Year 2022 in Review

How thankful we are to serve the Lord through Word of Messiah Ministries, for He is a faithful God and worthy of all praise! To summarize: people have been saved, discipled, and trained for service, six conferences have been conducted, new congregations are being planted, teaching webinars took place, we have ministered in dozens of churches, and more discipleship materials are being produced. Praise the Lord!

While Miriam has been working on her fifth book, “Messiah, the Healer of Women,” she has also conducted three “sisterhood” conferences as well as regularly discipling women through her two bible studies each week. Her upcoming book shows how the Healer of Israel is especially mindful of the needs of women from Genesis through the New Covenant. I have tried to keep up with her by conducting (with her help) six conferences this year, which include marriage conferences, a Boot Camp for new planters and a Leadership conference for developing greater evangelism to reach the lost sheep of the house of Israel.

The responses to the conferences gave Messiah much praise!

From the leadership conferences, “Our leadership decided to do this conference because we wanted to undertake some changes. What you’ve given to us is an awful lot for us to consider, but it’s exactly what we were hoping for—to have something to work with, so we can plan, go forward, and accomplish more for Messiah in our little community. [As a team] we will be formulating a few changes to the way we ‘do congregation’ because of the teachings we received from Sam. He led us through many good practices that should be in place in healthy congregations.”

Another leader stated, “My big takeaway was the very structured, disciplined approach to discipleship. It was my ‘Aha! moment’ to realize it is strategic in spreading the Good News.”

From one of our Marriage conferences, Messianic rabbi, Josh Taiz shared, “Hands down, this is the best marriage conference and information I’ve ever seen. The discussion questions were difficult and convicting…but the most hopeful thing. We can have victory in the finished work of Messiah.”

Not Grounded in the Word=Lack of Discipleship

As some of you know, as an evangelist, I am committed to discipleship, which is why I am a congregation planter and trainer. For the most part, the evangelical churches expect acculturation of its members, rather than conducting discipleship. Acculturation assumes people fit into the congregational culture and that by osmosis, they will take in what is needed to spiritually grow in the Lord. But the fact is that the acculturated member ends up understanding the faith by the cultural expression of that congregation’s faith, and they are limited in their faith by their culture, and any change to the culture they see as a change of the faith. They are not actually grounded in the word and can’t share their faith outside of their congregation’s culture.

Grounded in the Word=More effective Sharing of Faith

Discipleship, on the other hand, makes sure that each believer is grounded in the word, memorizes scripture pertinent to each area of the faith (assurance of salvation, prayer, biblical study, fellowship and witnessing, the deity of Messiah, the nature of God, etc.). This way they are not limited to their congregation’s culture but can be cross-cultural and more effective in sharing their faith with those completely outside the faith.

And because discipleship is part of congregational life, congregation planting has been established on two basic activities: evangelism and discipleship. And regarding those two matters, I have written my books. They are either to win the lost, or to disciple the saved. This year, I have two books that I believe are so very needed to be properly grounded in the faith: “The Mysterious Parables of the Kingdom of Heaven” and “Messiah in the End Times.”

“The Mysterious Parables”

“The Mysterious Parables” is an inductive devotional study of Matthew chapter 13. Messiah had been officially rejected by the religious leadership in Matthew 12:14, and now instructed His disciples in eight parables on how to successfully navigate for the sake of the Good News in a kingdom of God where the King has been rejected.

“Messiah in the End Times”

“Messiah in the End Times” is a last days study that is intended to give both assurance and confidence to all Messianic believers as to God’s time table as He concludes His redemptive program, which centers on Messiah’s finished work and His promises to Israel. God expects us to be victorious saints as we confidently serve Messiah during this, as well as confidently looking forward to His soon coming!

There’s so much more to tell, so I hope you will check out the various articles at our Word of Messiah website, and thank you for praying and standing with us as we bring the Good News to the Jew first in all we do. Shalom.