Moores in Macedonia: September 2022

Hi everyone, thank you for reading our latest update. Here goes…

Momentum & Breakthrough

Over the past few years, it has often felt like we have struggled to gain momentum in our work here. Even without the well-known Covid challenges, there have been a number of barriers to really seeing God’s kingdom coming here. There is a lot to celebrate, and we have seen God do some wonderful things as we have reported over the years, but we hope that this coming season will bring some long-term momentum and breakthroughs with mission. It is time return to our core purpose of being in Macedonia: To share the gospel with as many people as possible and to build with those who receive the message, while supporting local church members in the mission God has called them to do.

To support this, we have tentatively begun to restart the work at the drug rehabilitation centre in Kisela Voda alongside Vladko, one of the church members. We have been able to reconnect with some of the people who we met when we used to visit weekly pre-lockdown. Later this month we are hoping to begin a small group with a few people from our church, and one area of focus for the group will be how we work together to proclaim the message of Christ. Additionally, due to the school holidays, we have been able to have more time in our local community and have met some new families which we hope to be able to spend more time with.

We will keep you updated as to how things are going as we continue to try to sow the seed of the message of Christ and demonstrate his love for us.

Luka goes travelling!

Luka is a member of our church whom many of you will be familiar with. He became a Christian a few months after we moved to Macedonia. He also shares a flat with our friend and fellow Elim missionary, Scott Jackson. We are pleased to tell you that later this month Luka will be moving to Belgrade in Serbia for a year to undertake a bible school and ministry training course. This is a great step in his continuing journey with Jesus. Please pray for him as he makes the transition to living and studying elsewhere.

Do you like browsing the charity shops?

One of the ways in which God has grown us as a family over our time in Macedonia is in regard to the children’s education. As many of you will be aware Kristen and Josiah are educated at home, generally by Katie. This was something we felt God lead us into in our early days here and it has been wonderful, they are both making excellent progress in their education and it also gives us great flexibility as a family in regards to our work as we are not tied to school timetables or holidays.

From this month the children are beginning a new curriculum, and over the next 2-3 years we will require a number of books, a lot of which is classic literature. The difficulty is… obtaining them! (Amazon doesn’t deliver here!)

If you are the kind of person who likes to have a browse round the charity shops to see if you could help us out, please do get in touch and we will send you a list of what we need. We can reimburse you for the costs of the books, and we also need to figure out how to get them here ! However we thought that to begin with we would see if anyone is interested in supporting us in this way. Please get in touch if you feel able to help.

Prayer

• Please give thanks for the opportunities to meet new families in our community.
• Please pray for Kristen and Josiah as they continue with their education, that they will continue with their good progress. Please also thank God for the gifting and creativity he has given Katie as she guides the children.
• Please pray for breakthrough with our local community and that we will build some momentum with the things that are beginning in September.

Thank you for reading our update and for praying for us.

Ian, Katie, Kristen and Josiah.