In this issue…

  1. BAG THIS INSPIRATIONAL TESTIMONY ABOUT THE CALL TO MISSIONS
  2. “PRAYER RESOURCE LIST
  3. MULTIPLYING MISSIONS THROUGH THE LOCAL CHURCH
  4. WANT TO PEEK BACK IN TIME? CHECK OUT THE WAYBACK MACHINE
  5. FREE ONLINE WORSHIP RESOURCES
  6. SUPPORT RAISING TRAINING
  7. STANDARDS OF EXCELLENCE IN SHORT-TERM MISSION
  8. HOW HAPPY IS YOUR COUNTRY – REMIXED
  9. EUROPE WORSHIP LINK
  10. THANKS FOR FUELING THE BRIGADA MISSIONS FIRE
  11. COULD YOU HELP FUEL OUR FIRE TO FINISH THE COURSE?
  12. THE BACK PAGE: “HOW DO I GET FED?”
  13. CLOSING STUFF
  1. BAG THIS INSPIRATIONAL TESTIMONY ABOUT THE CALL TO MISSIONS — Now you can own the book, “Call Against the Will”, and help Brigada too. Read about God’s call to a stubborn phone man. Learn how he went on to establish MASTER Provisions, a global Christian clothing ministry. You’ll be entertained, inspired, and challenged. 161 pages. This book was released about 7 days ago. It is being sold exclusively through MASTER Provisions by contacting roger(at)masterprovisions(dot)org . [As a means of preventing spam for our contributors, in the preceding email address(es), please replace (at) with @ and (dot) with .] The cost is $12.95 (includes post office shipping) and payment can be made to MASTER Provisions, 12236 Hutton Drive, Walton, KY 41094. Orders should include a mailing address. Visa and MasterCard transactions will be accepted. Purchase 5 books and the 6th book is free. MASTER Provisions will donate nearly $2.00 per book purchased to Brigada. Just tell them you heard about it here. (And thanks in advance for your help to Brigada!)
  2. “PRAYER RESOURCE LIST — Betty is the new Prayer Coordinator for Team Expansion and she’d love to compile a list for prayer coordinators of missionary sending organizations, churches sold out on missions, prayer warriors for missionaries on the frontlines, and those concerned for their own personal prayer lives. Which books would you recommend? What conferences would be helpful? Which websites would you explore? What organizations or services would you cite? Let her know! Betty will receive your info and then assemble it for us to reprint as a feature. If you have info, share it with her. You will be helping with the crucial strategy in making Christ Jesus known to the nations.

    Just e-mail Betty at prayer(at)teamexpansion(dot)org [As a means of preventing spam for our contributors, in the preceding email address(es), please replace (at) with @ and (dot) with .]

  3. MULTIPLYING MISSIONS THROUGH THE LOCAL CHURCH -– You have the amazing opportunity to get strategically involved in reaching the world’s least reached people groups. AIMS can help. Accelerating International Mission Strategies (AIMS) presents, “Multiplying Missions through the Local Church,” January 8-12 at Bethel Temple in Hampton, VA. Join other pastors, missionaries, church leaders, and students to learn how you can mobilize your church can develop effective strategies to make a greater impact in the Great Commission. For more information, call the AIMS home office at (757) 226-5850, email aims(at)aims(dot)org [As a means of preventing spam for our contributors, in the preceding email address(es), please replace (at) with @ and (dot) with .], or visit

    http://www.aims.org/associates

  4. WANT TO PEEK BACK IN TIME? CHECK OUT THE WAYBACK MACHINE — Now I’ve heard it all. Log on at:

    http://www.archive.org/web/web.php

    to see The “Internet Archive Wayback Machine” It’ll show you snapshots in time for just about whatever site you want to remember. Try it out! Wild. (Thanks for the tip, Greg!)

  5. FREE ONLINE WORSHIP RESOURCES — The website of Worship Resources, a department of Greater Europe Mission, has many free resources. Of special interest to Brigada readers is the page entitled “Worldwide Worship,” which has links and articles related to global worship. Check out the article “The Bridge: Worship and Culture” on the Articles page too. “Worship Notes” is a free monthly online worship newsletter found on the site as well. Go to

    http://www.worr.org

  6. SUPPORT RAISING TRAINING — The BodyBuilders “Personal Support Raising Boot Camp” is a two-day intense training for first-time support raisers and under-funded veterans. Its goal: Getting you to 100% in 100 days! Check out the website for more details at

    http://www.thebodybuilders.net

    or email info(at)thebodybuilders(dot)net [As a means of preventing spam for our contributors, in the preceding email address(es), please replace (at) with @ and (dot) with .]

    Upcoming Boot Camp dates: Oceanside, CA – December 11-12th Colorado Springs, CO – March 26-27th Register online today.

  7. STANDARDS OF EXCELLENCE IN SHORT-TERM MISSION — U.S. churches, schools and agencies have come together to set national standards of excellence (SOE) for short-term mission. The seven standards come at a time when more than one million U.S. short-termers serve each year on mission projects of varying quality. Adopting and implementing the standards lets the world know your short-term mission programs operate according to a code of best practices that emphasizes mutual partnership between senders and receivers. Churches, agencies and schools can use these standards as a tool to improve training, relationships with field partners, ministry effectiveness, and debriefing and follow-up. Membership brings professionally structured guidance for achieving goals and an impressive network of organizations offering opportunities for resource sharing, improved training, minimized risk and mentoring. For more information, visit

    http://www.stmstandards.org

    or call 1-866-SOE-8221. A Standards Introductory Workshop will be held Jan. 18-19, 2007 during pre-conference seminars at the National Short- Term Mission Conference in Los Angeles, CA. See

    http://www.nstmc.org

    or email info(at)nstmc(dot)org for more on the workshop or conference. [As a means of preventing spam for our contributors, in the preceding email address(es), please replace (at) with @ and (dot) with .]

