Disappointments and Praises

For most of you who are on our email list, you know our week was disappointing because no children came to our 5-Day Club. We invited the children, we saw them playing outside right up until time for club, then they would all disappear.

I think Satan has a stronghold on this neighborhood because of the "Lighthouse Chapel" across the street from us. This used to be a Salvation Army Church, but about 10 years ago, they sold the building to the group that is in it now. They worship angels, stars, and many other things; they have seances and psychic fairs.

Please pray for us to be lights in our neighborhood.

The praises - Philip has his first job in his field of study - computer-aided drafting. He is working for Attack Race Cars - a shop that builds drag race cars for one racer. He will be drawing the smaller parts used to build up the car. Not only will he work full time, but after three months, he will receive health benefits! they are willing to work around his schooling. But the best thing of all is that his boss attends a good church in Charlotte and so the work environment will be nice.

JOanna is teaching clubs in Hesperia this week (near Newaygo/Fremont area). Pray for her as she teaches four clubs a day. Next week, she will be teaching clubs in Laingsburg - a little closer to home but still staying with others for the week. The following week, she is in Wayne County (Detroit area!)

Bethany won't have any clubs to teach this coming week, so will mainly work at the daycare.

Doug has jury duty this week in Mason, so the car juggling will be interesting.

I hope to get some pictures of clubs up soon.

End of club

Today was day 5 of the 5-Day Club I taught here in Lansing. There were 13 children enrolled, all but 3 were from Tanzania. All week long I have been praying that God would help me relate the truth of His Word to the children. Although none of the children responded to the invitation, that I know of, several of the children said today that they do believe in Jesus as their Savior. Whether they made that decision in club or at another time, I do not know but God does. Some of the children did say they attended church in Tanzania.

I found a "chick" tract in Swahili on-line that I printed and copied for the children, and John 3:16 in Swahili. I trust that these two items will further explain the gospel and the boys and girls will come to know Jesus as Savior if they don't already know Him.

I thank God that I was able to teach this club this week.

5-Day Clubs

This week, both Bethany and Joanna are teaching 2 clubs each, and I am teaching one club. In the club I teach at 3:00 most of the children are from Tanzania and speak Swahili. Our missionary project is raising money for a car for Kathy Gleckler who is a CEF missionary to East and Central Africa of which Tanzania is a part. In fact, they had their first CYIA in Tanzania last year to train young people in that country to teach clubs. We have a song in Swahili that we use when we teach about Kathy. The children in my club love that song because it is in their native language. So, I dug through my tubs of CEF materials and found two more Swahili songs to use today in club.

Please pray for me that I can know how to relate the truths of the Word of God to these children in a way they will understand. They have been in the Lansing school district for a year so do know English and can read it, but I am not sure how much understanding they have. They do not know what "sin" is, so I went on the internet and found the swahili word for it - kosa. To say "we sin" is tunakosa.

Hopefully, by the end of the week, I will have a picture to share with you.

Summer ministry

This week we did not have 5-Day Clubs scheduled because of the holiday, but we did take the young people who went to CYIA and SMA on open air, sharing the Wordless Book with children that we met on the streets. Many children or their parents did not want to listen to the story, but 17 people did (14 children and 3 adults) and 7 prayed to recieve Christ as their Savior.

Next week we start clubs, although there are only 5 scheduled. Bethany, Joanna and I will each be teaching in separate clubs, using others who went to training. Our schedule will be interesting, but now, one of our vehicles needs exhaust repairs - that if we had the problem area replaced would be $1000 (for a car that may be worth $2000.) We are hoping to get a cobble job done that would be considerable less $.

Looking ahead - Joanna will be teaching clubs for Shoreline CEF (Ludington, Newaygo area) the week of July 21, then in Capital Area - in Laingsburg- July 28, and in Detroit the week of Aug. 4.

Bethany will teach morning clubs, then work at the daycare in the afternoons.

Philip and Bethany are trying to get their fall schedule figured out. Please pray for them. Bethany needs three classes to complete her course of study but may need to take each one separately. Pray that she can take at least two of the classes concurrently, so then she can be done in two semesters.

Philip has one class left for his associates and is applying to Laurence Tech for his Bachelors, but can do most of the work at LCC. He has an appointment with an advisor next Thursday.

Joanna and I are in the process of planning her Senior Year of High School.

Doug continues to work at the State Office doing his duties as Director of Administration.

