Are you looking forward to 2021?  Ready to leave 2020 in the rearview mirror? Me too- but there are some generosity opportunities that expire on December 31, 2020, which are worth noting! Here are two resources we’d like you to see, which can help increase your stewardship as we approach the end of this unique year.

One:  A Guide to Year-End Giving

Compiled by our partners CDF Foundation, this Guide can help you reach your personal generosity goals and protect your financial planning

Two:  CARES Act Fact Sheet

Unique generosity opportunities that will expire on December 31, 2020, connected to the CARES Act of 2020.

Download these resources, and if you have any questions please contact Jeff Coon jcoon@fameworld.org or 317-675-7373 and he will answer, or connect you to a partner who can answer your questions.

This week I was on a Zoom call and was asked if we ever worked together with other ministries.  Well, the answer is YES.

That is what we do!

Can I name a few partnerships for you?

First, we only go into the “uttermost parts of the earth” where there are partner ministries who have requested our teamwork and ministry with sustainable partnerships, shipping equipment and supplies, and sending short-term teams.  That is where the evangelism happens because FAME helps open doors for our global partners.

Second, we only are able to do ministry because of individuals and churches like you who partner financially with us- there is no FAME ministry- it is OUR ministry with you!

Third, we work in partnership with other parachurch ministries to support the global partners we share in the world.  Here is a short-list of a partner and an example of partnership

TEAM Expansion– Last week co-sponsored Community Health Evangelism (CHE) Training at the FAME headquarters, preparing Trainers headed to global partner locations

IDES – International Disaster Emergency Services – recently FAME and IDES have partnered on a Hospital in Pakistan, and Ambulances in the Philippines and Honduras

CMF- Christian Missionary Fellowship– Sustainable Project collaboration in Africa and SE Asia, clinics, hospitals, mobile clinics, and medical resources

PBT-Pioneer Bible Translators – For many years FAME has provided the basic medical supplies for PBT team leaders as they head to the field.  Recent conversations have begun for one Translator in Papua New Guinea to help outfit a clinic they are using for medical evangelism.

So, yes; we work with other ministries- that is what we do!

And by the way, the original question…when I’m asked, “who is our greatest partner?”  It is YOU!  And others like you.

FAME – Partners in Medical Evangelism is who we are, and what we do!

Jeff Coon

Director of Development.

The pandemic has reached into the most remote parts of the world – but SO HAVE YOU!

For months, Myanmar appeared to have escaped a major COVID-19 outbreak. Between March and August, cases were limited to 374 with only six deaths. The last fatality was recorded in April, and no local transmissions were reported between July 16 and August 16. But on August 16, everything changed. A second wave of COVID-19 cases erupted and quickly spread to Yangon, with smaller clusters now being found across the country, including the remote area of North Myanmar!

In early September, 17 preachers gathered in remote North Myanmar in the village of Putao.   Putao is tucked into the Himalayan foothills where there are no paved roads!  They met to divide up the critical medical supplies purchased with Funds sent by FAME which you made possible!  The $1500 sent by FAME was exchanged for 1,950,000 kyats!

These great men scattered around the mountain villages and they were able to provide infrared thermometers, sanitizers, masks, and medicines for 45 churches.  Forty-Five Churches with one gift!   Also, now is the rainy season, the season that the people in Myanmar most suffer from various kinds of illnesses and diseases.

These preachers become the frontline workers where there is no doctor.  Many of them have minimal training from FAME teams teaching Health Education and CHE (Community Health Evangelism); but without proper resources, training is only minimally helpful. Now, because of you, and other partners like you- even Himalayan foothill villages are more prepared for what’s ahead.

 

That’s multiplying your impact!  Thank you for your partnership in the remotest parts of the earth!

Bill Warren
Executive Director

Thank you for your continued support of the ministry of FAME through prayer. Our partners, scholarship recipients, volunteers, board members and staff are blessed by your devotion to prayer for our ministry. Your prayers are making an impact in lives all around the world!

This month we ask you to partner with us in praying for our FAME Board of Directors as they prepare for the Semi-Annual FAME Board of Directors meeting on October 17. Please pray for each of the wonderful FAME Board members that God has put in place and that they continue to be guided by the Spirit in making decisions regarding the ministry.

Please also pray for many of the FAME volunteers who come in on a weekly or monthly basis. We are so grateful for these volunteers who give of their time and talents to help further the mission of FAME in seeing people come to Christ through medical evangelism. If you would like to volunteer at FAME, either individually or as a group, please contact Barry Reed, FAME’s Director of Mission Resources at BarryR@fameworld.org.

