An Encouraging New Years Eve Email From Japan

Hello Friends, we received such an encouraging email on New Year’s Eve from our friend Kaoru from Japan who you may recall us requesting your prayers for this past spring. It’s not every day that we get to hear from those we’ve had a chance to minister to after returning from the U.K. to their home country, so it’s a special treat to share this with you. 

After meeting with Kaoru several times and him coming along to English classes and our Home Group Bible Study in the spring and summer, it became apparent that Kaoru was already a Christian, which was an encouraging surprise! We’re so thankful to hear from him about what an encouragement our ministry to him was while he was away from his home culture, wife, and children, and that he was able to pass his Japanese government service English exams with distinction. 

Please continue to pray for Kaoru, that he would continue to walk with Jesus while living in his home country of Japan, one of the world’s largest unreached people groups, where less than 0.6% of Japanese people are Bible believing Christians and Christian fellowship and good teaching can be very hard to find. Please also pray for his efforts to be promoted to a foreign service post with his government in the U.S., U.K., or other English speaking country, or that the Lord would give him more and greater opportunities to witness to his faith in Christ at home in Japan.

London's Cutest Evangelist

It’s been a very busy week for us here, with multiple Christmas party events, carol services, and even a funeral of a friend from seminary, but one of the of highlights of this week was getting to see Shanna Hymes Bean share her testimony and clearly present the Gospel to the ladies gathered for the Free English Classes women’s Christmas party on Wednesday morning at the church with women in attendance from Iran, Ukraine, Japan, and several other nationalities who do not have access to the Gospel in their home countries. I’m not often up there for the women’s class because some of the women come from cultures that discourage them from interacting with men outside of their family, but I had to go drop some things off at the church from our co-ed English Class Christmas Party the night before, and I just happened to walk in right as Shanna was getting up to give her talk and was able to snap a sneeky pic of my cute evangelist.

Please pray that the Holy Spirit would be at work among the ladies present for the Christmas Party to hear Shanna’s talk, and that many of them would come to one of the church’s four upcoming Christmas Carol Services over the next week to hear more about Jesus.

Thank you for praying for our Tuesday night Free English Classes Christmas Party outreach this evening!

We all had a fantastic time and I honestly have no idea how many people we had, it was like counting fish in an aquarium, they wouldn't stop moving! Probably about 60+. Nearly all of them were non-Christians, several of whom we’re connecting with regularly and sharing Christ with through small group and one-to-one Bible reading, and so many of them have become some of our favourite people!

Regardless, we had a merry time and there were several newcomers who came along, including an entire family of Persians who emailed me out of the blue just yesterday, and a very sweet Pakistani family who’ve been coming and brought several family members who’ve never come to English class before. At one point I did have to answer a question from a newcomer named Abdul about whether or not the mince pies we were serving were "Halal friendly" or not, which honestly was not something I'd had to think much about before!

Dawson read the story of Jesus’ birth from Luke 1 & 2 in front of the group before dinner and spoke about the hope of Christmas in Jesus Christ, as well as expressing our gratitude and appreciation to our team of teachers and volunteers with some special gifts, all of whom we could not run our weekly Free English Classes outreach without!

Our Wednesday morning women’s Free English Class will have their own Christmas party in the morning, which Shanna will be sharing her testimony at in front of about 40-50 women. Please pray for the Lord to work in the hearts of these women in the morning and for those who came to the party this evening to come to know our great saviour Jesus Christ.

Please Pray for Our Free English Classes Christmas Party Outreaches at IPC-Ealing

Hi Friends, December is such a wonderful time for Gospel outreach to our friends and neighbours! Please pray for our upcoming Christmas Parties with our students from our Free English Classes outreach at IPC-Ealing next Tuesday evening and Wednesday morning. Nearly all of our students are new to the U.K. and many of them are coming from various world faith backgrounds including Islam, Buddhism, and Hinduism, or no faith background at all. Students have been invited to bring along their families to the party as well, and we hope that this will help us and our volunteers and teachers (all are IPC-Ealing church members) come into contact with even more people to share Christ with. We will also be sharing the story of Jesus's birth narrative from the Gospel of Luke at the party.

Please pray that we would have fun, make good connections for the Gospel, and that we would continue to be able to follow up with students for evangelism, discipleship, and one-to-one & small group Bible studies. We will also be holding four different Christmas Carol outreach events at the church later this month, as well as running a Christianity Explored course at the church in January, which we'll be announcing at the parties and extending personal invitations to students to come along with us to.

Thank you for your continued prayers and partnership!

Free English Classes at IPC-Ealing Are Growing

Hello Friends-

Apologies for the lack of posts recently! We've been having such a great time with our Free English Class students and other new friends here in London who we are pointing to Jesus I'm afraid we often get swept up in the moment and either forget to take pictures completely or it would just be awkward to do so.

Just two nights ago, I think we may have set a new record for the number of students attending our Tuesday evening Free English Classes, Ealing, but we were all having such a good time, none of us thought to stop and count. If I had to hazard a guess, I think we had about 40-45 students, exceeding our previous attendance record of 36 from the week before. The Wednesday morning women's class also set a new record as well of 44 attendees this past week.

