Dr. Kammar's Bio

Salvation: My name is Ramzi George KAMMAR and I was born in Beirut, Lebanon in December of 1953 into a Greek Orthodox home. My background is Greek. My blood is Greek. My parents started sending me to a Christian School whose denomination I did not know. In that school there was a certain preacher whose denomination I did not know either. He used to come every morning and for 15 minutes he would explain to us either a miracle that the Lord performed or he would teach us a parable that the Lord taught. If that did not do anything it instilled in our hearts a love for the Lord Jesus Christ.

At the age of 12 my father had a cerebral hemorrhage and he was supposed to die. My parents started praying to their saints but I said to myself "We are called Christians after Christ and why is nobody is praying to Him?" So I decided to pray to the Lord Jesus Christ myself. I went into my bedroom and began praying earnestly; I prayed with all of my heart asking the Lord Jesus to heal my father. After three days of earnest prayer all of a sudden I felt in my heart that the Lord Jesus was going to heal my father. So I ran out of my bedroom and told my mother that the Lord Jesus Christ told me He was going to heal my father. She did believe me, in fact she pushed me aside as she was heading for the door to the hospital where they had put him in a corner waiting for him to die.

They were preparing everything for the funeral and he was expected to die any moment. But my father did not die. He went into a coma for 21 days. After 21 days the pupils of his eyes started moving and he came back to life. In fact at the American University Hospital they started calling my father the walking miracle. My father lived a normal life for 17 more years. That was the first encounter that our home had with the Lord Jesus Christ.

A year later my parents moved me from an elementary school to a secondary school. We have a different educational system in Lebanon. In that school there was a Christian layman who used to teach us the Arabic language. One day in October of 1966 he came to class and instead of teaching us a lesson he said that the Lord impressed on his heart to preach a message to us, so he did. He preached on Heaven and Hell and how that Jesus is up in Heaven and down in Hell there is hell, fire, and brimstone; if we love Jesus Christ we would want to be up in Heaven where He is or else because of our sins we are going to wind up in Hell. That was the first message I had ever heard in my life. I contemplated that message all day long. I felt I could not be indifferent. That night before going to bed I felt I had to take a stand. Moved by Jesus' love for me (I had seen Him heal my father), and out of fear of Hell, anybody who has any common sense would be afraid of Hell, I decided to accept Jesus Christ as my Lord and Savior. So I knelt down by the side of my bed and trusted Jesus Christ as my Lord and Savior. Immediately a stream of joy flooded into my heart and I was never the same person again.

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Baptism: I laid my head on the pillow to sleep and the Lord brought to my mind one word: Missions. I woke up in the morning and life was different. Life was bright and there was joy within. I went to my Dad and Mom and began witnessing to them. I did not know how but I wanted them to get what I had. I started sharing Jesus with them and at best I wanted them to pray the prayer that I had prayed the night before. They didn't like that not one bit. So they began persecuting me. They tore up all of my books and wanted to pull me out of the school where I was, and at home they treated me like I was an alien.

Well the man that preached that message that led to my salvation had a motto in his office that read like this: There is the greatest hope for the greatest sinner and that is to keep on reading the Word of God and there is the greatest danger on the greatest Christian and that is to neglect reading the Word of God. I took that motto to heart and bought a small torch light and a New Testament; and under the blanket I would read a chapter from the Bible every day even if I were too tired to grasp a single word I would still read a chapter from the Bible every day.

The man who preached that message that led to my salvation was later on martyred for the Lord. He won 2 Moslem kids to the Lord Jesus. Their father was a sheik in a mosque and the Holy Spirit produced his fruit in the kids so they began witnessing about the Lord Jesus Christ in the streets while their father would be speaking about their false prophet in the mosque. Because of his position the father could not take it so he set a trap for the man who led me to the Lord. He bribed his aunt and she was not saved so came to him and told him that there were people who wanted him to tell them about the Lord Jesus Christ. He would do anything for the Lord Jesus Christ - He spent his life in celibacy just winning people to the Lord Jesus Christ - so he went with her; but he never came back. After 8 days they found his body on the seashore and his head cut off and his right arm was cut off too because he had a tattoo of a cross on it and there was a bullet in his heart as well. He was decapitated and amputated for his zeal for the Lord Jesus Christ. He went up to glory and his fruit is following him.

