Re: {FECA Vision Choir} Report 9

Hu Marshall 

Just a friendly reminder, ( to your whole group) do not post  any pictures ( esp with translators who are believers now) on any social media like Facebook 

I was in Iraq in January, met all the people you met , praying for them and your group 

Carolin Eng 

FEC Arcadia 

On Sun, Mar 31, 2019 at 11:59 AM Marshall <umarsh07@gmail.com> wrote:

Sunday, March 31

Some points of clarification: Failed to explain that the ancient stone bridge we walked to yesterday is the site where the Jews were relocated after the Northern Kingdom of Israel fell to Assyria (2 Kings 17, especially verse 6).  You also may want to look up Nahum 1:1, which says "Nahum of Elkosh" now spelled Al Qosh.  That is why this village claims Nahum was buried here.  During our morning's devotion, we shared many thoughts about our visit with Dr. Paul. He is alone, fighting incredible odds, living full time (alone) among the unwanted Yazidis.  All of us were so awed to meet this man.  Here is a living model of a man who gave up everything to follow Jesus to a distant land like Hudson Taylor, living by faith for his needs like George Mueller.  Yesterday, Dr. Paul pointed out the vast valley below his compound and mentioned that the Garden of Eden was probably somewhere around here.  He said Noah's Ark is in the distant hills, that the original translators mistranslated RRT as Ararat, and that even as late as the fifteenth century, many travelers broke off small pieces of the Ark for souvenirs.  On a different note, Dawoo never showed up at the Friday night service in case you were wondering.

Johnny and Willy left to go to Zakho Hospital while the rest of us (see photo) went with Kaizak to Darkar camp, located close to Berseve, but further up the hills.  This is a smaller community of 4000 and the camp is actually a lot nicer.  The families live in trailers instead of tents (see photo), and the community center we went to has working electricity, but it is raining quite hard continually since we arrived, so it has limited our activities.  Dr. Glenn is the only doctor working until Dr. Johnny arrives.  At noon, we were surprised to see Dawoo here.  He did not come to the Friday night service as we had hoped, but somehow he found us here.  Again he requested prayer and this time he came with his dad.  Since Willy had not yet returned with Johnny, Kenny and Marshall talked to them with Aram and Araz translating.  Actually, Aram and Araz did all the talking, encouraging Dawoo to receive Jesus as his only God, no angels, nothing else but Jesus.  It was good to see the local believers step up to minister.  This time Dawoo took off his amulet, gave it to his dad, and Kenny led Dawoo in the sinner's prayer (see photo) while Aram translated.  Then Kenny prayed for healing and release from all oppression for Dawoo in English.  On the bus ride to Zakho last Sunday, Aram had given Kenny a microchip memory card containing the Scripture in several local dialects, the Jesus film and some Bible stories.  Kenny was now able to give it to Dawoo (what divine provision).  Dawoo and his father promised to go home and burn all the amulets.  They thanked us as they left and we rejoice we had this divine appointment.  Willy and Johnny finally returned to eat lunch and resume treating patients with Glenn.  Amy is teaching children and Sharon, Mei and Civa (translator) had tea with a local lady living in a nearby trailer, the rain finally abating.  After returning, they started a knitting group with some of the Yazidi ladies and Christine led them in some exercises while we had a few more short visits to different families.  Since we are invited to another Sunday evening service, we closed shop early - about 4 PM, having seen 50+ patients.

We attended another Arabic service, this time at the Free Methodist Church, the only other evangelical church in Zakho (the other was the church we attended Friday night) quite different in style but with equally enthusiastic worship singing.  We sang Psalm 121, John 14:6, and The Name Above All Names, and Kenny gave a few words of greetings and encouragement.  We returned to our hotel and ate a home cooked meal of rice porridge with tea eggs and veggie soup made from the leftover chicken and beef from yesterday's lunch and veggies we bought during our walk to the bridge.  At debriefing, we praised God for a great day - for anytime someone c9mes to Christ is a great day.  Brandon seems better from his cold but Christine might be coming down with symptoms similar to Brandon's.  We thank God no one is seriously ill and we are able to do our ministry in spite of the sore throat and tickles.

