by Brant Holladay, Editor

The journey began April 22, 1991. Dr. James Ray, Dean Watters, Dennis Morris, Vernon Lee, Vester Crutchfield and I boarded a Delta Flight in Atlanta. We flew to Budapest, rented a van, and drove all day to Lugoj, Romania, with a load of 10,000 New Testaments. Over the next few days we felt a part of history in the making. Communism had only recently fallen. Hundreds in the market square excitedly snatched from our hands their first Bibles. I remember suddenly opening my English Bible and reading John 3:16 and preaching the very first message outdoors in the market with my interpreter echoing the sermon in the Romanian tongue. Talk about a thrill. To think that we could proclaim the Gospel in the open where only weeks before Christians had been openly humiliated and jailed for their faith in Christ by the Communist Secret Police.

Twelve years later the journey continues. Over one million New Testaments and Bibles have now been presented mainly to the people of Russia, Romania, and others in Eastern Europe. Last week Maylou and I personally were in France assisting Bob Huffman as his church reaches out to a Paris suburb. Soon we will return to St. Petersburg, Russia, to continue our ministry, and next spring we are making plans to reach way out south of Moscow where BIMI missionaries will lead a major Bible distribution. It will take $20,000 to have these Bibles printed by the time they are needed.

Speaking of reaching out, way, way out, 5,000 BIMI New Testaments were sent to these children in Ulan Ude, in Buryatia and Chita in EASTERN SIBERIA. These Testaments are going out to the ends of the earth!

Your gift to the East European Bible Fund (656) will be your witness to the ends of the earth, too.

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Dan and Beth Canavan, with their triplets Andrew, Caleb and Rebecca, arrived in Ireland September 28, 1999. What did God use to get them to this country for service to Him? While Dan was in the Marine Corps, they were attending Heritage Baptist Church in Woodbridge, Virginia. God used the strong missions emphasis at the church to call Dan and Beth to Ireland. After the Marine Corps, Bible College and deputation, they are full-time for the Lord in the land of Ireland. God is also using them to reach out to some of the Chinese population in their area.


The Community Centre God has provided for the Canavan's church in Sandyford (a southern suburb of Dublin), Ireland.


Triplet Three-part Harmony!

Beth Canavan's Irish Writing Class

For anyone moving to a foreign country, learning that country's culture is important. We knew that our whole family needed to learn the Irish culture. After living in Ireland for just three months, my husband and I decided that taking an evening class would be a good way for me to do so. I have an interest in writing, so I enrolled in a writing class.

The evening of the first class found me as excited as a young school girl. Somewhat afraid of entering a new situation alone yet looking forward to learning, I hoped that taking this class would not only help me learn more of the Irish culture but also make me a more effective servant for Jesus Christ.

Each class began with the teacher reading a sentence and then giving us two minutes to write whatever that sentence brought to mind. One evening she read: "A middle-aged couple moved into the rows." As each of my classmates read what they had written, their responses immediately showed our obvious cultural differences. I had written about a couple finding a seat in an auditorium while the others had written of a couple moving into a new house.

For our major assignment for the term, our teacher recommended that we write a fictional paper on a topic about which we were already quite knowledgeable. I wrote of the pregnancy and birth of triplets (since I am the mother of triplets). Other cultural differences surfaced as we discussed these papers together. The doctor in my story had told the expectant mother the truth about her babies. My classmates taught me that since the Irish value making people happy, they often do not give details that could be upsetting. This is important for me to learn when witnessing in my new country.

The poem that I wrote as an assignment brought the most positive comments. Poetry can be strong words that create vivid pictures or emotions in any language. God used a simple poem about his lovely creation, a rose, to help me build a bridge to my classmates.

I praise the Lord for the opportunity to take this class. It broadened my ability to connect with the Irish people. It also broadened my horizons in the field of writing. My husband and I both feel that this class has helped to make us more effective witnesses for Christ in our ministry in IRELAND.



A ROSE
By Elizabeth A. Canavan

The essence of beauty envelopes the senses.
Vibrant in color, captivating the eyes,
Splashes of sunshine, badges of red,
Delicate pinks, orange hues of sunrise.

