Harris
Family Christmas letter 2009
Hello
Old Friend,
December 1, 2009
As
we come to the end of the year, we want to
remember to say thank you for loving
us so well this past year. We have had our
trials and tribulations, as all do,
but God is faithful and in that we put our
trust. Many of you have kept up with
us through the year, but here’s a quick
recap.
At
the beginning of the year, we were racing
to raise the funds to keep the ship
afloat at home and get us to India for our
K-Teams training. Alan, Lori, James,
Susan & John trained in
Pune, India for ecumenical
evangelization. There we made many precious
friends, sharpened our vision and
received encouragement for the task ahead
in the U.S.
We
came back ready to tackle our first Life in
the Spirit Conference, with Deacon
Alex Jones. God pulled it all together and
a core prayer team emerged from
those who participated. This small prayer
group has continued to intercede and
assist with what the Holy Spirit has been
birthing in the Tyler area. They have
been a great encouragement for us
personally as well as becoming precious
friends.
During
the Summer we worked with YWAM’s Summer of
Service Training (SST) as drivers to
Chicago for James’ school. Four 15
passenger vans took 55 kids and staff to
the
windy city for 10 days of intensive
ministry over the 4th of July. We were
thrilled to get to be a part of it and see
God work using these teenagers to
speak His words to the many cultures in the
city.
James,
John and Susan
have been
blessed this fall to begin private school
in Tyler. John is in first grade,
Susan in fifth and James in 8th. James has
turned out to be quite the track
star and we are proud of all of the kids’
scholastic accomplishments. They love
this different situation. Because they are
away at school, we have the time to
devote our full energy to serving the
Church on a daily basis. Our main church
has given us an office to work out of which
has been a huge blessing and allows
us to stay in and work out of Tyler most
days.
Our
prayer meetings are small but solid and
help to keep our focus on the once a
month Healing Service we coordinate. We
have seen this healing service become a
huge focal point for our area. God is
touching lives through this and we are so
blessed to be a part of it. We have seen
physical, spiritual and emotional
healings and the Body of Christ uniting as
one. We have no higher calling.
Sam is living at home and working at
the handicapped school in Tyler. Juanita
is a nurse at East Texas Medical
Center in the cancer ward. God has given
both of them many opportunities to
minister to others and we are glad to have
their input and presence at home. Charlie
is flying planes at LeTourneau University
in Longview and is a chapel worship
leader there. He loves it. We covet your
prayers for him as the burden of debt
for school is not God’s best for anyone.
It’s a real weight for him. Charlotte
lives and works in Arlington.
We
need a secure foundation to stand on. We
cannot build if there’s no place for
our feet. Will you be those support braces?
Like Moses had his arms held up to
continue the work of the Holy Spirit, we
need those who will simply hold up our
arms. We’re waiting for God to send actual
workers to literally hold our hands,
but we also need those of you who stay in
the camp and pray, or send us
supplies to the front lines.
As
2009 disappears into memory and 2010 looms
ahead, we know that only God is
King, no matter whose politics run the
country. If we look at the world through
the King’s eyes, we have nothing to fear.
Alan,
Lori, Juanita, Charles, Charlotte, Sam,
James, Susan, John
Off
to School August 18, 2009
Our
three youngest children, John, Susan and
James, (the three who went to India
with us earlier this year) proudly marched
into new schools yesterday. They now
attend the Tyler Catholic Schools. They are
very excited about having new
friends and new opportunities to polish
their knowledge, after homeschooling
most of their lives. Alan and Lori will be
spending concentrated time working
on the many events and meetings we are
developing for our ministry.
Lori is planning to attend the women's ACTS
reteat the first weekend in October
with St. Mary Magdalene. Alan continues to
meet twice a month with the men's
ACTS fellowship at the same church. It is
very good to see Catholics opening up
and sharing with each other through the
ACTS ministry.
Healing
Mass Held August 10
 A Healing Mass for Cancer victims was held,
Monday, August 10, 2009
at St. Mary Magdalene, Flint, TX. Father
Timothy Kelly officiated.
This
night began with Adoration of the Blessed
Sacrament with
beautiful worship music provided by Angela
Krusi from Garden Valley,
TX. This set the tone to receive ministry
from the Lord during this
service. 
Fr.