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Carolin Eng

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{FECA Vision Choir} Report 9

Sunday, March 31

Some points of clarification: Failed to explain that the ancient stone bridge we walked to yesterday is the site where the Jews were relocated after the Northern Kingdom of Israel fell to Assyria (2 Kings 17, especially verse 6).  You also may want to look up Nahum 1:1, which says "Nahum of Elkosh" now spelled Al Qosh.  That is why this village claims Nahum was buried here.  During our morning's devotion, we shared many thoughts about our visit with Dr. Paul. He is alone, fighting incredible odds, living full time (alone) among the unwanted Yazidis.  All of us were so awed to meet this man.  Here is a living model of a man who gave up everything to follow Jesus to a distant land like Hudson Taylor, living by faith for his needs like George Mueller.  Yesterday, Dr. Paul pointed out the vast valley below his compound and mentioned that the Garden of Eden was probably somewhere around here.  He said Noah's Ark is in the distant hills, that the original translators mistranslated RRT as Ararat, and that even as late as the fifteenth century, many travelers broke off small pieces of the Ark for souvenirs.  On a different note, Dawoo never showed up at the Friday night service in case you were wondering.

Johnny and Willy left to go to Zakho Hospital while the rest of us (see photo) went with Kaizak to Darkar camp, located close to Berseve, but further up the hills.  This is a smaller community of 4000 and the camp is actually a lot nicer.  The families live in trailers instead of tents (see photo), and the community center we went to has working electricity, but it is raining quite hard continually since we arrived, so it has limited our activities.  Dr. Glenn is the only doctor working until Dr. Johnny arrives.  At noon, we were surprised to see Dawoo here.  He did not come to the Friday night service as we had hoped, but somehow he found us here.  Again he requested prayer and this time he came with his dad.  Since Willy had not yet returned with Johnny, Kenny and Marshall talked to them with Aram and Araz translating.  Actually, Aram and Araz did all the talking, encouraging Dawoo to receive Jesus as his only God, no angels, nothing else but Jesus.  It was good to see the local believers step up to minister.  This time Dawoo took off his amulet, gave it to his dad, and Kenny led Dawoo in the sinner's prayer (see photo) while Aram translated.  Then Kenny prayed for healing and release from all oppression for Dawoo in English.  On the bus ride to Zakho last Sunday, Aram had given Kenny a microchip memory card containing the Scripture in several local dialects, the Jesus film and some Bible stories.  Kenny was now able to give it to Dawoo (what divine provision).  Dawoo and his father promised to go home and burn all the amulets.  They thanked us as they left and we rejoice we had this divine appointment.  Willy and Johnny finally returned to eat lunch and resume treating patients with Glenn.  Amy is teaching children and Sharon, Mei and Civa (translator) had tea with a local lady living in a nearby trailer, the rain finally abating.  After returning, they started a knitting group with some of the Yazidi ladies and Christine led them in some exercises while we had a few more short visits to different families.  Since we are invited to another Sunday evening service, we closed shop early - about 4 PM, having seen 50+ patients.

We attended another Arabic service, this time at the Free Methodist Church, the only other evangelical church in Zakho (the other was the church we attended Friday night) quite different in style but with equally enthusiastic worship singing.  We sang Psalm 121, John 14:6, and The Name Above All Names, and Kenny gave a few words of greetings and encouragement.  We returned to our hotel and ate a home cooked meal of rice porridge with tea eggs and veggie soup made from the leftover chicken and beef from yesterday's lunch and veggies we bought during our walk to the bridge.  At debriefing, we praised God for a great day - for anytime someone c9mes to Christ is a great day.  Brandon seems better from his cold but Christine might be coming down with symptoms similar to Brandon's.  We thank God no one is seriously ill and we are able to do our ministry in spite of the sore throat and tickles.

{FECA Vision Choir} Report 8

Saturday, March 30

Thanks to Joshua Yeh, he was able to take a Johnny Gaw's video and reduce the file size so it could be posted.  This video is a portion of our singing Lamb of God at St. George's church in Al Qosh.  The stone walls' resonance made 8 of us sound like a full choir!

Several interesting observations from last night's meeting.  There was definitely a multiethnic flavor with participants and congregation from Asia and America (us), Germany, Kurds, Arabs, Turkey and maybe more.  When the German pastor spoke, he was translated to Kurdish which was then translated into English, not into Arabic, even though it was an Arabic church.  Because Kenny spoke after the German pastor, he did not preached his prepared message and PowerPoint on Agape love, but switched at the last minute to his powerful and Spirit-led testimony.  We also heard an interesting story from Kenny about one of the better English speaking teachers at Berseve school.  When asked how did he learn English, he said he listened to Joel Osteen and got one of his students to do the same!  Willy will try to recommend he listen to Chuck Swindoll instead.  It is amazing how God prepares hearts for the good news,

