God is Already Moving...

Jenni and Carin

God is already moving on our El Salvador team, and our journey has just begun! We are taking the largest All Blessings outreach team overseas to date, and I am so excited about the incredible people that God has placed on our team!

One of my close friends, Carin Wasson, is part of our team and she recently experienced God's provision for her fundraising. I have known Carin for over 15 years. We served together on staff at Mariners Church many years ago and are now both part of The Village Church of Irvine. Carin's husband has been unemployed for two years, and by faith, Carin and their two daughters have followed God's call to serve the children in El Salvador this summer. Here is part of her story....

"God has been providing for us on this trip since we sent our first email asking for support!

We needed $300 to hold our flights and had two weeks to raise the funds. I put together a fundraising letter, prayed over it, had it approved and pressed 'send' on my email button! After just a few days of sending the email, we received our first donation of $200. A few days later, a friend handed me a check for $50.

Jenni told us that we only had a few days left to pay the balance for our flights, and we prayed for God's provision again. Because of our tight budget, I had chosen not to mail support letters (and emailed letters instead). As you know, stamps and copies are expensive! However, Jenni encouraged us to mail the letters and trust God for the stamps and necessary funds. In faith, we made the copies and started to separate the envelopes into groups of people.

At my CBS leaders meeting, I asked permission to hand the letters out to the leaders, my group and other friends in the class. I was frustrated because stamps are so expensive (did I mention my husband has been out of full time work for
almost 2 years?) and it was less expensive to hand them out. They told me that I could not hand out letters (because of a CBS policy). But a friend heard me ask about it and responded, "Do you need stamps? How many?" I laughed and said, "140!" She replied, "I will get them for you! While I was ordering stamps online, I accidentally hit the wrong button and ended up with 400, so I have some to spare. Please let me donate them to you for your trip!" I was overjoyed and thankful at God's provision!!!

The next day I had lunch with a dear friend. I began to pull out her envelope
with our support letter and she said, "I already donated! Your check is in the mail!" WOW! That was Friday, the deadline for our money to hold the flights! I got a text later that day from Jenni that said, "You received a check today and have even more than you need for the airline deposit!" As I was finishing lunch, the friend from CBS stopped by and gave me the stamps! So after lunch I drove to the post office, put all 140 stamps on the envelopes and sent the rest in the mail! God is GOOD! I am so thankful!" - Carin Wasson

16 Team Members Headed to El Salvador!!!

I am excited to announce that we just placed a deposit for 16 seats on American Airlines headed to El Salvador on July 9, 2011! Here are our team members:

Mike, Jenni & Aidan Ramsey
Jacquie Younger
Carin, Taylor & Samantha Wasson
Dave, Tanya, Micah & Rebekah Eason
Amanda Deal
Robert Veith
Kendall Langdon
Stephanie & Stephen Keenan

I am so excited about what God is going to do in and through our team! Please pray for our team as we begin our fundraising efforts. Pray for God's perfect provision for our finances and pray that He will be preparing our hearts to serve the beautiful children in El Salvador.

Here are a few of my favorite faces from El Salvador...

Unparalleled Church Growth in Korea...

Loren Cunningham, the founder of Youth With a Mission (YWAM) is one of my favorite authors. I love reading Loren's books to our kids because they are filled with powerful stories of how God is moving around the world. Recently we read through "The Book That Transforms Nations: The Power of the Bible to Change any Country." Chapter 9 (An Overnight Success Story: South Korea) details the incredible church explosion that has taken place in Korea over the past forty years. It is an unbelievable account of how God is moving in Korea. Here are a few excerpts:

"When I visited South Korea for the first time in 1971, poverty and military rule still plagued the nation. I'll never forget that visit. In Seoul, I spoke at Dr. David Yonggi Cho's church. I stood before these Korean believers and said what God had impressed upon me: Korea was going to become a great nation, sending missionaries all over the world. Afterward, several believers came up to me, greeting me with "Kahm sah ham nee tah," which means "thank you." Then they politely disagreed with my prediction. They were too poor to go out as missionaries. Besides, their government made it impossible for them to get passports for international travel.