Phi Nguyen from the Diocese of Houston
shared his message of
healing from cancer and God’s provision for
healing from the
scriptures.
This was followed by the Mass. Catholics
consider the Lord’s Supper to
be the central mystery of the faith. It is
the highest form of
Christian prayer and a uniting of the whole
church, gathered to worship
Jesus, our high priest (Heb 7:26).
Anointing
with oil and the laying on of hands (Mk
6:13) by the
priests continued the service. We know that
Christians will see the
power of God manifest in healing when we
pray in expectant faith and
call upon his healing power. Personal
ministry followed as the saints
of God gathered around one another and
continued to pray.
 The
Sacrament of Healing has been practiced
since the earliest days of the
Church. The Second Vatican
Council restored an emphasis on prayer for
physical and spiritual healing for all
seriously ill people. Jesus
commanded his apostles to anoint and pray
for healing for the sick. The
Church recognizes the power that has been
at work through this
ministry.
This sacrament does not guarantee healing
in any particular way and we
know that many scriptures point to sharing
in the suffering of Christ
(Rom 8:16, 17; Col. 1:24; 2 Tim 2:11,12; l
Pet. 4:13; 2 Cor 4:16-18)
but our God is a healing God and He does
respond to the prayers of his
children.
We
look forward to many more such Healing
Masses within the Diocese
of Tyler and know that God is on the move
to bring revival to His
people.
Lori
Harris
August
4, 2009
Lori
and I took 4 children to Mt. Pleasant TX on
Saturday Aug 1 to a Huge Spanish
Catholic Youth Conference, called Preparate
Para La Tormenta. We really didn't
know what to expect. Oh
My! There were 1000 people there and
they were glad to be there. See the
pictures in the photo Album called "La
Tormenta," or click here
to read Lori's article on the day.
State
of the Ministry: Saturday, June 25
Being a missionary is more busy than
working a regular job. This week I spent
most of one day building a third online
photo story of our Chicago outreach.
Web work takes a lot of time. The story is
about outdoor drama and dance
ministry on Lake Michigan July 3. Click here to read it.
Each Wednesday night this Summer we are
participating in intense prayer for two
hours at Community Christian Fellowship. We
feel prayer is the only way the
body of Christ will survive in this
frightening world. We are
seeking leaders and participants for home
prayer groups as part of the
Charismatic movement we work with in the
Catholic Church in East Texas. We are
praying for an “awakening.” This praying
informally with others and learning
how to bear their hearts to the Lord is a
new thing for Catholics. Fr. Tim
Kelly, our spiritual advisor, would like to
see 5 or 6 prayer groups start
within the parish of St. Mary Magdalene.
Bishop Corrada wants
to have one in every parish! We’ll work on
getting one actually started.
We have three homes ready to start.
I continue to participate in A.C.T.S., a
Catholic men’s fellowship. These men
are opening up to each other and sharing
concerns about their life and faith. I
meet with the local group in Flint twice a
month. From this group of men I am
trying to find some that would meet with me
for a home men’s prayer group. I’m
starting to meet weekly with another team
in Longview that’s planning an ACTS
retreat in October. Lori will attend a
women’s ACTS retreat in October.
In November we will have our second annual
weekend youth retreat for Catholics.
It will be held at the YWAM SST village
here in Lindale, where James just attended
a 3-week summer camp. This will be an
enticement for the youth to attend a full
3-week Catholic oriented Summer of Service
and Training next summer.
This past Wednesday Lori and I left at 6am
to Pittsburg Texas in time for 8:00
am mass with Fr. Ariel Cortes. Father
Ariel, the Evangelization Director for
the Diocese, is an excellent leader of the
Spanish-speaking believers. He needs
someone to lead the English in
evangelization. We are working with him to
put
evangelistic activities in place in this
diocese.
One of the challenges is getting people to
understand just what evangelization is.
Kerygma means “proclamation of the Good
News.” That is what evangelization is
about. Sharing the Good News that God is
not dead or sleeping. We want to see
Catholics be solid and growing in their
faith. This comes through opening our
mouths and sharing with one another.
That’s evangelization.
Fr.