We walked around to an ancient stone bridge after breakfast.  Then we took a rented can to Kaizak's home for lunch.  Kaizak is a key leader Habibi relies on for logistics help.  We asked Kaizak to share his story.  At 27, in 1983, he was captured by Iran and held as a prisoner of war for 15 years.  As a Christian they were treated as cats and dogs, whereas Muslim prisoners were treated very well.  There were 27 Christian prisoners, but 5 converted to Islam when tortured.  When caught even with a pencil, the prisoners were severely punished.  At this point, we were called to lunch, a scrumptious feast cooked by his wife and niece.  After lunch, we sang and left to go to Seje, where Dr. Paul Kingery has built a safe house for girls and guys) fleeing slavery or death because they became believers.  Dr. Paul is a retired (but he is only about 60) educator who quit his job because God called him to care for these (primarily) young women.  Himself not married, but adoptive father of many boys (over 20), he mentored these young men to build an incredible dorm for young ladies consisting of 7 bedrooms and 5 baths and an adjacent house where he and the boys live plus a garden to raise their own veggies, fish ponds, sheep, etc.  please check out his website, www.medeast.org for more detail and pictures.  He has written several books which Vision highly recommends.  Because he rescued a young Yazidi girl who was raped and became pregnant by an Islamic fighter (and had now emigrated to Canada with her toddler, he is currently shuned by the Yazidis who have very strong beliefs that this baby is unclean due to his not having pure Yazidi blood.  In the next few days, Syria is releasing hundred of young Iraqi girls and their "half breed" children to Iraq, dumping them in the Iraq desert.  He anticipates a crisis of enormous magnitude since the Iraq government does not want them not have funds to care for them and the UN and news media consider this "old news" and not covering this crisis.  Pray for wisdom for Dr. Paul how to deal with this situation.  Donations online to his organization is desperately needed.  When we sang In His Time he was deeply moved and we prayed for him (Habibi is a minor supporter of Dr. Paul).

After leaving Dr, Paul, we drove to the Family Mall because a local doctor wanted to meet up with a cardiologist and we happened to have Dr. Johnny Gaw with us.  Just as we pulled into the mall, our rented van died in the middle of the driveway.  We pushed the van to the edge of the road and walked to the mall where the doctors talked and arranged for Johnny to go to a clinic at 9 AM tomorrow to consult on a case.  Eventually, a replacement van was sent to drive us back to Zuhok where we were invited for dinner by one of our translators, Araz.  Because of the car problem, we arrived at 8, an hour late.  Araz extended family including his parents greeted us and we ate our second big feast of the day.  After dinner, we sang to the family and walked back to our hotel to sleep and prepare for our second camp starting tomorrow, Darkar.

{FECA Vision Choir}

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{FECA Vision Choir} Report 7

Friday, March 29

Today is preparation day since the sabbath starts at sundown Friday.  No work today or tomorrow, Saturday.  Sunday is the beginning of the work week.  We left at 9:30 to visit Al Qosh, the legendary tomb of the prophet Nahum, located about 20 km from Duhok.  There is a Jewish synagogue here abandoned when the Jews returned to Israel in the early 50's which is being restored. But there are two ancient churches here and a new sanctuary a few minutes walk from the synagogue.  We stopped at the first church, St. George Chaldean Apostolic Church.  We sang several songs including Lamb of God, Palestrina's Holy, Holy, Holy, and a couple other songs, enjoying the natural acoustics there.  We then walked across the courtyard to the new sanctuary, where we found about 25 late teens to early 20's meeting in fellowship led by a nun (see photo).  We asked if we could sing for them and received approval, so we sang I Will Lift Mine Eyes (Psalm 121) and Majesty and Glory (Psalm8).  We then walked to another ancient church where Nahum is supposedly buried.  No one was there so we sang Lamb of God.  Then we drove to St. Hormitz's Monastery, located in a beautiful mountain top.  The cars can only drive up some distance, and we have to walk several hundred stone steps in the drizzling rain to get to the now semi-abandoned monastery.  Only Glenn, Johnny, Christine, Amy, Lily, Brandon, Sharon, and Kenny made the trek, returning and saying it was quite an adventure (see photo taken from monastery showing the road uphill).  We then drove to Duhok for a scrumptious late lunch, paying about twice what our normal dinners cost (but we are eating leftovers for dinner after the church service) so it averages out.

