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Newsletter: November 2001

MCGN is a non-profit, non-denominational Christian organization promoting spiritual and economic development of the people in Mizoram and the surrounding region by serving them as Jesus did (Mt. 20:28).


Thanksgiving Greetings

We wish you all a happy Thanksgiving! May you recall many blessings the Lord gave you. For MCGN, we have so much to be grateful for Mizo Leadership Training in USA. We are thankful to the participants, the speakers, and the various contributors.
MIZO LEADERSHIP TRAINING

This is the first time we have had Leadership Training for Mizo leaders outside of Mizoram. Through the work of Liana & Ngeni Mualchin of MCGN International Headquarters, MLT was held from October 29 to November 11, 2001, followed by a study field trip. The first week took place at Church of the Foothills (COTF), Cameron Park, CA and the second week at Liberty Christian Center (LCC), Fairfield, CA. The following participants from Mizoram, India came to attend the training:

  • 1. Mr. F. Lalbiakdika
  • 2. Mr. R. Vanlalzauva
  • 3. Mr. Hl. Zirsangzela
  • 4. Ms. Sangpari Mualchin
  • 5. Ms. Vanlalvuli.
THANKS
  • For your prayers for Mizo Leadership Training (MLT) in USA. Things go very well.
  • To our wonderful Father for answering our prayers and faithfully providing our needs. We have seen His faithfulness everyday and "Great is Thy faithfulness!" 
  • To great contributors for our various needs: speakers, lunch providers, home providers, leaders of morning devotion, etc. They made our leadership training successful.
  • To Church of the Foothills (COTF), Cameron Park, California for providing a nice room, facility, and other needs for the leadership training.
  • To Liberty Christian Center (LCC), Fairfield, California for co-sponsoring MLT, providing the needs of the Mizo visitors with much love, and sharing various dynamic ministries. 
  • To Nancy Glogauer and her staff at the Parasol Foundation, Incline Village, Nevada for their generosity and willingness to help MCGN.

Mizo Leaders with Pastor Bruce Moore

L - R : R. Vanlal Zauva, Vanlal Vuli, Bruce Moore, F. Lalbiak Dika, Sangpari Mualchin, H.L. Zirsangzela

The Mizo leaders have benefited even more than they had expected. The speakers were dedicated persons and had deep experiences in their respective areas. We would like to thank them for their contributions and valuable times to the MCGN leadership training. We list their names:

Resource persons in the first week at Church of the Foothills, Cameron Park:
 

Bruce Moore

Associate Pastor, Liberty Christian Center, Fairfield, California

Pastor Bruce is truly responsible for moving the Mizo Leadership Training. He has

a heart for the needy and to build communities for the Lord's Kingdom. For the past 20 years, Pastor Bruce has served as Senior Pastor in a number of Northern California churches. He is now a full-time Associate Pastor at Liberty Christian Center, Fairfield, California. He is responsible for counseling, new memberships, and Liberty Mission International (LMI). LMI sends teams to Latin America and East European countries, and also to Prince Edward Island, Canada. Pastor Bruce started the first Christian school in his community, and from that small beginning many Christians schools are now in the region. He has also founded Kingdom Builder Construction Company "to build buildings and people". One of his next projects is to work among the people in Rumania where the Gospel will be introduced to non-Christians as they work together in the construction business. He is a Bible teacher and a motivator of people. In short, Pastor Moore's passion is to build up people for God's Kingdom. He will share his visions for the benefit of the Mizo leaders briefly in Placerville and more fully when the Mizo group goes to LCC in Fairfield. 

Brian Long

Senior Pastor, Church of the Foothills (COTF), Cameron Park, California

Brian Long is the senior pastor of Church of the Foothills (COTF), Cameron Park, California. Prior to this position, he was a pastor in Paradise, California. Brian has a talent of teaching. In the concluding session of the Leadership Training in COTF, Brian presented a concise and powerful massage that God is the owner of everything and He calls each of us to responsible management, according to Matt. 25:14-15.

Lanny Langston

Director, Golden Sierra Job Training Agency, California

Lanny has been director of the tri-county Sierra Job Training Agency for

almost 30 years. He has been involved with the local BusinessMen's Fellowship since its foundation eight years ago and co-chairs their summer camp meeting with his father, Virgil Langston. Lanny and his wife, Tish, attend the Federated Church in Placerville. The church has always been supportive of Tish Langston's non-profit organization PRIDE&Joy that educates mentally and physically challenged children. In 1999, Lanny and his best friend co-founded Imagination Theatre. This highly successful youth and family-oriented performing arts company recently received five Elly Award nominations from the Sacramento Area Regional Theater Alliance. MCGN is thankful for Lanny's generous offer to share his business expertise with the Mizo leaders.

