Tag: New Covenant Church Plant

October 2012 Philippines Conferences/Ministry Update

Roberto and Marcion, my “bodyguards” in Pantukan. Yes, that is a 9mm Glock on Roberto’s hip. Usually it was out of site.

This is a “brief” summary of my three weeks of ministry and what our Lord provided and accomplished for His glory.
I left Buffalo at 11:35 AM on  Thursday October 4  ( arrived back home on October 26) and arrived in Manila at 11:50 PM October 5. Spent the night in Manila and flew to Davao City on Saturday, October 6. On Sunday the 7th, I preached at our church in Davao. Later in the afternoon we travelled 1.5 hours to Pantukan in a borrowed vehicle we were test driving for two weeks, with a view toward making a down payment. It saved us many pesos over the two weeks of travel on the east side of the island.

Monday Oct 8, after teaching at the Pantukan Government office, we began our conference for three days in Pantukan. All of our attendees came from Pentecostal churches, and have been requesting a conference for 2 years.
On Wed, I taught 120 Jr High School children at the public school. Both of these events are part of the Government sanctioned Moral Recovery Program for officials and schools, of which we are a part by invitation.
After our conference, we had a down day in Pantukan, and I was given a wonderful birthday party by my Filipino family.
I was assigned two police bodyguards, because there are some extremist rebels up in the mountains behind the banana plantation behind the property. Usually not a problem, but with the back and forth commuters everyday and knowing an American is present, it was just a safety measure. Those guys were great.
We talked and laughed…alot.
On Friday, we traveled to Carmen, a 4 hour trip, our newest church.
On Saturday I went on visitations in the mountains with our Pastor, Ray and his wife Linda, and Ernie. I preached at our Carmen church on Sunday AM. Later we traveled to Kalinan, 1/2 hour, where I was asked to preach at the evening service.
We started our conference there the next day hosted by Pastor Felix, at a Bible Baptist church, with a mix of three of our pastors, some Baptists, Pentecostals and CMA and 10 more attendees than we planned (20) for, but our budget was still met with no overage. We (Ernie, Dorcas, Ian and me) bunked at the church in the Elementary School room on tables with swimming pool mattresses we brought with us 3 years ago.
On Tuesday, our friend and brother Pastor Bobbi Badillio attended. Yes,this is Bobbi who has had me teach at the Police Academy and do a broadcast that goes to Malaysia, Indonesia and Philippines the past two years… and yes, we headed there Tuesday evening to do both, live from the Academy.
I taught at Wed. eve prayer service as well.
We left for Cagayan DeOro on Thursday, a 9 hour trip by bus, stayed  in Opol, with Ernie’s brother and sister in law, like last year, where we have our church and was there for Sunday A.M. That afternoon we travelled to the other side of the city where we stayed for our conference for three days with Pastor Jesse, who hosted us, not one of our churches but a Southern Baptist fellowship. Another 30 attendees. There were 50 requests… maybe next year.

Our study was in Hebrews. Obviously, not a verse by verse but we had three goals in mind with the chapters we did use.
1. Beginning with the  Chapter1 v.1-2 we laid the foundation for the author using the Historic-Redemptive approach of seeing the Big Picture of Redemptive History.
2. Christ is the priority of Scripture and our hermeneutic. He fulfilling His redeemer role and all that includes as Isaiah’s Servant and so on.
3. The contrast of the Old Covenant and the New Covenant by the authors use of OT passages being applied in the NT scriptures to explain the purpose and nature of the New Covenant. This took us to Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Exodus, Psalms, Isaiah, 2 Cor.3 –  directly from texts in Hebrews.
For the first time, many saw that the Doctrines of Grace are biblical, and nothing to be afraid of if properly understood and applied. They have mostly been exposed to  the cult of Hyper-Calvinism.
5. None had a problem with grasping the Incarnality of Christ as the New Covenant in His person and was a joyous revelation from the Scripture.

We are praying and making  plans for our full time conference center and Bible Institute in Pantukan, where Ernie lives on a property that belonged to Dorcas’ family.
This includes digging a deeper well and providing a pump and water lines to an outside comfort room, kitchen and into the house. At present, Ernie must travel 2.3 km one way each day for fresh drinking water. Once the well is updated, we can treat it with chlorine and have potable water on site, pumped into the house and other facilities.
We are planing to add another building to be a bunkhouse/guestroom for up to 20.
Final phase (as long as it takes) is to tear down the older building that is termite infested, and make that our lecture hall with two guest rooms upstairs.
Our current outdoor lecture hall will become an outdoor kitchen
We can function well without the 3rd phase as we grow the Institute.
Plans are moving forward for completing our building in Carmen.
These are our needed vehicles to help with for many projects as we are looking to the Lord in prayer.