Years went by and I reached my high school year and my parents thought I it was starting to keep bad company so they decided it was better for me to be a stupid Christian than to keep bad company. So they went to one of my relatives who was going to a Fundamental Independent Baptist Church started by a BBF missionary, his name is Clarence Green, and they asked him to come and take me to church. He came on Saturday to invite me to church. He spent 7 hours at our place and that day he won my mother and my 3 younger sisters to the Lord; and the next day we all went to church!

Over there I first heard about baptism. I had never heard about baptism before. So I immediately followed the Lord in believer's baptism. I was baptised by pastor Victor Sadaka on December 30, 1973. Dr. Victor Sadaka is the pastor of my home church and is on the board of Bob Jones University.

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Consecration: I started being active in church. I asked the pastor if I could teach a Sunday school class so he gave me a class of 7 kids between the ages of 5 and 7 and his oldest son Paul was one of them. God blessed and the class grew to 23. In fact, it grew so big they had to divide it up three times: and I ended up becoming the Sunday School Superintendent of the church. God blessed then and the church grew from 76 to 173 in 9 months.

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Call to the Ministry: By that time I had gotten a degree in Business Administration and an Accounts Expert degree. I was thus authorised to sign Balance Sheets presented to the government and I was working for 3M company as financial accounting coordinator reporting the whole Middle East operation to the parent company in St. Paul, Minnesota.

Because of the war in Lebanon, the company decided to move the management and some of the personnel to Brussels, Belgium. Out of the 250 employees I was one of the 10 chosen to go. That was a great privilege but I did not want to go. I wanted to stay in my home church and serve the Lord Jesus Christ in my home church. God brought about events in my life that made me accept the offer of 3M; there was a church split that broke my heart. That was a different experience for me so I took the offer and headed for Brussels, Belgium.

There I did not know what God had for me in store. Through a contact from my home church I joined another BBF church started by another BBF missionary whose name was Tommy Duniho. There I started being active in visitation in spite of my limited French. In fact, I won a person to the Lord Jesus in the French language and he is still a baptised member of the church over there. I went out on visitation twice a week with Tommy and I was active in church. I was very happy in Brussels both at church and at work.

But all of a sudden I became very dissatisfied with life. I began to go home everyday and say what have I done for the Lord today. I started feeling an emptiness in my life that I could not understand, and there was a great vacuum that nothing could fill; I thought I was going to die. The Lord had brought me up very high in life that I had an enviable position and He allowed me to win one of the executive sales and marketing managers of 3M to Him; and I had a very good salary and everything that I wanted in life. I had an apartment furnished twice with everything and I had 3 cars, a Volvo, an Audi, and a Mazda. And a very good looking prospective girl in church. But the higher He raised me up in life the more dissatisfied I was with life. I could not go on living like that.

Now all the time from the day I got saved until then I had been praying Lord send me out on the field as a missionary. In fact I had begun praying Lord I do not have the faith anymore to see it come true but I still ask you to send me out on the field as a missionary.

Three weeks later another BBF missionary, a missionary to Holland by the name of Corky Albright stopped over in Brussels, Belgium on his way from the States to his field. That Wednesday night he came to church and spoke about missions. He showed us slides about souls, lost souls on their way to eternity without Christ and how great was the need for more workers to go to the field. While he was showing us a slide of the Amsterdam city square with hundreds of people just gathered around sitting down, and hanging around just doing nothing; all of a sudden I felt in my heart that the Lord JESUS was telling me that now is the time. So I sat back in my pew and for the remainder of the service I did not listen to the message. I just re-evaluated my life and saw that for 13 years God had been preparing me for the ministry, He had given me experience both in the Christian world and in the professional world as well and now was the time. So when the service was over I was ready for the invitation but the missionary did not give an invitation but I came forward anyway and I surrendered to the mission field.

