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Topic: Please Pray! Middle East Update~The Sherrods update
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Posted: 02/10/2016 at 1:52pm
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Please Pray! Middle East Update~The Sherrods Date: Sunday, February 07, 2016
Greetings beloved:
Wow! The last year has been so amazing with everything that has happened. Sure, there have been challenges, trials, tribulations. Sometimes, it hasn't been easy to keep going, BUT when we look back and see the beauty of God's love working in all things, overcoming the impossible, bringing His healing power, and restoring hope to the hopeless, it's worth any price we've had to pay and more. We are truly grateful for His hand and His leading. He is Light and the darkness flees before Him!
*SPECIAL ATTN:* We want to give everyone a thorough update as we have entered a brand new season. I am sending this, on Christy and I's behalf, as a regular email to my former list as well as our Mailchimp newsletter format so if you get this twice, this is why. The email will have some video links but only the newsletter has the pictures we include. We want to ask prayer from as many people as possible as we embark on this new year and all it has to offer. We believe there are great things in store this year, for all of us, and we know the power there is in prayer. So please lift us up in prayer! I also ask that you please respond if you only received the email (with no pictures) and would like to continue to receive our newsletters. You will then receive our newsletter (with pictures) as well. I want to create an accurate group list under my email too so if you receive the newsletter (with pictures) but not a separate email, please reply to let me know and add richardsherrod333@gmail.com to your address book. It will be easier at times for us to simply put out an email. This is a tool of the Lord we want to utilize more as it is so important to stay connected to the Body of Christ when you are on the front lines. Also, please watch the videos at the end to learn about the plight of our persecuted family, seeing them face to face!
*ZINA UPDATE:* Thank you to all who gave to this great need! We received over $5,000 to give to the Bashar family which was enough to take care of all pre-op chemo treatments and part of surgery! She had successful surgery 6 days ago and is recovering well! Continue to pray for continued provision and that immigration will be very quick. Pray they would come to the U.S. as they hope. Currently, they are approved to Australia but alot of their family is in the USA.
*WHAT HAVE WE BEEN DOING?* (A little review) After 3 fruitful years of ministering and pastoring in Jericho and Jerusalem, God directed us to Jordan. This was after ISIS had taken over northern Iraq and caused a mass diaspora of Christian and Yazidi refugees. We knew many came to Jordan for refuge and we also saw that Jordan is to be an end-time refuge Biblically. This is a very strategic country for the Lord. It went differently than expected as we essentially became refugees ourselves, not allowed to return back to Israel where we had our home, car, and most of our possessions! How is that for being able to identify with those you will minister God's love to? That was September 2014 and we jumped in wherever we could to help as we made new connections and sought the Lord for His positioning.
In January 2015, we began helping Canon Andrew White, aka the Vicar of Baghdad, with pioneering the work for his Foundation in Jordan, helping the Iraqi Christians, as he was not allowed back into Iraq under the circumstances. For the foundation, we started and ran a school for 250 Iraqi Christian refugee children, developed and managed a partnership with a medical clinic to treat 100's per month, and provided accommodation and food relief for as many as our budget would allow. Along with meeting the natural needs of those who come to Jordan with limited resources and are not allowed to work on top of that (a pretty impossible situation to find yourself in and the UN does not help the Iraqis), we also pray with them, encourage them, give them hope, and simply LOVE however the Holy Spirit leads. The spiritual aspect of being here is vital. We are to equip the saints, and release the kingdom! We have seen much fruit in praying for the sick and just loving on people who are hurt, broken and traumatized. We turned the foundation work over to a younger couple. We pioneered the work and now they are managing and improving it as they can. One concern we have heard recently is that many families we were helping previously have just been told they will no longer receive help. We left in September, and have heard great things about the work continuing but we will find out more...
*THE NEW SEASON:* Needing to renew our visas, we enjoyed some rest and ministry in Europe staying with some pastor friends and speaking to several churches. It was a great time of refreshing as Middle Eastern life is not necessarily easy. It has been a big adjustment in many ways going from Israel to Jordan in September 2014 and now God brought the beginning of another huge transition exactly a year later, September 2015.
