Semuanya karena Yesus!
This month God has continued to give me great opportunities going into villages. It started by going into ‘salabulan’ village. It was a great day! We started out pretty early and to get there. And to get there we had to get on these old, big jeeps because the road was so rough. I climbed up on the top of the roof with the locals… it was an adventure just getting there! Banging around on top of that old roof! Haha.. I could barely sit down for 2 days after the trip! Hehehe.. The adventures continued when we got there. We were to do a baptism in the river.. Getting to the river was fun too.. Hiking through rice paddies and up and down mountains. And when we got to the river we had work to do before the baptism.. Catching fish .. With our bare hands! Haha. It was fun! That night we had an outreach in the local gathering place. I was shocked when I entered and two Muslim were sitting there waiting for it to start! It was a great night! Jesus was lifted high in that village!This month I spent a lot of time helping my team with different events: a children’s festival. A village outreach. A youth drama. Every event was a great success. At one of these events we were out in a village that is a pretty hard one.. Full of gangs and violence. But suprisingly when at the end we offered to pray for the people they all came up! There was a huge amount of them. So we all began praying for them. I was praying for an old grandma who had a very bad pain in her legs.. It hurt so bad that it gave her trouble walking. Sometimes her eyes would tear up because it hurt so bad. But after we prayed something awesome happened.. She began to walk and move without pain! She was smiling sooooo big! So I asked her to testify and we began to show the people what God had done! I saw she was walking so good so I grabbed her by the arm and we began to run! I heard the gasp of the crowd and their shocked faces! At the time I was thinking it was because they were just so suprised by what God had done for this grandma. But later when I thought about it. I realized maybed they were just so suprised by the weird white girl who was making old grandmas run! Hahahaha…
I’ve been having such a great time ministering to the women in the prison here. One week I was sharing God’s grace with them.. They really need to learn about God’s grace.. About how they can receive and enjoy what they are not worthy to.. Like us all! That day all the women were there crying and thanking God for His grace. It was soooo beautiful. Then one of the young girls asked us to pray. She was going to receive her sentence that day. It was supposed to be 15 years for murder! I can’t even believe this girl could murder someone.. God has changed her so much she is the sweetest little thing! That day we prayed.. And I came back the next week and she had good news. God had done a miracle! Her sentence was already down to 3 years! And could even be only half of that!! Wow!! How miraculous! After hearing that we all started to celebrate! Joy broke out in that prison cell!! We began to sing, clapping our hands, and rejoicing!
You’ve probably heard me talk about Herman before. He is a young guy here who I have taken in like my brother. He has become like my right hand man. Becoming an awesome leader! About a year ago he and I were talking about a dream we had to own a home where we could take in young people that have nowhere to go. At the time it didn’t seem possible.. But because we have already rented a place as a studio Herman has moved in and without even realizing it our dream started becoming reality! We have already taken in 2 young guys! One of them had a heavy drug addiction but has been set free! Jesus working in them is so beautiful! It is awesome to see such big changes in such a short amount of time! Now they are working along with me. Driving the bus, setting up the sound system.. taking part in every outreach! This is not easy work.. but already I see them sharing their testimony with others and I can see that it is sooo worth it! It reminds me of the story of the prodigal son. It is a joy to be like that father.. And just accept them all back in. When others, like the big brother reject them, we can be like Jesus and accept them in. And rejoice that they have come back… it doesn’t matter what they have done.. With the love and grace of God we embrace them in and bring them back home to their daddy, Abba Father!
One afternoon I was sharing that story at a high school. I was speaking to hundreds of young people. And I told them about their loving father.. At the end I just kept saying ‘pulanglah’ which means. ‘come back home’. Come back to their heavenly father who is waiting for them with open arms! The presence of God was awesome.. so still.. many of the young people began to cry as they experienced God’s awesome love touching them! Our Father is soooo good to us!
We started off this month by giving out food to a local area that is very poor. It was a great experience. We’ve done it before in that area. So they people recognize us and accept it well. It was so much fun climbing around with all the local children as they lead us to homes we never would have found without them! The sick even came out and asked for prayer! Even though we could just give a little food.. We knew we were sowing seeds to reach them with something so much greater.. Eternal life! Even while we were there radical Islam teachers came into the area warning the people not to accept us.. But the people still readily accept us.. Not because of us! But because the love of Christ is in us and touches them!
Please pray for us! Tomorrow we are leaving to go into Aceh, the Muslim province above us. The last time I went to this part of it we ventured into areas where no white man had ever gone before! It is sooo exciting to be able to take the gospel there! We plan to reach 4 villages next week! Thanks for keeping us in your prayers each day.. we’re expecting something awesome!
And… it’s not too early to start praying.. Mid April we are planning a huge youth outreach! In the city of Balige. This city has the 2nd highest drug useage and recently had some horrible events with youth.. including 7 youth dying after running from the police. Although the area is called ‘christian’ there are few who really believe in Jesus. Most of the population is still animists. They need a drastic change in the young people there.. only one can do that.. Jesus!! We are planning on at least 5,000 young people attending our music concert where they will hear the gospel! It’s going to be amazing.. you will make it possible!!
To end this email off: a little Indonesian humor! Indonesians have a weird sickness they call ‘masuk angin’. I might have written about this before. It actually means. ‘enter wind’. Bascially they believe that when they are hot their pores open and that the wind can enter their body and make them sick! And so often if you are feeling sick people will tell you it is because you had the bus window open or some other way the ‘wind entered you’. This month I went to go visit a young man in the hospital. He was rolling around in his bed writhing in pain, tears streaming down his face. Immediately I asked what was wrong. Their answer: ‘masuk angin’. Not kidding! So I asked what the doctor said. ‘masuk angin’. He sat too long and the wind entered him. Even after being here for over 4 years I couldn’t believe it.. oh well. I thought. Jesus heals us from every disease.. even the weirdest things we’ve ever heard of. Haha. So we prayed.. and by the time we left him he was sitting up doing fine!
This month I had a little incident.. most of my stuff was stolen. Including my camera, which I haven’t been able to replace yet. So I included some pictures. But I apologize some are quite old because most of my events this month weren’t captured.
Thanks so much for all your prayers and support that this month so great.. March is guaranteed to be another amazing month here!
SEMUANYA KARENA JESUS!! (All because of Jesus!!) Susan Joy
Pictures:
The local girls lead me on muddy path amounst rice fields to find more needy families that we could give food to.
This is one of the families we met there.. I was spending some time sharing with her. .that we brought food because we cared.. not because of us. But because God cared for this family.
Standing with the children there in that poor area.. you can tell by how the houses on the right are built how the living standards are there.
With friends at a special night to reach out and show love to our neighbours!
Infront of one of the houses we visit often in the prostitution village, with some of the girls there.
Team Fun Day. Our team, with some of our close workers and the boys in my home, take a day to enjoy beautiful lake toba.
This is ‘Biring’. She is an elderly woman who was a Muslim. But after receiving healing at one of our meetings she got saved.. that was 4 years ago!! and to this day she attends church! I met her one on the street one day. It was a happy reunion! And such an encouragement to see fruit from something 4 years ago!
Our team gathered around our pathetic attempt at celebrating Christmas Canadian style! Hahaha. (I said some of these pics were old! Hehe)
If you’d like to support Susan in Indonesia you can makes cheques payable to : CJI-Susan Hoover.
And send them to:
Celebrate Jesus International
Box 968
St. Catharines, ON
L2R 6Z4
Or you can call 905-646-0790 for more options.
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