Missions
Thailand Mission
Church Website: https://www.pleasantvalley.website/missions-work
Patinya Thitathan leads the Thailand Mission. He is a native of Bangkok, Thailand. He and his wife Penjai have been married for over 32 years, and they have two daughters, Penya and Pradittha. In Thailand, there are about 100 churches of Christ with approximately 3,000 believers. Most of the churches are in the northeast part of the country. Patinya spends most of his time visiting, teaching and encouraging the churches in this area. The mission field in Thailand is a stable and constantly growing work. The fact that Patinya and Penjai are Thais makes them especially useful to God because they know the language, the culture, and the people. God has prepared them and given them many experiences that have been useful tools in his work with the Thai people.
How do you communicate with the people you are trying to reach?
At Ramkhamhaeng University Christian Center (RCC), we have full‐time Outreach Ministers who invite university students and neighbors to come to study free English with us. The condition for free English is that they will have to stay with us for an hour of Christian songs, games, and Bible talks. We make trips every month to work with the churches we have started through our church planting project, Tai for the Savior. Each month, we select two or three churches to visit. We encourage each church to prepare their non‐Christian neighbors for us to visit and study in their homes.
What do you like to do for fun?
I love so much to swim with my wife, but I have to find the time to do it. Also, I like to read a lot.
How do you see God at work in your ministry?
God has blessed us with ten churches we have established in the past ten years. All of these churches are doing well. They are still small, but growing slowly. Also, God blessed us with the number of people who graduated from our Bangkok Servant Leadership Institute (BSLI). Most of these graduates went home to serve in their churches as self-support workers. I believe the churches in Thailand will do well with this approach.
What is your future vision for this ministry?
I want to see Tai for the Savior plant more churches around Thailand. I want to see more graduates from BSLI help strengthen their local churches by being self‐supporting workers in the area. I want to see Tai for the Savior team members continue to visit and encourage small churches. At this point, we have adopted seventeen small churches around Thailand. The purpose of all these works is to help churches to be able to stand on their own financially, and to be able to keep reaching out to the lost in their own area. Lastly, my wife and I want to see our daughter and her husband continue to serve in our place in the future. Right now, they are full time students at BSLI.
What can we do to help?
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First, pray for us.
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Second, continue to support us financially.
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Third, encourage our family. We are working in countries where 99.5% of the people do not share our faith. Yes, we are Thais working in Thailand, but we do not share a thing with them; not our faith, our thoughts, or our value of life. We are completely different from our own people. We need constant communication from you. It gives us much encouragement. In most cases, missionaries have to be the ones who write and communicate.
Southern Christian Children's Home
Website: https://schome.org/
As a mission work of the churches of Christ, Southern Christian Home has been in existence since 1926, originating in Fort Smith, Arkansas and later moving to Morrilton, Arkansas in 1936. Southern Christian Home is a children’s home that cares for school-age children through high school. Children are taken into our program to provide them the spiritual nurture they deserve. As they receive this care, they are provided their needs and given a safe and loving environment. Dedicated houseparents are the main reason we are so successful in serving all the children’s needs effectively. With six full time cottages and two relief cottages, we can provide full time care for up to 48 children who come either through private placement or state agencies. We provide invaluable experiences for our residents, including: Loving family environment, with meals shared daily around the dinner table. Regular church attendance and involvement in church youth activities. Regular counseling services with a full time counselor on staff. Exciting therapeutic care including Equine Assisted Learning and Outdoor Adventure. Educational guidance with tutoring. Monthly activities ranging from ice skating and go-karts to trips to museums and sporting events.
Misión Para Cristo
Church Website: https://grapevinechurch.com/
Mission Website: https://www.misionparacristo.com/
Misión Para Cristo (Mission for Christ) is an international development mission and registered NGO in the Jinotega (northern) region of Nicaragua, focusing on the spiritual and physical needs of the people. The mission was started with God's blessings by Benny and Donna Baker and continues to be directed by them. Since 1997 the mission has been serving the people of Nicaragua sharing the good news of Jesus Christ through opportunities of service. The mission accomplishes this goal by helping the church meet three basic needs: Body, Mind, and Soul.
The work began in 1997 with 1 evangelist and 12 members of the church by opening a medical clinic in Jinotega as an outreach of the church to the community. Initially, Benny and Donna traveled to Nicaragua several times a year, while continuing to work in local ministry in Arkansas and Louisiana. In 2001, thanks to the support of the church in Minden, LA, they were able to work half-time with the mission. In 2005, thanks to the Garland Street congregation in Plainview, TX, the Bakers went full-time and moved to Jinotega. This allowed them the opportunity to work more closely with the mission. On August 1, 2013, the Grapevine congregation in Grapevine, TX assumed the oversight of the mission. God has blessed this work richly. Today the mission works with 28 congregations, 18 full-time Nicaraguan preachers and 4 part-time preachers with Sunday attendance of over 1,000 adults and children.