South Korea was indeed poor. Since the moment of my arrival I saw the grip of poverty on the people. As I traveled around Seoul, I noticed it was filled with poorly constructed apartment buildings and garbage-filled alleyways. Very few people could own an automobile. In fact, I didn't see one car parked outside Dr. Cho's church. Dr. Cho himself had prayed and trusted God for a bicycle so that he could get around to his parishioners more easily." (page 75)

Thirty years later I returned to speak at Pastor Cho's church. As we drove into Seoul that evening, I looked about me, amazed at the changes. Koreans had a new problem, with thousands and thousands of Hyundais, Daewoos and Kias jostling in bumper-to-bumper traffic. High-rise buildings- layers of offices and luxury apartments for the new affluent- speared the sky. I looked closer and saw something that warmed my heart - neon blue crosses on the tops of countless churches on both sides of the freeway glowed in the pale light.

When it was time for me to speak at Dr. Cho's church, again I could scarcely believe the difference. Yoido Full Gospel Church now had more than seven hundred thousand members, making it the largest church in the world. And what about that unbelievable prediction the Lord compelled me to make from Dr. Cho's pulpit in 1971 - that Korea would send out many missionaries? With a population of just forty-eight million, South Korea now sends the second greatest number of missionaries overseas, only behind the United States. (page 76)

What happened? How could one country's fortunes change in less than thirty years? South Korea's economic growth came hand in hand with a rapid growth of the church - one of the greatest in the history of the world. The soil for Korea's dramatic church growth was watered by the blood of martyrs, many thousands in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. A story I'll never forget told of soldiers herding Korean believers into a church. The soldiers barred the doors and set the building on fire. The believers sang as they died, their hymns rising above the sounds of crackling fire and collapsing beams.

Korean followers of Jesus who survived persecution seemed girded with steel. Rising from these roots, Koreans gave themselves to prayer and Bible study in any unusual way. If you visit South Korea today, you'll find hundreds of thousands filling churches every morning at 5:00 am to pray and read their Bibles for two hours before heading to work. I have visited the Osanri Prayer Mountain outside Seoul, where thousands of Koreans spend time every weekend on their knees with their open Bibles. As a result of all this fervor, believers and churches have multiplied, quickly changing the spiritual landscape.

Ten of the eleven largest megachurches in the world are in Seoul. According to a recent Seoul Times article, South Korea now has more than twelve thousand missionaries abroad. Korean missionaries work in many nations, with a significant number in Middle Eastern countries. The South Korean church is also reaching into China, and even into North Korea." (page 77)

Wow! Needless to say, we have a lot to learn from the Korean church! I can't wait to visit Dr. Cho's church and meet these heroes of the faith. While the immense pressure on unwed mothers has created an orphan crisis in Korea, there are reports that this is beginning to change. I believe that the church is influencing this horrible Confucian cultural devaluation and most foster moms in Korea are believers. We feel honored that God has called our family to adopt from Korea and are excited to share these heroic stories with our daughter about her birthplace one day.


Blog posted by Jenni Ramsey, Outreach Director for All Blessings

Accepting applications for El Salvador!

We are now accepting applications for the El Salvador trip! The team will have two main focus areas - visiting orphans and construction. We will also be participating in a soccer tournament and are collecting soccer balls and cones to take with us.

If you would like donate soccer items, children's shoes, or other items for the orphanage, please contact Jenni @ jenni@allblessings.org.

Haiti trip postponed...

The February Haiti trip has been postponed for a number of reasons. Please join us in praying for Haiti. The Haitian people are in desperate need of spiritual, emotional and physical relief. Pray for our families who are waiting to bring their children home from Haiti as well.

Haiti Trip - February 26 - March 5, 2011

We are still taking applications for the February-March, 2011 Haiti trip. Most of our time will be spent loving on the kids at New Life Orphanage. We are in need of volunteers with construction experience to do small projects. We are also in need of doctors, nurses, dentists and anyone with training in counseling or therapy.

God is moving in Haiti! Come and be a part of it!

The Ramsey Family Adoption Blog

The Ramsey family visiting the Youth With a Mission (YWAM) base in Kona, HI

If you'd like to follow the Ramsey family's adoption journey, check out their blog at www.globalfamramsey.blogspot.com. Jenni serves as the Outreach Coordinator for All Blessings International.