July 2011 Dear mission partners, We had a blessed COCM Pastoral Retreat on 27th-‐28th June. This is the fourth time that we organized this retreat for the pastors and missionaries laboring in the Europe mission field. Rev. Stanley Kwong from Christian and Missionary Alliance (C&MA) in the USA is our keynote speaker. He led through a series of sessions to reflect upon the challenges in pastoral ministry, to renew our desires to rest in God’s work, and to recommit ourselves to serve, knowing God’s love for us in all circumstances. When more than 50 pastors and missionaries from all over the UK gathered together at COCM mission center, there was a clear sense of fellowship among all of us. Even though we are from different church backgrounds and mission organizations, but we are fellow sojourners working together in the mission field. I am personally very encouraged to have this opportunity sharing and praying with some of the co-‐ workers. Just like Rev Kwong mentioned in his talks, we are sharing this precious “koinonia” (Greek word for fellowship) in the body of Christ. Time flies so quickly. Ling and I, together with our two kids Annabel and Jonathan, will soon finish our first 4-‐year term in this coming July. We are very much looking forward to our second term serving with COCM and God willing, many more years in the Europe mission field. It’s been a blessing for us to receive many warm supports from our fellow co-‐workers in the mission field. Praise the Lord for this “koinonia”! We also had a very successful 5-‐day Bible Camp in June. Our missionary workers along with Pastor and Mrs. Zhang Jing and Lu Xia from the USA gave an overview of the Bible to more than 40 students from different fellowships in this country. We will be developing more Bible camps like this and other Bible-‐ based trainings to expand our training ministry. We are also looking forward to our next Bible Camp on 12th-‐16th September. We plan to study a book in the Bible together with the students, using inductive Bi-‐ ble study method. During the process, we will be able to teach the students to learn how to read the Bible individually and how to lead group Bible study. We encourage you or the brothers and sisters at your church to participate in this Bible Camp. Please visit COCM website www.cocm.org.uk to register online. This coming July, our Gospel Team will be getting into high gear and starting the preparation of their busy ministry in the next several months. At this moment, we already have had 30 young people from different university campuses all over the country signing up to join the team. As a starting point, we will have a Gospel Team Training Camp on 8th-‐10th July to kick off the evangelistic journey this year. The first Gospel event will be held at University of East Angelia in Norwich on 29th July. Please join me to pray for all the preparation work of the Gospel Team, especially for the hearts of these young people who are willing to serve the Lord. Please also pray that we will continue to strengthen the existing mission partnership with the churches and fellowships through this evangelistic work, and at the same time to explore the possibil-‐ ity of building up new mission partnership with more like-‐minded churches and fellowships in the UK and Continental Europe. As we are pushing forward and reaching out to those who are yet to hear the Gospel, we always bear in mind the word of God that “our gospel came to you not simply with words, but also with power, with the Holy Spirit and with deep conviction” (1 Thessalonians 1: 5). May the Lord be the source of our power!
Serving together in Christ, Rev. Henry Lu General Director