An encouraging start to 2022

This new year is off to a great start. It's been a very encouraging start of what I'm expecting to be another tremendous year of growth in spreading the Gospel of Jesus Christ, making disciples, and meeting needs of the homeless and poor.

God knows how to encourage us, and that's what He did in the first week of 2022.

Let me start with a young man He directed to Love In Action for the first time. Abdul Karim is originally from the country of Turkey. About two years ago someone in North Carolina told him about Jesus and led him to give his life to Jesus. However, that was it. There wasn't and hasn't been any teaching about what to do next or how to live this life for Jesus.

Bro. Suhail started talking with him and teaching him about Jesus. Suhail told him about baptism and he immediately said he wanted to be baptized. I was in the warehouse at that time, so Suhail brought him to see me. This young man was excited to be learning about Jesus, and when I said let's fill up the baptismal trough and baptize him, he started clapping his hands and saying, "Yes! Yes!"

I told him I wish everyone was as excited as he was about following Jesus in baptism. Suhail and I baptized him. I believe in baptizing as soon as possible, and since he understood and was so excited, there's no way I could put his baptism off. He had gone two years without knowing anything other than he prayed to surrender his life to Jesus.

He is excited about starting discipleship classes and going with us on outreaches to learn how to pray with others and share Jesus with others. Please keep Abdul Karim in your prayers. He is homeless, but he has a car and is excited about getting a job and moving forward in Jesus. And, praise be to God, he was hired for a new job yesterday.

One More Soul came to Jesus and was baptized yesterday (Tuesday, Jan. 11) at Love In Action. Praise Jesus! After he prayed to surrender his life to Jesus, Bro. Suhail talked to him about baptism. Our new brother, Abdul Karim, encouraged him by saying, “You need to be baptized today!” Abdul Karim is so excited about Jesus. He is telling others about Jesus and says, “I love Him so much.” He even helped in the baptism yesterday.

God is touching hearts and lives are being transformed. This is another reason we are remodeling Suite 1 to turn it into the Love In Action School of Discipleship.

Then on Thursday God encouraged me again with two individuals who are at The Ark. We hold our Samaritan Clinic for the homeless on Thursdays, and on the first Thursday we start with patients from The Ark. These men and women are trying to put their lives back together, and it all starts with a solid foundation built on Jesus Christ. So, to further encourage them, we set a day and time aside for them.

As I walked out of Suite 6 last Thursday, I heard, "Bro. Ken." It was a man I knew from the streets. He had been homeless, and like so many of our homeless friends, he was spinning his wheels trying to do things his way and not taking the time to let Jesus transform his life.

He said, "I've finally made it here." I am so thankful. We encourage our homeless friends to go to The Ark, which is a Christian ministry with a 12-month in-house program. I hugged him and encouraged him to stay with the program and let Jesus do a great work in him."

Then, there was a woman who we knew for the past 3-4 years. She had been in and out of homelessness. We had encouraged her several years ago to apply for The Ark's women's program, but she didn't. Thursday was the first time I had seen her in a long time, and it was so good to see she made the decision to get the help she needed.

Both, the man and the woman, thanked us for all we did for them while they were homeless. They remembered everything, even what we might think are little things. It was a reminder that everything we do matters. Everything we say and do should always bring glory to God and give grace to others.

Goals for 2022

Have you set any goals for 2022? I'm not much on New Year's resolutions. Those are made to be broken. What's the use? Goals, on the other hand, are achievements we strive for ... something we are intentional about, put effort into.

I have set some personal and ministry goals for 2022. One of those is this blog. It's been a while since I've been intentional about writing blog entries. Why is that a goal? It's two-fold. I studied journalism and graduated with a degree in it from Troy State University. I know the "State" isn't in the institution's name any longer, but it's still on my diploma. 

I pursued a career in journalism afterward, and enjoyed a 22-year career in a field where I wrote and edited stories daily. Writing is in my blood. It's also therapeutic. I'm just weird that way.

Secondly, this blog helps further shine the light on what God is doing in and through Love In Action. It can give more insights to the move of God, upcoming events, and needs of the ministry.

Other personal goals include seeking and knowing God more and more throughout the year. To accomplish that I'll be even more intentional in my daily Bible reading. I read God's Word daily, but I desire to study it more. I've read through the Bible a number of times. That's a great thing to do, and I encourage it. But, it's also good to slow down and take your time going through books of the Bible.

My friend Dr. Dave Smith, professor of Bible at Indiana Wesleyan University, presents a challenging way to study the Bible. He encourages and teaches that we should make time to read entire books of the Bible in one reading. Some books are more challenging to read through in one sitting than others. You can try to impress others by telling them you read the entire letter of Jude without taking a break. As long as they don't know Jude is only two pages they'll be impressed.

My goal is to take each book of the New Testament and read them all, one at a time, in one reading. You better understand the context of the Word doing that. Digging deeper and deeper into God's Word is my forever goal. We can never dig too deep.