We would like to get up to Tustin/Cadillac area sometime this summer. Please pray that we can figure out when, where we would stay, and have the $ for gas.

Thanks.

Maryann

CYIA and SMA

Doug, Bethany, Joanna were at Christian Youth In Action Training for two weeks. Doug and Bethany were staff, Joanna a student. I was there the first week, then went to SMA the second week. Here, Doug and I are teaching Bible Lesson Preparation and Presentation, helping the students to know and understand the process of preparing the Bible Lesson.




















Kathy Gleckler and Lucy Wanjohi - from Kenya, East Africa. Kathy has been a CEF missionary there for almost 30 years and directs the education for CEF of East and Central Africa. She is the featured missionary in the 5-Day Clubs this summer. The students raised over $1200 to buy her a new laptop. The monies the children bring during 5-Day Club will go to help Kathy get another car. Lucy is the director of Education for CEF of Kenya. She was able to come and observe our CYIA program, then perhaps implement some of the things we do into the CYIA program in Kenya and surrounding countries.







Joanna celebrated her 17th birthday while at CYIA. She had 42 other students to help her celebrate. I think we made the day enjoyable for her. On Open air that day, the Lord used her to bring 2 children to Himself.







The picture below is of 1/2 of the students taking a test that covered the information they learned in Wordless Book class, Counseling a Child for Salvation, and Bible Lesson class. If they knew there verses they needed to memorize, they did well on the test.
The most important part of CYIA is the study groups. Staff are assigned a group of 3-4 students to work with them, evaluate their lessons, and encourage them throughout the two weeks. Below are several pictures of CYIA study groups.









Students are working on outlining their Bible Lesson for the day. Then they practice outloud telling the story. In one day, they see the lesson demonstrated, outline the story from Scripture and the script, practice, and tell the lesson for evaluation.





At SMA, the students learn to the Wordless Book, how to teach songs, memory verses, and the missionary story in a 5-Day Club. They also are taught how to counsel a child for salvation. In one week, there are 9 evaluations that need to be done.

This is the hallway in the Academic building when all of our classes were held.

The SMA office was in the same hallway.




The students had many classes - several times they were in classes together, but most classes were in smaller classes, then in smaller study groups where they practiced their missionary story, songs, verses, and wordless book.

Thanks for praying for us while we were at training.

At training

It has been awhile since I updated this, so here we go.

This is the second week of CYIA training. Doug, Bethany, Joanna, and I were all there the first week. I am now at SMA; Doug, Bethany, and Joanna are at CYIA. Bethany is student staff and is working with three students this week. Doug has a study group of four young men - two teams teaching 5-Day Clubs this week. Joanna has been paired with a young lady that has really struggled at CYIA. Joanna will have to carry most of the weight of the club.

There are 43 students at CYIA and 40 at SMA.

Philip has been home sick - unable to go to work.

We have four more days of training than we will be heading home. It will nice to be together as a family again.

A new week

This past week seems like it went by very fast. The biggest thing that happened is that we got rid of our big red van and bought a mini-van - a Dodge Grand Caravan. It is silver. My brother, Kevin, told us about dealer we bought it from. We put new tires on it, it needs a new EGR valve, and needs new front breaks, but we will still come out less then the maximum we thought we could spend on another vehicle. God provided the money so we could pay cash for it. I am thankful that God gave Doug the ability to save and budget (sometimes it is a hassle) so that we don't have to go into debt to buy things like another vehicle.

JOanna should finish her school work this week, then she'll have two weeks before CYIA training begins. Bethany continues to work at the daycare. It looks she will get extra hours to make up for some of the hours she is taking off to go to Cedar Point and CYIA training. Philip is still waiting to hear about the job interview he had.

Doug and I are preparing for CYIA training - we are teaching the Bible Lesson classes this year so there is alot to get ready. I am also using the same Bible Lesson notes at SMA for our second year students.

Sherry Harris, our pastor's wife, goes to U of M on Friday for a second opinion concerning her brain tumor. Please continue to pray for her.

There is another family in our church that just recently lost a sister-in-law (Aunt to the kids) from cancer, and just this past week, the father (and grandpa) died after having a brain aneurism. ONe daughter, Danielle, is about 14 and having a very difficult time with these deaths. She has other struggles already, but this just adds to her rebellion and anger at God. Please pray for Danielle.

I think that about updates you on the Hammar Family. Thanks for your prayers for us.