After returning to our hotel and resting for a half hour, we headed to an Arabic church in Zuhok for their Friday service.  Tonight is the inaugural service in their new sanctuary, which seats about 50 people, and the place was packed with an overflow crowd of ladies in the adjoining room.  The service is very homey, the worship leaders trying to d3cide what to sing just as the service started.  Nevertheless, the singing was enthusiastic and we could sense the presence of the Spirit.  We sang In This Very Room, Lamb of God, and In His Time (see photo).  Then a visiting pastor from Germany preached about Peter walking on water followed by Kenny sharing his testimony and explaining that we came to love the Yazidis.  The pastor then asked us to sing a Chinese song but we sang the Kurmanji John 14:6 song instead.  Then another brother shared a long testimony.  The 2-1/2 hour service finally ended, we stayed for some picture taking (see photo of church leaders and guests) and chatted, and returned to our hotel just before 10, tired but grateful for a nice day.  We met a lady who had just become a believer during the previous group's visit last week.  Mei talked to a lady from Turkey who accepted Christ 2 years ago and learned to forgive, a very foreign concept in the Muslim culture.  We found out that there were a few Yazidi believers in the congregation.  One man recorded Kenny's sharing and wanted Kenny to repeat the first part because he missed recording it.  We also learned there were a few Christians in Berseve so Willy wants to track them down.  We plan to sleep in tomorrow on the sabbath so we stayed up late and made porridge from the lunch left over rice and a few of us ate porridge and/or ramen noodles

{FECA Vision Choir} Report 6

Thursday, March 28

Since our schedule is more or less settled in, only deviations or special activities will be reported even though it is our last day at Berseve1 camp.  We sang Psalm 121 and In This Very Room to the children and adults and Kenny shared a bit with them, but the audience was less engaged than they were yesterday.  During the children's program, we passed out some balloon which caused a ruckus as the children fought to get them, so we stopped it and thought we could teach them about learning to get in line and wait in the afternoon.  Meanwhile, Kenny and Marshall decided to help the local economy by going to the camp barbershop and get trimmed (see photo).  While waiting, they were able to talk to several men, and empathized with their loss at being brutalized out of their home villages by ISIS.  Statements like "we are peaceful and we love everyone, why were they so evil?"  Marshall was able to say although there is much evil, but Jesus loves you.  It wasn't clear how much communication took place because of the language barrier.  They did meet the English teacher at the Arabic secondary school at the camp who translated our haircut preferences to the barber and then invited us to his classes in the afternoon.  He also offered to pay for the haircuts (costing 2000 dinars, or the equivalent of $1.67) but of course his offer was refused.  All the singers except Dr. Glenn went to visit Tasheen's family and sang The Lord Bless You and Keep You to them.  We also tried to follow up with the lady who was released y months ago but could not locate her.  Since Tasheen's mother was not able to get a number to see our doctors, we offered (and had previously obtained Willy's permission) to escort her and bypass the ticketing system, which Christine and Brandon did at 2 PM.  Willy was able to get a local pastor and his German-Kurd speaking friend to meet with Dawoo (the young man who asked for prayer Monday).  Both these pastors recognized that Dawoo was wearing a demonic amulet.  After much discussion during which they asked Dawoo to discard the amulet, Dawoo said he would ask his father's permission to come to their church tomorrow when we would be going and (we hope) not be wearing this amulet.  Pray for this power encounter.   Then Willy, Kenny, Aram, Mei and Marshall went in the afternoon to visit the English classes taught at the Arabic school, but the school supervisor said we did not have the required permission from the school board so we were turned away.  In the meantime, the balloon standing-in-line lesson (see photo) almost turned into a riot, as many, many more children and even parents fought to bypass the line.  After handing out more than 150 (?) balloons (apparently, word of mouth spread so instead of the 60 or so "regular students", more than double that number showed up, becoming more boisterous.  Many were still waiting when we terminated the balloon giving program.  The whole process took almost two hours and left us exhausted, vowing not to do balloons again.  Christine was able to share the good news with Tasheen when she saw him in the late afternoon.  At debriefing time this evening, we saw that today was a harder day with some success (Tasheen and his family) and some tough resistance (not finding the lady, getting denied at the Arabic school, Dawoo spiritual warfare).  Glenn pointed out that encountering spiritual resistance may also be a sign we are doing something right, so keep on praying for us.  Many of us are quite tired due to jet lag, long day's work, especially Dr. Johnny Gaw, who is 70, seeing 40+ patients a day, almost non-stop.