Fragrance divine - it wafts on the breeze
Enticing the captive to draw nearer still.
Intoxicating - its perfume doth please,
Tempting the nose to drink to the fill.

The gentle brushing of petals over skin
Giving light touches of velvety pleasure,
Whispering sweetly of its own fragility
And of the moments we tenderly treasure

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Sometimes the good we do we will not know about until we get to Heaven. Once in a while God lets us see how He has used us here...even from times long ago.

by Ferrell Kearney

(After 36 years in Iceland and the UK, the Kearneys are being used of the Lord to fill in for furloughing missionaries).

The surprises God brings into our lives are unimaginable. Barbara and I served the Lord in Iceland from 1967 to 1973. During that time we met a young Icelandic believer named Gardar. Gardar had visited his sister in the USA, heard the Gospel and received Christ as his Savior. We met him in 1968 when he was about seventeen years of age. At that time I gave him a Gideon's Icelandic new Testament, with my name stamped in the front of it. I am sure that for over thirty years the remembrance of that time never came into my mind even once.

After we left Iceland in 1967, we lost track of Gardar. He later met and married an American lady. They moved to the West Coast of the USA where he attended Bible College and became a pastor. He died a few years ago of a brain tumor.

In June, 2003, on our way to the USA, we spent five days in Iceland. On our first night there, we heard a knock on the door. A tall, red-headed Icelander named Helgi had been asked by a friend to check upon us to see if there was anything we needed. As we talked with Helgi and his wife, Gudrun, he said he thought he knew us but then realized he didn't. He had only heard our names.

Helgi told me that he had a Gideon's New Testament with my name stamped in the front. Helgi had become a good friend of Gardar. When Gardar passed away, some of his books had been given to Helgi. Among them was the New testament.

I expressed a desire to Helgi to see the New Testament. He very graciously not only allowed me to see it but gave it to me. What a treasured remembrance!!! It is a reminder that God is faithful and will reward every word and work done for His glory...even after thirty-five years!

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ROMANIA:

Thoughts from: The TIM TYLER FAMILY Our new missionaries in Romania

Hours of.... DEPUTATION.... ANTICIPATION... THEN REALIZATION!

With excitement and anticipation, we boarded our departing flight towards our desired destination...ROMANIA. So much preparation had gone into that moment; it was hard to believe it had finally arrived.

How can one describe the feeling of being at home in a place ...
- where you have never lived before?
- where there is a house with none of your belongings?
- where neighbors greet you with words you cannot understand

And yet...
It all feels so familiar - so right! Only the Lord can make that happen. We also praise the Lord for good missionary friends like Ed and Carole Hembree who spent numerous hours helping us find things we needed. Apart from a battle with fleas and spiders, insane road traffic and a more humid climate, we are all doing great and the kids love it!

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Ed and Carole Hembree have been BIMI missionaries since 1991. God has used them greatly in planting churches, establishing Bible institutes and a college, and in providing a home for orphan children. Now God is using them to help our new missionaries to get established in the country of Romania.

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AND IN UKRAINE...

"IS THIS TAG-TEAM EVANGELISM OR WHAT?"

by Tony Hess

(Tony and Dawn Hess are new missionaries in Ukraine)

Seriosha and I were out to play tennis here in Simferopol. I gave a tract to a man named Andre who was watching us play. He began to read and hardly looked up until he finished. I wanted to talk to him about it but it is difficult with only a limited vocabulary. Seriosha came over and began explaining the Gospel to him and shortly after, glory to the Lord, this young man bowed his head and asked Christ to be His Savior. For the next week, he came to our church with Seriosha. He lives in a town further north where we know a good missionary and church. We prayed that he would remain faithful when he returned home. In a few days, we received word that Andre attended church that next Sunday, gave a testimony of his faith in the Lord Jesus and was baptized the following Sunday. Is that tag-team evangelism? The Bible says that one sows the seed, another waters the seed but the Lord gives theincrease.