For the past three weeks after our Tuesday evening Free English Class ends, we've held a Christianity Explored Bible study, which is a 7 week study looking at the life of Jesus from the Gospel of Mark, and have had several English students stay on to participate including students from Japan, Ukraine, Russia, Poland, China, and Iran. 

We've made the Christianity Explored study completely optional and separate from the English Class as a low pressure opportunity for students who the Holy Spirit may be at work in to further explore the Gospel and to take another step toward knowing Jesus. We plan to run these a few times a year in conjunction with Free English Classes on Tuesday nights, and the Wednesday morning women's class has an optional Bible study after class ends as well.

Ultimately, this is what Free English Classes is meant to be about. We are trusting the Lord to create a "funnel" of sorts to draw as many non-christians as possible into closer contact with the Church and God's people, in hopes that as we build relationships with them, practice hospitality, and share the Gospel with them, that some of them may come to trust Jesus and "get stuck-in"* to Church life for a lifetime of deepening faithfulness to Jesus and His Church.

Thank you so much for all of your prayers and support as we trust Jesus together to build His Church in London.

*to "get stuck-in" is a "British-ism" that means "to start doing something with enthusiasm or determination".

God is at Work Building His Church

You might recall our update a couple of weeks ago about Sara and Ray teaming up to teach English to South American Spanish speakers at our weekly Free English Classes outreach that we launched at IPC-Ealing in January. Sara and her mum Andrea are members of of our House Group Bible study that meets in our home weekly, and we were so encouraged to see Sara baptised yesterday and join the church at IPC-Ealing.

In fact, the past two Sundays we’ve been so encouraged to welcome into church membership at IPC-Ealing four members of our House Group Bible Study, as well as three other friends who we’ve enjoyed spending time with over the past year in Ealing. Sara amazes us with her bilingual superpowers and the way that she loves and cares for those around her, and how the Lord is using her already as a new believer.

In addition to Sara, we also welcomed into membership our House Group members Anthony, Justin, and Rebekah on Palm Sunday, as well as our friends Funso, Dana, and David, who is another of our English teachers.

Nothing encourages us more than seeing how the Lord is at work to build His church in this place, both in those coming to faith in Christ, as well as seeing longtime believers finding a church home and place to serve at IPC-Ealing, and helps remind us that missions works best when paired with planting and strengthening Gospel centered churches.

Ray and Sara: Teaming Up to Teach English to Spanish Speakers in West London

You guys are probably tired of hearing about just our family all the time, so we thought we'd do a post about some very special folks: some of our Free English Classes teachers, volunteers, and students! Each Tuesday night our team of teachers and volunteers made up of IPC-Ealing members and regulars arrive at the church at about 6:30 pm to get ready to teach English to folks from the surrounding community, many of whom are non-christians.

Pictured on the left are our dear friends Ray and Sara who volunteer every week to teach our most basic beginner level class together, which they've created completely from scratch. At first glance, Ray and Sara might seem like an odd pair to team up and teach English together, but Jesus seems to love bringing folks together in His church from different generations and walks of life. Ray is an 80 years young retired Northern Irish school teacher, principal, and basketball coach (he spent most of his teaching and coaching career in Canada before retiring back to the U.K.). Ray grew up as a Northern Irish Catholic in Belfast and came to faith in Christ later in life after living through "the troubles" in Northern Ireland as a younger man. Ray wakes up and reads his Bible and lifts weights every morning, and loves talking with us about American football and basketball, especially his beloved Notre Dame Fighting Irish, which we try not to hold against him!

Sara is 19 and was born and raised here in London after her Spanish mother Andrea and Ecuadorian father Mauricio met here, got married, and decided to call London home. So because of her unique story, Sara speaks perfect Spanish, as well English with a lovely west London accent, having lived in London her entire life. Sara and Andrea are relative newcomers to IPC-Ealing and members of our House Group Bible Study that meets at our home every Thursday night, and as a new believer who we have the privilege helping to disciple, Sara is hoping to be baptised at IPC-Ealing soon. It has been such an encouragement having Sara and Andrea as a part of our lives through church, House Group, and now Free English Classes every week!

On the far right is Elvira ("El-veer-ah") who's been coming to Free English Classes since the very first week we started offering classes back in January. Elvira is from Colombia, and on her first night at Free English Classes Elvira called her English speaking son to have him explain her situation to us. Elvira's son explained to me that he had heard about our Free English Classes on Facebook and that he was hoping we could help Elvira. He explained that Elvira lives with him and his family and even though she has called London home for over 12 years, Elvira does not speak any English at all, and because of this, is often very dependent on her family to be able to communicate with the outside world and do the most basic things in London.

After coming to class the first couple of weeks, Elvira was so encouraged by what she was learning and the relationships that she was building with others that she invited her niece Mariana (standing behind Elvira) to come along as well to Free English Classes. However, Elvira and Mariana spoke so little English that they were not even able participate very effectively in our beginners level class. We didn't know what to do or how to help them most effectively.