Our outdoor classroom

View from the road and outdoor comfort room and shower

Ministry vehicles/ Future Bunkhouse area

Old outdoor kitchen- eventual lecture hall and two guest rooms upstairs

Cost of well project…$750.00 we were able to pay for this since I returned

Bunkhouse… approximately $2000.00

2 story lecture hall/guest rooms approximately $7500.00

Ministry vehicles.  Motorbike  $75.00/month through September 2013 (one year already paid off)
Passenger-equipment van      $313.00 per month until October 2013 ( we already made a downpayment and two payments)

Once we have all our church buildings completed in Carmen  and Opol (update on Opol at a later date) and we will also establish a church at our site in Patukan, we will partner with the government and provide public school education, as free as possible.  We will start with Kinderschool and then once that class advances, add on 1st grade and so on, building from the bottom up, as an outreach to the communities. We will follow a government curriculum for the basics, including native languages and English and we can also teach ANYTHING else we desire. We do not need any special teaching certifications. The government sees churches willing to participate as a plus ( it saves them money in many communities) and accept the fact that pastors read, study, write, etc.  Public education costs $200.00 per student. Many families cannot afford this. We hope to provide this education for as close to $0.00 as possible with the help of others. If we can help children to read and write, they can have more of a future.

Our church family in Carmen

Pantukan Conference


Kalinan Conference

Cagayan De Oro Conference
We already have a number of pastors, at least 25, asking us when we can start the Bible Institute classes. Pastor Jesse has already offered us his building as an extension campus on the other side of the island in Cagayan DeOro. We are putting together a curriculum, I have an academic advisory board on this side of the pond and we are working on a budget. There will be NO tuition. Most of the pastors we would work with are subsistence farmers. There will be no textbooks. Some of our course work will be translated into Cebuano or Visayen. I am looking into a pdf reader that is made in China that only costs about $32.00 ea. Most cell phones have mp3 players. Our lectures will be distributed on dvds and audio, at least that is the plan for now.  We will video many lectures here and upload them to Ernie. He can translate, when necessary as the videos are playing, although, most times, English will be sufficient.

There is so much more I could share, so if you like, write me or call, or Skype, or Google Hangout and I’ll share all you want. Of course you can follow our entire four year history on our blog at www.fbceny.org/blog and our website www.fbceny.org . This includes our relationship with  Christian Aid as a recognized indigenous ministry and being chosen as a disaster relief arm when needed. The church building in Carmen as you see it, came from funds Christian Aid raised on our behalf. I will have more pictures than posted here on our blog and maybe a few more details. These are just the facts, not  the great personal moments of being with our brothers and sisters on Mindanao Island.
Just because you are a small fellowship of believers does not mean you are limited as far as God’s sovereign purposes are concerned. We are only five families at NCBF and we did not go looking for this mission.

The Lord has provided for these things with help from friends like you and from some resources we have by not being a “traditional ” church.

 

Philippines Update.

As we have previously reported, we are the feet on the ground for Christian Aid in Mindanao, concerning the recent floods and loss of life and property there.  Ernie has just returned from Caygan De Oro having distributed materials such as clothing food, health items and other needed essentials. Chritian Aid raised $11,677.00 for that relief and entrusted our ministry with the distribution. God is gracious and we love serving Him in multiple ways through our church planting, evangelism and pastor training work via TheoDoulos Church Planting Movement.

Pastor Ambin’s wife is returning from Dubai this week, and they will be moving into the new small parsonage we built for them in Pamuhatan on our church property there. Again, thank you to all who helped with that project. She was in Dubai for a year doing  domestic work, to earn money, so Pastor Ambin could continue to serve the church and our tribal work on a near full time basis. He has a small income driving people  for rice pickups with his motorcycle. This is how committed our partners are in Mindanao, many of whom are only substance farmers.

Temporary sheters are being built on our two newest parcels of property in Opol and Carmen. Pictures will be posted soon.

I will be teaching three conferences this year in October, between Oct 6 and October 26.

We may have to move the location of one. It is , well not in the center, but near the area of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF), Manila forced the Islamist group to cut its links with various terror groups to whom it had offered sanctuary.

The MILF is one of the groups which is fighting for the creation of an Islamic state on Mindanao where it controls a few provinces.

So, we are looking at our options,. Not as much of a threat for the Filipino’s  but with ther foreign guy with them, it is more of a potential target.