Ariel joined us the next morning in Tyler
to meet with the Bishop’s assistant,
who coordinates the assembling of
information about the diocese and it’s
appearance on the Internet. We need the
ability to communicate what we are
doing to the whole diocese quickly and
accurately. After our long meeting
Thursday, we believe the Lord is ironing out
past difficulties. As a result, Fr.
Ariel and I spent Thursday afternoon creating a wonderful new webpage
to share the work the Holy Spirit is doing
in Evangelization, tylerevangelization.com.
Friday Lori and I and our Woodcrest staff
member Claudia were able to film a 91
year old woman, Doris, who began 20 years
of charismatic prayer meetings in her
home in 1971. She shared about the mighty
move of the spirit she and her
husband witnessed. Lori hopes to put
together some articles and perhaps a video
of Doris.
Through scholarships, the Lord is providing
the means for our three younger children to
begin Catholic private school this
fall. Although transportation will be a
challenge, this will provide great
opportunities for the children. We look
forward to connecting with new young
families
to work with in our ministry. We see the
void of young people in the church.
The challenge is finding where to begin to
reverse the trend. We pray this new
school adventure will provide a source for
answers.
Everything Lori and I do involves spiritual
warfare. The enemy doesn’t like
people getting closer to God and cleaning
the mess out of their lives. We have
to pray just to keep our minds and hearts
clear in order to do this pioneering
work. Do continue to pray
for us in this, our calling. It’s
hard, but it’s fun too.
Alan
Harris
Ministry
Update June 17, 2009 by Alan
As
you read on the home page, James is
participating in SST Phase II, which we
just found out is actually occurring June
21- July 8. Lori and
I have volunteered to be van drivers for
the final week of SST when they go to
Chicago June 29- July 6. This will give us
great experience with a large
missions outreach and a chance to make some
new contacts up north.
Pray for this adventure. Juanita will stay
home and keep John and Susan. Sam is
working in California at Hume Lake (watch a video of Charlie there last summer), and Charlie is taking flight school at
LeTourneau University in Longview this
summer. Charlotte wants to live in Ft
Worth.
Alan
and Lori Newsletter
PO Box 2531 Lindale, TX 75771
June 1, 2009
|
The rain began
early AM, just like we had prayed. A sweet
and gentle rain that was a sign of
what was to come. There had been much
spiritual warfare but we felt it
beginning to lift and were so excited that
the Lord was opening doors that no
man could close! The call came right as we
got to church. Our son Sam was on
the other end telling us they had just had
a wreck! He, his brother Charles and
a friend, were coming to
lead worship. They had spun out on
the road but the great big angels guarding
the three, had done their job.
Praise the Lord no one was really hurt! I
asked Charlie if he wanted us to get
started and let someone else lead worship.
He said, “No way Mom. We are coming
to kick the devil in the teeth!” That they
did. |
 Our first ecumenical conference, Life in
the Spirit, with Alex Jones was a success.
Opening night saw 120 in attendance
and averaged 60 throughout the day on
Saturday. One lady commented that she had
always thought charismatic things were
scary but after the weekend, she knew
they weren't. We were excited to see Jesus
was giving these wonderful people,
just like the gentle rain, a sweet and
gentle appreciation of his gifts.
We
had exceptional teachers and intercessory
prayer art that God used Sam in. Our
14 year old James, helped with sound and
photography and Charles led worship.
It was a real family ministry and we saw
the Lord heal many wounds and
encourage others. We are so thankful for
your support of us.
|
|
 Future
projects: We
have been encouraged to visit all the areas
of our diocese to find those
willing to work with us. We are planning a
fall youth retreat for kids that
will be a GXP: God Experience that will
unite them and help them grow in their
faith.
The
charismatic prayer group meets monthly and
we are pushing toward home
fellowship/Bible studies. It is through
intimate relationships that God will
begin to open the people to new life in
Christ. Pray for us as we establish a
model work here in East Texas. We are
actively recruiting staff to join us at
YWAM Woodcrest. Come help us stir up the
waters!
Alan
and Lori
|
|
|
May
21 Communications Lab in Madison, Wisconsin
continues. Today we are
studying working on the Internet, and
this is actually part of our in class work.
Jeff the teacher asked us to make a
new post on our website. Just now we're
talking about the phrase WSIWYG. Do you
know that one? Its pronounced wizi-wig, and
means what-you-see-is-what-you-get.
