Mission Mexico 2010! (Exciting News)

One of the things we clearly heard from the Lord about our brief three month trip to Mexico is that we would be spying out the land, much as Caleb and Joshua and their team did millennia ago (Deuteronomy 1:19-23). Just as for them, we had a choice about how to look at the land. We could 'be real,' focus on the difficulties (too many to list) and become disheartened; or we could look with the eyes of faith and see what God could do with us and through us in that beautiful land hungry for the Kingdom of Heaven. We chose the latter.

During our visit we experienced great favour and learnt how to steward that favour by using it only for what God intended and by working diligently for His purposes in all things. We believe that this mission was imperative for laying the foundation for our second mission, which will differ in several ways. During our second mission we feel the Lord is sending us to "take the land". Sam and I felt the Lord was going to open many doors for us, even doors we hadn't knocked on. The fame of all the miracles and salvations that were being done in Jesus name through us extended over all the city. As an evidence of this, I have been asked to present our 2010 vision for the city, before an association of 100 churches. The meeting will take place at the beginning of January 2010. If they decide to go ahead this will imply the following:

- We will be coordinating one team per church. In other words, there will be up to 100 teams.

- We will be running weekly workshops to equip the teams with the tools and expertise to reach out effectively.

- There will be a great framework and huge net to collaborate for doing monthly campaigns reaching out to thousands in stadiums, auditoriums, parks and squares.

The team that we led on our recent mission, as a model of equipping and evangelism for the future, saw between 50-100 coming to Christ every week. We evangelised every two weeks as we spent the weeks in between evangelism weeks consolidating the faith of the brand new believers saved the week before, pursuing quality alongside quantity - we want to see fruit that remains. With those very "realistic" figures, a team, well trained, per church could easily lead between 1000 and 2000 people to the Lord in 10 months. Now, multiply that by 100. Can we reach out to 100,000 in 10 months in the city of Tuxtla? The answer is: Yes we can!!

"Unless the Lord builds the house, its builders labor in vain. Unless the Lord watches over the city, the watchmen stand guard in vain" Psalm 127:1

Without God's help, nothing will prosper. This is why Sam and I ask you to join us in prayer for the following:

- Wisdom and favour to document and present the vision for 2010 before the association of pastors.

- As we are in the process of setting up a trust fund for Gospel Action, that God will enable whatever is necessary for it take place.

- As the "worker deserves his wages." (1 Timothy 5:18) and knowing that "the Lord has commanded that those who preach the gospel should receive their living from the gospel", that God may release a constant flow of finances to be able to afford flight tickets and wages.

We hope you have enjoyed our adventures in the Gospel and we look forward to seeing you back in the UK or other parts of the world soon so that we can rejoice with you!

All our love and blessings!

Mario and Sam

Fruit that remains (Raised to life and a new hope!)

Guess what everyone?! God is faithful...AND His mercies endure forever!

Across the homes we've visited here in Tuxtla, we've seen over one hundred miracles done in Jesus' name. Perhaps the most striking example is Carmen's (read our 22 June 2009 entry). When we first saw her, she was more dead than alive. I have seen people die in front of me several times. I know by now when a person is almost ready for the last breath and Carmen was in that category. Today 5 weeks have passed since Carmen got prayed for at her house in Tuxtla. Her recovery is now almost complete - indeed, at the last report we heard she'd taken two of her daughters on holiday! As a consequence of God's healing power, 15 people from Carmen's home came to Christ. For the last few weeks a team has been going to that home to help consolidate their faith. The doors in that house are always open and gradually the people in it are being added to the church.

Like in Carmen's case, we have seen that the gospel of Christ, accompanied by signs and wonders through God's hand, have enabled us to get to people's hearts wining their lives for Jesus!

After two months of mission starting at the end of May and concluding around the 15th of July, we've seen 200 lives coming to Christ through house visits evangelism. Most of them are being followed up weekly. Some of them have already incorporated to church life, coming on Sundays and meeting in the week. We clearly heard from the Lord (for this season) that He was interested in us taking care of a few and consolidating their faith than going for the big numbers. Ideally, and I believe that's where we are heading, we will one day go for both quality and quantity. In this two months of mission we faced simple difficulties such the heat, mosquitos, parasites, salmonella, flu and even typhoid. However, nothing could offset the reality of seeing a real God manifesting without allegory but tangibly in our midst.