I’ll post my schedule soon and our budget for the conferences. Remember, we charge nothing to our attendees. We cover all costs at about $30.00/person for 4 days.

Thanks for your prayers.

 

Thank you for your prayers.

Philippines Update-Lots of News

Dear brethren,
This is a big update for us.
1. The parsonage in Pamuhatan will be finished this week. We were able to put together a final $350.00 to finish the project.
2. Our bible study in Carmen, with Brother Ray at the helm, had its first official Sunday service as a church, last Sunday, with 22 in attendance.
3. I have mentioned Christian Aid Mission before.This is one of the Mission Insider updates. Ernie sent the pictures after being interviewed by Steven Van Valkenberg, the SE Asia representative we have been working with. We are now listed as one of their recognized Indigenous Ministries under the name of Theos Doulos Church Planting Movement. They have listed us for prayer, with a picture of our tribal meeting in their monthly newsletter/brochure for Feb 1. At present the  electronic version Prayerline link is not working. At the website, Bob Finley’s book is a must read if you are serious about true indigenous work. He has , after 50 years, just stepped down as CEO of ChristianAid Mission. As I have mentioned in the past, Deborah  and I have supported work through Christian Aid for over 20 years.Christian Aid Mission :: Philippine Flood Survivors Say Hundreds of Children Were Snatched from their Beds – Print

4. They are raising funds for the Cagayan Flood victims, and from what Ernie told me this week, our ministry will be the conduit for distribution.
5.Another pastor who attended our conferences the past two years, want to join us to do a work among tribal peoples in the mountains. Please pray for Brother Philippe.
Remember, at present, we are not able to support any of our fellow pastors, except Ernie, our lead man, with any regular support. I will detail  all of our 5 pastors backgrounds, again, in another update.  The funds we have raised, with your generous help, have helped us with some property needs, where we cannot rent (in the mountains) and with our pastor training conferences.
6. Pastor Ernon, our Pentecostal brother who hosted our  recent conference in  October 2011, in Cagayan informed Ernie that he and his  wife just returned from a meeting with a large number of Penetecostal pastors, where he taught the materials I presented at the conference, including biblical theology , a redemptive historical perspective and what all that means regarding NCT. THey want to know more and are willing to walk away from things they have come to understand as not being biblical in their approach to Scripture. If you recall, brother Ernon’s and the church made this approach their official policy for training teachers and ministry people in their church after our conference. Lord willing, this years conference will focus on the same things, but rather than primarily topically, doing it all in the context of Hebrews. We may even be able to do some teaching at a Bible College. An instructor who is a church member discussed this with me while there in October. You may also  recall that two of the  “pastor’s” were women and questioned their role as such as they began studying in a different way during the conference.
7. This  week, Ernie will baptize 3 new believers in the ocean, in Davao city at our “mother church” plant.
Once Pastor Ambin is moved in in Pamuhaten, he will plant a new work from there, about an hour down the Federal Highway.
8. Our new bible study in Lacsun is meeting resistance form the Catholic  Defenders. We are praying it through.
9. Our tribal work in Buhangninan ( up the road form Pamuhatan) has been disrupted by some political and low level insurgencies which has caused many of our families to leave the area. We are praying for the Lords direction in rebuilding/regathering this work.

We will upload some pictures of the new building soon. Ernie will be there next week and also in Cagayan doing some post- flood counseling.

Well that is  all for now.
Thank you for your prayers and support for His glory.

Philippines Update#2-October 2011 Trip

Well friends, this is finally getting up. I had a busy schedule upon my return. Some more video will be added soon and some pictures. We have many. More will be posted at ourwebsite. I will update you.

We did two conferences, one in Davao City and one in Cagayan De Oro and I taught at two of our church plants – Davao and Cagayan (Opol). I also had the opportunity to teach the Police Academy Cadets, again this year in Davo. Pastor Bobby broadcast that meeting on his radio program.  I also did his Saturday night  program and he broadcast our final conference meeting in Davao.

Our conferences focused on Biblical Theology and New Covenant Theology as hermeneutical standards. It produced, by God’s grace, some very interesting results, which are mentioned in the video. The video is too long – 30 min.- to post here, so follow the link UPDATE.

This week we have a carpenter building a home for  Pastor Ambin at our mountain church property in Pamuhatan, so his commute to the church and the work  further in the mountains in Buhanginan among the Bogobo, is more easily travelled to each week. I will add some pictures by tomorrow.