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Ordination: My pastor the missionary to Belgium, Tommy Duniho, said you have to go to Bible college and I said what is that? I had never heard of a Bible college before and he said: it is a place where you get your Bible education and training for the ministry so I conceded to the idea. Being affiliated with only BBF missionaries, I feel like I am a second generation BBF missionary, I applied to BBF colleges and I said Lord I do not know anything about this at all so the one that accepts me first I will take that as a sign from you.

Baptist Bible College in Springfield, Missouri accepted me first. PCBBC in Los Angeles accepted me a week later. So I proceeded to go to BBC in Springfield, Missouri. The first thing to do was to obtain a visa for the States. So Tommy and I went down to the embassy in Brussels and applied for a student visa but I was disqualified financially. But the consul said that if BBC would give me an I-20 form saying that they will have a part-time job on campus for me then he would grant me the visa.

We went to my place and called Dana Sprinkle the head of the registrar at BBC then, but she said that they couldn't provide that form because the college was cutting back because of finances. So Tommy said see this is God's will for your life. You have a very good job and a very good salary, you can stay here and help me and be a blessing to the church. I said "Good-bye, Tommy."

He left and I stayed up all night that night praying to the Lord and preparing messages in my mind about faith and how I am doing this by faith. In the morning I did not have to wake up because I had not gone to sleep so I took my morning shower and went down to the personnel department and asked them for a letter stating that I was a 3M employee and had been their employee for the last 7 years and that my title was Financial Accounting Coordinator.

They gave me the letter and I went down to the embassy planning to preach to the consul on faith and how I am doing this step by faith although he was not saved, he was cussing the day before. I submitted the letter and stood in line to see him. As soon as the consul saw me in the distance he raised his hand up and said I still need the I-20 form. I said there was no I-20 form and as I was fixing to open my mouth and speak to him about faith he kept his hand up in the air and said I am going to do an act of faith and grant you the visa. That was a miracle. He stretched his neck out for me but to me this was a seal of God's call to the ministry.

The financial manager of 3M called me in and said, "Ramzi if you go back on your resignation I promise you that within two years I will double your salary." I said, "Sir, I am not for sale." That manager was suddenly fired two months after I left. I got to BBC and because I had already had a degree in Business Administration I was exempted from my English and Accounting courses. So I was able to finish 3 years, and in 1-3/4 years and I walked the line and graduated in May of 1981. Later on in May of 1991 I earned my Doctorate in Systematic Theology from the then Baptist Christian University now Louisiana Baptist Seminary in Shreveport, Louisiana.

I was ordained during the national graduation fellowship week in Springfield, Missouri at the High Street Baptist Church on May 21st, 1981. Dr. David A. Cavin gave me the charge of the ministry and Dr. R.O. Woodworth was the moderator of the ordination while Rev. Ron Walker was the interrogator and Rev. Steve Ward was the clerk of the ordination.

The pastors that laid their hands on me were: Dr. David A. Cavin, Dr. R.O. Woodwoth, Dr. W.E. Dowell, Sr., Dr. Kenneth Gilming, Sr., Dr. Robert Terrey, Rev. Jim White, Rev. Ron Walker, and Rev. Steve Ward. Three other pastors that were present signed my ordination certificate and they were Dr. Frank Hodges, Dr. Curtis Goldman, and Rev. Dannie Webster.

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Deputation: I started my deputation in Florida in August of 1981 with a one way ticket from Springfield to Orlando for $90, a rental Ford Escort for $79 a week paid for one week in advance, arrived there to Hertz to be given a Ford Fairmont for the same price, and I had $70 in my pocket.

God gave me grace in pastors eyes and I was able to raise my support in 9 months finishing it off in California in May of 1982.

