March 03, 2013

StreetCry Newsletter March 2013


Dear Friends,


Thank you so much for your continued prayers, friendship and support! May the Lord bless you more and more with his abundant love, grace and mercy!

At the end of December we had the opportunity to hold two Christmas feasts in Tallinn for foreign students who were unable to return to their home countries for Christmas (see the pictures on the left and below). We served students from Latvia, Lithuania, Canada, India, Germany, France, Morocco, Italy, Spain, Iran, Pakistan, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, China, Bulgaria, Ukraine, Russia, Turkey, Brazil, Finland, Belorussia, Korea, Vietnam and Ecuador. We formed a house band specifically for the Christmas concert and also had many volunteers who helped in the kitchen, served the food and witnessed to people one on one. There were a number of visitors from Muslim countries who said that it was their first Christmas. After the feast, Iranian student Masoud made an appointment with Sara and Natasha to learn more about Jesus and the Bible. We were able to share the Gospel with him and answer  his many questions and give him DVD’s with testimonies of Muslims coming to Jesus. Your prayers for Masoud’s salvation are really appreciated!

Now we have regular fellowship  at the coffee-shop on Saturday nights. Jesus is constantly blessing us with wonderful times of worship and intercession. Almost every week we have new visitors and never miss the opportunity to share words of knowledge with them and to minister to them. One of our new friends is Raivo who just come back to the Lord last week. He came to the cafe to eat and picked up one of our Bibles to read. Nancy, one of our staff members talked with him and invited him for fellowship. Sara shared with Raivo the story about the prodigal son and he told us with tears in his eyes that it was the way he felt about himself. Later we found out that Raivo used to be a Christian but had backslidden into his old lifestyle. So, Sara lead him in a prayer of repentance.

We have been watching Todd White's videos about going out on the streets and praying for people. One of those nights our worship leader Imre experienced healing: one of Imre's arms had been several centimeters shorter to the point that his jackets were altered by a tailor. After watching a miraculous street healing while Todd was praying for a woman, Imre asked the Lord if He would grow his arm and he immediately witnessed it.


We Need Missionaries!!!!

Our ministry here in Tallinn is desperately in need of young missionaries to come and work with us here in the harvest field. Jesus said, pray to the Lord of the harvest that He will send laborers into the harvest. We need young people (18-30) to help in the cafe, do street ministry and use their God-given gifts. We could especially use musicians, singers and artistic people, but our needs are not limited to these types. We need to form a full worship band as well as an evangelism music team. We need people to come for 2-10 weeks during the summer or any time you might have available, and we also need people who can commit for 1-2 years or more. For more info please contact John at john.krossroad@gmail.com. Thank you! 

Ruthe Brookshire 

Our very dear friend, fellow laborer and ministry secretary for 9 years, Ruthe Brookshire has left for the mission field of South Africa. After going for a 3 month visit, Ruthe then itinerated for  support for 1 year’s living expenses. It was quite an undertaking, but God was with her, and we rejoice with her. We are always so excited when people hear the call of missions and follow through by doing what He tells them. Please keep Ruthe in your prayers.


In January God blessed us with two wonderful Swedish interns Matilda and Alicia (see the picture to the right: Matilda and Alicia in the middle front, with our staff members) who helped us at the cafe for two weeks. As a part of school practicum they were the only ones from their group to leave Sweden as volunteers. God sent them at the time when Sara and Dasha went to Russia for our Christmas feed-in there. The girls got witnessed by all our staff members  and John got a chance to sit with them and thoroughly share the salvation message. Matilda and Alicia enjoyed being here with us and told us that they felt safe and protected when with us, like with their own families. Before they left we gave them Bibles as presents. 


Last week we set up prophetic tables at the cafe and ministered words of knowledge to visitors who wanted it. We are now doing it 2 days a week. The first week we ministered to 5 people. One of them was a young man from Poland, Karol, a student at the Estonian Academy of Music and Theater. After receiving a word of knowledge Karol asked if he could comment on what he had just heard: he told us that we had read his diary. The other student, Christian, is a regular customer at the cafe as well. Since his first visit, he has been on Sara's heart and she has had several opportunities to witness to him. We believe that both of them were deeply touched by the words we shared with them, please join us in prayer for their salvation!


In our last newsletter  we shared how one person had come to Christ via the cafe ministry. Since then, 5 more have come to Christ.


Prison Ministry Update


After serving seven years of a nine-year sentence, Lilly (see her testimony in our August 2009 newsletter) was released from prison. It was a difficult but exciting journey of finding the Lord and learning to walk with Him in an environment full of ungodliness and resistance to the knowledge of Christ. During the last year we visited Lilly regularly, trying to encourage and support her on a personal level since we were not able to hold Sunday church services in prison any longer. She is thankful for the fellowship and Bible school classes she was able to receive that strengthened her resolve to follow Jesus. During the last two years she had on her heart to write to the president of Estonia appealing for clemency. She wrote to him several times and this month she was granted clemency. Praise the Lord! Please pray for Lilly that she will get plugged in to the body of Christ in Russia and continue serving God there. 


Russia



This year the Christmas feast in Russia (see the picture on the left) gathered 250 former drug addicts from several Christian drug rehab centers who are now completely free and serving God. Since last autumn our team members Sergey and Zhenya Abezin have been pastoring a church at a rehabilitation center in Saint-Petersburg. This year their center took the responsibility of organizing the feed-in which was a huge blessing.


For the last 4 years we had been renting a hall to have the feast but the owners have been raising the price each year. This time God opened the doors of a Swedish Lutheran Church in Saint-Petersburg and the pastor of the church didn't  want to take the money from us for renting the hall.

The feed-in was very encouraging and inspiring for us: for two and a half hours we had worship and intercession. Several men from the center’s gave powerful testimonies of how Jesus changed their lives, and there was a young man who prayed a very powerful prayer asking God to raise up and send laborers to the harvest field, and encouraging people to lay everything aside and commit their lives to Christ & ministry. Also, Sara had a chance to meet with some people who went through our rehab program at StreetCry who are now actively involved in ministry. What a blessing it was to hear how thankful they were to John when he came to Russia and committed his life to take care for them.
 
Mozambique


Lana has returned for furlough and will be returning to IRIS Ministries in April leading outreach teams into Kenya. Natasha has also been accepted to the IRIS school of ministry and if she is able to raise support, she will be leaving for Mozambique in June. If God puts it on your heart to help support either Lana or Natasha, support can be sent through our office.


Please join us in prayer for:
  • Laborers to join us here in Estonia
  • More souls coming to Christ at the cafe and on the streets
  • Blessing and protection for Ruthe in South Africa
  • Boldness for all of the staff to minister
  • Fruitful, effective training of Estonian brethren to minister and lead others
  • The raising up of anointed effective evangelism band and worship team
  • Favor with the authorities
  • An abundance of finances to cover our costs, finances and debts
  • Finances for Lana's full-time missions work
  • Finances for Natasha going to IRIS school of ministry 


Thank you and God bless!

John, Sara and the StreetCry team