NTM

What a blessing to honor our graduates this past May 18 here at NTM’s Missionary Training Center!  Sixty-seven students walked the aisle to finish their cross-cultural ministry training and receive their degrees!  The theme was, “Expanding the Reach of the Gospel” taken from Romans 1:16, “I am not ashamed of the Gospel, because it is the power of God for the salvation of everyone who believes…” State Representative – Dr. Wayne Cooper, a dear friend and strong community supporter of NTM brought the opening greetings and prayer. 

From the moment a missionary sets foot in the tribe, their life is a living, breathing example of God’s Word. But God’s Word not only needs to be seen it must to be introduced to the mind…stored in the heart …applied to life’s everyday situations. It’s what every missionary dreams of and prays for.

The application of God’s Word into tribal people’s lives requires a careful translation of the Bible into their “tongue” so they can read and understand it for themselves. This is all awesome in theory but how is possible to produce a meaningful scripture translation for people with no written language!? How will God’s Word ever be woven into their lives? Praise God, with Him all things are possible!

Here at MTC , we are training our missionary students to do just that with the teaching of phonemics. What is phonemics? Does it have to do with phones? No, and it’s not "techno" babel of a communication company either but it is related to communcation. Phonemics is the principle used in creating an alphabet. Our students are taught the processes and reasoning for not only learning and reproducing the way a language is spoken (verbal) but to also produce an alphabet for the language (written). Phonemics is this process which takes the “verbal” sounds in a language (only spoken) and produces a “written” form of those sounds (orthography-alphabet).

But just producing an alphabet is not enough! The people must be  taught to recognize and read their own alphabet if they’re to be introduced to the written Word of God in their own language. When the people begin to "read" God’s Word for themselves based on their own alphabet,  it’s light will boldly make an entrance where only darkness reigned before and it’s truth will penetrate their empty, searching souls, and engage them to turn their eyes to the life-changing person of Jesus Christ!

Sleet, ice, snow and cold! Snap…a tree limb falls to the ground! More sleet, ice, snow and cold! Thud…a power line pole with three transformers smashes to the frozen ground! Long into the night, one could hear the crack and severing of tree limbs and trunks under the weight of the accumulating ice. Limbs and trees fell on power lines! No more electric power.

For many there was no heat. Car doors were welded shut by the 3/4” think layer of ice! One small town was completely evacuated. Businesses and churches were closed. Many people were stranded in their homes as the roads were impassable! The Governor declared our little corner of the state a disaster area. The weather here in southwest Missouri has been the topic of conversation. It was the worst ice storm in twenty years! Many people, after two weeks, have recently had their power restored. We even cancelled classes here at the Missionary Training Center for a week.

But…crisis has an “up side” too! People tend to bond together caring and spending time with each other because there was no TV, Cable, Internet, Computer Games and other electronic gismos. In our home because of the power outage there were just old fashion “board games”, hide and seek in the dark and that lost art of conversing with each other around candles or kerosene lanterns. When the power returned and life got back to “normal”, it wasn’t long before my youngest daughter of nine said, “I wish the power would go off again because we spent more time together as a family when we didn’t have it.” Keep the candles handy! I’m thinking of throwing the main power switch off at my house at least one weekend a month!

   We certainly have many things to thank the Lord for this season; first and foremost – His Son, Who made Himself nothing; He took the humble position of a slave and appeared in human form!
   We also appreciate all the Lord is doing in the hearts and lives of our srudents. One student commented that, before coming here, he had fallen in love with the written Word and now he’s falling in love with the Person whom the Word is written of! We desire for the Word to come alive to them and be relevant in everyday, practical living!
   Part of this first semester included a Field Fair. All of our fields we work in were represented before the candidates to help make them aware of what God’s doing around the world and just where He might have them fit in His work of making disciples.

Praise the Lord for the 84 new Missionary Training Center’s missionary candidates!

Pray for Dave to find answers to his health needs.

Pray for increased monthly financial support. The Moughs are currently at 40% of NTM’s recommended support level.

Dave has not been able to operate at his best lately.  For about three weeks now he has not been well at all.  We would appreciate your prayers for Dave to regain strength and for God’s direction in leading us to a doctor that can help.

Corissa is in the midst of applying for college.  This is all new territory for us.  By the time Lindsey is ready for college, our youngest, we should be pros at this kind of thing!  Anyway, we know Corissa would appreciate your prayers as we head through this process.

What seemed like the Lord closing one ministry was His way to open another.  We have a passion to see cultural minority groups reached with the Gospel and discipled to maturity in Jesus Christ.  The Lord has graciously allowed us to join the MTC team, the NTM Missionary Training Center here in Missouri. 

We now have the privilege of informing and inspiring future missionaries in church planting principles and methodolgy.  Right now the candidates are involved with Teaching Skills, Effective Parenting and Phonetics classes. 

We were excited to be part of serving as missionaries to "one" cultural minority group for the Gospel, but now we are thrilled to be reaching "many" people groups through training the candidates represented here for future ministry to the uttermost parts of the earth, by God’s grace. 

Dave has another module coming up titled New Testament Church Principles.  We ask your prayers on his behalf as he has not been well these last couple of weeks.  Pray that he will regain his strength and pray for wisdom as we ask the Lord where to direct us in regards to seeking out help from a doctor.  We appreciate you praying with us.  Thank you!