February 1, 2022
Dear FFICM Prayer Partners,
This week Jerel shared with us from Paul Tripp’s New Morning Mercies.
As we talked about the story of David and Goliath Jerel reminded us that if you’re God’s child it’s no more you against the world than it was David against Goliath. God is with you. God is present. David conquered Goliath with 5 little stones. He walked into the valley because his identity was clear and he knew what God had given him. David taught us that “I must decrease so that God can increase.” God will pave the way. Be reassured today in where your identity is. God is with you, taking care of the big and the small.
New highlights from prayer updates (noted in blue below):
- Pray for the FFICM Nigeria team as they are in the middle of several new believer follow-up trainings this week.
- Prayer: Vehicle search – Keep praying! We continue to look for a vehicle for the team to use in Ethiopia.
- Praise/Pray: Church status- We are still waiting for a response from the IRS.
- Pray for Rich and Jerel as they prepare to travel around the midwest and east coast to share about FFICM February 2-14, 2022.
Nigeria:
Nigeria Program Updates
- Pray for Peter, Ahmed and Pankyes as they are doing a new believer follow-up training this week in Bambur, Nigeria at the UMCN Seminary. They are expecting about 150 to attend.
- Pray for Prisca, Sam, Ishaku doing new believer follow-up training near Jos, Nigeria this week. They are expecting about 100 to attend the training.
- Pray for HBB (Hausa Background Believers) Conference preparations. Preparations continue to come together for the upcoming conference planned for mid-March.
- Pray for preparations for the HBB conference where we expect over 2,000 attendees in March.
- Please pray for traveling mercies as this is a dangerous area to be driving through with frequent kidnappers and bandits.
- Pray that they will be able to contact all of the right people.
- Pray also for wisdom in establishing the budget that is needed to be able to make this event happen. We are excited to see more and more funds coming from sources in Nigeria.
Prayer for the Nigeria Ministry Team
- Peter Wash, FFICM Nigeria National Director
- Doctoral studies work — Peter is continuing to work on his Doctorate in Global Evangelism. Pray for wisdom as he divides his time between work at the office, going out and helping with training events, doing school assignments, as well as personal and family responsibilities. Pray for wisdom in allocating time to his studies in the midst of his busy ministry and leadership schedule.
- Samuel Chungwom, Trainer
- Praise: Samuel’s wife Jessica is expecting a baby on February 11th and has been experiencing some complications. Please pray that God will continue to uphold her and for a safe delivery.
- Pray that the baby won’t come this week while Sam is helping with the FFICM new believer follow-up training.
- Yusuf:
- Please continue to pray for Yusuf, former FFICM staff member who has been questioning his faith. Yusuf was doing follow-up with new believers from a Muslim background and training others to do the same. Yusuf has been going through a difficult time of persecution and this has caused him to question his faith and relationship with Jesus. Pray that God would draw him back and whatever is pulling his heart away from God would be made powerless.
- Rich met with Yusuf by phone on Friday this past week for several hours and prayed with him. Yusuf is struggling to trust people in the church as he has had negative experiences lately with many of them. Pray that trust can be rebuilt and that Yusuf would turn to God for strength and wisdom rather than try to run from God when trials and struggles come his way.
- Mercy, Nigeria Office
- Praise: Birthday is February 3. Pray for God to be with her in this coming year. Praise God for 36 years.
- Rick Cordell, Adjunct Trainer from US
- Rick is currently in Nigeria and plans to be there until early June helping with new believer follow-up training. He had some challenges with getting his approval to travel with all the COVID regulations, but we praise God, at the last minute he got all the paperwork and was able to travel as planned.
Muslim Outreach Ministry
- Pray: TV and Radio Ministry — We continue to broadcast the TV and radio episodes that have been recorded to share about what it means to have a personal relationship with Jesus, and are specifically made for people coming to Christ from a Muslim background. Continue to pray for the impact of these recordings, and for the FFICM staff as they work to follow-up those who are coming to Christ. The FFICM-Nigeria team is meeting in-person with these converts to support them in their new faith.
Safety amidst Dangerous Violence:
- Pray: Safety while Traveling — Ongoing security issues make it difficult to travel and do ministry. You never know which road will be closed or where the bandits will be. There are very frequent attacks and insecurity in the land and kidnappings are reported daily. Please pray for safety for the trainers.
Ethiopia:
Program Updates
- Prayer: Vehicle search – Keep praying! We continue to look for a vehicle for the team to use in Ethiopia. The Ethiopian government is looking at stopping the import of used vehicles in the country, which would squeeze an already very tight market. We might be able to purchase a vehicle from another department at the EKHC church denomination, our main partner denomination there. Pray for wisdom and God’s provision. It has been over a year now that we have been looking for a suitable car to purchase there. We have had many vehicles that we almost purchased, but the purchase didn’t go through for one reason or another. If you want to donate to the fund for this vehicle purchase, you can do this at: https://fficm.org/ethiopiavehicle
- Praise for Eskinder’s safe trip to Durame, Ethiopia this past Friday. Pray for the ongoing preparations for the new believer follow-up training and the large conference in that area where 8,000 are expected to attend as they call people back to the true gospel message as many have turned away recently to the message of the prosperity gospel and other false teachings.