{FECA Vision Choir} Report 5

Wednesday, March 27

Kenny shared a significant insight last night:  before ISIS, the Yazidis were happily settled in their multiple villages, most likely never having heard the Good News, an unreachable people group.  Now significant numbers of them are living together in these IDP camps, two such camps here at Berseve (1 and 2) with an additional camp adjacent to Berseve sharing one high school for these three camps where all the future leaders are being educated and where we can reach them quite easily.  What the enemy meant for evil, God has provided an opportunity for much greater good.  At this time, the Yazidis feel the insecurity and hopelessness. The door is open, but for how long?  Habibi wants to step into this opening.  Willy has a dream of one or two churches partnering to adopt one of these camps, to provide teams to come continuously and go beyond humanitarian work to (eternal) life changing ministries, and of course, long term individuals to model incarnational living.  Are we willing to walk along-side?

Unlike yesterday, it rained throughout the night and it is much cooler and wet today.  We started by singing The Lord Bless You and Keep You and The Name Above All Names.  Then Kenny told the adults and children listening something about his background and that we had come to understand their pain and love them.  One of the men in the audience responded with how much they appreciated our coming.  Then we started our regular daily activities.  During the morning session, Mei, Amy, Lily, and Sharon (see photo) had an arts and crafts session with the younger kids. The kids were given a blank piece of paper with a hole cut out in the center in order for them to place the sheet over their faces like a frame. They were asked to write their names on a piece of paper and on the bottom of the sheet to write a word to express how they were feeling such as "love," "joy," "happy," or "kind" and to also decorate the frame with some artwork. You could really see the creativity of the kids as they drew flowers, hearts, and stars. After the children's program, we went to the home of one of the high school students who had initially invited us over to his house on our first day at the camp.  His name is Tahsheen. We felt so blessed to be able to visit his home today as Tasheen is someone who could be a future leader for the Yazidi people. His whole extended family including his mom, two uncles, two brothers, in-laws, grandchildren, etc. came and we were able to talk about many topics, including God's tremendous love for the Yazidis.  Thank We commiserated with them that 13 members of their family were killed by ISIS.  One impressive thing that stood out to us is the emphasis Tasheen's mother had in wanting her children to have a good education.  After being served drinks and snacks, we then prayed for the family.  

This afternoon, Kenny took over Christine's triage duties so she was able to join the children's ministry, leading the children in a series of physical exercises (see photo).  Later that afternoon, Mei, Christine, Brandon, and Sharon were invited to the home of Naïf and his wife, Shireen, and their son. We also met Shireen's mother. Naïf shared with us that 3 families shared 2 tents. Naïf used to work as a journalist and cameraman back in Sinjar, and also informed us of his hemophilia. When we asked if we could pray for his family, Naïf said yes and made the comment that he believes in God and that God is above all things. Christine then said a prayer to bless Naif's family, and they in turn expressed their deep gratitude for visiting them and blessed us by saying that their home is our home, which was very touching.  Late in the afternoon, one of the patient was a lady who had been purchased (rescued by paying a fee) from ISIS only 6 months ago.  Her husband is still missing and her parents (or maybe her parents-in-law) paid a ransom to secure her release from the slave market, so now she is living at Berseve1 with her 4 children.  Her parents are in a different camp but her in-laws are also living in this camp but not in an adjacent tent.  She did not share the details of her trials during her captivity but seeing her gave life and reality to the news stories and touched those among us who heard her and prayed for her.  We left the site at 4:30 after seeing 80+ patients today, ate dinner, debriefed the day quickly at the restaurant (not a good practice due to the noise even though we were in a more secluded section), and returned home before 9 PM.

{FECA Vision Choir} Report 4

Tuesday, March 26

First, apologies for calling our city Kuhko when it should be Zakho (now you can find it on the map).  Even though we are tired, the time change from the jet lag caused some of us to wake up very early after initially hitting the sack.  But that is also part of the missions trip and we trust God to mount us up with wings like the eagle's.  We had our morning devotions, ate, and left the hotel (see photo of us on the bus with some of our translators) at 9:15 arriving at Berseve (see photo of camp) before 10.  It is a beautiful, warm, sunny day today unlike yesterday's cold rain.  After setting up, we sang In His Time and John 14:6 to our "captive" audience (photo of audience with us in the back, medical examination room is inside through the open door) before beginning our activities.  The medical team is set up much like yesterday, but the rest of us has a more organized plan after consultation with Connie who heads the Habibi educational program.  This consists of 20 minutes of singing, some free time, then arts and crafts for about 20 children.  But, today, there are about 40 children, so during craft time, Lily had to take a large group of kids to sing more.  The rest of us went to visit a family of one of the high school boy and listened to their struggle to find a better future for their children.  Meanwhile, Kenny was taken by a couple of boys to their elementary school where he met Falal, the English teacher there.  Falal invited Kenny and brought Willy to meet up at lunch (photo of lunch at Falal's tent) .  At the school, they "bumped" into another teacher who is a nursing graduate but couldn't find a job in nursing so he is teaching temporarily.  Willy gave him his business card because he could fill a need for Habibi's future medical ministry.  It turned out that Falal had the afternoon off, so he invited Kenny to visit the high school and arranged for Kenny to visit all 5 English classes at the school in the afternoon.