As well as supporting the local church in Mexico in the area of evangelism (in my case) and worship (in Sam's case), we also ran several workshops those two months. As we understand, an evangelist is no evangelist unless she prepares "God's people for works of service" (Ephesians 4:12). Our style of evangelism is very simple and can be summed up as: Compassion-Testimony-Gospel-Power. This is not so much a method as an initial approach. Both during and after ministry, the Holy Spirit is our helper. We preach the good news, pray for the sick, and hey! He does the rest!

Sustainable evangelism teams are now set up in Tuxtla and Huixtla, equipped to lead people to the Lord in the street and their own homes, as well as to revisit and affirm the faith of the new believers. Teams of worshippers have been raised up in three churches to move and dance before the Lord during worship services and with one another. We've fostered unity between these teams and even led a team on mission to Huixtla (a four hour drive south) where we also ministered together in dance.

A new life and a new vision!

We want to tell you briefly about what God's been up to in one of the houses this week. On Saturday we revisited an elderly lady we visited the week before. The first time we saw Carmen, she was drifting in and out of consciousness at the point of death. Her family by her bedside, awaiting her final breath at any moment. She had been confused and incoherent in recent days and suffering from intense pain. Her intestines were riddled with cancer, she hadn't lived a normal life for some time and was unable to perform normal physical functions like feeding herself or using the bathroom. Mario prayed for her in the name of Jesus, she opened her eyes and smiled. The pain began to leave and she and eight of family members put their faith in Jesus Christ. This week, Carmen was a new woman. Frail but improving, she's smiling, walking and talking. We shared stories of the goodness of God, and Carmen told us all about how wonderful Jesus was to her. Two more family members were present, and accepted Jesus into their hearts that day, we went on our way rejoicing! We're delighted to see such a transformation in an entire family and pleased to report that a dear friend will be visiting weekly to encourage them in their faith and see them grow in the Lord.

In addition to all this, our dreams are becoming reality. So far we've been seeing between 50 and 100 people come to Christ each week. With a vision to see the local church grow in attendance by a factor of ten, a local pastor who leads an association of 100 churches in the city has contacted us to arrange for outreach teams to be set up in each of the churches, so that this vision has just grown 100-fold overnight. Who says we can't take Tuxtla for Jesus in just one year?! Isn't God good!? Isaiah 40 tells us that “those who hope in the LORD will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint.”

Freedom to Dance!

This week I'm going to take a bit of time to update you on what I've been up to in the dance ministry so far.

For many years I've had a burden to dance and move before God in prayer, intercession, prophesy, praise and worship. Thanks to God I was living in Brighton during many of these years, where an international ministry known as 'Movement in Worship' is based. Movement in Worship consists of a team of worshippers who move and dance before God in anointing, freedom, maturity and power. This team travels internationally to events to aid in worshipping God, prayer, prophesy, and equipping others to do the same. Dance and movement before God often has a powerful effect in setting people free and receiving from God in ways they hadn't been able to do before. Being a part of this team over the past few years has afforded me the glorious opportunity to practice and grow in a gift that has brought tremendous blessing and freedom to my life and the lives of many of those I've had the pleasure of sharing it with. Dance and movement brings me into new realms of expression and communication with my Daddy God that I'd not experienced before, and just being able to be with God in this way is often overwhelming to me.

During our time in Mexico I've been running movement in worship classes for children and adults across three different areas of the city in four weekly workshops. I was initially helped by Mario, who's also skilled in movement in the presence of God, so I'd have help with demonstrations and translation. Fortunately my Spanish is now good enough for me to run classes alone and my descriptions and demos sufficient for everyone to get the gist of what I'm trying to explain! It's necessary for me to teach without Mario as he's preaching the Good News of Jesus Christ in as many houses as possible each day.

In our classes we've covered various areas including 'worship and why,' 'how God made us to move individually,' 'moving as a group,' 'prayer and intercession,' 'prophesy,' 'self-image,' 'the biblical significance of movement and colours,' 'moving with props, e.g. banners and staffs,' and 'moving to scripture.' There are still a number of areas to cover in the remaining weeks.

