Turkey!!!

The ministry was split up into a couple of different elements. Part of my team went to a gypsy village – here is an except from one of my teammates blogs on that experience- 
 

One of my favorite memories of our time in Istanbul happened when my team was given the task of locating Turkish gypsy people—a people group not reached within the area.  My team was out one day trying to find some of the gypsy people and after hours of no such luck, our translater was able to make a phone call which led to a conversation with someone who then led us to a remote village…we ended up in the jackpot of gypsy villages!!!! And we were there for a gypsy wedding that was taking place right there in the street! The gypsies invited us in, had us dance with them and then asked us to return…..and the next day we did!  After spending some time talking with some of the ‘elders’ of the gypsy village and after some songs with the kids, I had asked one of the older women if we could go talk in her home.  God was stirring my Spirit so hard to share  the Gospel with them.  She wanted hear from me and from our translator, a Turkish Muslim believer.  We had the opportunity to pray for her and give her a bible and a DVD of the Jesus Film Project.— Jessica Phillip

 

I spent a lot of time on the campus of the University of Istanbul hanging out with college students and sharing Christ with them. There were many that were receptive and some that were fiercely opposed to even being told about Jesus. We had the chance to give out many Bibles and DVD’s of the Jesus video there. The Lord opened some incredible doors that we joyfully got to walk through.

 

The last piece of ministry that we got to take part in was through Intercessory Prayer. We prayed hard for this nation.  There were some times when our team went into one of the major Mosque in Istanbul and began to pray that the Lord would tear down the walls of Islam and birth a Kingdom awakening here for the name of Jesus. Obviously we had to be careful while we were in there. But we felt the Spirit leading us to pray at what is basically “ground zero” for the religion of Islam there.

 

Please continue to pray for this lost nation. I am hoping that the Lord will open doors to return here in the future. There are so many people who desperately need hope and have no clue that it is found in the Son of God.

 

ALSO- thank you so much for hitting PAUSE on the blog comments and emails in while we were in Turkey and Israel.  Those comments have been so encouraging and have been such a source of life for me while I have been gone but it was necessary because of our location to not have emails coming in that might possibly be flagged. Thank you all for helping support my squad with that and for the continued encouragement that so many of you leave on these blogs.

 

I will try to get a blog posted in the next few days about everything that happen in Israel. One last little bit of cool information that came to us as a surprise. As it turns out, in an effort to save money, we are going to go into North Africa to catch a flight to S. Africa for about a day and a half to save some money instead of trying to fly out of Tel Aviv. Where in North Africa you ask?