It means typing on the screen will look the
same way the final presentation
will look. We teach all of this kind of
tools at YWAM Woodcrest in Texas. Do
you have a heart for communication skills?
This week we're studying Writing,
Design, Video and today, Internet. These
are tools we will use to share our
message with today's world. We want to be
excellent in all that we do to reach
our audience. Alan
May
18 Alan
is alone in
Madison Wisconsin this week
with 7 other YWAM Woodcrest members
participating in a Communications Lab.
There’s 7 others here at the YWAM Madison
facility. We’re having a crash course
in writing, video, and internet. Janice,
Jeff and Monica are teachiing this week.
There will be practical exercises and
workshops. How to communicate to this high
tech
generation. We want to impact the people
God is sending us to touch. Please
pray for us to focus on the most effective
thing at all times. What does God
want us to do?
April
28. We had the Alex Jones “Life in the Spirit”
Conference this weekend. It went smoothly.
It was an introduction to living a
spirit filled life. An introduction.
There's a lot more to cover in the future.
All speakers were able to speak. On Friday
night we had over 100 in attendance
for Alex Jones' testimony. All day Saturday
we had 50-60 hear each speaker. The
food provided by St Mary Magdalene Church
was excellent and free of charge, as
was the whole conference. Christian
recording artist Kelly Willard ministered
at the piano during adoration on Saturday
before mass, sat in mass with Lori
and I, then played again during prayer
ministry after mass. It was anointed and
very refreshing. Thank you Kelly.
The members of St. Mary Magdalene and
guests heard some very ecumenical talks
and saw our style of conference
organization. We look forward to bringing
more
great events in the near future. We enjoyed
the fellowship with Deacon Alex
Jones, another charismatic convert like
ourselves. He remarked he had never
done a conference like ours before.
We're going to get him to
write our his thoughts.
All the speakers were recorded. We are
working on getting those sessions on CD
and online. Thanks to all for praying for a
spiritual covering. There were many
attacks that tried to trump up the event,
including my two oldest sons totaling
their car on the way in the rain on
Saturday. Charlie was still able to lead
worship at 8:15 and Sam was upstairs
ministering
in prayer art.
This is what God called Lori and I to do:
bring unity to the body of Christ.
Continue to pray for us as we seek the best
ways to bring new life to all
mankind in East Texas.
What is your part?
Alan
April
15, 2009
We continue to prepare
for the Alex Jones and the Life in the
Spirit Conference on April 24-26. We are
receiving good calls from people learning
of the conference. Many details are
being worked out. Alan
began working at the YWAM Woodcrest
base this week, preparing to input their
video and document archives to
computer media. He is also designing a
database
to store all of their school
applications and contact information to
access from a computer.
The three younger children are
homeschooling and looking forward to
attending
private Catholic school in Tyler in the
Fall.
On
Thursday, March 26 Alan
and Lori spoke for over 70 Priests at
Clergy Day in Tyler, TX.
Bishop Alvaro Corrada invited us to address
the clergy about our ministry. We shared our testimonies,
about YWAM, India and what our vision is
for the Diocese of Tyler.
We showed some of the videos and pictures seen on this website. Jeff, the
Discipleship Training School leader at
Woodcrest, also spoke to the priests on
behalf of Youth With A Mission. He shared
an early story of the History of YWAM
involving his uncle, founder Loren
Cunningham. Bishop Corrada
got up at the end of the meeting and said
“Alan
and Lori make us uncomfortable!
They are still evangelical and we Catholics
aren’t used to that. They have much
to teach us.”
Well Bishop Corrada, we met many Catholics
overseas that put us to shame! They were
passionate and excited about their
relationship with Jesus and the
Church. We
are excited about what God wants to
bring to the American Catholic Church. Our prayer is that we will get to play a small
part in that Revival.
Bishop Corrada
India, Final Report
For the video version of this report, click
here>
P.O. Box 2531
Lindale, TX 75775
March 4, 2009
Dear
Team Members,
Thank
you for your prayers and support for our
recent trip. We arrived home
from India this past weekend. We’re still
suffering from jet lag
somewhat and are glad to be home. We get
tired or wake up at the
strangest times. We wanted to give you a
post mission trip report and
would be happy to share with your church,
parish or auxiliary
ministries. Give us a call or email to set
that up.
