Jan 2014 eNews from South India Church of Christ Mission

January, 2014

Dear Prayer Partners,

My prayer this morning is that your hearts are as warm as our weather here, in the low 80F’s, following a busy, fulfilling Christmas Program to welcome 2014! The year is already over a week old, and we are well into the work of the New Year, since snow and ice and cold like what we hear you are experiencing is something we only see on TV.

Since it is warm here, Philomina and I had no idea that the latest “polar vortex” had hit the entire United States until we started receiving phone calls from our church members here telling us. How small the world is when church members in a village in India can watch cars in the U.S. try to navigate icy roads and people suffering under the impact of the coldest winter in 20 years!

We have passed the message to the church leaders throughout the network to pray for their brothers and sisters in America who are hit with the weight of so much snow and ice. We pray especially for those whose health conditions are made worse by the extreme cold and those at risk from travel in these conditions, that Jesus will protect you and keep you safe until more normal weather returns.

For the 2013-2014 Christmas Program, we were able to distribute blankets and Bibles and treats to almost 3000 children. While what seems cold to us might seem like balmy to you (mid-70F-low 80F ranges), it is still 20 degrees colder than usual, and so children and their grandparents are especially susceptible to cold. The blankets turned out to be the right gift for this year, with abundant rains and flooding earlier in the year. When we drove through some villages on our way to visit more remote villages to see how their Christmas Programs were up in Andhra Pradesh, we saw people wrapped in the blankets, immediately put to use!

Here the blankets are used at night, but then during the day, when it is coldest, people also wrap up in the blankets, giving extra warmth. So all you see is a blanket wrapped around a person, looking almost like a walking blanket!

We want to thank each and every one of you and the supporting churches who made the Christmas Program possible. The warmth of your gift will be appreciated for months and even years to come, as the blankets are used and the Bibles read.

You can see more pictures of the various Christmas programs on the SICCM Facebook page and on our website atmission.siccm.org.

Christmas Programs

It’s been a special blessing for Philomina, Arthur, William, David and me as we get to experience a different Christmas Program almost every night for the week before and days after Christmas Day. A lot of traveling and living out of the suitcase but the energy and inspiration of different village churches is the reward and special blessing. We praise Jesus for making these celebrations of His coming to earth possible and meaningful.

How much for which we have to thank God! From the unearned blessing of the Word being sent to earth for our redemption and salvation to the blessing of each village church and its congregation, a part of the fabric of that particular village and village area. Step by step, planted seed by planted seed, Christ’s church here in southern India continues to be guided by Jesus, and we continue to marvel at His handiwork.

We began the new year’s work at Southern Asia Christian College before it starts up again this week. Time to meet with the faculty in a day of prayer before welcoming back the students for their second semester and the year’s examinations around the time of Easter. The students who helped the most with the Christmas Program this year stayed at the College through that time, sang in their choir groups, and ministered to the children of the villages where they visited.

The College has its beautiful Chapel now, with its light, airy and large space and the pews from Lockland Christian Church. The maintenance required for the new semester is underway. Thanks to Bright Christian Church, we have new (to us) hymn books in the US and we look to add these to the services where the College meets as a community and worships.

Schools have finished vacation, so the children in the villages are coming to the tutoring.programs run by the Boys Home staff and teachers to get a running start on the new year. In India, all elementary and high school students take state level examinations, with 10th graders and 12th graders (in order to graduate) taking a national examination.

This means that the first semester of the year is mostly around learning the content of the subjects like math, science, history, social studies and languages while the second semester is for review and test preparation. It puts a heavy burden of memorizing large amount of textbooks and much more math than in the US schools on India’s students.

So in the first semester of the year, India’s children absorb the new knowledge for their grade level and in the second semester of the year, they drill in it. There are major attempts to get the curriculum to be more supportive of developing the ability to use what they learn instead of creating “memorization machines.” This especially as the widening use of computers even in the villages mean that memorization becomes less important than the ability to think creatively and productively.

In the AfterSchool Schools, the teachers combine additional memory drilling, test-taking skills, individual attention to the student, and thinking-out-loud exercises to not only memorize but also comprehend what’s been taught and on which the students will be tested. Since starting the AfterSchool Schools, we’ve seen all our students pass their year end examinations, a real tribute to the teachers and the Boys Home staff. Before a year of attending the AfterSchool Schools, most of these children had failed one or more of their subjects and several had been held back a year.

You won’t be surprised at what a positive influence these children are on their families, whether Christian now or sufficiently interested to allow their children to attend the Schools. And how their positive influence radiates out into their villages.

This 2014, we are going to start the AfterSchool Schools program in some of our urban slum churches, by sponsoring teachers and church members to set up their own AfterSchool School. If this is the will of Jesus, starting such schools should allow the Childrens ministry to strengthen the overall outreach of the SICCM-planted churches in the sprawling slums and shanty-towns of India’s growing population.

We praise Jesus once again for all His guidance and blessings as we work here as His servants to build His church here in south India with your prayers key to the work here.

And we thank Jesus again for the warmth of your hearts, praying that He will be with you through storm and cold,

David Morris