 

 

 

Philippines Update

I am returning to Davao City and Cagayan De Oro in October. I will be there from October 13-November 1.  We will do two pastor’s conferences, one at Hope Mountain in Davao and one at Word of Life Camp in Cagyan De Oro, the locations are the same as last year. We are adding two church conferences, one each at our church plants in Davao and Cagayan De Oro/Opal. We have a third church in Pamuhatan and you can read about all of  them in previous blogs or at www.fbceny.org

Ernie , our lead elder, is  scheduled for surgery for a cyst removal from his inner nose. Funds to pay for this were made available to us ands I sent them via Western Union.

We are currently raising funds for our work in October. Airfare has already been paid in advance, by faith. I usually pay my own way, but this year the airfare was $650.00 more for the international flight and the church decided that they desire to raise at least half of my airfare. The in-country airfare has been covered.  A more detailed accounting will be included in a link once I post the video.

I am preparing a video newsletter that will be posted here and at our website. I hope to have it finished by the end of this week.

Philippines Update:New Location in Davao

Ernie and family have moved to a new location in Davao City. This accomplishes three things:

1. They are living with his sister in law. This will be much more affordable

2. There is property adjacent to the house that will be developed for a meeting place

3. More of our brethren attending the church are from that side of DavaoCity, so transportation will be cheaper and a shorter distance travelled.

We will need about $1200.00 to level the land and build a basic structure.Presently the church meets in the house, although it is small, so all are not yet able to attend at one time. We are praying through alternatives for this until the structure can be built.

Two new disciples study groups are continuing and a bible study at the largest mall in Mindanao in Davao City has begun.

We have 14 baptisms planned in Pamuhatan and our work in Cagayan De Oro is growing out of the present building.

Philippines Update – September Trip

I will be adding photos, links, and a full report soon but to get you started, here is a half hour interview with Ernie, our church planting pastor in Davao City.  Ernie oversees all four of our works in Davao, Pamuhatan, Baganihan and Cagayan De Oro.


Davao Church Update-New Tribal Bible Study

Ernie (in the blue shirt) and Pastor Bosay from our church in Pamuhatan,  received permission from the tribal chieftains to start a new bible study.  20 were in attendance not counting children. This meeting was held in Baganihan on Friday, June 11.   Our upcoming Sept-Oct 2010 pastor conferences and evangelistic meetings report can be found here –  Davao-update

New Covenant Church in Davao

Here are pictures of the roof repair of our church plant meeting place in Pamuhatan and pictures of the pastors from Pamuhatan who attended the mini-conference at Ernie’s home/church building. The conference focused on aspects of understanding New Covenant Theology and was based on a conference I taught on Samal Island last April.You will notice a small home with an extension to the front in one picture. That was the original meeting area for the church meetings. The new structure needing repair is on a neighbor’s property which was given to us for the church to put up a larger structure. We secured the property with a gift to the family. They did not want to sell it. [new covenant theology]

New Covenant Events in Davao

Last week Ernie was able to visit Pamuhatan and fix the roof. The damage was from heavy rains caused by the typhoons up north in Manilla a few weeks earlier. Pictures will posted once I get them.
I had my weekly chat with Ernie this morning.
Here is an update on how things are moving along with Ernie, the pastors mini-conference at his home this past week ( he translated all of the seminars on aspects of New Covenant Theology that I taught last year into Bagobo for this conference), church planting hopes and ideas for further pastor training and a conference in the Philippines this year, Lord willing. Our church planting efforts are as Sovereign Grace Baptists committed to a continued understanding of New Covenant  Theology as a biblical theology .