This is what your
money actually went for:
a. Airfare to Mumbai, India
b. Ground transportation to Pune and back
to Mumbai
c. Making sure the lights were still on
when we got back.
We
still owe for India school fees, room and
board and our continuing
daily maintenance here at home. We
appreciate your ongoing support and
belief in what we do… and there is LOTS to
do!
This
is what we learned about:
- Ecumenism, working together with Catholics
and Protestants, in society, in charismatic
worship and prayer, in communities
and in YWAM.
- Kerygma
Teams –
the ecumenical branch
of Youth With a Mission, with a Catholic
focus
- The
different programs
we will
aim toward facilitating in the U.S. are:
a. Full year weekly courses in parishes
called “Finding Jesus.”
b. Discipleship Training Schools (DTS) with
short-term mission outreach.
c. Two to four week Go-Teams of short term
outreach
d. Weekend GXP’s for youth to have a God
eXPerience.
- Fellowshippingwith an international mix of
believers.
The accents were great – Slavic, African,
Australian, Dutch, Canadian,
French, New Zealand, Belgian, German. We
invited them all to Texas and
we all benefited from living in close
quarters
with 16 nationalities!
- Indian
believers
who love Jesus, both Catholic and
Protestant, including priests,
pastors and Bishops. We acquired a heart
for India and saw potential
mission opportunities there.
- We
Heard God
and got our eyes off ourselves. Letting him
teach us and show us the
right path and vision. We realized our
convenient, quiet clean lives
are a luxury in other countries.
Why
are you supporting us instead of us having
a paying job?
- God
has called us to be full time lay
missionaries serving the body of Christ
around the world.
- As
unpaid staff members of YWAM we are
facilitating the daily operations of a
growing training base.
We help train young adults who are taking
time out of their education
and careers to get grounded in the deeper
things of God and experience
short-term missions overseas and in
America.
- We
are also utilizing our workweek to work
closely with churches in East
Texas initiating new programs and events to
challenge their existing
youth and young adults, and multiply them.
Local churches do not have the funds or
know-how to bolster their young adult
ministries. We are providing that.
- We
are improving communication methods for all
the ministries and projects
we are involved with, using modern
technology, print media, video,
music and the Internet.
Will
you pray about supporting us monthly?
Pray
about how God might have you become
involved in missions more directly
by partnering with us. We do need monthly
and on going support.
Can we come to speak to your church?
Would you be willing to host a group of
friends in your home so
that we might share our ministry with
them?
This
is what we need a month:
The
cost of living in Texas is very reasonable.
$2000 a month for our
family would free us to concentrate on
ministry and not be so pressured
by the day-to-day bills.
20
people to partner with us at $100 per
month.
40 people to partner with us at $50
per month.
Pray if this could be a part of your
tithes.
If
you need a tax deductible receipt, you can
make checks payable to YWAM.
They are then processed through YWAM and
they receive a part of the
tithe for their services.
If a receipt isn’t an issue, making them
direct to us helps us immediately and we do
not lose any due
to the processing fee.
That’s
the report on our trip to India. You can
read our full India Cronicles on our Articles Tab. We’d love to talk to and see
all of you. There is so much to do!
Please pray that we can sort it all out and
do the most important first.
Thanks
again for all your encouragement.
In Christ,
Alan,
Lori, James, Susan and John
(903)
963-7146
landmarkal@hotmail.com
lori@kerygmatexas.com
Ministry
Update, March 9, 2009
We are back from India over a week now. We
have gotten over our jet lag and are
digging in for our new work. We are
getting together with our local spiritual
leaders in YWAM and the Catholic
church to move forward. Alan is working on
video projects to share what we did
in India. Lori is making connections as we
try to expand into new projects.
Stay tuned. The YWAM Woodcrest DTS just
ended and we will be helping various
physical projects at the Woodcrest base
before any other schools begin. Our three
younger children are preparing for SAT
tests in preparation to enter private
school in the Fall.
Ministry
Update, February 2, 2009
Who said missionary training couldn't be
fun? Lori and I have our writing skills
flowing well now. Check our our latest
articles this week. Thank you Janice for
the Writers School! We started the
third week of the L-5 Leadership School
this morning. It's really hot still.