Other goals are a stronger personal time of prayer, leading more people into a relationship with Jesus and making more disciples who make disciples. In other words, to be even more intentional on living out my Lord's Great Commission (Matthew 28:18-20 and Mark 16:15)

My prayer life is something I really need to be intentional more about. I pray all the time. Often very short prayers throughout the day. The Apostle Paul tell us to pray without ceasing (1 Thess. 5:17). That's having a mindset of prayer throughout each day and praying often. What I need to work on is spending more time in prayer; talking and listening for longer periods of time with my Abba Father. 

You notice my personal goals all deal with spiritual growth. Material things are inconsequential. As my pastor, Ralph Sigler, says, only things that we do for God last for eternity. So, I choose to focus on the eternal. Of course, if Alabama wins another national championship I'll be good with that, too. LOL

Goals for Love In Action include reaching more people locally and around the world with the Gospel of Jesus Christ, and to see more people enter into a life-transforming relationship with Jesus Christ. As they do, I desire for us to make more disciples who can make disciples. That's why we have started the Love In Action School of Discipleship and are currently remodeling suite 1 on our campus to host this school. I'll write more about that in another blog.

I believe God is wanting to further expand our food ministry to meet many more needs. You might not realize it, but there are a lot of people out there who have very little to no food. I'll blog more about the food ministry expansion later.

I also believe God is leading us to do more with video blogs and video testimonies. People engage with videos. That's our culture. Being able to show what God is doing through videos will add another layer on shining the light on what God is doing. I think it encourages people to see and hear life-transforming testimonies. I pray God will use those testimonies to lead people to Jesus. 

We are going to be more intentional about prayer at Love In Action. Within our School of Discipleship will be a prayer room. We will have focused times of prayer, strategic times of prayer. Prayer is too important, and as the family of God, we need to be more focused on praying together.

I'll end this blog entry here. It's already getting long. If you haven't already, I encourage you to sit down and make goals. Pray about them. Make them realistic, but also challenging. With the help of the Holy Spirit, we can do this.

Happy New Year, everyone. May it be a year of knowing Jesus more, sharing our faith with others, and making disciples who can make disciples.

Leadership Lessons from a Pandemic: Family of God is Vital

Continuing to fellowship and serve together throughout the pandemic made a huge difference in our lives and the lives of those we served.

"While He was still speaking to the people, behold, His mother and His brothers stood outside, asking to speak to Him. But He replied to the man who told Him, 'Who is my mother, and who are my brothers?' And stretching out His hand toward His disciples, He said, 'Here are my mother and my brothers! For whoever does the will of my Father in Heaven is my brother and sister and mother.'" - Jesus speaking in Matthew 12:46-50

Like many of you, I've learned a number of lessons this past year. I'm going to share some leadership lessons learned during this pandemic. 

The first lesson confirmed what I already knew, the family of God is vital to our growth and stability as followers of Jesus Christ. It confirmed our family truly is "whoever does the will of my Father in Heaven."

A year ago everything started shutting down, not just in the U.S., but around the world. Economies crashed and churches, schools, businesses, governments ... pretty much everything closed for at least two months; much longer in other parts of our nation and world.

We didn't close Love In Action. I was concerned with the needs of the homeless and the poor during a time of crisis when everything was closed. It meant there would be more needs to meet. I communicated with Dothan Mayor Mark Saliba and he agreed we were essential, so we kept going.

I don't want to focus on that in this blog entry, though. A very important aspect that kept Martha and me strong through the toughest times of the pandemic was keeping our Love In Action Family together. I heard from people who could not fellowship with their church family except through Zoom and other technology. It just wasn't the same for them and they struggled spiritually.

I told our staff and volunteers at the beginning that if they didn't feel safe serving during the pandemic they didn't have to, but Martha and I were going to keep doing what we can to help those in need and share the Gospel.

LIA staff member Pamela Johnson told me, "I'd be disappointed if you closed." Our small staff stayed and so did most volunteers. The elderly in our LIA Family understandably stayed at home, well, except for Robert. If you know Robert, you know there's no keeping him at home.

We gained more volunteers as we kept running toward the pandemic to help people. Our family actually grew during the pandemic. The daily fellowship kept us all strong. Daily serving and sharing the Gospel on the streets and at LIA together strengthened us spiritually. We worshipped together. We continued living life together.

Without our LIA Family being together daily the pandemic would have been much tougher. We all grew more in the Lord and closer to each other. We learned that we don't run from situations, we run to them in the name of Jesus to help those in need and encourage people who are going through the toughest times of their lives.

As a leader, I had to balance our response with safety. We changed how we did things. Instead of gathering everyone inside, we kept everything outside. We still kept our showers open and laundry services available for the homeless. Part of the fight against Covid-19 is good hygiene, so those two parts of the ministry were more important than ever.

We cut our services back to just hot meals at first, and then we continued to helped families and individuals with groceries, hygiene items and clothes. We did so with having very few people in suite 6. We sanitized everything even better than we did prior to the pandemic. Once we understood how serious the Covid-19 pandemic was, I required masks to be worn.