Bill Thorpe

Consultant, Possibility Resource Management, Placerville, California

Bill has more than 20 years of experience in the field of communications, from

academic to industrial applications. He is a neighbor of the Mualchin and from them he became aware of Mizoram. Bill has excellent communications skills and the ability to create concise, compelling presentations for decision making. He has strong interpersonal and leadership skills and the ability to build and work successfully with teams. Bill is an experienced teacher, educator, entrepreneur, independent researcher, scholar, media producer and facilitator. He is a collaborative developer of Possibility Resource Management (PRM).

Bill introduced Mizo Christian Global Network to Valerie Bentz of the Fielding Graduate Institute. With the support of MCGN, a trip to Mizoram was organized for a research team from Fielding, which evolved in to Mizoram Action Research Center (MARC).


 
 
 
 

Harold Kurtz

Senior Associate, Presbyterian Frontier Fellowship, Portland, Oregon

Harold and his wife, Polly, were missionaries in Ethiopia from1955 to 1977

preaching and teaching, operating schools and clinics, encouraging people and building communities. During that time, they witnessed of violent and politically motivated revolutions. God used them to build the foundation for Christian communities. Two of their five children have been back to Ethiopia as missionaries. Harold has been a pastor in Portland, Oregon since1977 and has served as the Executive Director of the Presbyterian Frontier Fellowship (PFF) since 1984. He is now Senior Associate of PFF. Harold was in Mizoram for the Gospel Centenary. Harold and Polly are great and loving friends of Mizo Christian Global Network and have been consulted about many of our needs. You can view some of the Kurtzs' activities and contributions at www.pff.net. They are outstanding, exemplary Christians with life-long commitments to bring the Gospel cross-culturally to all the world. We are so thankful to know them, and we look forward to Harold's presence at MLT. 

Frank Dietz

Minister-at-Large to Operation Mobilization, Roseville, California

Frank Dietz has been a missionary for over 40 years. He was saved at the age of 21,

and served the Lord mostly with Operation Mobilization (OM). In the mid-60's, he opened an OM office in South India, and then worked in Nepal for one year. He was Assistant Director of the original LOGOS (an innovative ocean-liner used for mission operation) for 3 years. 

Following this in the mid-70's, he opened an OM's office in Finland, the home country of his wife, Annelli. From there, a team was formed in neighboring Holland to pray for one year for another ship and crew similar to LOGOS. The prayer was answered in the late 70's and Frank became the Director of the second ship, DOULOS from 1979 to 1984. Trips were made to Latin America with great results. Frank became the OM Field Leader in Latin America from 1985 to 1995 which he eventually handed over to others. He has been Minister-at-large to OM since 1995. 

Frank occasionally speaks for Perspective, a unique series of mission lectures. As his record indicates, he is a proven leader for the Lord's Kingdom. 

Frank is a native of California and his wife is a native of Finland. They met in London, became engaged by letter when she was in India and he was in Spain, and were married in Teheran, Iran. Their first home was in Kathmandu, Nepal. Their first daughter was born in England and took her first steps in Vietnam. Their second daughter was born in Quito, Ecuador and took her first steps in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Their first daughter is married with two children and their second daughter is studying at Biola. 

Frank is a good friend of Mizo Christian Global Network. He wants to visit Mizoram to encourage and work with them. He told Stuart Spani about MCGN and he introduced Pastor Bruce Moore via Tentmaker to MCGN.

Dr. Mary Beth Haines Counselor, Sunnyside Counseling Service, Portland, Oregon

Mary Beth Haines has completed her Ph. D. at the Fielding Graduate Institute

in Human Development on "walking a mystical path with practical feet." 

She has worked in mental health services most of her adult life: worked with severely emotionally disturbed children for 14 years in residential and day treatment; completed required training; served as a trained lay counselor for 3 years at Sunnyside Counseling Services; worked for Men's Resource Center for 6 years, including 4 years as a therapist working with groups of men in treatment for domestic and other violence. Currently, she has a private practice as a counselor, and is teaching a course called "Reading mystics: A deeper path to self help."

Mary Beth had been to Mizoram in March 2000 as a member of Mizoram Action Research Team which evolved to Mizoram Action Research Center (MARC). 

Mary Beth contributed swingsets for some schools in Aizawl. Her compassionate action encouraged MCGN to start a low-budget project to provide swingsets and basket-ball hoops to a couple of villages in each of the districts of Mizoram.