We ate lunch and resumed our activities after lunch.  As part of the craft, we had the older children make the 5 color beads, which gave us a chance to present the good news to them.  But instead of the forty plus kids this morning, we now had about 60.  After we completed the lesson, Araz, our translator went over the meaning of the beads in their language, and was pleasantly surprised at the answers to the meaning of the colors from the kids.  After dismissing the kids, Araz expressed his personal enthusiasm of this simple, yet clear presentation of the good news.  The medical team finished about 4:30 when the 83rd patient came plus several who came without numbers (parents who came with child and wanted to see the doctor), so today was actually more efficient than yesterday.  But by finishing early, we had to locate Kenny.  We drove over to the pool hall where we thought we might find him, but, no Kenny; but thanks to GPS, we were able to track him to the high school at the next camp (Berseve 2), where he was busy having a great time time talking to the different classes.  He spent at least 5 minutes engaging each class in conversation and among others, met a young high school girl who excelled in translating English to Kurmanji.  Such high level young people are exactly the caliber of person Habibi wants to find, train, and disciple into leaders and society influencers for the Yazadi people.  We thank God for these divine appointments He allowed Kenny to encounter.   We finally left Berseve at 5:15, arriving at the hotel for a few minutes of rest before leaving for dinner at 6:30.  We debriefed after dinner where we could share these wonderful things God is doing and got ready for a good night's rest at 9 PM.

Re: {FECA Vision Choir} Iraq report 3

Sorry for the typos.  Tried to fix them in the message below while I am having insomnia due to jet lag.

On Mar 26, 2019, at 3:29 AM, Marshall <umarsh07@gmail.com> wrote:

Monday, March 25

We met at 7:30 to begin our day with devotions.  We also continued sharing what we have seen our first day here.  Meiring shared how the family who sat besides her on the flight to Erbil had a baby who cried incessantly for hours.  Finally, she felt prompted to sing "Jesus Loves Me" to this baby.  After only two choruses, the baby fell asleep.  The parents said nothing, but today's Daily Bread reading encourages us to "not be weary in doing good" even when we don't see a response (from the parents) because "at the proper time, we will reap a harvest".

After devotions, we ate breakfast then met up with some of our translators (some would go directly to the IDP - internally displaced person - camp) and we left at 9:30, arriving about 10 at Berseve camp.  There are dozens of such camps around Duhok with over a hundred missionaries serving these camps, but only a few around Kuhko ministered to by a handful of missionaries.  That is one reason Habibi has chosen to minister in Kuhko and is focusing on 4 camps.  The previous medical team which left when we arrived served at two camps and we are serving at the other two camps (Berseve for 4 days this week and another camp for 4 days next week), all these for the first time.  Pioneering work into a new mission field is exciting and very interesting, but also scary since there is no precedent and as Willy said, we don't have to worry about stepping on other people's toes.  We set up the medical team in one large room and they started to work about 10:30 with Christine and a translator doing triage and Johnny and Glenn with their own translators set up at their stations.  By now a large crowd had gathered, but a local brother had divided the Berseve camp into 4 quadrants and passed out 100 numbered tickets in each quadrant so he shooed everyone away who did not have tickets and the medical team started to screen the patients numerically, lowest number first.  Somehow, by word of mouth all these people had come when we arrived.  Meanwhile, the rest of us sang one song and started to meet the children who had come, a half dozen at first, and soon over twenty in a second room.  We taught them the alphabet (which most knew already) and then Sunday school songs - somehow Amy, Lily and Sharon kept adlibing teaching material.  It rained intermittently the whole day, sometimes quite heavily, so only Kenny braved the elements and set out with a local high school boy as his guide to explore the village.  He ended up visiting an elderly man with a small canteen store and had tea with several men (see photo).  We broke for lunch at 1 PM, with the medical team seeing almost 30 patients.  We resumed work before 2 and the medical team worked until it got dark after 6 PM and they couldn't see before electricity was finally connected, so they saw a couple more patients, 82 in all today.  The rest of us was was invited by a young girl to visit her home for tea and Willy and Marshall prayed for a young man who asked for prayer for healing.  Communication was difficult even though this young man spoke some English but we explained John 14:6 to him, stressing that Jesus is the only way and he could not believe in multiple gods.  He promised to meet with us tomorrow when he left.  Meantime, Kenny in exploring the camp found a pool hall where many young men hung around shooting pool.  He spent several hours with these men, even inviting Marshall to join in.  Kenny shooting pool in a cigarette smoke filled room reminds us of Jesus hanging out and partying with sinners.  When we left the camp around 6:30, he received numerous 8nvitations to dinner, which he had to turn down.  We returned to the hotel, walked to a nearby restaurant (see photo) and debriefed, before retiring for the night around 9:30 PM, very tired but grateful for our first day.  Here are some comments from our team members:

