G.O. Explore Jan 26-30

Jeff, Chris, Felix, Jacob and Brook

From January 26th through the 30th I had the opportunity to lead an Exploratory trip with Brook, hosting Jacob Breeze and Chris Denbow from Grace Christian Church near Houston, Texas. We shared some great ministry experiences over the course of our 3 ½ days. The trip has proven to be very successful on many fronts. This year we have made some adjustments to our approach of encouraging the national Christian leaders. At an all pastor meeting we rolled out a plan to be more intentional in investing in the pastors and leaders of the various churches we are networked with. The vision was received with a lot of enthusiasm.

The Entire Dominican G.O. Leadership

We discovered in Jacob a quality theologian and teacher. He and I will be working together regularly to coordinate and translate training materials for our pastors and leaders. He will also be bringing his students down regularly starting this summer.

Thanks to an engineering class that came down on a trip with us this past year from Evansville University, we had the opportunity to reveal the blue prints and 3 D virtual model of the new Central Church that we will begin construction on this Spring. The Dominican and Haitian leadership is very excited about getting this project up and running. Once the first level is complete we will be able to move forward with the medical facility that will stand on the location of the current out grown, church building.

Jeff, Jordy, Jacob, Tats and the Gospel

While in the Hole with Jacob and Chris, I ran into our deaf friend, Jordy, at the nutrition center. Jordy drew my attention to Jacob’s tattooed arm. I signed for Jordy to come with me for a closer look.

"The Lamb that was slain..." The lamb is at the top of the arm, the skeletons rising are bodies being resurrected

I signed to him the significance of Jacob’s tattoo which essentially was an image drawn from the doxology in Revelation: “The Lamb that was slain is worthy to be praised.” I explained that the lamb was Jesus and that the skeletons floating up were each of us being resurrected. He nodded with a big smile. I don’t know how clearly he understood it but the visual was a tremendous help in trying to connect these ideas. It was a great part of the day. The week was a tremendous blessing all the way around.

Giving Jacob a tour of the current Central Church and future site of our medical facility

Felix discusses the future on the ministry in the Hole with me

Kids in the Hole

*all of the photos in this post are by Chris Denbow

Help the Rogers' Ministry With G.O. by...

Doing something you're probably already doing.

If you shop at Kroger or one of these: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kroger#Chains you can help us out. We’ve made an arrangement with Kroger so that if you care to, 4% of what you spend on groceries anyway, can be designated to help support our work.

So, here’s how the whole thing works:

1. Fill out this Web form: http://go-ministries.org/give_kroger_gift_card2.shtml

2. Be sure to pick "Jeff and Vicki Rogers" in the "Supporting" drop down box.

3. You will receive a Kroger gift card in the mail already credited with $5

4. Next time you go to Kroger to get groceries go to the customer service desk first and put additional money on your gift card (whatever you estimate you will spend).

5. Get groceries and pay with gift card.

6. Keep your gift card and reuse it over and over again just like the above. It’s important to keep the card b/c that’s how the whole thing is tracked.

Kroger will donate 4% of each dollar you put on the gift card to G.O. Ministries in our name, helping support our work.

This adds a step to your grocery run but helps the cash you’re spending go 4% further to help change the world in which we live in very positive ways. Once we receive your registration we’ll get a card in the mail to you right away.

Thanks very much and God bless!

The Rogers

Successive Storms Torment Haiti

Haiti has suffered storms back to back. Heavy rains always spell trouble for this country because of rampant deforestation. Gonaives has been especially hard hit. I spoke to my friend Romano tonight over Skype. He is Haitian living in Santiago in the Dominican Republic. He told me that he has heard that they have found around 600 bodies in Haiti. He believes that as the water recedes many more will be discovered.

Pray for the survivors, pray that relief agencies get there promptly, that nations with resources come quick with significant aid.

To learn more about the current crisis check out these NPR links:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=94407524
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=94389789
http://www.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/americas/09/09/haiti.gonaives.flood/index.html?eref=rss_world

Grace and Peace

Ministry is Moving Along...

There has been so much going on. Vicki is booking new teams like crazy for 2009. I just got back a week and a half ago from leading an exploratory trip with three sets of leaders from three different churches spanning Kansas, Indiana, and Maryland. One of the churches, Harris Prairie, is getting on board with a Partnership with Nico Gracesqui in a big way. The leaders from Maryland are already on the calendar for a trip 2009 and the leader from Kansas City is meeting with his leadership to see if G.O. is the route their church wants to partner with for further involvement in global ministry.