Many people wanted to 'copy' a style or 'learn steps.' However, I desired to bring a freshness and spontaneity to dance and movement that involved a focus on being sensitive to the Holy Spirit so that new interpretative and worshipful dance would be embraced. For this reason I've had to avoid lengthy demonstrations and continually reiterate that God has made each of us to move in beautiful and unique ways, and we need to each find the style that God has individually planned for us.

During our sessions, particularly the session on prayer and intercession, we saw a lot of liberation and old paradigms broken. There are various things that I mean by this. For example, many people received answers to prayers that they had been praying for a long time. Others were set free from addictions, shame, fear of man, fear of intimacy, religiosity, and other problems. Others were healed of emotional pain and broken dreams. All received a deeper level of intimacy with one another and the Lord Jesus Christ. Each were also therefore equipped to continue to reach this level in future both alone or with others.

I've also had the privilege of dancing in various worship services across the city during my time here, and have witnessed a greater freedom in worship as a result. I've heard a number of prophesies that the Lord has given to people during a dance, and people have also been set free and healed of various things, including marital problems while watching this movement in worship. I'm pleased to say Mario continues to dance with me on Sundays, along with dear friends from the workshops who are sensitive to the Holy Spirit and move with a heart of worship. Together with the team we've already ministered some specific dances in our congregation, and this weekend we'll be ministering at a three day outreach in Wisla, some six hours away. I expect our update next week will be all about the miraculous things God does on this outreach!!

Lady has just received Christ and tells of her experience!

On Wednesday 17 June we saw how in a house visit 5 people came to Christ on Wednesday 17 June and also the Holy Spirit came upon the place. You can watch the person describing what's happened. The language she speaks is Spanish, but she is speaking of the "presence of God" and how her mama is on the floor under the anointing of the Holy Spirit! I love it! Thank you Jesus!!

Healings, miracles and salvations accelerate as things hot up in the Spirit!

There have been many more miracles over the past week and many more people set free from the Kingdom of Darkness and safely hidden in the Kingdom of Light by their heavenly father, God Almighty. We've experienced more of the supernatural and the spiritual realm this week – along with the weather at over 40 degrees centigrade most days, things are really heating up here!

Last week , despite the oppressive heat, an unpleasant gust of freezing cold air woke Mario in the early hours of Tuesday morning. He looked towards the door of our bedroom and saw a tall, dark, cloaked and hooded figure with a sickle, rather like the representation of 'death' we see in our culture. Here in Mexico this figure is part of a powerful and growing cult known as the Santa Muerte, or 'Saint Death,' which many people now worship. Mario knew just what to do. Extending his hand towards the figure he said “In the name of Jesus, I rebuke you, get out of here.” At which the Holy Spirit reassured Mario “now turn over and go back to sleep, I'll deal with this.” Mario resumed his sleep.

Now, guess what happened next? The first appointment to minister to a family in their home the next morning took him to a house where the Santa Muerte was worshipped. Although the home was clean and airy, the atmosphere was oppressive. As Mario entered the house he felt as though invisible hands were pushing him back. As he sat down to speak with the family, it became clear that the family members were utterly defeated, and terror was in their eyes. As Mario sat and listened, the mother unfolded an horrendous tale of devastation.

Some months earlier, their son had a run of bad luck; a series of car accidents and similar problems. He decided to visit a witch to see if anything could be done to change his fortunes. She gave him a statue of the Santa Muerte and told him this would bring him better luck. So he paid her his money and eagerly accepted the statue into his home. His luck did change and things started to go well for him. One night about two months later, the Santa Muerte visited him in the night. “Has your luck improved?” it asked? “Yes,” the son replied. “I've come for payment” said the Santa Muerte. “What do you want?” the son was uncertain he had anything the Santa Muerte might want. “In two months, I'm going to take a member of your family” came the ominous response. Now, here in Mexico the family unit is the central focus of society, and families remain close and very attached for their whole lives. I cannot stress strongly enough how stressful this statement would have been for this young man, who then replied as any good son would have done in his position: “No! Take me. Please don't take anyone in my family. Take me.” “Good,” came the reply. “In two months I'll come for you.”