91* at 3 PM. We're avoiding the food pretty
well, drinking the right water. The
Global Gathering begins Friday. Today we
met two men from Juanita's outreach
team, who brought letters from her! We're
actually hearing news about her
that's not censored! Susie was thrilled.
Ministry
Update January 29, 2009
Its a lazy afternoon in Pune. We had a
run-in with our health this week. Upset
bowels for too much India spices. Lori
and James had fever yesterday and are still
a little puny. This is our eighth
day here now. We know what we like and what
we have to tolerate. The teaching
is great. Too great. Wow. We've got this
Indian priest teaching us this week.
Fr. Anil. He's amazing. Check out the India chronicles.
Alan
Ministry
Update January 25, 2009
The family is safely in India. Read our
daily report by clicking here.
We
bought the tickets and leave January 20th!
We
bought the tickets today and we leave
Tuesday, Inauguration Day at 1:30 from
DFW. It was a wild weekend of waiting on
the Lord, who was waiting for bad
weather to clear on the East Coast,
apparently. Get this: our video camera
arrived back from repair and Radio Shack
called us tonight. we really wanted to
take it with us. Watch for new photos and
videos online!
Ministry
Update, Monday, January 19 by Alan
Waiting on the Lord. I recalled when we
moved out of our house in Fillmore in 2000
I stood at the front door and
proclaimed the words of Moses from Exodus
14:13 "Fear not,
stand firm and see the salvation of the
Lord, which he will work for you today."
This time I claimed verse 21 "Then
Moses stretched ou his hand
over the sea; and the Lord drove the ea
back by a strong east wind all night
and made the sea dry land and the waters
were divided."
Some have suggested we not take our
children to India or just I go alone. That
is now what the Lord promised us. We
have come to far to turn back. We are
going. Show us the way, Lord. This is the
breakthrough of a new thing and the enemy
doesn't want it to crack. Please pray
for us. It is a good time of pressing in to
Jesus.
Ministry
Update, Saturday, January 17, 2009 by Alan
Still in Texas. We need four credit cards
with $1100 to buy our other four tickets.
We have the fifth ticket covered.
I
read Prov 2 this morning, Living Bible. God
told me understanding comes from
the mouth of the Lord. He grants good sense
and wisdom to find the right course
of action. God's understanding will keep us
safe. I feel he's making us wait
for our safety. Perhaps because of the
harsh weather on the east coast. At this
point we will be flying Delta through
Atlanta. It's 24* there this morning. We
were going to fly through Newark
originally. It's 11* there. Our bags are
packed. there's a lot of them. Everybody
keep praying. Any giving on this site
through paypal will be appreciated. If you
can buy a ticket outright, call us
now. Blessings.
Ministry
Update, January 15, 2009 by Alan
Hello everyone - We haven't left for India
yet. We are still praying for the funds.
This happens with YWAM missionaries.
God teaches faith by making us wait til the
last minute. Our bags are almost
packed. The kids are as nervous as
Christmas Eve. We'd love to drive off RIGHT
NOW. Pray for Charlie, Juanita, Sam and
Charlotte, who will not be with us. We
feel very loved and supported in prayer.
The Woodcrest base "prayed
us out" yesterday morning.
For our fellow Catholics, that means
they had us come up and they gathered
around us and prayed God's blessings over
us and our trip. Kind of like what CCF
did on Sunday. I remarked that I really can
feel we're representing Woodcrest
as we go. They have really incorporated "The
Harrises"
into their family.
Ministry
Update, January 5, 2009 by Alan
Happy New Year – We spent a quiet Christmas
and New Years at home, missing two older
daughters. Sunday, yesterday, we had
our year end goal review and prayer for the
new year. We are anticipating God’s
provision for our trip to India in ten
days. Our shots and visas are in order,
but we still don’t have tickets. Please
pray for us. Anyone with miles to
share, please let us know.
Our
three young ones are excited about going to
India. We felt that would be better
than trying to find people to keep them
here. They have never been on an
airplane. We are researching foundations
for grants to fund our new Catholic
YWAM work through Kerygma Teams. It’s quite
fascinating what you must go
through to apply. A whole new language to
speak, practically. We are thankful
for the YWAM writers school stirring up our
writing skills to help craft the
words we must use to promote K-Teams.
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