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| | Donna Jackson, Ministerial Spouse leader of the North American Division |
From the pen
of Donna Jackson...
Hi Friends,
Spring is my favorite season and mission trips are one of my favorite ways to spend spring time! So this issue of Fresh Strength focuses on our two NAD April ministerial spouse fun mission trips to Flint and Los Angeles. Check out the reports and stories from the videos and articles featured below and pick out the 'divine appointments' in this issue - such as with 10 year old Mekhi, Brenda Kis, Cynthia Nguyen's family, pk Dr. Fiona Silvo, and Steve Lewis. Then why not share your 'divine appointments' with us all by sending in a short video or article to me at [email protected]? We'd love to hear how God is working in your life!
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To Flint with Love Project
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| | Donna Jackson, Ministerial Spouse leader of the North American Division
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Compassion Projects Report
By Donna Jackson
If you would like to contribute to the August Flint Children's Health Expo, send your tax deductible donation to Fairhaven Seventh-day Adventist Church at G-1379 Louis Ave., Flint, MI 48505 and be sure to indicate that it is for the Children's Health Expo.
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| | Brenda Bond Kis,
Ministerial Spouse |
My Michigan Mission
By Brenda Kis
The date is Sunday, April 17. I am across the state in the city of Flint on an unknown mission. Well, not fully unknown, but I'd never distributed water before. In fact, I'd never really thought much about the importance of water in my own life. I drink it, cook with it, bathe in it among other things. Yet here I was in an area of the United States where people had to stop drinking, cooking, and bathing with what came out of their lead-contaminated faucets!
Barbara Livesay and I joined ministerial spouses from other conferences to assist two Seventh-day Adventist churches of Flint, churches who have an ongoing ministry of water distribution that will probably last another year at least while the phosphates build up in the pipes and water until it is safe to use. Donna Jackson of the NAD Ministerial Spouses Department encouraged us all to minister to the people we met as we fanned out along the streets, sharing cases of bottled drinking water and packages of baby & adult wipes for bathing. Read More
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PATHWAYS LANGUAGE GROUP PROJECT
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Translators Gather for Rally
Translators representing Southern California Conference churches preaching in more than a dozen languages gathered at the El Monte Vietnamese Mission Center on March 13. The group came together for a rally and translation information session for the Pathway to Health mega clinic scheduled in Los Angeles at the end of April.
The NAD Ministerial Department invited Pastor Vinh and Cynthia Nguyen, El Monte Vietnamese church, to play the leading role in visioning and pulling together the various language-group leaders to explore how their people could best be reached. Pastor Vinh worked with a team of Vietnamese young adults to assemble translators for the various languages to serve patients at the mega clinic.
The NAD Ministerial team and the Immigration Ministries Refugee Committee, Pathway to Health and SCC helped with funding for the language initiative. James G. Lee, Jr., vice president, and Betty Cooney, SCC Communication director, worked with pastors and others from several language churches to translate the flyer for their various communities and to plan advertising. Read More
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Translators Give Some a Voice
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| | Your Best Pathway to Health volunteers register in the Los Angeles Convention Center. Photo by Tanya Musgrave |
It's Tuesday afternoon at the Los Angeles Convention Center (Calif.). More than 4000 volunteers, including health professionals and other service-minded Adventists, are streaming in to get registration packets and assignments for the April 27-29 mega-clinic known as Your Best Pathway to Health LA. Tables and medical equipment are being set up in preparation for the 10,000-plus crowd of area residents expected to receive free medical treatment. Before the sun rises tomorrow, lines of people are expected to form outside the convention center for the 7 a.m. start of the free clinic. And many will be able to communicate with the volunteer medical personnel in their own language. In a first for the Adventist Church in North America (NAD), translation service will be provided at the mega-clinic for 14 different language groups (see list below) largely from immigrant and refugee populations. Read More
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Pathways to Health Translators
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Cuong Diep has had a cyst on his forehead his entire life. He could never afford to have it removed, but today, that's going to change. Watch the video here.
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Impacted Lives of a Ministerial Family
By Cynthia Nguyen
I really felt blessed to be able to volunteer as a ministerial family at Your Best Pathway to Health in Los Angeles. My husband and I have always wanted to do ministry as a family. We desire to instill the passion for helping others in our children. Each one of us, my pastoral husband, me, as a ministerial spouse, and my boys as "PKs" were able to participate in various ways, yet we worked as a team. We specifically were able to work with various language and immigrant/refugee groups.
Seeing my boys excited to reach out and care for others at Pathway to Health was invaluable. Seeing patients being able to smile, being a part in relieving their pain, sharing a prayer with patients, and hearing their stories was life-changing to us us. As volunteers, we probably were more blessed than even the patients! Take a look at a snapshot of my boys' experiences at Pathways to Health here:
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Hello, My Name Is ...
By Becky Weigley
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Becky Weigley leads the Ministerial Spouses group for the Columbia Union Conference_ in Columbia_ Maryland.
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Be honest. How many times have you been identified as an extension of your husband? Don't get me wrong, I love being "Dave's Wife"---and have loved it for the past 38+ years (well, most of the time J). But sometimes I would just like to be known as "Becky." Becky, the one who would love to tell you about her grandchildren (yes, all 5 of them!). The one who loves walking her dogs, playing tennis, being creative, and spending time in her "quiet room" when she is home. The one who loves to work on crafts and all types of projects; and can communicate one-on-one, but feels way out of her comfort zone when put in front of a crowd. Read More
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A Passion Burns
By Donna Jackson
Last month while catching up on their lives in Los Angeles at the Pathways event, I saw and heard the vibrant passion in Fiona for ministering to people, so I asked her and her parents when they thought this passion began. Fiona immediately replied that she was convinced that Jesus would soon return and that fueled her passion. Her dad thoughtfully and almost reverently reflected on a mission trip that he took her on to Bulgaria when she was a teenager and that while he was preaching about Jesus' soon coming she was deeply impressed. Fiona smiled and nodded.
Since then, it's as though she has no time to waste - there are so many people with which to share God's love. "Whether they be dis-enfranchised homeless people or high profile medical people that I rub shoulders with on frequent mission trips with various organizations to various continents - they all need to know about Jesus love for them and His plan to rescue them."
Fiona is presently the Medical Director of Urogynecology at Houston Methodist Willowbrook of Houston Methodist Urogynecology Associates in Houston Texas. In her spare time, she plans surgical activities and medical acquisitions for Your Best Pathways to Health events and travels with world-wide medical organizations providing training in her areas of expertise. Watch this 1.5 minute video of Fiona and let me know if you see and hear the passion of Jesus beating in her soul.
Fiona M. Lindo, MD, MPH, FACOG, is a pastor's daughter from Toronto, Ontario who 'caught' the love and passion for God from her parents, Pastor Sil and Gloria Lindo.
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A Different World: My Journey
By Steve Lewis
 "Steve, you need to be the new Sabbath School teacher. I just cannot take another Sabbath school like the last one! " My wife, Karen, in her bold Viking manner expressed strong feelings. Thankfully, two of Karen's best friends were visiting and supported my point of view which recognized that this would cause World War 3 in that church. I am a retired CPA and formerly worked for the US Customs Service as a supervisor. We audited companies that imported into the United States. Our purpose was primarily to recover monies due the government but also to look for white collar fraud such as money laundering. We would audit a variety of companies, most were Fortune 500 size (since importations into the United States is so significant, think NAFTA). When we found a company that owed the government millions of dollars, they would not just cut a check but would hire a law or CPA firm to do battle sometimes involving the court system. Read More
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