United States:
Ongoing:
- Pray that our team will be able to get visas for Nigeria and Cameroon. We are planning a ministry trip to Nigeria, Cameroon, Ethiopia and Kenya in March/April 2022 and we have several people on our team who are needing visas to be able to participate in that trip.
- Pray for negative covid results as our team travels. We will need a negative test each time we get on a plane on our Spring tour through Africa.
- Pray for Rich and Jerel as they prepare to take a midwest and East coast tour to share with churches and individuals about FFICM and the many exciting things we have planned for 2022. Snow is impacting their route, pray for safety for their drive from Tennessee to Pennsylvania, and all travel involved. Pray for safety and smooth travels. They will be fundraising and friendraising! They plan to depart Portland on Wednesday February 2 and will return on Monday February 14.
Ministry Partners
- Carly Powne, US Based International Trainer — www.fficm.org/carly-powne
- Continue to pray for Carly to be at 100% monthly support by the end of February 2022 — We pray that God will continue to bring a full team of prayer and financial partners for Carly before the end of December so she can focus fully on her role as an International Trainer with FFICM. Praise God for those who have already signed up to be part of her prayer and financial support team. Praise God for the new monthly donor that just committed this past weekend! She is currently at 60% of her needed monthly support.
- Pray for wisdom: As we look at what Carly will be able to take on in 2022, a lot of that is tied to how much time she will need to devote to ongoing fundraising. We currently have her scheduled to help with 2 training trips overseas of about four weeks each. Once she gets up to full support we can look at increasing that to 4-6 trips per year.
- David Moore, Director of Operations
- Continue to pray for wisdom in parenting. Pray for spiritual protection of his children and for good ability to communicate as a family. Pray especially for his son Andrew (aka: Benjamin) who has been having a hard time making wise choices. Andrew came back from San Diego this past Saturday after being there for several weeks with his aunt and uncle. The family is trying to figure out the best next steps.
- Pray for his continued progress on David’s MA in Nonprofit Management. David is in his last class, and then has two months to write the final action research paper.
- Pray for his wife Denise who is pregnant and due in May 2022. She continues to feel a lot of discomfort during the pregnancy. In preparation for the baby’s arrival, they are working on adding a second bathroom to their house. Pray for wisdom, finances and all that is needed will come together in the coming months.
- Pray for the bathroom addition project that David has been working on during the weekends in preparation for the arrival of the new baby. This coming weekend they will be taking out the chimney!
- Rich Gardner, President
- Rich’s daughter, Dara Searcy-Gardner, continues to struggle with debilitating asthma. With the failure of the first medication, she’s needed to try a new medicine; however, the insurance is refusing to pay for it. Pray that the insurance company would change their response so Dara could receive the treatment she needs. She’s unable to work and barely able to function. She is asking us to pray that the medication would conquer the asthma. We pray for complete healing.
- Jerel Skeith, Director of Strategic Relationships
- Praise for healing! Jerel has recovered from Covid!
- Praise: 2021 Impact Report and year-end giving summaries have been mailed out! Let us know if you don’t get yours in the mail.
- Rick Cordell, Adjunct International Trainer
- Pray: Rick is currently on his way to Nigeria. He will be there for 4 months.
- Pray: For patience as he waits on finalized training schedules.
- Praise for donations and support coming through that are helping to pay for his last trip as well as future trips.
Strategic Development
- Praise/Pray: Church status — FFICM has applied for church status here in the US. The application is complete and has been submitted! Pray for wisdom for the IRS as they consider our application. Most large mission organizations have applied for and been granted church status in the US. This would allow us to be able to have all of our staff receive the ministerial housing allowance and would have other tax and financial benefits for us as an organization. We are still waiting for a response from the IRS. Keep praying about this…
- Pray: International Director of Prayer — We are praying that God will provide a volunteer International Director of Prayer for FFICM. We would love to have someone to take charge and develop this crucial area of ministry even more. Pray that God would raise the right person up for the job.
- Pray for Rich and Jerel as they prepare to travel around the midwest and east coast to share about FFICM February 2-14, 2022.
Abba,
Into your hands I entrust my body, mind, and spirit and this entire day–morning, afternoon, evening, and night. Whatever you want of me, I want of me, falling into you and trusting in you in the midst of my life. Into your heart I entrust my heart, feeble, distracted, insecure, uncertain. Abba, unto you I abandon myself in Jesus our Lord.
Amen.
Brennan Manning, Ruthless Trust