 
 
 
 
 

Resource persons in the second week at Liberty Christian Center, Fairfield:
 

Richard West, Senior Pastor, Liberty Christian Center, Fairfield, California

Tim LeFever, Attorney At Law, Vacaville, California

Deborah RiessChildren Pastor, LCC, Fairfield, California

Aritha Tomlinson Women Pastor, LCC, Fairfield, California

Greg Angan Supervising Deputy Probation Officer, Solano County, Fairfield, California

Debbi Barnett

Worship Leader, LCC, Fairfield, California

Mitch Allen

Network Administrator, Sports Rack Vehicle Outfit.

The following people led morning devotions during the first week of training. We thank them for their spiritual guidance.

We would like to extend our gratitude to the following persons for their invaluable support of the leadership training. Ms. Vijay Cammauf, Mission Pastor of First Covenant Church, Oakland took us to outreach ministries in Oakland. In particular, we want to thank the following: Vijay and her husband also arranged an Indian dinner for us. We thank them for their support, wonderful fellowship, and discussing various Christian ministries in India.

We also had a great time in the home of Scott and Deanna Healy (Crowley Lane Outreach of LCC) in Fairfield, California where we had a wonderful dinner and a great time of sharing with brothers and sisters in Christ. It would be difficult to forget that night. The presence of the Holy Spirit was so evident with great joy and love.

During our field trip, we visited the Parasol Foundation at Incline Village, Nevada at beautiful North Lake Tahoe. The contribution of Parasol Foundation for our training is of great significance and is much appreciated. Nanci M. Glogauer, Executive Director and her staff provided us with practical documents as well as lecture and discussion. They were very generous in sharing their experiences which we will apply in Mizoram. Our wonderful lunch was provided by Parasol at a nice restaurant at Lake Tahoe. Their support was much more than we had expected. It is our pleasure to give our heartfelt thanks to the Parasol people.

Last, but not least, we would like to give our sincere thanks to Pastor Brian Long and Pastor Richard West, both Senior Pastors of Church of the Foothills, Cameron Park, California and Liberty Christian Center, Fairfield, California, respectively. They provided their church facilities and equipment for our training. We are thankful for their valuable times and for their words of encouragement. May God richly bless them and their churches!

We believe this is a good start for Mizo leaders. We strongly recommend that training of this type, or of more specialized types, should be held at least once a year.

BRIEF REPORTS FROM MCGN GLOBAL POINTS

JAPAN:

Coordinator Pu Hruaia received the MCGN check we sent for the Peace Conference in Myanmar. The conference is organized by Dr. Laithuama, President of MCGN-Myanmar. We are thankful to Pu Hruaia for providing information about how to contact Pu Laithuama. Liana Mualchin and Harold Kurtz had a successful phone connection and conversations with Dr.Laithuma. It was quite a surprise for both sides for having a chance to talk after a number of years. They will have their conference in early part of the new year (2002).

INDIA - CALCUTTA:

We received a report letter from Calcutta. They shared their need for mature leaders in MCGN-Calcutta. Pray that they will have God-chosen leaders in that strategic city, a gateway to Mizoram.

INDIA - DELHI:

We received encouraging e-mails from Dr. Chinkholal Thangsing (Lala) regarding starting MCGN in Delhi. Pray that the Lord will open the door in Delhi, the capital city of the great country of India.

INDIA - MIZORAM:

NEPAL:

We appreciated emails from Pu Lura, Pu Ringa, and Pu Hriata. Pu Lura has been to Mustang area for witness, Pu Ringa had been to a training near Bombay for two months, and Pu Hriata was thankful for the Mizo Leadership Training in USA.

USA:

Before and after the training team arrived, we were busy and excited. Ngeni's only wish was that the Mizo leaders would get here to hear. Because of work connected with the MLT, we did not have time to prepare our Newsletter on time. Training during the first week was wonderful. All the speakers presented what we needed to hear. On the final night of the training week, the Mualchins, the Mizo leaders, Mary Beth Haines and Harold Kurtz sat down after dinner for a songfest of Mizo songs. Mary Beth and Harold joined in heartily. The group discussed how the things learned during the leadership conference could be applied in Mizoram.

NEW MEMBERSHIP:

WelcomePu Zaichhawna Hlawndo! Our new member is a student in Grand Rapids, Michigan. We wish him and his family the best in the Lord. We thank him for his interest in MCGN and hope that he will write something encouraging for others.
 
 

PRAYER REQUESTS


---IDEAS, ADVICE, AND COMMENTS ARE ALWAYS WELCOME---

MCGN International HQ: USA: Lalliana Mualchin (Email: mualchin@hotmail.com)

Webmaster: Jeff Mead (Email: jeffmead@cameron-park.com)

News Compiler: Ngeni Mualchin (Email: mualchin@hotmail.com)

Editor: Patricia Macy (Email: pamacy@d-web.net)