Friday, February 8th, 2008

Dear brethren:

Sunday, January 20th, 2008, was baptized for remission of her sins KRISSIA YAHAIRA RAMOS SANCHEZ, she is a young of 18 years old, that throughout year 2007 was attending the meetings that regularly we celebrated all Sundays, so that, she obeyed totally conscious to the Lord. This is the first fruit of year 2008. Krissia is daughter of sister Leticia Sosa Ramos, who also obeyed Sunday, November 4th, 2007. Her father was visiting the church for several years, we hope someday he obey the Word of God.

Greetings in the Lord, this good Wednesday (OOP’S – I mean Thursday) morning.

A day late this week visiting with you as Jamie Wootton and I had a full day of visiting local sites here in Greece. Jamie has been with us three weeks so far and has now realized he only has one more week before he heads back to the good ol’ U.S.A. So much to see, and so little time to see it all. We spent a full day yesterday taking the opportunity to get out on a boat and visit three local islands nearby, just to give Jamie the experience of seeing a little of the Greek culture outside of Athens.

We are three weeks done in this school term and only have one more week before we get on with final exams. The students made it through their mid-terms ok, and are now getting ready to head into finals. As always it’s been such a joy to be with them in class. Their enthusiasm in learning God’s word and watching them apply His lessons to their lives, gives us much joy. One Student, Iyke Ibekwe, told me this week, “What we learn in this bible are things that change our lives forever.” Wouldn’t it be great if we all had that attitude towards God’s word?

By Rilda Perry

2007 has been an especially busy year for missions among the SAIM group. Following are some of the trips made this year.

Welcome to this month’s Happenings! Thanks to those who have sent information during the last two months. If you want to send information please email it to tedpaull@hotmail.com either in text or Word files, or mail it to P O Box 41 NORTH RYDE NSW 1670 or ring (02) 9888 9664, (02) 9878 3008 or (02) 9878 1078. Ted Paull

Camp baptisms
3 young people were baptised during Camp Challenge, near Sydney – Nathan Clark from Canberra, Belinda Giles from Richmond, and Amanda Olorenshaw from Brisbane.

South East baptisms
Kate Treloggen was baptised into Christ on New Year's Day. She had been attending the South East congregation in Melbourne for some time, being the wife of one of the members. Also at South East, Dale Christensen was baptised on January 12, his 15th birthday.

Tassie Baptism
Good news from the Lindisfarne (Hobart) congregation is that. Josh Troy was baptised into Christ in January.

North Queensland Baptism
Peter Yip from Cooktown was baptised at lunchtime on January 27. He travels down from Cooktown (about 5 hrs drive each way) to worship with the church in Cairns!

Sydney Baptisms

The 18th Annual Church of Christ FAMILY CAMP is scheduled for June 30th - July 5th (Monday 1 PM to Staturday 12: PM)

Location RICHARDSON GROVE RV & CAMP (AT RICHARDSON GROVE STATE PARK)

GARBERVILLE, CALIFORNIA

COST: EACH FAMILY WILL RESERVE THEIR OWN SPACE AND PAY DIRECT TO RICHARDSON GROVE RV PARK THIS YEAR.

For camp planning purposes registeration should be sent to McKinleyville Church of Christ

2208 Walnut

McKinleyville, CA 95521

For More Information Call: (707) 839-5086

Family, congregation shocked by preacher’s death

Roy McLaurin Jr. was also active in volunteer work

Tragedy touched the lives of a local family and church congregation with the death of 74-year-old Roy Gilbert McLaurin Jr. of Victoria.

A preacher at Central Church of Christ in Victoria for 19 years, McLaurin died Saturday afternoon in a farm equipment malfunction on Saturday, said his brother Gary McLaurin, 60, of Victoria. “Everybody was shocked; he was really loved by a lot of people,” he said.

Elders at McLaurin’s church paid homage to him at the worship service on Sunday, said 55-year-old Nancy Schmidt of Victoria, McLaurin’s daughter.

“Because he meant so much to all of them, they all took turns saying something about my dad,” she said. “It was almost like a funeral with the beautiful things they had to say. It was a celebration service.”

Have I mentioned before that God is awesome? We started the year with a congregational meeting to discuss our five year plan and budget for 2008. To say that the meeting went well would be an understatement. The plan was very well received. If I have not previously sent you a copy and you would like one please let me know. A few of the highlights from that meeting are: Have each member involved in an active prayer and study lifestyle; To grow by one-third a year; Involve more men in the preaching and teaching; Work towards becoming self-supporting; Get more active in the community as a group; Get more active on the college campus. We also set a budget of $324 a week. This budget would cover our expenses minus the preacher salary right now.
We had a doctor from Kansas visiting with us for the last of December to mid-January. Floyd was a great encouragement to us while he was here. He was working pro-locum at the local hospital. We hope he gets to come back for another visit.

March 1st.... Launch Date

We all knew we’d have to pull the trigger some time. It made more sense to set a date with all the funds in place. But … where would the faith be in that?

The reason for setting a date is simple … The work isn’t getting easier or getting done. My co-worker, Ted Paull is still buried in the work. He has so much on his plate and my efforts along side of him might … possibly make a dent in the work there is to do.

Latest News…

We hope all of you had a good holiday season. The holidays have been good to us. They have certainly kept us busy. As most of you know the majority of the year I have had to work two full-time jobs and have been going to graduate school as well. However, thanks to the generosity of Chris Swinford and Dwight Whitsett at the Sunset International Bible Institute I received a small financial gift that set me free from one of my full-time jobs back in the middle of October that have allowed me to finally get on the fundraising trail.

Greetings to all of you! We hope your new year is off to a good start. As a family, we have been weathering the ups and downs of seasonal sickness. The first week of January I found myself battling a terrible cold which slowed me down a bit, but I managed to return to my schedule of contacting Christians from around the country and sharing with them the vision of the Singapore ministry training institute.