Lily - the people hunger for learning

Sharon - kids are so lovely and welcoming

Glenn - great working with a cardiologist.  One 14 year old needed a heart transplant.  Need to pray for her.

Johnny - lots of patients are overweight, so lots of hypertension, diabetes.  Surprised to see in a poor environment.

Mei - great adaptability to respond to needs by our team, but we need to ask God what we are here for and focus more.

Kenny - overwhelmed by their hospitality, hanging out in a pool hall; one of the guys wanted to take him to barber.  Kept on being invited.  A high school kid shared his hurt when a Yazidi girl burned to death last year.

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{FECA Vision Choir} Iraq report 3

Monday, March 25

We met at 7:30 to begin our day with devotions.  We also continued sharing what we have seen our first day here.  Meiring shared how the family who sat besides her on the flight to Erbil had a baby who cried incessantly for hours.  Finally, she felt prompted to sing "Jesus Loves Me" to this baby.  After only two choruses, the baby fell asleep.  The parents said nothing, but today's Daily Bread reading encourages us to "not be weary in doing good" even when we don't see a response (from the parents) because "at the proper time, we will reap a harvest".

After devotions, we ate breakfast then met up with some of our translators (some would go directly to the IDP - internally displaced person - camp) and we left at 9:30, arriving about 10 at Berseve camp.  There are dozens of such camps around Duhok and over a hundred missionaries serving these camps, but only a few around Kuhko ministered to by a handful of missionaries.  That is one reason Habibi has chosen to minister in Kuhko and is focusing on 4 camps.  The previous medical team which left when we arrived served at two camps and we are serving at the other two camps, all these for the first time.  Pioneering work into a new mission field is exciting and very interesting, but also scary since there is no precedent and as Willy said, we don't have to worry about stepping on other people"s toes.  We set up the medical team in one large room and they started to work about 10:30 with Christine and a translator doing triage and Johnny and Glenn with their own translators set up at their stations.  By now a large crowd had gathered, but a local brother had divided the Berseve camp into 4 quadrants and passed out 100 numbered tickets in each quadrant so he shooed everyone away who did not have tickets and the medical team started to screen the patients numerically, lowest number first.  Somehow, by word of mouth all these people had come when we arrived.  Meanwhile, the rest of us sang one song and started to meet the children who had come, a half dozen at first, and stone over twenty in a second room.  We taught them the alphabet (which most knew already) and then Sunday school songs - somehow Amy, Lily and Sharon kept adlibing teaching material.  It rained intermittently the whole day, sometimes quite heavily, so only Kenny braved the elements and set out with a local high school boy as his guide to explore the village.  He ended up visiting an elderly man with a small canteen store and had tea with several men (see photo).  We broke for lunch at 1 PM, with the medical team seeing almost 30 patients.  We resumed work before 2 and the medical team worked until it got dark after 6 PM and they couldn't see before electricity was finally connected, so they saw a couple more patients, 82 in all today.  The rest of was was invited by a young girl to visit her home for tea and Willy and Marshall prayed for a young man who asked for prayer for healing.  Communication was difficult even though this young man spoke some English but we explained John 14:6 to him, stressing that Jesus is the only way and he could not believe in multiple gods.  He promised to meet with us tomorrow when he left.  Meantime, Kenny in exploring the camp found a pool hall where many young men hung around shooting pool.  He spent several hours with these men, even inviting Marshall to join in.  Kenny shooting pool in a cigarette smoke filled room reminds us of Jesus hanging out and partying with sinners.  When we left the camp around 6:30, he received numerous 8nvitations to dinner, which he had to turn down.  We returned to the hotel, walked to a nearby restaurant (see photo) and debriefed, before retiring for the night around 9:30 PM, very tired but grateful for our first day.  Here are some comments from our team members:

Lily - the people hunger for learning

Sharon - kids are so lovely and welcoming

Glenn - great working with a cardiologist.  One 14 year old needed a heart transplant.  Need to pray for her.