The young man was distraught. He didn't know what to do. He told his mother what had happened, and she didn't know what to do either. They lived in fear. Two months later, for no medical reason, this healthy young man died in his sleep. The family were devastated and frightened for their lives. They were at their wits end. The Santa Muerte continued to invade their lives and its statue held a prominent position upstairs in the home. They lived in fear of offending this spirit and were willing to continue serving it in the hope of preserving their lives.

This was the state of the family in need of deliverance that day. As Mario shared his testimony, and about the power of the Lord Jesus who has broken the power of sin and death, slowly hope began to return. As they bowed their heads and confessed Christ, the hold of the Santa Muerte was broken. As they renounced idolatry and witchcraft the oppression lifted. As we smashed and burned the statue the era of evil was ended for that household and authority of Christ was reinstated over His beloved family. They prayed for the guilt and grief to be healed and left the home rejoicing that the enemy's camp has once again been plundered and the captives set free. Hallelujah!

I felt it appropriate to write all these details in full, and for that reason there is not sufficient room this week to tell of all the remaining miracles and salvations in detail, so a summary will suffice. We've seen 30 further salvations spread across 6 homes (a total of 99 people in under 4 weeks). We've seen 3 demons cast out and people restored to Jesus; 2 reconciliations of family members, 5 healings, and many more wonderful testimonies, all last week. On Thursday our friend Martha Cepeda invited us to meet some of her girlfriends at her home. Many were involved in Reiki, metaphysical witchcraft, and others were “Catholic till I die.” We shared a testimony of grace, of God's goodness, and the salvation message. All received Christ, but there were still some misconceptions in place, largely as a result of seeing a powerless church and a powerless God represented by His people. We began to pray for people. One of the more sceptical ladies said she'd suffered from internal varicose veins for many years, which in the last two months had become so inflamed and troublesome she had been in pain 24 hours a day. We prayed for healing in Jesus' name. She said to her great surprise she began to feel better. Suddenly they were all clamouring for prayer for longstanding physical and emotional conditions, in themselves and on behalf of family members. 20 minutes later the lady with the varicose veins declares “the pain has completely gone, it's a miracle!” We were there until 1.30am praying for people. It was a wonderful evening and typical of our meetings in people's homes.

Samantha Otero

The Gospel is touching the city!

Our time last week was spread between house visits, ministry in the church and unexpected doors being opened by the Lord. On Tuesday we saw 9 people (friends and family) at the same house come to Christ. We also laid hands on them as there were several sicknesses, diseases and emotional conditions. We are re-visiting these new believers this week. I love when God moves and we can witness the power of His Gospel and His Spirit. After the meeting they wanted us to go and visit their own extended families. We will do so this week, if the Lord is willing (I think He is!). 

Last Wednesday I taught the first evangelism workshop to the church. 25 people have committed to take part in the 9 week program. Sam and I are very excited about this since in our heart is also the equipping of the church with the grace God has given us in the area of soul-winning. The course also includes on-the-job action as we all as cell group creation and discipleship. Please see details at: http://www.gospelaction.org/ourmethod.html.

On Saturday 10 people came to Christ in an outreach with the youth I led. We had young men and women from two churches. The following day Sam and I ministered to a group of 50 youth at a nearby church on "purpose and mission". We received "words of knowledge" (1 Corinthians 12:8) for two younger men. As a result of this, we laid hands on a young woman and a young man and they were healed of post operation pain, and deafness in one ear, respectively. Later both of them and many more got filled with the Holy Spirit and spoke in other tongues (Acts 2:4).

A wonderful door has opened to do a two day outreach in the main square of Tuxtla (city of half a million people)! This amazing and unprecedented favour. The will consist of worship (music and dance), testimonies of lives changed by the grace of God and a short Gospel message (which I'll be most privileged to deliver). They expect thousands of people to attend the meetings. So we expect many miracles and salvations in Jesus name!

We now ask you to join us in prayer to see God doing the following:

- Affirming the new believers faith as the local church continues to revisit the new believers.

- That more homes will continue to open the doors to the messengers of peace.

- That God will release finances to support a dedicated team of missionaries supporting the local church in the area of evangelism and church planting.

There are many more wonderful stories, but that will be sufficient for now we think!

God bless you all!!

Mario and Samantha