"They Shall Go Out With Joy!"

Panama | Debbie Meroff

OM Central America’s Easter Campaign Brings Resurrection Hope to Hundreds

At the start of the week before Easter this year, 262 fishers-of-souls from Mexico, Costa Rica, Guatemala, Honduras, El Salvador, Panama and the USA, converged on the country of Panama—whose name happens to mean, very appropriately, “a place of fish.” God did not disappoint their expectations. In fact, their catch for the Kingdom that week exceeded their wildest dreams.

Kick-starting the March '08 outreach was an intensive training and discipleship conference near OM Panama’s base in Volcán. Volcán is named for the inactive volcano that rises above the town; guest speaker Gareth Bolton, however, challenged participants to let God’s power erupt and overflow from their lives to others. The students, housewives, church workers and professionals who listened and responded spanned the ages of 14 to 64. As forty-something Maria Porras from Costa Rica declared, “That’s why I like OM.—They don’t refuse you because of your age!”

Other people appreciate OM’s role in uniting likeminded people.--At least two couples at this year’s Central America outreach met and married through their participation last year. And newlyweds Andy and Perla, from Switzerland and Guatemala respectively, opted to join the action only two weeks after their wedding. They thought it was a great way to spend a honeymoon!

For dozens of participants, raising the funds for the outreach was the greatest hurdle. One young person took a backbreaking job planting coffee. Another Costa Rican named Cathy was blessed by a donation from someone in her church. But then she remembered the Bible story about the servants admonished to multiply their master’s money. Cathy decided to try selling snacks at her workplace. The original gift was multiplied three times over! On the day before the campaign, Cathy learned of a young man who didn’t have enough funds to take part. She realized that Henson was the reason she had earned so much, and gave him the entire amount. By the end of the campaign Henson was convinced of his call into full-time missionary service.

Participants agreed they’d been privileged to see and do things they’d never tried before—from seeing sick people healed and teaching mimes to painting a church and even digging ditches, so that a village could have piped water. Many of the teams held workshops in their host churches in order to pass on the evangelism skills they themselves had just learned. Church members then joined in with the effort of reaching their local areas. A number of fellowships had prayed and fasted in preparation for this special week.

A Honduran man reported meeting a young Muslim from Syria while he was going house to house. By “coincidence” Rigo had just been studying Islam back home, hoping to one day become a missionary in the Muslim world. He and Jahamma were both aged 25 and immediately hit it off. When Jahamma offered a copy of the Quran, Rigo reciprocated with a Bible. Eventually the two men prayed together, and Rigo is convinced that his new friend opened his heart to Jesus Christ. He plans to stay in touch, and marvels, “I didn’t have to go to Africa or the Middle East to meet a Muslim!”

One team told about an unsaved man in a rural area who dreamed that two young men would come to his door with life-changing news. The next day the campaigners arrived and the old man recognized them from his dream! The pair shared God’s Good News with the man and led him to faith.

Three “Extreme Teams” accepted assignments in difficult conditions among indigenous Indians. “The villages were remote, it was very hot, and the people were very poor,” a team leader describes the experience. “We walked for miles, slept on the floor, and washed every day in the same river where the kids brought the pigs to bathe! There was no electricity so we preached by lamplight. And the people didn’t understand Spanish so a local pastor had to translate into the dialect. But,” she adds, “I wouldn’t have changed this team for anything! 286 people prayed to receive Jesus. The Holy Spirit was really present….They didn’t want us to go. The children cried when we left.”

Medical Team

Nineteen doctors, nurses, physician assistants and evangelism helpers led by OM’s Dr. Pat Railey also travelled to Panama from the U.S. At the airport each person checked in a second bag full of medications and Christian literature. When OM Panama’s Aileen Arauz—a young graduate of their School of Missions—was asked to organize the medical team’s visit and serve as a translater, she was at first overwhelmed by the prospect. “But then I remembered Philippians 4:13 and told myself, God is the one who’s in charge, not me!”

Looking back afterwards Aileen was awed. “It makes me cry to see how He worked everything out. It really impacted me to see how passionate the team was, showing the love of God in such a practical way. And it touched me to see how the churches helped alongside the team.”

Altogether 1150 men, women and children were evaluated, prescribed for and prayed with during this group’s four and a half days of service in several locations. As a pastor who worked with them expressed it, “You guys have made an inroad into our hearts.”

Tears of Joy

When all 22 teams regrouped at the OM base for a final report and celebration at the end of the outreach, the excitement overflowed. “People were like sponges, absorbing everything we said,” exlaimed one campaigner. “We preached, we cried with the people, we prayed for the sick,” testified another. “When we spoke, people started crying. They wanted to accept Christ right away.”

In fact, more than thousand men, women and children came to a spiritual turning point and asked the Lord into their lives during Easter week. This April the OM Panama team is working with the host churches on following up new believers. When the team met for devotions on the final morning of the campaign they were in tears, recalling God’s answers to so many of their prayers. But as leader Roger Branda notes, it wasn’t just Panamanians but participants whose lives were changed. “Seeing dozens of people run to the front after Gareth Bolton’s challenge at the conference International Night—two of the ladies kneeling and crying--I thought, wow. These people will touch the nations! Not only do they have a vision for the 10/40 Window, although many were called into missions, but they go home with a vision for their own church situations. All the work and tiredness of these past weeks doesn’t matter. God is in control!”

Credit: Debbie Meroff
© 2008 Debbie Meroff