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Launching into the ministry of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ - First Term on the Field: Because I had the culture and language advantages I decided to go back to the Middle East. But where to go to in the Middle East? There was no work going on in Damascus, Syria so I proceeded to go there. But the Syrian intelligence did not leave me alone. They could not believe that I was coming from the United States of America just to preach the Gospel there. They gave me such a hard time that in three day's time I developed pain in my back from fear. I became frustrated and did not know what to do.

The third day I was there Israel came into the Southern part of Lebanon and drove the PLO out and that opened a new field for me. The Southern part of Lebanon with Sidon and Tyre of the Bible as the two major cities was PLO land and it was a closed field. I immediately went back to Lebanon and decided to plant a church in Sidon which is the capital of the southern part of Lebanon.

In the middle of the heavy armament and Israeli tanks I was the first civilian to drive down to Tyre and Sidon of the Bible. I decided to settle in Sidon but there were no hotels in this war torn city So every day I would drive down from Beirut to Sidon looking for an apartment to rent. After three weeks I was successful in finding one so I moved in and settled down.

Being the only missionary in the whole city of Sidon I decided to knock every single door in Sidon. So from north to south and from east to west I decided to comb the whole city of Sidon. I knocked every single door there and almost 70% of the doors that I knocked were Moslem. My knees never failed to tremble as I knocked these doors. Most of the people over there live in buildings so when I went out door knocking I always started from the top of the building and worked my way down; never the other way round for fear that if I started from the first floor upon the way back down somebody would be waiting for me with a knife. I spent 3 years in Sidon and had 75 people saved.

Now getting them saved was one story but getting them baptised was a totally different story. It was very difficult crack virgin soil. For them to cut off from their society and take a stand for the Lord Jesus Christ and get baptised and emerge as a local New Testament Baptist Church was something that they just would not do. It took for the Lord to evict us from Sidon. The Moslems launched an attack on us and we were evicted to the Security Zone of Israel. People were devastated and it took a year to calm down. I fled in a short sleeve shirt and lost all my earthly belongings most important was my library then my furniture and clothes and everything. I only escaped with my car. Over in the Security Zone, being up-rooted from their society and their family ties, they were willing to obey the Lord in Believer's Baptism and a local New Testament Baptist Church was established.

It was high time for me to return to the States on furlough. I had been on the field for 7 years, I was exhausted and had lost most of my support. I should have gone on furlough after 4 years but I wanted something tangible to present to my supporting churches. So I waited until the church was established. Some 60% of my originally supporting churches that had supported me when I first went out on the field thought that because I had the culture and language advantages I should have had a church going in one or two years. They expected me to perform miracles and as time started passing by I started losing support and by the time I went on furlough I was bleeding financially; but I had in my bag a church planted and established. You can kill a man but you cannot kill a church. Even the gates of Hell cannot prevail against it. The other 40% of my supporting churches were faithful and supported me to the end and they still support me today. So I came on furlough with boldness and vigour and thankfulness to the Lord Jesus Christ.