Other items to pray for include:

• FAME Executive Director, Bill Warren, as he raises funds for the Reeves Project Fund through his participation in Indy-thon and the Run for Global Health. If you would like to learn more about this run, visit our website at www.fameworld.org/want-to-go-for-a-run
  
• Community Health Evangelism (CHE) TOT 1 Training October 5-8 being held at FAME in Indianapolis. www.fameworld.org/sustainable-projects/che.

Thank you for your partnership in medical evangelism through prayer!

Blessings in the coming month.

Click here for the October Prayer Calendar

Babeni* was suffering and weak, but no one knew why.  Day after day his family thought he was just aging and under a curse.  He and his family gave up hope and thought all was lost because even the inadequately supplied clinic they had visited didn’t have the supplies needed to diagnose what was wrong.

Then Babeni’s daughter heard the new clinic received supplies and was ready to see patients.  The shipment of supplies had been sent by FAME and made possible by you and partners like you!

Babeni was able to visit the clinic, and the newly arrived blood pressure cuff was used to identify the cause of his weakness and decline.  Hypertension, or high blood pressure.  Even here in the USA hypertension is often called a “silent disease” because you usually don’t know that you have it.  But here in America our doctors have an abundance of supplies like Blood pressure cuffs!  CVS, Walgreens, Walmart, and many other stores have BP stations where you can check your own blood pressure!

Access to healthcare and even health information is limited and even non-existent to 400 million of the people of the world.  Men and women like Babeni are at risk of dying before they have a chance to even hear the gospel.

Babeni’s story ends well – a few lifestyle changes and a diuretic was able to be prescribed and his life is extended.  Your FAME partner can now tell him and his family all about Jesus- and he has time to respond to the good news!

Thank you for your partnership!  You make it possible for FAME to send help and hope every day to global partners who are saving lives for eternity!

Thank you!

Bill Warren
Executive Director

*Babeni’s name is changed, but his story is real and repeated time and time again!

I’m running for something and I’d love to have you with me!  Here’s the story…

On Saturday, March 14th I returned from an extended trip to Asia visiting your FAME ministry partners.  While the places I visited had very low case numbers of the coronavirus, fear was growing.  By the time I arrived home, I had decided on a voluntary 14-day self-quarantine.  On Monday, March 16, the shutdown began and my 14 days at home became three months.

With my calendar clear and some extra time available, I decided to exercise.  I began walking three miles each day.  Eventually, I increased the distance and began some running.  As I write this, I have logged over 800 miles since March.

During the hours on my walks / runs, I wondered: “How can I help our FAME partners who are working in under-resourced parts of the world?”  The answer became INDY-THON.  Indy-thon is the combination of the Half Marathon at Fort Benjamin Harrison on October 3 and the Monumental Half Marathon on November 7.  My goal is to raise $1,000 per mile (that’s 26.2 miles) for the FAME Reeves Memorial Project Fund.

The Reeves fund will complete 11 Sustainable Healthcare Projects through FAME partners in India, Haiti, Mexico, Ghana, Spain, Ivory Coast and the Philippines.  It will purchase surgical equipment, a hospital generator, two ambulances and construction materials for a cardiac hospital and 6 primary care clinics.  For example, $26,200 could complete a primary care clinic in Mahabalipuram, India.

Every project of every partner will result in medical evangelism.  The gospel will be proclaimed as individuals are given otherwise unavailable healthcare in the name of Jesus!

Will you join me?  I am asking you to pledge a dollar amount for every mile I complete.  A $10.00 / mile pledge would be $262.00.  Or, you could sponsor a mile for $1,000 or a half mile for $500.  Really your gift of any amount will help.  Click HERE to join me!

Whatever you decide, thanks for joining me – and know that your gift will help meet desperate medical needs – but more importantly, meet them in Jesus’ name!  You will be changing lives now and into eternity.

Thanks & God Bless!

Bill Warren
Executive Director

The typhoon season of the Philippines has started amidst a rampaging coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic. The first typhoon, Vongfong, with strong winds of 155 kph (96 mph) and torrential rains pounded the country while on strict lockdown.

It placed the health system of the Philippines into a test as a perfect storm developed—a strong typhoon during a devastating pandemic. In a country of 110 million people, Vongfong displaced populations and knocked out power, thus complicating the COVID-19 initiatives and adding additional burden to the emergency situation of the country. The Philippines is hit by an average of twenty tropical typhoons every year.

