Dear Friends,

Wow! It’s February already. The holiday season is behind us and now 2018 is charging ahead at breakneck speed! Add visiting ministers, guest speakers, and a host of other things on top of running the Charis location, we’ve had a very productive time.

One of those “other things” that I (Chris) did was develop and build out a new network of websites for the Charis Bible College organization in the UK. Long story, but I tapped into my experience from before we moved here to Scotland. It took a bunch of time on top of everything else we had going on. But I think the final product will provide a much better experience for both the website visitors and our staff at each of our local campuses.

It’s still a “work in progress” and there is still a whole bunch we need to do yet. But here’s the link where you can see the new sites.

Rest for Fellow Missionaries

Lisa and I were blessed by a visit from our good friends from Bible college, Mick, Linda, and Sam Entwistle. They are doing some amazing mission work in Mexico, where they are focusing on equipping pastors there to become more effective in ministry.

In theory they were back in the UK for a bit of a rest. Unfortunately the reality for many missionaries is that “rest” time too often gets filled up with other ministry activities, such as connecting with financial partners, etc. That’s a challenge Lisa and I appreciate better than most.

So I was well pleased by a comment Sam made as they were loading up their car to leave at the end of their visit: “I think that’s the first weekend in more than a year when we weren’t working.” At least they were able to get a few day’s rest!

If you are interested in learning more about the work they are doing in Mexico, please check out their website.

Cecil Paxton Visited Charis Dumfries

If you have never heard of Cecil Paxton, he has an anointing to minister to people’s hearts, especially in the area of healing. So we were incredibly blessed to have the honor of hosting him for a day at the Charis campus here in Scotland.

We opened the event up to the public and 55 people came out to receive from his ministry. We saw miraculous healings in the room. Later we asked our students to share the impact of his ministry. Half of them had testimonies of God doing something miraculous through Cecil’s ministry.

One student had been living with chronic knee pain that was simply gone. Another’s teenaged son commented the next week about how wonderful it was to have his Mom back after she was set free from a harsh and critical attitude. And another of our students had been in the hospital because of a heart attack over the holidays. She had a follow up appointment for a scan after that ministry time with Cecil. The medical staff asked her why she was there because they could find no evidence of her ever having had a heart attack!

Needless to say, we were all tremendously blessed and look forward to Cecil returning to minister in Dumfries! You can learn more about his ministry via his website.

Another Student Testimony

God is changing lives as we minister the Word at the Bible college. As you may know, I was given permission to put together a complete 8 hour course for the school about finances in the Kingdom of God. I called it Rejecting Mammon: How to See Results From Your Giving.

About half way through the course, I invited one of our students to share how that specific course material was transforming her life. She shared that she discovered her past had locked her into a poverty mindset because she had experienced a season where she was homeless.

As she listened to me share some of the testimonies of what God has done in the lives of Lisa and I and in our finances she asked God, “why isn’t that for me?” And she heard him answer, “It is!”

Those two words from God resonated in her heart and completely set her free from that bondage of her old poverty mindset. She’s already had multiple examples where God prompted people to bless her materially. In one instance, she was praying about needing money to pay the bus fare to get to school.

Then someone came to give her some money. Turns out our student had baked a cake for this person’s daughter weeks earlier. That cake was such a blessing that they wanted to give her some money to thank her. It just happened that they gave it to her right at the moment when as she was choosing to believe God to meet her need!

God is changing lives and setting people free here in Scotland!

If that testimony resonated with you, then please know the course is an expanded version of a three part sermon series I gave here in Dumfries at Glen Aros Church. You can find that three part message when you click here.

More Activity Ahead

We’ve still got a whole lot more ministry activity coming up. In addition to our work running the Bible college, we will be hosting guest speakers Greg Mohr, and Wendell Parr. Both are instructors from Charis Colorado.

Next month, Charis Dumfries will host a mission team from the Charis Bible College campus in Oklahoma City. We are looking forward to some joint ministry with our fellow Charis family members.

After the Oklahoma City team departs back home, Lisa and I will be traveling up to the Highlands of Scotland with Rich and Dorothy Van Winkle. They are friends of ours who pastor a church in the Fort Worth area of Texas, teach in several of the Charis locations in that part of America, and will be joining the mission team from Oklahoma.

Rich and Dorothy have ministered in Scotland several times over the years. So we are looking forward to joining next month.

Financial Reality Check

I appreciate that you may receiving our newsletter for the first time because you signed up to get the free eBook. We are happy to bless you with that book. We do pray that it has been a blessing to you.

If you are still reading then you probably now realize that Lisa and I do a whole bunch more in addition to providing complimentary articles, podcasts, ebooks, and so on via our website. It is only because of the generous financial support of our NewCREEations ministry partners that we are able to do all that while we also live overseas in Scotland where we head up a local campus for Charis Bible College too.

We are following God’s call and fulfilling the great commission Jesus instructed us to “go and make disciples of all nations." We are training up believers in the ways of the Kingdom of God and ultimately we expect to see a shift in the entire nation of Scotland back towards God.

Friend, if you already partner with us, Lisa and I appreciate you co-laboring with us more than you know. In the Rejecting Mammon course I taught a full class hour on partnership. In that lesson I shared with the Bible college students that the only reason Lisa and I are able to be here sharing these life-changing truths is because of the money you give each month.

On behalf of each one of them, Lisa and I thank you.

One of the challenges in living overseas is that we are subject to fluctuations in relative currency values. The British Pound has been gaining strength compared to the US Dollar over the past year. Today it costs about 17% more to pay for what we do here in Scotland than it did when we arrived just over a year ago, simply because of the difference in exchange rates.

I say that in out of humility to be transparent. And so that you know where we stand in our support needs at the moment. We are believing for another $1200.00 US in monthly support to meet budget. In addition to covering our monthly expenses (which have gone up by 17% due to the currency exchange increase), our budget also needs to cover expenses involved in traveling back to the States in June for the yearly Charis Bible College Directors meeting. We must set aside money each month to save for these traveling expenses.

If Scotland has a place in your heart, please playfully consider either donating to or partnering with NewCREEations. In doing so you will be planting your financial seed into good ground that is already producing fruit.

You may click the blue button below to give money securely online. Or you may mail a check to the address below.

Thank you so much for journeying with us into 2018. The best is yet to come!

Blessings,

Chris & Lisa Cree

P.S. Here is that button and address for your donation.

Online:

Mail:

NewCREEations Ministries
120 N. Elm St
Wooland Park, CO 80863