  8. HOW HAPPY IS YOUR COUNTRY – REMIXED — It’s back. That map that shows the happiness levels of various countries. This time it’s being featured by CNN. See it by logging on at

    http://www.cnn.com/SPECIALS/2006/happiness/

    Click on web extras, then “Map: Happiness levels of countries” to see the map.

  9. EUROPE WORSHIP LINK — This Europe-wide worship network is looking for key worship leaders from the nations of Europe for its Conference 2007, to be held in Malenovice, Czech Republic April 18-21, 2007. Scholarships are available (excluding travel) for those who otherwise could not attend. EWL’s website also has information and links for Europe-based worship ministries and information on worship books available in European languages. See

    http://ewl.shorturl.com

    or contact Ron Man at RMan(at)gemission(dot)com. [As a means of preventing spam for our contributors, in the preceding email address(es), please replace (at) with @ and (dot) with .]

  10. THANKS FOR FUELING THE BRIGADA MISSIONS FIRE — Thanks so much for the anonymous gifts of $20, $50, $25, $5, and $20 to Brigada! Your generosity and partnership is *such* a shot in the arm! That’s why I’m up at midnight tonight doing this! Thanks, too, for the gift of $150 from VisionSynergy. Learn more about their ministry at:

    http://www.visionsynergy.net/

    This organization picks up where Interdev left off . . . and goes well into the future by connecting networks that can make a difference! Thanks, Bill, for the tremendous help and hope!

    Also we’re grateful for Insurance Services of America (ISA) for their sponsorship of $70.87, due to the overseas travel by folks from College Heights Christian Church in Joplin, MO. (Go College Heights!) It’s a win-win situation. College Heights gets fare protection for all their flights, in case something goes haywire on their trips… and Brigada gets more fuel for the fire of missions! Love it. Learn more about your options with ISA at:

    http://www.missionaryhealth.net/brigada.htm

    Thanks, too, to Blessed Hope for their $9.27 gift due to long distance phone use. Sign up for their very reasonably-priced services at:

    http://www.lowermyphonebill.com/brigada

    Finally — get this — Covenant College’s Chalmers Center has come through again to help us with a $600 gift — as a thank-you note for telling the world about their great programs to help missionaries all over the world. Learn more at

    http://www.chalmers.org

    I’m *completely* humbled by their help — which is allowing us to make good progress toward our hopeful outcome of $16,650 during 2006. We started last edition with 6795.85. Add this edition’s $950.14 and we now stand at 7,745.99! yahoooooooooooooooo! :-)

  11. COULD YOU HELP FUEL OUR FIRE TO FINISH THE COURSE? — Want to get on board and pass some fuel for the missions fire at Brigada? (We’d be eternally grateful!) Just click on “sponsor” in the top menu (to use PayPal or a credit card), or if you prefer, send a check payable to Team Expansion to: Team Expansion (Brigada secretary), 13711 Willow Reed Dr., Louisville, KY 40299. As always, be sure to let us know if you’d like us to promote any particular service or ministry, or if you’d prefer your gift be anonymous. In any case, thanks for considering Brigada in your estate giving, your monthly church missions fund, and/or your own personal giving for this calendar year. (Nobody has ever put Brigada in their will to date, as far as we know. But we keep saying that because we think it would be cool if it ever happened. After all, you’ll be gone anyway. Will anyone notice getting 1% less of your estate if you prescribe that 1% to go to Brigada? :-) )
  12. THE BACK PAGE: “HOW DO I GET FED?” — That question arose in a talk recently with a young missionary. How do we make sure our missionaries continue their spiritual growth… eating at a banquet table of spiritual food … while they’re serving overseas. Some churches mail sermon tapes. Others allow missionaries to tap into their streaming audio — at not cost (other than the missionaries having to pay for the throughput on the field side — a common practice by ISPs overseas). Still others actually send books & even delegations of people to lead in pastoral care visits. But in the end, how can the missionary him/herself take initiative to make sure the spiritual feeding happens?

    If we’re truly trying to prioritize, it seems we would place that question high on the list of tasks missionaries face. Their kids are losing their youth group, the wives are leaving their ladies ministries, and the guys are missing out on that Thursday morning accountability group. So what’s a body to do?

    I wish more of us could put studies like these on the web:

    http://www.thetask.org/thETASK/biblestudy/

    If more of us took this kind of initiative, there’d be more meat on the web. I also wish our missions agencies would come up with more input on this topic. Here I am, president of a mission organization with 300 workers, and I find myself wishing that we did more for our workers overseas too.

    Got ideas? Got resources? Write a quick paragraph to: how-do-I-get-fed(at)googlegroups(dot)com [As a means of preventing spam for our contributors, in the preceding email address(es), please replace (at) with @ and (dot) with .] The emails go only to me. This googlegroup is basically just a way to collect these items. I’ll gather up all the input and make sure it’s presented later in another issue of Brigada Today. Let’s find out what’s happening now… and what *should* happen long-term on this important topic.

Tweet
Share
Share
Pin
0 Shares