this letter off.

Home for Home: Pillar Development, owned by the Youngquist family, started a "Home for Home Program". For every home they build in the US, they will build one in Baja for the poor. Well, the Lord has blessed them and they have been spending quite a bit of time in Baja in the last few months. Chad Youngquist and Craig Ronning are leading a team this week to build two more!  If you're on facebook you can read their blog here:

http://www.facebook.com/home.php#/pages/Home-for-Home-Program/135188933194?ref=ts

Building Champions Across the Border: This is a team led by Dean Johnson from Bothel, WA. They are building a house and engaging in outreach and evangelism starting Monday.

Please cover each of these teams and individuals in prayer!  Please pray that God would bless and protect them and their possessions. Pray that God would fill them with the fullness of joy in His Presence, His peace that passes understanding, His love that passes knowledge and that His Unfailing Springs (Isaiah 58:11) would well up in them as they serve the poor (Psalm 41:1-3) in His Name! Thank you for your powerful and effective prayers (James 5:16)!

Teams Serving With BCM from This Weekend Through Mid-December:

Nov 20-22 Gina Hansen & Lindsey Porter, Mariners Church, Irvine, CA 1 home

Nove 21 Scott & Cyndi Vestal, The Crossing, Costa Mesa, CA projects and evangelism

Nov 22-27 Dean Johnson, Building Champions Across The Border, Bothell, WA 1 home 

Nov 26-29 Chad Younguist and Craig Ronning, Pillar Development, Home for Home Program. Ellensburg, WA 2 homes

Dec 5  Doug Ament, Pasquale Russo, Borras Family and Friends, Point Loma, CA 2 homes

Dec 11-13  Dean Monohan, San Clemente Presbyterian Church, CA 2 homes

Dec 11-13  Chris Wade, Daniel Strand, Life Spring Church of Torrance, CA--1 house

Dec 13-15 Taylor Redmond, Cal Poly, San Luis Obispo, Ca 2 homes

Two of these homes listed above are for families who lost their homes through a fire.

Bible/Purple Book Discipleship Ministry: BCM's David Angulo reports that we are very close to reaching the mark of 40,000 people starting the Purple Book Biblical Foundations study course since May of 2007. The gospel is spreading rapidly!  I'll give you a fuller report soon.

In closing, I'd like to say, I love the Thanksgiving and Christmas season!  It's a time that is charged with giving thanks, sharing generously, and bringing cheer!  It's also approaching the year's end. Year End giving is vital to this ministry as it is to most ministries!  Whether large or small please prayerfully consider this ministry in your year end giving. Thank you so much:http://www.bajachristian.org/make-a-year-end-donation-to-bc/

Thank you for your effective and powerful prayers, your generous giving, and your compassionate service. House by house, life by life, we are working along with our King and with others to win the peninsula for Christ!  Thank you for partnering with us in this passionate quest!

Harvesting the ripe fields of Baja together for our King,

Bob Sanders