---

Simferopol, Ukraine, has not been the same since Bob and Judy VanSant became BIMI missionaries in 1994. They are church planters with the hearing and the deaf. The impact of their church is felt in various ministries with conducting Bible institutes, ladies' meetings, teen choirs and helping newmissionaries like the Hess family.






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Missionaries Bob and Gail Huffman and their people prepare to cover Argenteuil (a suburb of Paris) with God's Word. Many Muslims live in this area. Please pray for this important effort.



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(Bob and Marlyn Elzey have been missionaries with BIMI for 34 years. From 1974-1979, Dr. Elzey served as European Director. They are currently serving the Lord in South Daytona, Florida.)

Dr. Elzey writes:

"Enclosed is a picture which shows a portion of our Sunday morning worship group at CountrySide Lakes Assisted Living Home where I serve as Chaplain. (Many of the residents had read in the EUROPE Magazine about the need for Bibles in EUROPE.)

We do not take an offering per se, but we have two plates available which the folks contribute to as they feel led. These monies have accumulated and out of this fund we were able to send $1,000 for Bibles for Europe."

THANK YOU, FRIENDS FROM COUNTRYSIDE!



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Compiled by Maylou Holladay

ALBANIA - Mike McCombie Family. We recently completed our sixth annual Bible School for children. We registered 148 children in 5 days and saw more than 30 children saved.

CZECH REPUBLIC - Dave Ostenson Family. Not long ago Roman came to our house and told me, "I'll give anything if I could only find peace in my life." I took my Bible and showed Roman that peace in life is through our Lord Jesus Christ. After an hour, Roman bowed his head and prayed a sinner's prayer.

ENGLAND - Ford Baker Family. We continue to distribute the John/Romans and Gospel tracts. Pray for the Bible Institute at Corby where we teach on Tuesdays and Saturdays and our ministry at Trinity Baptist Church in Leicester.

John Jones Family. Our average attendance recently has been in the high twenties. In our Young Life ministry, a teenager dedicated her life to the Lord and a young man accepted Christ as his Savior.

Glenn Palmer Family. Recently I have had the opportunity to speak with three men about their need of Christ. Pray for them.

Tom Pointer Family. Our pianist's son Jamie was saved in our children's church service. Then after the morning service, I had the privilege of leading one of our teens, Derrick, to the Lord Jesus Christ.

Jim Reynolds Family. Twenty-seven visitors arrived for our service with the youth group from Temple Baptist Church, Flower Mound, TX. After the preaching, I gave the invitation and the Lord gave us seven precious souls.

FRANCE - Carey Abbett Family. The Lord greatly blessed our camp ministry this year. Besides several making decisions for a closer walk with the Lord, at least seven have accepted Christ as their Savior.

Gailen Abbett Family. It has been 33 years since we first began our ministry in France. The Lord has blessed our camp ministry even from last year! Two of our campers, a brother and sister named Greg and Meryl, were saved last year. Their pastor told us recently that he had the pleasure of baptizing them both not long ago.

Bob Huffman Family. A record number of 215 people filled our auditorium and there was a sweet spirit as six of our young people followed the Lord in obedience and were baptized.

GERMANY - Dan Dubbe Family. Eduard Janz, who is one of our deacons and also a good preacher, led a middle-aged couple to Christ. Over two years of faithful work with them finally paid off as they both were saved.

Michael Fields Family (new missionaries to Germany). When Cheri and I went to get our visas, the woman in charge was willing to help us obtain our visas for one entire year. Praise the Lord for His continued goodness to us.

Walter Hornung Family. A young Iranian man was saved and baptized at our church about two years ago. He recently won his mother to the Lord. Two days before she went back to Iran, she followed the Lord in baptism. Thrasilla was able to lead a Russian lady to the Lord.

Rodney Kidd Family. We have had some contact with three students from China who were here in Mannheim to study German. Also a young man studying law in Mannheim visited our church. On his first Sunday he heard a message dealing with the purpose of life from Genesis and went home and prayed to receive the Lord.