Johnny - lots of patients are overweight, so lots of hypertension, diabetes.  Surprised to see in a poor environment.

Mei - great adaptability to respond to needs by our team, but we need to ask God what we are here for and focus more.

Kenny - overwhelmed by their hospitality, hanging out in a pool hall; one of the guys wanted to take him to barber.  Kept on being invited.  A high school kid shared his hurt when a Yazidi girl burned to death last year.

{FECA Vision Choir} Photos of our singing

Thanks to Kenny for taking these photos of our singing earlier this evening. Also please note that it was a Jason Kerner, not Jason Gemmer who came to brief us.

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{FECA Vision Choir} Iraq report 2

Sunday, March 24

We arrived at Erbil at 3:40 AM, but by the time we got our luggage, it was past 5.  The temperature was about 50F, quite cool.  We were met by Aram, a young man only 20 who works for Habibi.  This winsome articulate man, whose father is an Iman, was raised as a Muslim, but found Jesus by reading the Bible himself.  As a result, he was persecuted by his father and left his home in Erbil 2 years ago (to avoid being killed) and started working for Habibi 4 months ago.  The drive from the airport to Duhok on a 24 passenger bus hired by Habibi took over 3 hours, initially on a three lane freeway which degenerated to pothole dirt roads where the top speed is 5 MPH, and then back to a superhighway.  We dropped off Aram at the house rented by Habibi since he had work to do and the bus drove us to Zakho, about 40 minutes away on a beautiful 3 lane (each direction) freeway, arriving at Nobel Hotel 9:40 AM where we were greeted by Willy Tan.  We went to eat a buffet breakfast at the hotel restaurant, checked in and rested until 3:30 PM.  By the way, Aram and the bus driver drove from Zakho to Erbil to get us, sacrificing their sleep Saturday night.  Since it is spring, the country-side is beautiful, gently rolling hills, and because  of the rains, lushly green.  We could see sheep in several

several places, contently grazing in the green pastures.  But in the summer, it is unbearably hot, Aram said several consecutive days of 50 C (122 F).  The Noble Hotel is suppose to be the best in Zakho, 4 star rated.  Indeed, our room, where we will meet as a team for daily devotions, is a three room suite, living room with two couches, bedroom and bath, and a separate kitchen.  The bed is comfortable, each room equipped with a heat pump to provide cooling in the summer and heat in winter.  It has good amenities, but like many Indian and Asian hotels, there is no shower curtain or door so the whole bathroom gets wet when one showers.

We rested and were to meet at 3:30 to drive back to Duhok to the Habibi house to have our devotions, but Kenny overslept and we had to wake him via hotel phone.  Jason Gemmer joined us soon after we held our first group devotion in the Habibi house living room,  Jason briefed us on Arabic and Yazidi cultural issues, we ate some sandwiches that Aram bought, and left to attend our first Arabic service at a Christian Missionary Alliance church.  The room. was quite filled with a crowd of about 90, including many NGO workers from all over the world.  The singing was lively and the tunes somewhat exotic; the only tune we recognized was How Great Thou Art but sung in Arabic.  We sang The Name Above All Names, Psalm 121, and In His Time and listened to a visiting pastor from Canada share about the feeding of the 5000 from John 6.  Although the message was good, we all had a hard time staying awake.  We then returned home to the hotel to collapse on our beds (except for maybe Kenny who seemed most energetic after his long nap

Location of Zakho relative to surrounding countries.  Note proximity to Turkey border.

{FECA Vision Choir} Iraq report 1

Saturday, March 21
We made it to Istanbul after an uneventful flight, a few minutes late, but since we have a seven hour wait, that presented no difficulty. Edwin Leung came to see us off at LAX and prayed for us. Here is a picture of us taken by Edwin.

After we arrived, we found out our Brazilian doctor teammate, Camilla, is not able to join us. She just found out she is with child but we don't know if she is not coming because of that or for some other reason. Although we are disappointed that our team is short one doctor, and more importantly, a female doctor, we know our God is sovereign and He is not surprised by this development. We bless her.

Kenny was able to get Mei and myself into the primeclass lounge at the airport using his brother's lounge pass. The rest of the team, instead of paying 50 Euros, decided to wait it out at the food court. It is actually quite crowded here at the lounge, and not as nice as the lounge in LA or even the ones we visited in India. The time here (and in Iraq) is 10 hours ahead of LA time and our flight is scheduled to leave at 1:30 AM.

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