Missions Trips

The atmosphere of celebration surrounding the preparation for the World Cup in South Africa enhanced the excitement of the team of short term missionaries participating in the Ultimate Goal Challenge, an outreach to share the good news of Christ with locals, visiting athletes and tourists. On Monday, 7 June, participants of all ages arrived in Magaliesburg eager to see God at work in the coming weeks. Some traveled from Pretoria, while others came from as far as Singapore and Alaska, the USA.

Opening Night took the participants on a virtual journey around South Africa, with a dynamic blend of dances, sketches, songs, language and cultural trivia. The theme for the outreach is—One Team & One Goal. The ultimate goal is to bring glory to God and win souls for eternity with God. The night ended with joyful and energetic worship.

“I feel it is so special to have that many people willing to serve God, all from different countries and walks of life,” shared one participant. Praise God for this outreach currently happening in South Africa. Pray for opportunities for the participants to share God’s love with many, especially with those visiting from other nations.

Teams have already fanned out, going into rural areas sharing the love of Christ as depicted in this photo.

OM Arts International is a family of ministries (listed below) that exists to empower artists to engage their creative gifts in exalting God and making His name known among the nations.

OM Arts is a ministry of Operation Mobilization.

OM ArtsLink                omartslink.org

OM ArtsLink has a passion to see visual artists get involved in the Great Commission by uniquely impacting communities around the world. International missions trips are available for visual artists to serve the Church and engage the world for Christ.

OM DanceLink          omdancelink.org

OM DanceLink desires to train, mentor and send dancers of all skill levels to use their gifts to minister and further God’s kingdom on international and local missions trips.

Heart Sounds International              heart-sounds.org

Heart Sounds International exists to help ignite culturally relevant and Biblically appropriate worship, especially in places where Christ-followers are restricted, persecuted or unknown.

Bill Drake Band                       billdrake.com

Bill Drake and his team present multimedia concerts with a unique focus. The concerts are not simply about music, but about God and experiencing the reality of God in your life. The latest release is the “Crowns Experience” which will take you on a journey to find out what you are willing to give your life for.

Jon Simpson Music                   bugnogmusic.com

Musician, singer, songwriter, and dancer, Jon Simpson aims to skillfully, imaginatively, and beautifully proclaim God’s truth - sharing with others in music and in movement, in communion and in commentary, in devotion and in deed all for the glory of God.

Unishow                     unishow.org

World champion unicyclist Dustin Kelm performs and speaks at youth events, outreaches, retreats, camps, festivals, corporate events and school assemblies around the world.  With extreme uni-cycling as his tool, Dustin’s one-of-a-kind performance captivates people of all ages.  He challenges his audiences to have the courage to make good choices that change their lives.  In venues that permit, Dustin integrates his personal faith story and his relationship with Jesus.

Maria is a Bosnian woman who has lived in the same place for 30 years. Her children are grown, and she is retired and lives alone. In 2008, a missionary with Operation Mobilization (OM) in her city began a house church that met in Maria’s apartment. It was very small–only two local women in addition to the missionary.

A few months later, Maria broke her arm and was unable to cook for herself, so she arranged for a neighbor, Lucia, to bring lunch each day. Occasionally, Lucia would drop off lunch during the house church meeting. She wouldn’t stay although she was invited to. Then Maria told the group about the needs in Lucia’s life, and the church group began to pray regularly for her. Within a few months, Lucia was regularly attending the house church and then gave her life to Christ and was baptized. After that, her son also came to faith.

Then the little group began to discuss the needs of another woman in the neighborhood, Iris, and began to pray for her. Not long after, Iris began attending the church meeting in Maria’s apartment. Later, a long-time friend of Maria’s also began coming to the meeting.

The church group now numbers seven, up from just two in about a year’s time. This is a good picture of house church growth. As the OM missionary helps to disciple the new believers, the Gospel travels through already established relationships they have. These women are simply praying for people who are in need and then speaking to those around them. This house church of seven represents approximately 23 people who attend OM-connected house churches in this city. Pray that each one will multiply as members love their neighbors.

Operation Mobilization’s work in Eastern Europe continues even though the wall of communism is long gone. For many years, Operation Mobilization (OM), a Christian mission organization whose goal is to reach the world with the Gospel of Jesus Christ, produced and smuggled Christian literature to nations behind the iron curtain. Below is a picture of one of the brilliant ideas that emerged from that era. In the hand is a portion of scripture that has plastic pages. These were produced in the 1980’s and smuggled into the Soviet Union specifically for prisoners. It was made of plastic because if a prisoner was reading it and a guard walked by, he could drop it into his cup of tea and conceal it. One prisoner found the words to be so inspiring and dear to him, that he slept with the scriptures in his mouth. How valuable is the Word of God to you?

OM East, the ministry of OM that currently works in Eastern Europe, is bringing hope to the forgotten and persecuted peoples of Eastern Europe. OM East provides literature and practical aid to people groups such as the Tatars, Nenets, the Bayash and others.

“Speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves, for the rights of all who are destitute. Speak up and judge fairly; defend the rights of the poor and needy.”
(Proverbs 31:8-9 NIV)

Here you can DOWNLOAD the different country and people profiles:

Albania

AIDS HIV Situation

Crimean Tatar

Georgia

KazanTatars

Roma

Sakha Yakut

Slowakei

Ukraine

For more information about Operation Mobilization’s work in Eastern Europe, and for information about short term missions trips to that area of the world, you can access the following web sites that tell you how you can get involved.

