June 2025 Missions Update

 Dearly Beloved,

Happy new month. We praise God for the gift of life and the privilege of permitting us to be among His harvest force in June 2025. God has been very gracious to us on all fronts. We have bountiful harvests of souls across some of our mission fields, as well as a consolidation of discipleship efforts.

We choose to be economical with reports of conversions, discipleship efforts, and locations for security reasons, but please pray that God continues to strengthen our missionaries and prosper our labor.

Church Building Projects

Kobonka church building on top.
and Tugan Yaqub below

As we build lives through our discipleship efforts, we also make efforts to ensure that we build churches in every village where we have converts and there is no church building. Most of the time, it is challenging to access those locations with building materials due to the geographical terrain and sometimes a lack of funds, but they have continued to persist. As long as human beings reside in such locations, there must be a church

building before our hostile other cousins deny us the privilege.

God, in His mercy, has again used one of His sons to provide sponsorship for one of our mission fields that desperately needs a church building. The church building is located at Kobonka mission field. The building has reached the lintel level, and within the next month, both the post-lintel work and the roofing will be completed despite the heavy downpour.

Also, in the Benin Republic, a church was built from foundation to post-lintel level with mud awaiting roofing. It was anticipated that the building would be roofed before the rain so that it wouldn't collapse. To the glory of God, when all hope seemed lost, God provided the funds, and they have been deployed to the field. The next challenge is funding for doors, windows, plastering, and furniture. In many of our mission fields where the missionaries need accommodation, we have not yet kick-started the project.

Besides church buildings, finding a place for the missionaries to reside is a considerable challenge. We have such residences at different levels of completion, such as Kwala and Ahole in Niger Republic.  We also desperately need toilets at Libantee in Benin Republic and Sanga in Bauchi State.

Missions Training

The 29th Batch of the School of Cross-Cultural Missions is pressing on. The last two months have been very intensive. Besides their work duties, which expose them to building, painting, and farming yams in sacks, they participated in a Language Acquisition/Learning Technique course that enables them to learn the languages of their host communities when deployed to the field. They also did Discipleship and Theology of Missions. Twenty students enrolled in this batch, but two of them had temporarily withdrawn, and another two were released to return to their mission fields before completing additional modular courses. We are incredibly grateful to all our partners for helping to sustain some of our students through scholarships. Many others still lack sponsorship, and some are in school with their children, making it much more expensive, especially with the high cost of food.  Pray for more funding.

Home of Grace Update

HoG kids - Growing in grace

As the children at the Home of Grace grow, we have been unprepared for many challenges. To help develop our capacity to cope with the challenges, two of our partners, Mrs. Jennifer Alfa from Ireland and Mrs. Amina Ochai from Canada, conducted an intensive but brief training on Child Care Development for all our Caregivers, as well as interacted with the children and inspected our facilities. Several recommendations were made, and action steps were listed. Some are already implemented. Please continue to uphold each of us, the caregivers, in your prayers for grace and wisdom, as well as the children, that Christ may be formed in them. Our most profound appreciation goes to the trainers and facilitators for the enormous sacrifices they made.

Thank God for the provision of funds to cover the school fees for some of the children. Thank God for our children who sat for the Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB) examination. They all had the cut-off points of 200 and above despite the mass failure across the country.

Two Successful Weddings

God came through for us with the wedding of my children, Jemimah/Jeremiah Joseph (April 26, 2025) and Nehemiah/Sharon Abah (May 3, 2025). My wife and I are incredibly grateful to God, our partners, family, and friends for the role you all played. The occasion was another opportunity to showcase the Lordship of Jesus. Rev. Emmanuel Abah and Evangelist Sunday Oguche officiated and preached at the first wedding, while Dr. Bitrus Audu and Apostle Gideon Ekele officiated and preached at the second wedding.  Many persons from across several nations and several mission fields, cities, and villages attended despite the flight disruptions. They all returned to their home safely. Two persons were kidnapped but, after much prayer, were released after three days of torture in the den of the kidnappers. Please join us to appreciate God for the huge success, and thank you so much for your financial and prayer contributions.

Events

Next month, we will gather at least 400 youths and students for our National Youth and Students Missions Summit. It is a meeting where we will deliberately raise awareness of the need to distinguish ourselves in this generation, which is full of darkness, as a prerequisite to taking over the mantle of world evangelization. Dr. Philemon Ahmed of Christ Model Missions, a former banker and Pioneer Missionary of several decades, and Brother Ben Atebije, Author and Statistician representing Marketplace Missions, will be joining me and my team to speak at the Summit. The date is July 17-20, 2025. Pray along with us for open heaven in Jesus' name.

In October, if Jesus tarries, the Bi-Annual Advanced Missions Leadership course will be held in Jos. All the details will be communicated later.

Security Updates

It is no longer news that Boko Haram has "resurrected" and, with greater fury, as stipulated in

Jihadists

Revelation 12:12. In places like Borgu and parts of the Benin Republic, they adopt new names but with their ancient goals of killing, stealing, and destroying.  Sometimes, some villages come under siege, and their inhabitants are referred to as herdsmen, armed robbers, or bandits. They are the same but have different complexions. According to available reports, the Kainji Forest Reserve is their new home. God has continued to protect our missionaries, their families, and the converts. We covet more of your prayers. Despite the risk involved, we deployed an additional harvest force to cover more ground. Luka is currently in Kebbi State, Bitrus and his wife are in Benin Republic, and Charity and Yusuf are presently on probation on the Kamberi mission field. Please pray for them.

Appreciation

Once again, thank you so much for all the sacrifices you and your family, as well as your church, have continued to make. Every single advancement we have recorded cannot be divorced from your input. May God reward you bountifully.  Also, please join us in thanking the Lord for sparing our lives as we thread our way through the dark places, which we can also refer to as the shadows of death.  We insist that God has been gracious to us. May more of His mercies locate us this month in Jesus' name. God bless you.

Disaster

This is the current state of the church

On a somber note, the Benin Republic (TuganYaqub) church building published yesterday in this mission's update has been pulled down and washed away by heavy rainfall. This tragedy occurred after the roofing materials had already been purchased and transported to the site, but work on the rafter had not started. It has been very sad, but at this point, we have resolved not to give up. Remember, we said the converts built the church with mud blocks by themselves. Both the converts and the missionaries need encouragement at this time. Pray with us for funds to purchase cement blocks, rebuild the foundation, and construct a new church using cement blocks.