HUNGARY - Marc Patton Family - A Hungarian couple dropped by the church to see how we were progressing on our new building. They handed me an envelope which contained 600,000 Forints (about $2,600)! I was stunned. This family is not wealthy, and they are not even members of our church! We recently had a Saturday baptismal with 82 present and five baptized.

ICELAND - Ben Wharton Family. Let me say again how much your support and prayers have meant to us over the six years we have spent here in Iceland. The Lord is leading us to go to minister in Great Britain. Please pray for us in this new opportunity.

LATVIA - Paul LaGant Family. I had the privilege to baptize a family. Please pray for Dina, Sasha and Tonya that they will grow in the Lord.

NORTHERN IRELAND - Ed Bissett Family. Meta and Mervin, both unsaved, were attending the Sunday services. After several weeks, Meta went home from church with tears in her eyes and the Lord in her heart. Soon after, Mervin realized that he needed to accept Christ as his personal Savior and was saved.

Tom Fittis Family. Derek's parents (Bobby, aged ninety-two, and his wife Deborah, aged eighty-six) were both saved this year. I had witnessed to them several times at their nursing home. One afternoon Derek's dad told him. "I have been praying that you would come. I have been saved." Since then, both of them have gone to their home in Heaven.

REPUBLIC OF IRELAND - Dan Canavan Family. Our sons Andrew and Caleb have witnessed to Ethan, a neighbor boy, and invited him repeatedly to come to church. He came and his response to the invitation was immediate. Andrew and Caleb have noticed a difference in Ethan - he is truly a new creature in Christ.

Betsy Collins. In a recent baptismal service, nine folk were baptized - four from Mallow and five from Blarney. Our church in Blarney is now supporting four missionaries.

Bob Zemeski Family. We recently told you of the salvation of Colette Bailey. Please pray for Colette.

POLAND - Darrell Johnson Family. We have had several Poles in all three services. On a recent Wednesday evening Olech, Adam and Michal came which is a great blessing because Olech and Adam had not been in two or three years.

ROMANIA - Blair Forrester Family. Our Independent Bible Institute reopened with seventeen students attending a pastoral theology course. We are averaging thirty-seven people per service and three recently joined the church.

Tom Gentry Family. Camp has gone great! We have had over 2500 kids in camp with 1000 professions of faith. All of our material needs continue to be met. At our spiritual-growth camp, 220 teens dedicated their lives to the Lord.

Ed Hembree Family. We finished the ninth year of Maranatha Baptist Bible Institute with seventy-five graduates. Presently we have ten students in our Independent Baptist College. I recently baptized five teenagers in our church and all are active for the Lord.

Keith Herndon Family. Our missions school has enrolled two students so far, with ten more who are very interested. We have students coming from all over Romania, Moldova and possibly Ukraine.

Brian Nibbe Family. We have seen a large increase in the number of people going soul winning with between fifteen and twenty people taking part. We have seen many visitors from this and just led a man to the Lord last Thursday and baptized him on Sunday.

Tim Tyler Family (new missionaries in Romania) - "ROMANIA-FOUND." We have had to do some adjusting but praise the Lord for good missionary friends like Ed and Carol Hembree. We have already taught the teens, preached in the morning service, and gone doorknocking each Saturday.

Kyle Charters Family. I have been invited to speak in an English class of a school in another town south of our city. I will have the liberty to read the Bible and share the Gospel. We have seen two salvations in our services and also eight people have been saved during evangelism.

Robert Fuller (deaf missionary to the deaf). Our first deaf camp was held in Vyborg, near the Finnish border. We had around 32 campers. The exciting part - 5 deaf got saved.

Duane Hearron Family. We have seen ten new visitors in our services. Two teenage girls, Katya and Marina, have been saved. Six new Christians have been baptized.

Don Ossewaarde Family. Irina called and asked if she could bring her friend Dimitri to our home. They stayed for five hours. I used a sixteen-page presentation of the Gospel I was working on to witness to them. Irina took it home with her. Pray that they will be saved soon.

Ron Winkler Family (new missionaries in Siberia). We arrived safely in Krasnoyarsk, Russia, in Siberia. I agreed to help a young man named Yura with his English if he would come to church. He came. He is twenty years old and in his fourth year of Medical School. Please pray that he will be saved.

