Ministry Teams Serve in Israel, Families Came for NASA but Stayed to Spread the Gospel & Expressing Appreciation to Pastors

Texas Baptist Men distributed nearly 5,000 meals in Ashkelon, Israel, the coastal city near the Gaza border. The city has been one of the hardest hit locations in Israel and was one of the primary targets of the wide-scale rocket attacks by Hamas that initiated the war on Oct. 7.

Trained to meet the unique dietary needs of a kosher diet, volunteers served falafels at the hospital.

The current volunteer team on the ground in Israel is prepared to stay two weeks. Hall said they are currently organizing another team to replace this one at that time.

Volunteers arrived in two shifts through Jordan this week, according to an article in the Texas Baptist Standard. The first group arrived on Oct. 10. The second team arrived the next day. Texas Baptist Men teams are working alongside the Emergency Volunteers Project (EVP), a partner disaster relief organization formed specifically to deploy volunteer teams to Israel in times of crisis.
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Families who moved to the Clear Lake community of southeast Houston to start the U.S. space program more than five decades ago started something else that continues to impact the world: Clear Lake Baptist Church.

They met in homes for a while and sent mailers to the community to gauge interest – and they had a great turnout, said John Aaron Matthew, pastor of Clear Lake Baptist Church. “They have continued to minister here in the community and meet needs, to be a light for all these years,” he said.

Some of the founding members are still there, having retired from NASA or related contractors IBM or Boeing, and newer generations of space program workers have come along.

One new member recently graduated from college and moved to Houston to work for Mission Control, and another church member has trained astronauts.
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Good News for Today is made possible through our friends at The Voice of the Martyrs, a nonprofit organization that serves persecuted Christians around the world. Founded in 1967 by Richard and Sabina Wurmbrand, VOM is dedicated to inspiring believers to deepen their commitment to Christ and to fulfill His Great Commission — no matter the cost. Find out more and sign up for their free monthly magazine at vom.org/goodnews.
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One of Mark Marshall’s greatest keepsakes is a notebook filled with letters from church members expressing their love and appreciation for him and his wife.

“It was given to me 26 years ago, and I still have it,” said Marshall, a longtime Southern Baptist pastor now serving as assistant executive director of the Georgia Baptist Mission Board.

That’s an example of one of the many ways congregations can show they love their pastors in October, which has been set aside as Pastor Appreciation Month.

Southern Baptist leaders who minister to the needs of pastors say it’s vital that congregations show their appreciation.

Pastors are feeling increasingly dissatisfied with their jobs and more than 40 percent have considered leaving the ministry in the past 12 months, according to the Barna Group, a research organization that monitors cultural and religious trends in America.

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