March 2023 Afghanistan, Australia, UK, Ukraine

AFGHANISTAN
This week we baptized REZA online. We continue to receive worrying news about the persecution of our brethren there by the Taliban regime:
     
Do pray for them.

AUSTRALIA
UPCOMING CARELINKS CONFERENCES:
 SATURDAY 1st APRIL: CARELINKS CONFERENCE Gosnells Hotel, 2149 Albany Hwy, Gosnells WA 6110 Coffee from 12 noon
 SATURDAY 15th APRIL: CARELINKS CONFERENCE The theatre at Riverbanks College, 1 Harvest Bvd, Angle Vale SA 5117 Coffee from 10:30 for an 11 AM start.
For more details please contact brother Mark Hawkins mark.ppah@gmail.com Tel. 0400 772 190
Do please pray for our rather "out of the box" attempt to witness in Kellerberrin, Western Australia. A tiny town "in the middle of nowhere" where sister Jocelyn lives. Quite some drive from Perth out into the bush. Brother Mark and sister Jocelyn [his mother in law] have produced a video advertising "Church in a pub" there, see https://youtu.be/KCkhOEqXR9I . What a friendly, welcoming invitation... how could folk turn that down! We're now rolling out advertising for it, but the base population in such a rural area is very low. But on the other hand, the folks who live out there will likely not ever have had a chance to attend something like this. So, it's an initiative taken with hope and faith, that by all means we may save some, and bring some in that sparsely populated area to the saving knowledge of the Lord Jesus. Here you can see Lisa and her mum Jocelyn, and Mark and Jocelyn, inviting folks along:
            
Please do pray for it, and consider donating towards the cost of the advertising and free meal we're offering folks:

Cheques payable to Carelinks Australia, sent to Mark Hawkins, Carelinks Australia, 4 Brumby Place, Armadale WA 6112 AUSTRALIA mark.ppah@gmail.com
Or online: Account Name: Carelinks Australia BSB: 066-131 Account Number 10693858 BIC/SWIFT CTBAAU2S

UK
Attendance is stable at around 30 / day at Lunchtime churches this week, but we could easily have more, and operate every day of the week not just Monday-Wednesday, if we had more helpers. The range of attenders is very wide, from homeless living in tents to office workers who come in their lunchtimes to hear the word but not to eat. Here's a brief clip of sisters Cindy and Dana struggling to feed everyone with KFC bought from next door:
 https://youtu.be/pPwiWglsS9U
The amazing response to the Gospel continues with the baptism this week of IVAN, an attender at The Lunchtime church in Croydon. Ivan is an Italian originally from Naples, Italy. It's not hard to obey the command to go into all the world and preach the Gospel- all nations under heaven seem represented on the streets of south London. And they are responding. You can see a brief video of the happy occasion at
 https://youtu.be/c9VV0Qiq_0Y
        
And what a blast we had this Sunday at church in a pub in East Croydon. A very full house as ever [sermon on Paul's shipwreck at
  https://youtu.be/g7tGb0bqTqs  ], and then a large crowd back home to witness the baptisms of JEREMY and SAMANTHA. Jeremy had been following us online for a while, such a lovely and sincere young man. Samantha is a contact of our dear brother Kevin who hardly ever comes to the meetings without bringing someone with him. You can see them in one of the photos below, sitting at the same table in the pub waiting for service to start.

    
It's just impossible to share in words the joy of these occasions, pure joy, the joy that is the fruit of the Spirit. And the sincerity and wisdom of those who gave encouraging words to our brother- Kevin, Spiro, Marzena [who was baptized at the Dawn fellowship ecclesia in Lee] and others- including brother Marcus who's now out of hospital and picking up strength again, and was able to enjoy a good chat with Jeremy about and share missionary memories of his work in Ghana and elsewhere over many decades. These stills from the video hopefully show just a little of it all:
                                          
Samantha was baptized just by the sisters and there was no shortage of them to assist her:
    

UKRAINE
This week more funds were sent to Ukraine; the suffering there amongst the elderly and isolated continues, and they get little or no state assistance in the daily struggle to keep warm. Do pray for them.

PRAYER POINTS
   - For those recently baptized and those preparing for baptism in South London at this time
   - For more workers on the ground in London
   - For faith to be rewarded in the plans being made for outreach in Australia
   - For those facing serious persecution from the Taliban
   - For those still facing serious poverty and lack of winter heat in Ukraine

With love from your brothers and sisters of Carelinks