Pastor Nico

Gracesqui Family

I was able to get over 100 new books to Santiago for the Pastors’ Library. If all goes as we hope the library will be open and available for use by September 10th. All of the logistics are coming together.
I will be following up in the next week with all of those who have expressed interest in Partnering with a national pastor or worker over the last two months in the Dominican. Pray that hearts are turned to commit to help further the work of these passionate servants.
I’m currently coordinating a group of volunteers for another G.O. fundraiser at Churchill Downs in a couple of weeks. We’ll be helping to run a clearance sale of all of the 2008 Derby merchandise in conjunction with the Ryder Cup here in Louisville. The event should earn G.O. about $4500 to $5000.
It is also that time of year for Vicki and I to start thinking about budgets and hopping back on the fundraising trail. We’ve been so busy with ministry we’ve not kept up with our own fundraising development very well. We’ll be giving that some attention in the coming days.
If you’ve considered supporting us monthly, or dropping us a one-time gift, we welcome it. You can send in a check or give through the Paypal link to the right. We could use a little boost after losing some significant support recently.

More Books = AWESOME!!

Thanks to Harold Mckee at www.mccmissionteam.wordpress.com, Anne Jackson at www.flowerdust.net, and Pete Wilson at www.withoutwax.com we have received over 100 books in Spanish for the Pastors and their new library. These were purchased from Amazon.com in 2 days time. When we got back to the office from the Dominican Republic I had stacks of boxes on my desk.
Our original Amazon list had only 19 titles. It has sense been updated to 60 different titles. If you’d like to pick up a book choose one from the list at the bottom of this page. Every purchase you make through our site from Amazon will earn us 4% back for the purchase of more books for the Pastor’s Library.
I’m leading an exploratory trip on August 18th and am looking forward to dragging 100lbs of books down there with me. Pray I get through customs without too much fuss. I’ll have a hard time not looking like a book dealer. Better then looking like another kind of dealer I suppose!
Thanks to everyone who has contributed to this effort!
Much love and appreciation!
Jeff and Vic

The Pastor's Library...

Books collected and ready to be sent to the DR Pastor's Library

Dominican and Haitian pastors are starving for information about the Bible and ministry. They do the best they can with what they have but for the most part they do not have the resources available to them to further their own education. The resources are either unavailable or too expensive.

Bit by bit we are making an effort to improve this situation. Currently we have a few professors and teachers committed to coming down regularly to do intensive on-going training with the pastors. Now, in addition to that, we are finally establishing a modest library for the pastors in Santiago.

Many have purchased books I’ve asked for and had them shipped to our office state side. Others have made special gifts to the ministry specifically for books and tools for pastor education and given me the freedom to buy what we need. I just purchased 30 two volume sets of church history and theology books that will be used for the first installment of the History and Theology of Christianity being offered to the pastors in the fall.

Logos has offered us amazing comprehensive Bible study software in Spanish for $145 a license. It is normally $200. The software is comprised of 150 different books, commentaries, Biblical encyclopedias, lexicons and so on. With this tool the pastors will be able to work with Greek and Hebrew in a way that was completely inaccessible before and also get an enormous amount of study out of a smaller amount of time. We just need some more funding for the software as well as a few basic (but hopefully new) laptops to run the programs on.

We’d welcome any help towards the goals of building the library and study lab (Logos Software plus laptops). Follow http://www.amazon.com/gp/registry/wishlist/2910E2F5ULSYK/ to see the list of books we would like on Amazon. They can be shipped to our state-side office at:

Attn: Jeff Rogers
G.O. Ministries, Inc.
11501 Plantside Dr. suite 14
Louisville, Ky 40299

We will open the Pastors’ Library in mid-August. Some of the pastors are already buzzing about it!

If you have any questions please feel free to contact me.

Jeff

Partnership in Action...

It was great today to see Pete Wilson and Moise Jean discussing life and ministry in the window of a church Pete’s church is helping to build for Moise’s ministry and congregation. This is what G.O. Ministries is all about, creating partnerships in ministry between American churches and indigenous churches abroad. It is awesome to see men of God and leaders of God’s people enjoying the same work though in different cultures, together.