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Second Term on the Field: Furlough was successful and refreshing and I made up all of my lost support. I went back to the field refreshed, fresh, and ready to go.
Now from the first day I went down to Sidon I had prayed and asked the Lord Jesus to raise up workers on the field and that He would raise up someone to take over the work that I will start so that I can go on somewhere else and start another work. I wanted to be a church planter because the Middle East is a very needy field and there is a great need to plant churches there.
I arrived at Klaiaa in Marjaeoun which is the capital of the Security Zone. I had rented a house on my first term on the field, in a purely Catholic town. They were so fanatic that if you were a born-again Christian wanting to drive through that town you had to duck your head. I had moved in there rented a house and the next day the town woke up with a Baptist preacher in town.
So when I came back from furlough I launched a campaign to win people to the Lord Jesus in that town and all of a sudden the Lord JESUS visited us with a revival and the Holy Spirit hovered all over the county. People started getting saved and started getting baptised and the people that were evicted from Sidon started winning people to the Lord Jesus as well. In 9 months we had 70 people saved and 35 baptised which for that part of the world is a phenomenal record. Pastor Victor Sadaka my home church pastor was visiting us and he commented, "Ramzi, you are witnessing a revival." It was then that it dawned on me that we were witnessing a revival. The highlight of the revival was that when a man by the name of Pierre Francis whom I had trained for the ministry and invested life, time, and money in, and he was my Timothy in the ministry, he asked me to ordain him and the whole church voted him unanimously as the commencing pastor. I had ordained a deacon for life before and he is the right hand of pastor Pierre Francis today. So were arranged an ordination service. Three pastors and two ordained deacons took part in the ordination service; Pastor Victor Sadaka moderated it and I gave the charge of the ministry. I used that ordination occasion as an opportunity to have an impact on the whole community by promoting it, advertising it, and inviting people to attend it and show them that there are still people who simply follow the Bible. We had a wonderful ordination service and a season of refreshing from the presence of the Lord.
Also every time we had a baptismal service we would go down to the rivers because we didn't have a baptistery and the southern part of Lebanon is rich with water. So every time we had a baptismal service I would promote it in advance in order to impact the community for the Lord Jesus Christ. I would announce it beforehand so that those who wanted to get baptised could do so and those that were afraid of getting baptised would come and attend and see that there is nothing scary about it. We also invited unsaved people to come and attend and see that there are still people who simply read the Bible and simply implement what is in it. This was a great time of fellowship for us and a time of rejoicing in what God was doing in our midst.
Naturally, and according to the Bible, this stirred up severe persecution. People hated us and cussed us out in public; they called us names and threw stones at our cars and dented them. I had more enemies than I had hair on my head and at one time there was a rumor they were going to throw a bomb through my bedroom window at night when I was asleep. I panicked and kept all the windows closed but still went on with the soul winning and baptising ministry. Although I did not perform the baptisms myself, pastor Pierre did. I did not baptise a single person because I believe that Jesus sent me to preach not to baptise so that no one would say I baptised in my name. We thought we could fool the community a little bit but that did not work. Most of the heat came down on my head and at times it was too much to bear. I lived under such fear that the hair of my right cheek fell off and treating it with medicine left a scar that is still in my face until today.
I had a baptismal service planned for Sunday June 11th, 1991. So finally trying to stop these baptismal services, they came on Saturday night June 10, 1991 and poured fuel on my car and set it on fire (see picture in slide presentation). They also left me a death threat saying that if I didn't leave town they were going to kill me. I didn't lose my sleep that night and in the morning pastor Pierre Francis and some church people came and picked me up in their car. We went to church for regular Sunday morning services and after church we headed for the river. We had 11 people lined up for baptism, 7 of them showed up and we had a great victory in the Lord Jesus Christ. Sunday went by quietly; Monday I passed the word around that I wasn't leaving so whoever wanted to kill me could go ahead and do that. This drove them mad and they didn't know how to handle the situation. So they went and conspired with each other and with the general that controlled the area and on Wednesday June 14, 1991 he issued an order deporting me. I was to be kicked out from the country. On Sunday morning June 19, 1991 I went to church and held a farewell service for my people and challenged them to remain faithful to the Lord. You can kill a man but you cannot kill a church. And following the example of the Bible I administered the Lord's Supper to them, left them to the grace of God, said goodbye with prayer and tears, and headed for exile.
I became stateless! I also lost my car, my house, my furniture, my library, my earthly belongings and crossed over into Israel with two suitcases. That was all that I owned in this world. Statelessness like the book of Hebrews chapter 11 talks about is not a very nice feeling to have at all.
I went to the States to recuperate from this blow. I put my two suitcases in the basement of a church and a unique flood came and ruined the suitcases, and the pastor threw them away without even waiting for me or consulting me. The church did not compensate me, neither did the pastor who with his own hands threw my suitcases into the dumpster. My only earthly belongings were the clothes I had on me!
After spending much time alone with the Lord JESUS, I started coming back to my senses. Until today I do not understand why the Lord JESUS allowed this to happen but I know that it brought me closer to the Lord JESUS and I felt privileged to be counted worthy to taste of the sufferings for Christ that Paul talks about in Second Corinthians 11:26-27.
At that point in my life pastor David Stanford and pastor Bill Monroe of the Florence Baptist Temple in South Carolina played an important role in my life. God used them and pastor Bill Monroe with the help of pastor David Stanford adopted me and sponsored me for immigration purposes and I became a United States immigrant. When I was thrown out over the borders into Israel I called my sending church, and Dr. David A. Cavin called Jerry Falwel who in turn called the Israeli government and the Israeli government told Jerry that I was welcome to settle in Israel, so I did.
Back in Marjaeoun the burning of my car and my deportation cooled down the heat of the persecution on the church in the security zone and it was left to grow in peace at the same time keeping a low profile for a season.
Later on the political situation in Lebanon changed and the people from Sidon were able to go back and the Christians from Sidon went back and formed the Sidon Baptist Church (locally known as Hundred Percent Baptist Church) under pastor Pierre Francis and in the security zone the Christians that remained in the Marjaeoun Baptist Church were pastored by a church deacon that pastor Pierre ordained and his name is Najib Khoury. Today both churches are doing very well and testifying for the Lord Jesus. (See in the Photo Gallery new fresh slides about the two churches and their pastors that they sent in recently).
I came back to Israel to seek God's will for my life and I didn't have anything to do so I decided to get married. I remembered Ruth who was my Sunday School Superintendent. We already had an affinity for each other. She was very active in visitation and a great soul winner; she was also gifted with children. I proposed to her and we got married. We got married at the Hyatt Regency on the French Hill in Jerusalem. Two pastors flew in from the States for the occasion, pastor Duane Thorp performed the wedding while my dear precious friend pastor John Waldrip was my best man at the wedding. After a honeymoon in which we visited the Holy Land we started our ministry in Jerusalem as a married couple. On our first day on visitation after the very first visit that we made as a married couple and as we were walking back home that night some Moslems attacked us with fire crackers. One of them threw a rocket that flew across the street and all the way right down the street and hit my wife in the upper lip and cut her lip. She started bleeding. I saw her blood on the sidewalk where we were and I didn't know what to do so we ran back to the house where we were visiting. They treated her lip and covered us up in their car and took us back to our apartment. Until today we have not been able to replace the car that they fire bombed for me in the security zone of Lebanon with another decent one in Israel; but we have managed to serve and had 3 wonderful years and finished our second term on the field.
We labored very hard for 3 years in and around the old city walls of the great city of Jerusalem. We ministered to 5 families and in spite of the fact that persecution was high and we were robbed and vandalized twice (see testimonies from the field) we had 7 people saved and 3 baptised. We finished our second term in August of 1995 and came back to the States on our second furlough.