India Missions
Church Coordination: Shiloh Church of Christ in Hazel Green, AL.
The goal for this mission work:
We use the “4-T” formula in our efforts “Teach’em, Train’em, Trust’em, Turn’em loose!” We are making the Indian brethren full partners in the work now, not in the distant future. Indian brethren plan the work with us, teach in our preacher-training schools and are, in fact, doing the bulk of the work. Obviously, God deserves all glory, honor, praise and credit for all that this team has achieved. Yet, our Indian brethren are the “unsung heroes” of the Lord’s work in India.
Ethiopia Gospel Outreach
Church Website: https://www.wpcoc.com/ethiopian-gospel-outreach
Current works include:
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5 preacher training schools
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625 water wells which provide water for more than 2.5 million people everyday
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5 schools for the deaf
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3 kindergartens
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2 computer training schools
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Over 1000 students at world bible school
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Amharic language radio broadcast from San Jose, California which reaches 90 million people
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Solar audio players for all over Ethiopia
In Search of the Lord's Way
Main Website: https://searchtv.org/
Church Website: https://edmondchurchofchrist.com/
The year was 1980. Discovering that televangelists were reaching a hundred times more people than he was from his pulpit, Mack Lyon decided to go on TV on a local station. Almost 40 years later, Search now appears on all 210 television markets in the United States, nearly 150 local cable stations and on 50 radio stations, plus access virtually everywhere via the Internet. Search’s ministry remains dedicated to its five-fold purpose: to take the Way of salvation to thousands who live right among us; to light a candle in the darkness of immorality; to resist the materialism and humanism that is choking the faith and spirituality out of so many people; to restore credibility to the religion of Christ that has been diminished in many religious programs; to tell your friends that the church of Christ is not dead, but that it is very much alive and that we care. Search offers materials for free to those who request booklets and audio CDs.
Phil Sanders does the on-air preaching and leads the ministry. Search’s ministry remains dedicated to its five-fold purpose: to take the Way of salvation to thousands who live right among us; to light a candle in the darkness of immorality; to resist the materialism and humanism that is choking the faith and spirituality out of so many people; to restore credibility to the religion of Christ that has been diminished in many religious programs; to tell your friends that the church of Christ is not dead, but that it is very much alive and that we care.
Truth for Today World Mission School
Church Website: http://biblecourses.com/English/
Truth for Today World Mission School in Searcy, Arkansas, is a multifaceted non-profit organization dedicated to world evangelism. Directed by Eddie Cloer, a professor of Bible and preaching courses at Harding University, TFTWMS strives to teach faithfully the Holy Scriptures of our Lord.
Experienced missionaries agree that the survival and spiritual growth of congregations planted around the world may depend on the availability of printed Bible-study materials. The primary focus of Truth for Today World Mission School, a monthly publication called Truth for Today, is designed to address this need.
This publication is sent to tens of thousands of preachers and Bible teachers. Each issue is the equivalent of a 150-page book. It is published twelve times a year and is mailed in English to thousands of preaching brethren in many nations all over the globe. Translating offices have been established in Brazil, China, Costa Rica, France, India, Indonesia, Italy, and Ukraine.
Specific content guidelines have been set to ensure that the teaching materials are in harmony with the restoration of New Testament Christianity. Special projects: Through The Scriptures, Into the Abundant Life, Becoming a Faithful Christian, Facebook and Twitter
Sonlight in the Pacific
Church Website: https://www.fpcc.org/missions
Randy English and his wife Sharon became Christians in 1986 at Fort Smith, Arkansas. They immediately became involved in personal work and teaching Bible classes and were encouraged to enter a school for further Bible training. In 1988, Randy graduated from International Bible College with a BA in Bible & Missions. In 1989, Randy and Sharon moved to American Samoa, a country from which they could reach many other Pacific Island nations with the Gospel. Their 5 children were born and raised in Tutuila Island.
Randy and Sharon continue laboring to spread the Gospel in this remote area of the world, establishing indigenous, self-supporting congregations of the churches of Christ. Since 1989 their work has been overseen by the elders at the Forest Park church of Christ (fpcc.org). The English family works closely with short-term workers to evangelize, edify, and equip, making regular mission trips from their home base in American Samoa to other Pacific Island nations. In 2004 Randy and Sharon established the Pacific Broadcast Network which has now grown to operating 8 radio stations in the Pacific and in the US, including Churches of Christ Community Radio.