It may be recalled that the country is still reeling from the effects of super typhoon Haiyan on November 8 of 2013 that killed 6200 people, displacing 4 million and affecting 14 million from its destructive force.  And the Electric Co-op of Aparri in North Luzon is still often offline because of Typhoon Ompong in 2018.

A FAME partner Hospital, Charles W. Selby Memorial Hospital in Aparri, has at risk outdoor temporary Triage areas and treatment areas because of COVID-19.  Additionally, your partner in Aparri has an outdated, under-sized, and over-used generator. Many years ago, the hospital-acquired a small generator just for Emergencies.  Usually a temporary solution, this generator has now become a near-permanent provider of electricity for critical care patients with the ongoing and common Electricity Crisis in the Philippines. When the electricity is out only portions of the hospital are able to have power.

The following Departments are in crisis during these Outages:

• Pediatric Respiratory
• Dialysis
• Heart Monitoring
• COPD and Asthma

All of these patients are all at risk many times.

With your partnership FAME can provide a New Generator which will adequately power the full hospital if needed!

This FAME Partner Hospital is 100% Filipino-led and 99% self-funding for daily operations – an example of Sustainability!  Chaplains at this hospital boldly declare the gospel to EVERY patient who enters!

Can you partner with FAME with a gift to Sustainable Projects that will bring Power to the Philippines?  Power for Healthcare and Power from the Gospel!

Dear Friends and Partners of FAME,

Do you remember the Earth, Wind & Fire song from 1978, “September”?

Ba de ya, say do you remember?
Ba de ya, dancing in September
Ba de ya, never was a cloudy day     (are you humming it now?)

Do you remember last September? Do you remember what it was like to live in a world without an unrelenting pandemic, an increase in racial tensions, masks, getting together with family and friends, going to church, going to school, going to work, receiving medical care, volunteering, attending sporting events, going on a vacation, going on a mission trip, and no “social distancing”?

Last September, as well as other Septembers, seem like dreams compared to the world we live in now. So much has changed as we look at the current world we live in. What has not changed is the love of our God and He being with us through all of this.

Recently, FAME Executive Director, Bill Warren said, “Even though several FAME  short-term medical mission trips this year have been canceled and some of our Sustainable Healthcare Projects are “on hold” because of mandated lockdowns, God is still at work!  We have heard from so many of our partners with stories of their unique opportunities to reach out and help people in their communities during a pandemic. One partner in India is waiting for the pandemic to end so they can continue work on this desperately needed primary care clinic.  Today it is just a foundation but soon it will be a place where people will find help and hope – both physically and spiritually.  In the meantime, they are feeding people who are hungry, and I recently saw pictures of the baptisms of six people.”

There are great needs among our partners, and this month we invite you to partner with us in praying for many of them and the medical projects we have committed to funding for their missions.

Other items of prayer for this month include our FAME scholarship recipients who are studying to become medical professionals, FAME’s short-term mission trips that are currently scheduled for 2021, some upcoming conferences that will now be virtual instead of in person, volunteer groups, and some church visits where Jeff Coon, FAME Director of Development will be presenting FAME and how churches can partner with us in reaching the lost through medical evangelism.

Please know that we are grateful to you and your partnership. Your prayers are making a difference in lives around the world.

Many blessings to all of you!

Click here for the September Prayer Calendar

Laboratories and lab workers are currently one of the most important medical needs of our times.

In 2017 many FAME partners helped to send funding to Narok County, Kenya in order to establish a state of the art laboratory that was ahead of the standards required in Kenya.  This lab upgrade was needed for critical testing from AIDS to every other medical unknown in the network known as CHP Kenya.  7 Clinics are served by this lab allowing medical providers to have test results in hours or just a few days, instead of weeks.

You won’t be surprised that we learned last week that the caseload at this lab has increased. Official COVID testing is being sent to a Kenya Medical research institute, but the whole region would have had no information without you and your generosity!

Additionally, you have helped provide pathologists because of FAME’s Impact Scholarship program.

In the US there are 7 pathologists for every 100,000 people; in Sub-Saharan Africa that number is less than 1 for every 500,000!

Thank you for your impact on providing Access to the Good news around the world.   One obstacle you help eliminate is by providing access to healthcare information and technology!

Thank you for your part in this battle of bringing access to the Gospel through access to healthcare.

YOU are making a difference around the globe.