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Third Term on the Field: After a long furlough where our daughter was born in Washington D.C. on November 1996, we came back to Jerusalem in May of 1997 to resume our ministry and start our third term on the field.
We felt defeated to resume our ministry inside the city walls. We found out it was a hub for all kids of cults and religions and everybody wanted to do something in there. We felt we were fighting against to many odds and everybody there was playing religion. So we decided to move out of the Old City walls.
We moved to the Jewish quarter but racism was so high that even Jewish converts, mostly Russian, told us they did not want to get baptized and be one with the Palestinians. Moreover they wanted to live under the economy of the Old Testament. They did not want a pastor, they wanted a Rabbi. They did not want a church they wanted a synagogue. At best we could have a Bible Study going on; but that was not our purpose.
So we decided to move to the East part of the city and minister to a mixed community. There our ministry began to grow. We won people to the Lord Jesus. We baptized people and we grow in number and they grew spiritually with us too.
It was the dawn of a new era for us. We saw the nucleus of a new church begin to develop. We were very happy. Contrary to Lebanon where the fruit was abundant so was the persecution. Here the soil was very hard and the fruit was little but the persecution was almost less by 70%. The worst we could remember was that every Sunday we had services, the neighbors would turn their tape recorders on high to disrupt the services. One Sunday we had a moslem neighbor who waited for me on Sunday noon after having returned people home from the services and he threw a 3 pound stone from the roof of his house on my head. It missed my head but caused to huge holes in the roof of my van.
In four years we had 31 saved and 11 baptized that term. It was to for us to come back to the States on furlough. We entrusted our ministry to a friend of ours who was my class mate at BBC in Springfield, Missouri, from 1980-1981.
We came back to the States on furlough in June of 2001.

