NTM

Its what comes from being a foreigner – visas. Sometimes everything goes smoothly and sometimes not. We had the opportunity to add a visa story to our collection today when we received a call from our son Isaac.

We had left him to the bus station early in the morning to take the two hour trip to Dublin airport to fly back to the States after his Christmas break.  You can imagine our surprise to get a phone call at lunch time to say he was back in Belfast.  His visa was not in order and was not allowed to travel.  So, we need to go to the US Consulate and see about rectifying the problem.

Pray with us that he would get the issue fixed ASAP so he doesn’t miss too many days college.  Thank the Lord with us for another reminder of what it is to be a foreigner and that, in reality, we are strangers and sojourners on this earth with our citizenship in heaven.  Just one of the perks of missionary work.

Have you a good "visa story"?  Let us know!  Write us at james_hatton@ntm.org.

For the past year, the presidential election has hardly been out of the news. Finally, the day has come to make a choice between the republican and democratic messages. Every eligible US citizen has the right to vote. Whether they do our not is again a matter of choice.

Far from the White House in Washington are millions of men and women that have no choice. Its not just that they don’t have the choice to vote for one or other of the presidential candidates. They don’t have the choice to believe a message that is a matter of life and death, the message of the gospel of Jesus Christ. They have no choice because they have never heard.

Some 10,000 people groups have yet to hear of Jesus Christ, 3,000 of these are tribal peoples. These are the people groups that NTM have been focusing on for the past fifty years. Over the course of these fifty years, NTM has developed training to prepare men and women to tackle the specific issues involved in planting churches among tribal peoples.

Needless to say, the first phase of training is Biblical. There are two big reasons for this. First, the Bible is the primary tool in planting churches. It is the Bible that is the word of life. Second, missionaries not only need to know about the Bible but have learned to apply the Word of God in their daily walk with God. The goal is to equip believers to interpret and apply the foundational truths of the Bible.

The next phase of training equips men and women with practical helps in culture and language acquisition, principles of literacy and translation and methods of church planting including how to teach the Bible to those who have never heard. The training answers the question, where do you start to plant a church among tribal people.

The goal of trainer and trainee are one. Every church that is established, every group of believers that is discipled and given the scriptures in their own language is not just the work of one or two individuals. It is the work of a team seeking to bring the message of the gospel of Jesus Christ to tribal people so they too have the choice to believe and be saved.

NTM only exists because the church has been commissioned by God to make disciples of all people groups. NTM is a response by the church to adequately equip and sustain its men and women in fulfilling this commission among the tribal peoples of the world. Ultimately, NTM is God fulfilling his promise to bless all people groups. He wants to give every man and woman the choice to believe.

Why did Achan’s family have to suffer for Achan’s sin? Should Christians use fleeces like Gideon? Why did God pick Saul for Israel’s first king? Just some of the questions raised while teaching Old Testament History at NTM’s Biblical and Missionary Training Centre in England.

I had the joy of teaching Old Testament History at the BMTC for the past three weeks to a class that included six nationalities. I was nervous to start off with but gradually felt more and more at home. However, teaching Joshua was immediately applicable to my own situation. Right after a great victory at Jericho, Joshua was facing defeat at Ai and was deceived by the Gideonites. I had started off teaching very conscious of my need of God but was being warned as I taught to keep on depending and not be tempted to think, “I can do this!”

Lisa and I join the staff permanently in January of next year. Pray for the students that they will be diligent in their studies. Pray for us as we make preparations to move to England. I will be teaching but it is not clear what Lisa will be involved in, Pray that God will give us wisdom to find the ministry that will be most suitable for her.

