Missionaries of the Week

Eric and Beth Yodis

Eric Yodis was sure that God was not leading him to the mission field.  “There is too much work to be done here in America,” he told his then fiance, Beth.  There followed years of seminary at Western Seminary in San Jose.  He also worked with middle schoolers at First Baptist Church of San Jose, their home church.  They went out short-term to Ukraine to train teachers in teaching Christianity in the school classrooms and, after two trips, they both felt God’s call to Ukraine.

Education is still a priority for Eric.  He believes that God primarily uses the local church to advance His Kingdom in the world.  Eric has been involved in teaching nationals and assisting them in planting churches.  Ukrainian nationals now manage that project.  A few  years ago, the family moved to the Budyonovski section of Donetsk, Ukraine, and are planting Living Waters Church.  A short-term team from FBCLA visited Ukraine in the summer of 2004 and Eric would love to have a team come again to build on the relationships that were begun.

Eric and Beth have one child: Charity, age 16.  She is in her sophomore year at Black Forest Academy, a Christian boarding school in Germany.  She is doing well.  Pray for the family, especially at this time of year when the winters are long and harsh.  This makes ministry more difficult than usual.

Eric and Beth Yodis
7 Zagoskina, Donetsk 83059, UKRAINE
e-mail: EricYodis@worldventure.net

30 Sunday ~  Missionaries of the Week: Eric and Beth Yodis, Ukraine (World Venture). Eric and Beth are again in Ukraine in the ministry of training church planters.  Pray for their ministry, especially now in winter when it is snowy, cold and difficult.

31 Monday  ~ Nicolas and Puspa Narjinary, North Bengal (Partners Intnl). Pray for Nicolas as he plants churches and evangelizes in the mountain villages of North Bengal. He also trains local teams to be a part of this ministry.  Birthday – Puspa Narjinary

1 Tuesday  ~  Ben and Tillie Yazzie, New Mexico (Missions Door). Please pray for a young Christian man on a Pueblo Indian reservation who was visited at night by Pueblo leaders, escorted off the reservation and told to leave the village by a direct order of the governor.  He was left only with the clothes he was wearing despite the fact that it was a cold, wintry night. 
Birthday ~ Bob Deal, AZ

2 Wednesday  ~  Kenya – Pray for a group of eight refugee believers who have been able to escape perse-cution and are now safely in Kenya, and also for two others en route to other countries.  Pray for friends who are now visiting the refugees in Kenya for two weeks.

3 Thursday  ~  Herode and Edline Guillomettre, Haiti (Missions Door). Haiti is one of the poorest countries and lacks public transportation. Each of 5 new church plants has been given a motorcycle to operate a moto-taxi service to generate enough funds to help support the pastor and new church. 
Birthday ~ Edline Guillomettre

4 Friday  ~  Partners International workers in Turkey ask for prayer as they travel to meet and encourage pastors and congregations to strengthen the body of Christ in that country. 
Birthday ~ Kevin Carlson, Ecuador

5 Saturday  ~ Paul and Janie Hutton, Director Central America (Missions Door). Praise God for the 40 years Paul and Janie have served as missionaries: as newlyweds in Honduras, and later in Hawaii. This year Paul will concentrate more on advocacy for indigenous, foreign national missionaries, while Joaquin Vargas oversees ministry.