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Fourth Term on the Field: Our furlough was long, exhaustive, painful, and fruitful. During that time I made long and extensive trips to the field just to check on the flock.
Ruth got critically ill, she had health problems, the worst of which was birth defect in her spinal cord. She required a major surgery on her spinal cord. She was born with a birth defect that on surfaced a month after we arrived into Los Angeles on furlough. This is Divine Providence. She had excellent treatment and she is much better now. She has her limitations, like she cannot travel far by car, she cannot carry anything over five pounds, she has to exercise daily for thirty minutes.
Other than that, she is quite healthy and serves the Lord with all of her heart. She is a queen in the ministry. Also while on furlough, Ruth got her American citizenship, and so did our children. When we went back to the field in June of 2004 for our Fourth Term, we all went back as American citizens with American passports.
The man that we had entrusted our flock with to go on furlough proved to be a failure. He scattered the sheep. We resumed the task of planting a church in Jerusalem. We gathered the sheep and practically had to start all over again.
Finding a location to stabilize the ministry was in itself a tedious task. It took us a year and a half to find one. That was in October of 2005. And on the 22nd of January we organized, went into charter and established the " FIRST BAPTIST BIBLE CHURCH " of Beit Hanina in East Jerusalem.
This was the third church I planted in my total of 25 years in the ministry as a missionary. The first being in Sidon, Labanon; the second in Marjaeoun, in the security zone of Lebanon and Israel; and this third one in Jerusalem, Israel.
The church sits on a tripod of all denominations and religions and ministers freely to everybody.
At the same time God gave us a blessed convert by the name of Hanna Hamameh and his wife Tamara and their three years old daughter Priscilla and their one year old son David.
In the course of this fourth term on the field, we labored hard. The ministry grew from a Home Bible Study to a full course church.
On Sunday January 22nd 2006 we officially organized the First Baptist Bible Church in Beit Haninah in Northern Jerusalem.
We have church meetings on Sunday morning, Sunday evening and Wednesday evening plus visitation on Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday. We are now praying for a youth meeting on Friday.
We won several people to the Lord. We had two Baptismal services. We had two new families come from out of town and join our church. And we had two families immigrate; one to Australia and one to Sweden. But what is refreshing is that they are living for the Lord.
We teach our people to read their Bibles daily and pray and tithe and witness. Our people here have developed personal devotions, family altars. They are good tithers and they witness much. We praise the Lord Jesus, the Captain of our salvation and the God of Missions for the spiritual depth and Christian warmth of our congregation.
We have also had our share of persecution and oppression. This time it also came from other denominations which tried to steal some of our sheep, but we lost none by the Grace of Christ.
On another front, the two churches I established in Lebanon are doing well too. In fact, one of them, the second one I planted in the security zone is doing exceptionally well as they have planted two mission works, the first mission church they established is in a town called Hasbayya, 12 miles from them. The second in a town called Ebl Saki, 50 miles from them.
All in all in our combined ministry and over the last 4 years forming our fourth term on the field, we had 100 people saved and 46 baptized. Many have grown spiritually and we have had two couples called into the ministry. We had one new church established and one new work started. We thank God for you for your prayers and support for making this possible.
The date is now 3. 1. 2008. Our objective for the next term is to build up the attendance of the church, help John complete his Bible education and training, ordain him, appoint him pastor of the church here in Jerusalem; and complete the work on the Arabic Reference Study Bible..

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