jenefaed: hello Joe.
josephkrygier: Hello my brother.
jenefaed: how are you brother?
josephkrygier: I am well and looking forward to hearing about the time with the men.
jenefaed: Dorcas and Ian are with me now. By God’s grace we finished the meeting yesterday with joy in our hearts.
josephkrygier: :Hi Dorcas and Ian
jenefaed: hello brother joe..this is ian….i am with my father i did not go to work today so i have the time to come with him… GOD bless.
jenefaed: hello brother joe. this is dorcas. this is my first time to come with ernie in your chat time. please say my hello to deborah and please do hug her for me. GOD BLESS YOU AND I MISS YOU BOTH.
jenefaed: By God’s grace the meeting was succesfully done wwith the help of our Awesome God. there were only 7 of the ten who attended the meeting because the other pastors didn’t shown up.
josephkrygier: I will do so when Deborah gets home.She just left for work.
josephkrygier: Seven is still a good number for the purpose we hoped for.
josephkrygier: One of our pastor friend is trying to see if his church can raise some funds for us to visit again this year as we discussed, in early July. I’ll will keep you updated.
josephkrygier: How did the men respond to the teaching?
jenefaed: 5 of them decided to join our ministry for the Tribal church planting ministry. That is the reason why they decided to join us because of the good teaching we have, they really appreciated the lessons from our seminar last April.
josephkrygier: That is an answer to prayer.
jenefaed: Brother Joe, as I look forward to our ministry it is going to grow with God’s blessing. There are some opportunity to plant new churches in different places in Mindanao.
josephkrygier: We are praying for that. Pray for me as I develop more of our ministry training studies for you.
jenefaed: As of now my heart’s desire is to start a new work in Cagayan de Oro but I’m still praying for more budget for this plan.
josephkrygier: . Is that where your mom is? What kind of budget is needed to start? By the way, in 2-3 weeks I will start a series on Ephesians at our fellowship. Right now in Sunday School I am doing some thematic studies in Acts.
jenefaed: yes, it is the place where my mom lives. the budget I need is for transportation and for my food as I stay in CDO, in my brother’s house. I would appreciate if you can send me some copies of your new lessons.
jenefaed: The pastors who attended the meeting decided to meet again in February and they want to have a regular meeting once a month for training. I don’t know if I can do this because of the insufficiency of funds.
josephkrygier: Ok. How many times a month would you like to get Cagayan de Oro? Figure a budget for the travel and food. I will send you lessons via email as they develop. I have added 3 messages to the Who Do Men Say I am series I have sent you. When I finish this I will send the final ones. I think you have the first 18.
jenefaed: yes I have and I put them in a book bind files. I started to study them so I can use it for our next meeting with the pastors.
josephkrygier: Ok. Budget me the cost for the five men for a monthly pastors training meeting. We will pray. Then perhaps we can at least plan for a couple of months ahead and see how God continues to provide once we start. We have another brother who has given us some funds for NCBF Davao to use as we decide what is most important.
jenefaed: I think it would be good that I can get to CDO once a month or twice a month depends upon the development of the studies.
josephkrygier: I will also be developing the studies you requested on church leadership and so on. These we will be on dvd and I will send them when completed. I will also record the Ephesians and Acts studies for you. If I am able to come this year I want to do the Sermon on the Mount for a pastors meeting as we discussed last April, but if I cannot, I will record and send it.
josephkrygier: At this time if I can come, do you think it would be better to do a conference for whoever could come like last time or focus on the pastors who will be working with us and a few others who really benefited from our last confererence?
jenefaed: thanks, but I am very optimistic that the Lord will provide all you need for our seminar this year. You are really needed that you can come. I have to choose those pastors who attended last year and we will invite the pastors who are really committed to work with us because we will continue establish a new covenant church here in Davao, the one in Pamuhatan and beyond.
josephkrygier: When you get some time, get some information on a place for a conference that would be convenient and thinking about having some of the expenses possibly on a scholarship like last year but charging something for those who could contribute, if we do something with a larger group.
josephkrygier: We could also plan another ladies seminar if Deborah is coming along.
jenefaed: I would suggest if you agree with me that we will make our seminar in CDO this year if we have a good result of our Bible study there.
josephkrygier: Agreed.
jenefaed: okey, next week I will be in CDO to start a new bible study and I will let you know what will be the development.
josephkrygier: Excellent. Also, remind me of when school registration fees are due. We have a couple studying at seminary who want to support a student for next school year.
jenefaed: yes I will but most probably we offer the scholarship to the unbelievers because this is a ministry for the lost.
josephkrygier: I sent you an email concerning a mens retreat where i will be teaching in february where some of our think tank brothers are elders.
jenefaed: ok thanks.
josephkrygier: Yes. Will we have some guidelines like last time?
jenefaed: yes I will make some guidelines.
josephkrygier: ok.
josephkrygier: I saw your pictures with Dorcas on Facebook in your traditional clothes. Very nice.
jenefaed: It is the clothes of the Bagobo Tribe. I will let you know the budget for food and travel to CDO later.
josephkrygier: I thought so from pictures you have sent with Pastor Bosay and others in the pictures at the meetings in Pamuhatan.
jenefaed: the church building in pamuhatan is now temporarilly roofed with plastic trapal, I will send the pictures of it and our meeting activity.
josephkrygier: thank you. you did mention you got there last week to do the repairs.
jenefaed: I will send pictures tomorrow and Ian will do it for me.
josephkrygier: He will appreciate that. I will post them on the websites.
jenefaed: I want to talk with you more but my eyes is already “lowbat” tired.
josephkrygier: Understood. Rest them. Talk to you next week. We have much to pray and plan for, for Christ’s glory.
jenefaed: bye for now and our love to all the saints in your church family and to Deborah.
josephkrygier: Bye.

[new covenant theology]