Sascha Kroecker attended Big Woods a number of years ago while training at New Tribes Jersey Shore.  As a young single man, he was preparing to serve the Lord where ever God would lead. God led him to Guinea, West Africa. Since then, he met and married Damaris and they have continued their ministry in Guinea together. We have talked to Damaris through email but have not had the pleasure of meeting her in person. They have been blessed with two children, Johanna and Elisabeth. Please keep them in prayer as they serve our Lord Jesus Christ in Guinea, West Africa!

damaris_kroecker@ntm.org

October 2009

Dear prayer warriors!

Thanks so much for your intercession before the Most High. He keeps calming and guiding us these days beyond believe!

Here’s what we see as from the Lord for our near (and mid-range) future:

Damaris and the girls will be staying in Dakar (Senegal) until Guinea is stable enough again to handle our family without us having to continually worry about our security. Whenever needed, but no more than once a month, I (Sascha) will be coming to Conakry (Guinea) to take care of business in order to keep our missionaries in the tribal villages continue in their ministries.

Right now I am in Conakry, and I will stay here until the end of the month (October).

My next prospected time in Guinea is around the end of November – and the plan is to stay for no more but a few business days (Tuesday-Friday).

Guest House: Once the travel ban has been lifted, we are praying for more visitors again as we have our whole work crew still in place while in Dakar – it’s costly, but we hope to be able to provide stability to the field that way, and we do not like to let go of our workers who are all believers.

Times are less but ideal for Guinea and us serving in Conakry, but it’s very comforting to know that our God is around – and He is awesome!!!

Thanks again for your prayers – we wouldn’t want to do this without them.

Sascha for the family
 

September 2009

Guinea, September 2009

I n times of change it is encouraging to know:

Jesus Christ is the same: Yesterday, today, forever. Hebrews 13:8

Dear friends and prayer partners!

We’ve been back in Guinea, West Africa for five months already, and we thought you’d enjoy reading a little update on the happenings around us.

 When arriving in Guinea at the end of March we spent three weeks in a guest house of a French mission while looking for another house big enough to live at and to run our ministry from. The place God got us into is above and beyond anything we’ve ever expected. It is right at the ocean front and having our own well we will never have to look for water again – people in our suburb have been without town supplied water for months. Until today we do not exactly know why the landlord left this house to us for a much lower price as usual but we are surely thankful. There is no way to not share that blessing with others, and so we decided to use the lower floor as a guest house whereas we live upstairs. Our new mansion even provides room to run an office to take care of business and administrational things for NTM in the capital – I am writing this out of an office with ocean view. Don’t we serve an awesome God?

Since being back to Conakry we had to find another church to attend and that for a very African reason: The only dirt road leading to our church has been blocked by a wall to keep cars and trucks out of the area – no one really knows why, but the only way to church leads now through a river bed which is not much of an option for our car.

Four new missionary families arrived in the past months to help us see Guineans reached with the gospel of Christ. Most of these missionaries are spending time in Conakry to learn to function within the new culture. Local believers are helping them on their way and we have the privilege to help oversee the program for a while.

Working with authorities -be it at an intersection or in many offices- is not always an easy one to deal with as we do not want to enter into the system of corruption, and it oftentimes tires me out. Please pray that we might be able to reflect Christ in our dealings with these precious people. Christ died for them, and He wants them to receive the saving knowledge just like everybody else in this country.

 Much sweeter it is to get to know more of our brothers and sisters in Christ. People from church, pastors we work with, and friends of ours who do not know Christ yet, they all love to come by for a visit. Sometimes it can proof a real challenge to open up your house in an African culture. There’s still a lot we have to learn to receive people the way God does in order to make relationships grow deeper, but it is so much worth it. We also appreciate your prayers to arrive at a good balance between our ministry, our family live, and our outreach activities.

 Working on the NTM Guinea support team I am running my little office from where I represent Guinea to the local government; working with legal documents, supply buying and travel arrangements are some of the things I am doing to help our personnel up-country concentrate on their jobs in the villages and elsewhere. We also run our little guest house as described above and people love to spend a night with us or even a week for vacation.

Our children have both been sick (one with malaria), and we are experiencing God’s grace in times of need; but we’d rather live without those types of challenges – please pray for our health in a tropical country as Guinea where it’s hard to find adequate medical help. It is a good thing we always got our God as the best doctor with us - ...and my faithful wife with her expertise.

Guinea’s political and economical situation needs prayer. Elections have been postponed to early next year, and there is hardly any week when we don’t hear of people taking their dissatisfaction to the street. So far we’ve not had any problems as we usually know where not to go when things get “hot”.

We DO appreciate your prayers, even if I (Sascha) am still not putting out updates as I should. Stay encouraged wherever you are serving our great God – He is worth it!!  

Dear brothers and sisters,