OM International

OM East

OMusa

For more information about missions trips on board Operation Mobilization’s ministry ship Logos Hope, go to their web site:  www.omships.org

For information about youth, church, group, and individual short term missions trips all over the world that are affordable and adventurous, contact Operation Mobilization.

United States Residents click here: OMusa

All other nationalities, click here: OM International

If you are an artist searching for short term missions trips or long term missions trips in which you can use your artistic skill, contact: OM Arts International       info@arts.om.org

Throughout the Buddhist world, Christian radio programs are being broadcast via short wave radio. In addition to the general population, Buddhist monks are also tuning in and hearing the messages of truth that are being proclaimed. For many years, radio has been an effective tool to reach the masses with the Gospel. Along the Thai and Burma boarder,  however, the Mon people group have been hearing the Gospel on the radio only since 1995. At first there was only 15 minutes of broadcast daily, then half and hour and now the Gospel is being broadcast to this remote people group one hour a day, seven days a week by a Christian man named Mehm who is from the Mon peoples! Short wave radio is used as the broadcast medium because regular radio can be too easily controlled by the governments in the region which are opposed to the Gospel. Anything which they cannot control, they see as a threat. Radio has no boundaries! Praise the Lord for the use of technology to spread the truth of the Gospel!

For more information on this ministry, contact Far East Broadcasting Company.

If you are interested in knowing more or supporting the voice behind the broadcasts to the Mon people group, click to get to know Mehm & Ruth.

Click here if you are interested in short term missions trips to the region.

“You brought those Bibles into Romania under communism?” asked Dina who now works with the Christian mission Operation Mobilization (OM) in her home country of Romania.  In the 1980’s OM smuggled and distributed tens of thousands of Bibles into Romania that was ruled by Ceausescu, the dictator who did his best to stamp out Christianity.  In those days, Dina was the local secretary of the communist party in her town. She had gotten her hands on one of the Bibles, wrapped it up in newspaper, and carried it with her wherever she went. When asked why she had carried a Bible with her, she responded, “Because I believed that it would bring me good luck!”  She came to faith about ten years ago and her life has never been the same since!

Visual, performing and technical arts engage viewers and gives them a way to relate to the subject being presented. Jesus used the arts when he presented the message that the kingdom of God was near. The cross today is used as visual art to remind us of what our Savior did for us by dying, shedding his blood and redeeming us from eternal condemnation.  Today the arts are used in many ways to present the Gospel and often we are not even aware of it. If you attend church, the arts are used every Sunday in some form. There is singing, presentation of scriptural truths by a church leader, and often there is something visual on a large screen.

Many years ago I attended mass with a Catholic friend at a small church in the Catskills, NY.  The priest was a visiting missionary who was working in Brazil amongst street children. The day was warm, the church was full, and everyone was getting a bit dozy. The priest was in his robes and presenting his ministry and peoples’ attention span was getting shorter. All of a sudden, the priest did something that caused the audience to rub their eyes. Did we really see what we think we just saw? Did the priest really just do a back flip? No, surely not. He spoke for a few more minutes and then jumped up and spun around. Now he had everyone’s attention. We listened now to his presentation attentively. Then he did a somersault, spoke some more, then another back flip (which confirmed that we did see what we thought we had seen). This priest had no tools to make a fancy presentation, he invoked the arts to engage the audience. When he was finished, the offering plates were passed, and by the time a plate reached me in the 3rd row, it was already overflowing with donations. People were pulling whatever they had out of their wallets and purses. When the mass concluded, the congregation couldn’t wait to meet the priest. It was a church service and a missions presentation that I will never forget.

If arts ministry in missions interests you, you can contact OM Arts International, a ministry of Operation Mobilization.    email: info@arts.om.org

As an arm of OM Arts, “Heart Sounds International exists to help ignite culturally relevant and Biblicaly appropriate worship, especially in places where Christ-followers are persecuted, restricted or unknown.”

Heart Sounds seeks to help people around the world create worship music with their own cultural and linguistic distinctions. Volunteer professional recording engineers traveling with their equipment have helped produce worship music in over 33 countries including Yemen, Kosovo, Mongolia, Algeria and Tajikistan. Sometimes they will install a studio in the country and train nationals in audio production. Many songs have aired on Christian radio reaching millions of people. A lot of prayer and planning goes into each project, and OM missionaries in the home office and on the field make all the accommodating arrangements. Many recordings are done in secret, and each time the volunteers enter a closed country with their equipment, they pray earnestly for smooth passage. All work is doing in partnership with local house or established churches.

Research has shown that churches that are emerging in closed countries grow more rapidly when they have contextualized worship music.

For more information about how you can get involved, contact

Heart Sounds International

or OM Arts International or you can phone: 1-800-899-0432

Recently in the Czech Republic, artists who were involved in a short term missions trip with Artslink, a ministry of OM Arts International, were chalk drawing on a main pedestrian street. A gang of intimidating young men, led by Roman, came along. He broke away from the group and asked, “Are you artists?” They nodded. He began to share his newfound passion for art, discovered in prison, and wanted to meet the artists again to show us his work. Through this connection and new friendship, they shared Christ with him

.