Enter Ray and Sara. With Ray's years of experience teaching school and Sara's perfect bi-lingual skills in both English and Spanish, they both had a heart for helping Elvira and Mariana and decided to team up to create a unique “basic beginners” curriculum to help them, so that hopefully they will come far enough along to eventually be able to join our beginners class. About three weeks ago, Fausto from Argentina (back centre) began coming to Free English Classes as well, and after feeling a bit overwhelmed in our beginners level class, and as a fellow Spanish speaker, decided to join Ray and Sara’s basic beginners class along with Elvira and Mariana.

It is such an encouragement to see how God is at work through Ray and Sara at Free English Classes. Please pray for them both, along with Elvira, Mariana, and Fausto. Due to the language barrier that exists, as you might imagine, being able to communicate the Gospel with them (which is a big part of why we are teaching free English classes in the first place) verbally is especially challenging for all of us but Sara, but we are trusting that over time the Lord will use our (and especially Ray and Sara's) service and care for Elvira, Mariana, and Fausto to encourage them to learn more about the good news of Jesus Christ along the way and over the long haul of building a relationship with them.

Free English Classes Update - We have Covid, but God is Still at Work!

The last three months have been a whirlwind and I think we owe you guys an update. Since another bout of Covid has given Shanna and me a little "forced downtime" this week, we can finally write something up. Back over the Christmas holidays, we shared with you that we were launching a new “Free English Classes” program for both men and women in the evenings, and helping to better resource the church’s existing women’s English classes that Shanna had already been helping on Wednesday mornings. Several of the ladies in the church have been doing this very faithfully for years, but had been feeling a little overwhelmed by coming up with new curriculum every week, and a bit short handed recently as some of the older ladies began to feel the need to step back from their role as their participation has become more difficult with age.

Well, after spending the Autumn researching options and recruiting and training a team of teachers and volunteers from within the church for the new co-ed class, we launched the new co-ed class in the dead of winter in mid-January and we have been absolutely amazed by what God has done so far. Since 17 Jan we have met weekly on Tuesday nights for the new co-ed class and have had at least 22 students every week and a record breaking 34 students tonight, in spite of Shanna and I both having to miss due to Covid. Prior to tonight, Shanna and I have been very hands on with all of the details, but our team of volunteers and teachers pulled it off tonight with flying colours and we are so proud of them all.

Even though all of our teachers and volunteers are church members or regular attenders at IPC-Ealing, with only 1 or 2 exceptions almost all of our students have been complete newcomers to the church who have never set foot inside our doors before. In fact, many of them have never set foot inside of any church before. They are from backgrounds ranging from across Asia including Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Turkey, Iran, Azerbaijan, Japan, and China, to European nations like Ukraine, Russia, Poland, Belarus, Hungary, Spain, and Italy. We’ve even got a little table of Colombians who speak almost no English at all who’ve been helped by our 80 year old Northern Irish friend Ray who speaks no Spanish whatsoever and our 19 year old Home Group member Sara, who will be getting baptised at the church soon. I think I may have to tell you more about this fun little group that Ray and Sara are helping in a future update soon 😉

This is what we’ve prayed and continue to pray for- for Free English Classes to be an opportunity for our church members at IPC-Ealing to interact with and lovingly serve our non-christian neighbours who live all around us, in a very practical way, and that helps them forge positive relationships with them for the furthering of God’s kingdom. And by God's grace we are already beginning to see this happen as Free English Class members have begun trickling into our Sunday services and Home Groups during the week like our new Ukrainian friend Julia and her daughter Mira who’ve come to our Home Group the last 3 weeks in a row now (another upcoming update perhaps?). Please pray with us as we continue to build friendships with the folks who are coming to Free English Classes and help those who are interested to make the transition into church life at IPC-Ealing and saving faith in Jesus Christ.

The women’s class has continued to go strong, and just a couple of weeks ago experienced a record attendance of 40 after experiencing record low numbers this time last year. However, due to the challenge of meeting during the day when many potential volunteers may be busy with work or family, they have unfortunately continued to struggle with recruiting new volunteers and teachers. Please pray for the Lord to raise up new volunteers and teachers to help with this urgent need.

Thank you for all of your continued prayers and for your partnership in the Gospel with our family here in London!

2023 Year End Update

As we approach the end of 2022 and close out our first year in London, we wanted to post our year-end letter here for any who may not have received it already through post or email to give you a review of how the Lord has been at work over the past 12 months, and what our hopes, prayers, and needs are going into 2023. Thank you so much for all of your prayers and partnership this year, and wishing you all the best to you and yours in 2023!

"I thank my God in all my remembrance of you, always in every prayer of mine for you all making my prayer with joy, because of your partnership in the gospel from the first day until now." -Philippians 1:3-5

Learning From All Souls About Using English Classes to Serve and Point Our International Neighbours to Jesus

I’m at historic All Souls Church near Oxford Circus in Central London on this rainy British evening to research and learn about how they use their free English classes and other ministries to care for and reach internationals in London with the Gospel. They have a really great and well established program that we are hoping to learn some things from. Prayers appreciated!