What do…

Aaron from USA
Andrea from USA
Andy from Germany
Barry from England
Boris from Germany
Christine from England
Cornelia from Germany
Daniël from Netherlands
Inge from Netherlands
Irina from Germany
Jennie from USA
John from N. Ireland
Jon from USA
Kathy from England
Loes from Netherlands
Lyndsey from England
Marco from Italy
Matthew from England
Mervyn from Scotland
Micah from USA
Moses from Ethiopia
Regina from Germany
Regina from Germany
Ronald from Netherlands
Ruth from Brazil
Sam from N. Ireland
Samuel from Switzerland
Sandra from Switzerland
Sarah from USA
Stephanie from USA
Syntyche from Netherlands
Talitha from Netherlands
Witaly from Germany

…and James Hatton have in common?

We will be studying Old Testament History together from 7-24 October.

Pray for spiritual insight to see wonderful things from God’s Word.

Thanks

Have you ever had difficulty filling out forms when it comes to questions like ‘Permanent Address’. Over the years, we have puzzled over this and similar questions as we never quite know what to answer.  Over the past thirty years we don’t seem to have lived anywhere permanently.

The Lord has been gracious to provide for us to purchase a home in N. Ireland and one of the benefits will be to have a ‘permanent address’ that will make filling out forms that much simpler!

Just this week, our offer for a house in N. Ireland was accepted and the legal wheels are beginning to turn.  We hope to take possession the end of October.  We are looking at it as a place for our family to call home as they come and go around the world.  Indeed, we don’t see it as a place where we will settle down but rather, a place where we can launch out from and return to.

God has used the process to challenge our thinking.  We have been challenged not to covet, to be grateful and to have an eternal perspective on property, among other things.  It has been a thrill to be challenged to be transformed by the renewing of our minds.

We are grateful to all who prayed and provided and to the Lord that he would be so kind as to give us this place that we can call home until he comes and calls us home to be with him forever.

Since coming home to Belfast, N. Ireland at the beginning of July, we have been to North Cotes to see our daughter, Martha, graduate after completing her missionary training. She will be returning in September to do an additional linguistics course for one year. We plan on joining the staff there in January, so we will enjoy overlapping with her for part of that time. We were involved in a week long camp organized by our church I was responsible to do the talks in the evening, Lisa was leading devotions each morning with the leaders and Deborah and Martha also joined in as leaders. We enjoyed being able to minister to and with the leaders and trust that the seed sown will bear fruit in time. We are busy looking for a house so as to establish a family home in N. Ireland. It is tiring and exciting and discouraging. We have been living in a fully furnished home loaned to us by friends from our church. It really has been a God-send. However, we would like to get a home soon so as to be able to settle before heading off to North Cotes in January. Our crates from the States arrived safely, only one bowl broken so far as we know. Now we just need a place to put it all!!!! Pray for Deborah as she looks for a job and seeks to develope a network of friends here in NI. She had to leave the States because she couldn’t get a visa to work. She has a heart to be involved in ministry along the lines of her post in the States and has had some encouraging conversations but nothing concrete as yet. We would appreciate your prayers as we adjust to living back in N. Ireland, for preparations for our ministry at North Cotes and that the Lord would help us find a suitable house for our family.

Moving On!

Our time at NTBI, Jackson is almost over after nearly three years. We are in the midst of sorting, selling, shipping and packing for our return to the UK at the end of June.

The plan is to take up a new ministry at the New Tribes Biblical and Missionary Training Centre in North Cotes, England in January 2009. Lisa and I will be doing more of the same, preparing young people to take the gospel to tribal people around the world.

We will be in N. Ireland for six months. We need to take time to help our daughter Deborah who will be returning to Ireland after eight years in the States.

Martha and Isaac will be finishing up college next year and will need a place to go, so we will be looking for a place to call home in N. Ireland for the Hatton family.

While we look forward to being closer to our elderly mothers and family back in N. Ireland, we will certainly miss the kids and grandkids here in the States. We would appreciate your prayers during this time of upheaval.

• For strength and stamina for the packing and moving.
• For Deborah’s adjustment to N. Ireland.
• For a place to call home in N. Ireland.
• For opportunities to share the vision of tribal missions.
• Leaving kids and grandkids in the US.