Adam Young Family. We have had our first people (whom we had personally invited) to visit the church and then get saved. Anton, a 27-year-old, accepted Christ during the invitation. When I asked Alexander (a man in his fifties) how he heard about our church, he said that I had invited him. Praise the Lord, he accepted Christ.

SCOTLAND - Doug Cameron Family (new missionaries to Scotland). We arrived the third of June. Last week we met a man who was saved several years ago. He had gotten mixed up with the Mormons. When I visited him to encourage him, he threw his Mormon literature into the "rubbish (trash) bin." He asked for prayer and wants to return to church.

Arvin Devers Family. A man taking our Source of Light Correspondence Course wrote: "Your studies have actually blessed my life." And he also sent in requests for lessons from four other people. We have had several visitors in our services recently and that was a great blessing.

Graham Forbes Family. Our AWANA clubs have been greatly blessed with an average of over 60 kids in attendance each week. One little girl, Bobby, aged ten, got saved recently.

Mickey Schrimshire Family. This year marks our twenty-fifth anniversary with BIMI and our twentieth year in the UK.

Follow-up on Christine Meets Grace: On our recent return to the UK, Christine did very well on the flight. Although she was still frightened, she did not have one single panic attack. Thank you for your prayers.

Dennis Snelson Family. At our Friends' Day this year, we had two visitors who had come last year. As the Word of God was preached, it was apparent that God was touching the hearts of these visitors concerning salvation. Please pray for them.

SLOVAKIA - Ellis Johnston Family. Sheena had a good contact with Jana and her husband Juraj here in the neighborhood. Please pray for them. We have been continuing our mailbox distribution in other cities as well as here in Povazska Bystrica.

SPAIN - Clayton Livengood Family. We had our annual faith-promise missions conference at our church. Our faith-promise came to more than 7,000 Euros (nearly $8,000.00 at the current exchange rate) for the year. This will allow us to add support for a new missionary along with our ten current mission projects.

SWITZERLAND - Tim Carnicle Family. For the past several weeks, one of Esther's classmates has been attending Sunday School. She is very interested in the Bible lessons. Over the past several months we have distributed over four thousand booklets which contain a clear presentation of the Gospel.

UKRAINE - Tony Hess Family (new missionaries in Ukraine). The first time I was passing out tracts, I was able to share Christ with a young man. At the close of the conversation, he said, "You care enough about us to leave America. I want to listen to what you have to say about Jesus and the Bible."

Matthew Hudson Family. Please pray for two men named Alexander and Serge who have recently been saved. We also conducted another open-air baptismal service for four new believers. Wading out into a lake at 7:00 AM with temperatures in the 50's really makes one appreciate the heated baptismal tanks in America.

John Magas Family. Last year my wife and I had a Bible study with Sofia. On a recent visit with her, she was the most receptive I have ever seen her. To my amazement, she stood to her feet, raised her arms toward heaven and began to pray for the Lord to save her! Praise the Lord that He allowed her to get saved at the age of seventy!

John Spillman Family. I have spoken several times with the father of a good friend of ours. This man and his wife have always been hard to witness to but always kind to us. Our friend came to church last Wednesday so ecstatic because his dad had gotten saved the day before. Please pray for his mother, Galya

Bob Van Sant Family. We are grateful for two precious souls, Luda and her daughter Tanya, who were saved in one of our afternoon services. Irina accepted Christ in one of our other services. We also had a great deaf conference with about 80-90 deaf in attendance each day.

WALES - Ferrell Kearney Family. We have turned the work of Bethel Baptist Church over to a national pastor. We give all the glory to God for our thirty-seven years with BIMI. We look to the future to see what place of ministry he has for us as we face not retirement but reassignment, seeking to be steadfast...that our labor is not in vain in the Lord.

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Wednesday, February 8, 2012

John 3:16 For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.

Scot C & Katie Daku -  AMERICAN SAMOA
Paul J & Wendy Daku Jr -  FIJI ISLANDS
James & Dawn Daley -  INDONESIA