We returned to Jordan from Europe and we hit the ground running as we were contacted to be the point people for a large sponsorship/immigration program with a church in the US. We registered 60 families in one project where they will all move to the same place and be cared for by the church. They will be able to stay as a community in their new home instead of being scattered all over the world! People are working diligently in high levels of the US government to make this happen. There is obviously resistance with everything that's happened overseas and in the US. The work is to get the Christians moved to the top of the list for immigration. The Christians and the Yazidis are the persecuted minority and should rightfully have high priority. If/when this project is successful, it can be a pilot program for other churches to do the same thing across the US. Please pray for this. We believe it is utmost in the heart of Abba Father to see His children relocated to safety where they can start a new life after losing everything they had. (Oh, and just so you know, these are engineers, construction workers, drivers, teachers, doctors, lawyers, dentists, business owners, carpenters, etc., not so different than you and me...)
*WHAT NOW?* We continue pastoring & discipling them, encouraging them, praying for them (their #1 prayer request is always to leave), helping and providing as we are able, to bring hope, to release His kingdom, His provision, His love & His goodness. We are ministering and sharing the good news to our persecuted brethren in churches and in homes. We are partnering with different organizations to continue relief efforts. I stayed past Thanksgiving to facilitate a huge relief effort helping 150 families with rent over 2 days with the same US church who wants to sponsor the group immigration. During this time, I also acquired 8 apartments for 9 families currently with rent paid for a year. (Rent is the biggest need for the refugees here.) 4 of these 9 families had been living in a literal box on church compounds for well over a year. Now we have moved them to much better conditions in safer areas of Jordan where there are many other Jordanian Christians as well. The great need will not end in the near future. *Will you consider how you can help?* These people are our family and they need our help. They need our prayers and support. The work is abundant and plentiful and we have made so many connections and relationships over the past year. The Jordan task now? continue relief, discipleship, prayer, seeking His kingdom as well as being available for new projects and the current immigration project. We are still connecting with new groups and new pastors here in Jordan as well. We don't exactly know what it will look like but we feel that what we are moving into this year is bigger than last year and we are pushing in to go through the huge door He has in front of us!
*HOW CAN YOU HELP?* We need your partnership! We ask that you please partner with us in prayer. We also need financial partners. Would you prayerfully consider a one time or monthly gift? We need partners for $25, $50, $100, and $200 per month. Would you pick one of these spots & become a partner in this crucial work? You'll be playing a vital part in helping the persecuted church in the Middle East. To give any amount, simply use PayPal to send to richardsherrod333@gmail.com or mail your gift to Richard Sherrod, P.O. Box 10068, Tampa, FL 33679. Thank you so much for your support! We can't do this without you.
Much love and tremendous abundance, Richard & Christy
There is great reason to believe and have high expectations. Let HOPE arise! For there shall be a latter day reign of the Spirit of YHWH! It is time for signs & wonders. You carry heaven inside of you! Jesus said to him, "If you can believe, all things are possible to him who believes." Mark 9:23
BONUS MATERIAL: A dear Christian woman who lived here in Amman (a friend's aunt) had visitations from Jesus for 2 years in 1933. He showed her many things which lend to her accuracy, such as WW2, the holocaust, and the creation of Israel as a nation. She also saw a great outpouring of Holy Spirit in Amman which would spread into the nations. This has not come to pass... yet. I believe God is positioning things for such a time as this. These Christian refugees who are here now are from the Cradle of Christianity and carry the DNA of the first church (which walked in signs & wonders). *There is an awakening on the way!*
*I believe God is ready to do some amazing things this year,* not only here (we've had several healings since returning in January) but in the US. The 100 year Asuza St. prophecy is a couple of years overdue and Lou Engle is doing the Asuza Now Call on the 110th anniversary of the beginning of this outpouring that launched the pentecostal explosion to over a 1/2 billion around the world. There was also a specific word with such beautiful confirmation for Alabama in 2008 which should have come to pass in 2011 and it has been delayed. Whatever the reason, I believe *THIS is the season! The time is now* and we are excited!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uSv4vBcFyvo Who Would Dare To Love ISIS? (A Letter from the People of the Cross)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1W0_vdkeFts An encouraging word for 2016
https://www.facebook.com/KSMIsrael/videos/10156129951385076/ Kings School of Media (KSM) in Jerusalem came to Jordan and filmed some of the people we helped in 2015. Many have traveled already but many remain.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R5NdFOxrPAE This is a longer, more in-depth film from KSM of the families we were helping and connected them to.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wuv393P2Ns0 Another great video to see who we are helping here and to know the kinds of stories they have. (by MORE International)
Richard Sherrod richardsherrod333@gmail.com
Edited by Moderator on 02/10/2016 at 2:00pm
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