Bible School and Seminary graduates help meet needs in earthquake-devastated areas.

Indonesia (MNN) — It’s now been more than three weeks since the devastating earthquake in Java, Indonesia. While the local government isn’t encouraging a great amount of outside teams coming in to help, AMG International has indigenous partners on the ground that enable them to be involved.

“Where the earthquake (hit), the epicenter of the earthquake was in one of the parts of Indonesia where we’ve had our work going on for the longest period of time,” says AMG’s Paul Jenks.

One national worker died in the quake, and many families and church-planting workers were directly impacted as well.

Jenks says their national partners have been hard at work. “We continue to have teams going out daily to do feeding and to provide the necessary food and equipment that families that are living in tents and temporary shelters need.”

And that’s not all; nationals are responding to the needs with the love of Christ, “We’ve just had graduation of our Bible school and seminary, and those graduates have all been recruited now to be workers to go out and to minister to these who have lost everything.”

While the 42 graduates have risen to the challenge of this ministry, AMG is hoping to also recruit 25 medical personnel in-country to help meet the health needs in the wake of the devastation. But believers are providing much needed ministry, says Jenks, in the form of: “Prayer and counseling and for those that have been left homeless or grieving for lost loved ones, of course just trying to minister to them not only in deed but also from the Scriptures, trying to bring them the hope that is only comes from Jesus Christ. So that’s certainly something that we should all be in prayer for and that the Lord would just bless this effort and bring many to Himself.”

It’s an exciting opportunity, Jenks believes, because AMG has been there so long that they have developed trust and relationships prior to the disaster. Jenks says, “We really feel that we’re strategically placed, and that we have churches and groups of believers in the communities that were actually affected. So we can actually work through that body of believers and so it’s strategic in that we can be there to help those that we’ve been working with for thirty or more years.”

It’s about long-term impact, and Jenks says it’s happening through their relationship with people on the ground, “And so we do work through the local churches, through the local Christians there, and of course that gives us a presence that is not a surprise to anyone. We’re not there to proselytize or to take advantage of the situation, but to really be hands and feet and express the love of Christ to people that we’ve had long-term relationships with, and through them to their neighbors and their communities in a way that we hope will have long-term and lasting effect.”

Pray for God to work and bring hope to devastated lives. Pray for strength and encouragement for those ministering to others’ needs.