As we all know, the requirement of masks is not popular with everyone, and not everyone in our LIA Family were happy with my decision about masks. But, as the leader of a ministry, you have to seek God and make the decisions you feel He is leading you to make no matter if they are popular or not.

The safety of our volunteers and those we serve was just too important to me. As a leader, if there are tangible ways to keep people safe, then do it. They are family. You want your family safe and healthy.

A number of us have had Covid-19, including Martha and me. However, nobody has caught it at Love In Action. Only one homeless person has had it, and he had not been coming to LIA until the hospital sent him to us. 

However, I would not allow him to exit their van. He still had Covid. I couldn't endanger everyone else. I instructed the van driver where to take him. It was an isolated area where he couldn't unintentionally infect anyone else. We gave him a tent and camping supplies, and provided him food, water and other supplies during his time of isolation. He is healthy and doing good now. We now see him at LIA during the week.

Not neglecting to meet together and encouraging one another daily as God instructs us in Hebrews 10:25, was the key for all of us making it through 2020, and the first quarter of 2021, much easier than if we had been isolated from each other.

As a ministry leader, do your best to keep your family together no matter what's going on. God created His church, the Body of Christ, for a reason. He didn't want us to try to live this life for Him alone. We need each other.

Keep your family safe, while understanding there are risks involved. Jesus told us there would be many risks and challenges. Communicate those risks so your family will know, and so they can better understand your decisions. They all may not agree with you, but they will obey because they love and respect you. They know you are doing what you believe is best for them and the mission.

Thank you LIA Family. Martha and I would never have made it without each of you. We never would have seen 211 decisions for Jesus or distributed over 1 million pounds of food to people in need in 2020 without you. We love you all.

Thank you for putting up with your much less than perfect leader. Thank you for respecting my decisions even when they weren't popular with some of you.

Looking back, I certainly see things I could have done better. But at the same time, I see how God worked through this incredible Family to do amazing things during the toughest times any of us have ever lived through.

I'm sure the people we served will always remember how God showed His love for them and how He kept His promises of never leaving or forsaking them. 

To God be the glory!

Worshiping and serving together kept us strong during the pandemic.

Sharing Jesus, Making Disciples in Dothan

Pictured above is one of our previous T4T discipleship classes. Below, Jameson highlights his Bible during a T4T class. Jameson is one of our T4T discipleship graduates.

We serve countless plates of hot food, bags and boxes of groceries, bags of hygiene items, and clothes every week at our Love In Action campus in Dothan and out on the streets and in impoverished neighborhoods.

Yes, we do it to meet the many physical needs that are in our city and region in accordance to Matthew 25:35-40. The main reason we do all of this, though, is to proclaim the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

Every Tuesday, Thursday and the first three Saturdays of each month we are on our campus praying for and sharing the Gospel one-on-one with the homeless and those living in poverty as we meet their physical needs.

Every Wednesday, Friday and the first three Saturday afternoons we are on the streets, at homeless camps, low-rent motels, and impoverished neighborhoods, trailer parks and apartment complexes praying for people and sharing the Gospel one-on-one and in group settings. The Gospel is preached and shared with the lost and hurting. Those who are already saved are encouraged.

As people come to Jesus we strive to fulfill the our Lord's Great Commission (Matthew 28:18-20) through baptizing new believers and making disciples who can make disciples.

We teach Training for Trainers (T4T) for our discipleship method. It's a very solid discipleship course that is taught throughout the world. We have also taught it in Myanmar, India and Haiti. 

A new T4T discipleship class is currently underway at our Love In Action Campus in Dothan. Please pray as we make disciples who can make more disciples.

Obedient to the Great Commission

Jesus gives us His Great Commission in Matthew 28:18-20. He commands us to "Go and make disciples of all nations." The word "nations" in the Greek is "ethne" meaning people or ethnic groups. 

In Acts 1:8, Jesus says, "But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.”

Therefore, we are to proclaim the Gospel of Jesus Christ and make disciples at home and around the world. Here at Love In Action, we are so thankful and excited for each opportunity to fulfill our Lord's Great Commission.

We thank everyone who has joined us to make disciples who make disciples as our Lord commands us. You help us spread the Gospel of Jesus Christ through acts of compassion, which helps draw people to Jesus. Then, we are able to make disciples who make disciples.

Thank you to everyone who supports us financially. If you haven't been, please prayerfully consider becoming a financial supporter of Love In Action.

Your tax-deductible donation can be mailed to: Love In Action, P.O. Box 85, Dothan, AL 36302. You can also give securely online via PayPal through the donation page on our website by clicking on this link, https://loveinactionministries.com/donate

You can also give via the Venmo app. Our username is: @Loveinaction-InternationalMini and also online at https://venmo.com/Loveinaction-InternationalMini

Love In Action International Ministries, Inc. is a 501(c)3 tax-exempt, non-profit Christian organization. All donations and gifts are tax deductible. Our tax-exempt number is 63-1274627.

Thank you and God bless you.