Visit with Sister Virginia Sharma

In June 2009, Chim and Fay were able to visit with Sister Virginia Sharma in her Texas home after attending the NAMMAC conference in Houston. This year the conference is in Vancouver, Washington on August 9-12, 2010. It is undecided whether Chim will go this year. The conference theme is 2010 - The Year of the Seafarer. In the meantime, Fay has spent a beautiful week with Virginia attending a Tres Dias weekend and enjoying Virginia's family.
Chim has once again had to attend to family business issues in New Mexico but Fay has tried to meet the seafarers' needs as they became known. In April Fay had the pleasure of visiting the MOL Proficiency and our long time friend, Captain Nishant. He visited our home and Fay and our son, Denish, had a lovely time with him sharing the Gospel when appropriate in the conversation. We continue to answer e-mails and phone calls even though we are not at the port at this time. In fact, the APL Tennessee is coming in on Wednesday just as Fay arrives and will be there for them. On the May 15th the APL Colorado comes into port with Captain Ramesh Rai and his family and Chim plans to be there for them. Because the children are on school holiday they will be able to see Disneyland, Universal Studios and other "touristy" things. I am sure the Captain and some of the crew will visit our home for dinner during they stay as well!

Once again this year, the Internation Seafarers' Center is holding a fundraiser on the Queen Mary in September. Anyone interested in attending please let us know at cmandalia@msn.com

February happenings

This has been a very busy month for Chim and the ministry. From the APL England, we reconnected with the chief cook, Ramchandra (a Hindu convert) and the mess man, Melvin. They came to our home for dinner, fellowship and prayer. We shared the Goospel with mel. He shed many tears of repentance and he prayed the sinner's prayer. (The same day he met with Jac-who also works with seafarers-and he prayed with him as well.) Mel committe his life to the Lord at that time. He's from Goa and has a Catholic background. Both men will be back soon on their return voyage. Ramchandra has requested prayer for his family. They have been experiencing a lot of difficulty from the rest of the family because of their conversion. In fact, his brother actually tried to set Ram's house on fire while he and his family were sleeping inside!
Captain De Mallow and his wife from MOL Paradise returned and we spend 3 days taking them shopping and around the area at their request. They were comfortagle enought with us that they shared some of their family problems and we prayed for them. They also mentioned a crew member who had been suffering chest pains while at sea and upon their arrival in port he was admitted to Long Beach Memorial hospital.
Jugdesh Rawat was on the verge of having a heart attach but a stent was successfully implanted the same day President Clint had his 2 stents done! Chim phoned Jugdesh's wife in India letting her know of his condition and gave her reassurance that he was recovering well. The ship left Jugdesh behind so Chim continued to visit him daily until his release. We invited him to come to our house during his recovery but the ship's agent required him to stay at a local hotel. Chim picked him up each morning and we had him at our home for lunch and dinner daily until he flew home to India. He later called Chim to let him know he arrived safely.

Happy New Year 2010!

Well, it's good to be back and blogging again about our seafarers! Chim is back from 3 months in New Mexico. We drove back together after my one month stay. We were engaged in family business and will need to return again, if possible, in February for a short time. However, we kept in touch by receiving calls and emails from seafarers. We were unable to recruit anyone to relieve us during our time away from home. We returned on January 8th in the evening and the next day we received a missionary couple from Guyana four days. At the same time, Chim was entertaining the staff and crew from the Long Beach Bridge and MOL Proficiency. We also had Rajvi Patik (our old partner now in San Francisco with his Russian wife Anna and their 2 little girls). He brought a new friend, Sanjay, who's also in volunteering with LMM.

This last Friday, Chim took the responsibility for conducting a memorial service for Eric Hands, a 66 years old seaman, at the International Seafarers Center. Eric stayed with us for 2 weeks a few years ago when he had his orginal surgery for his cancer. He put up a brave fight but lost the battle on Monday last. His son and brother traveled cross country to attend the service. Ron Nelson assisted Chim during the service and was a blessing to us and Alex Carpenter from our church played guitar and lead the singing. Father Henry, the Catholic priest also took part.

October Activies

It proably doesn't surprise you to learn that Chim considers evangelism of seafarers a personal thing. It is how he tries to simply and understandably communicate the Gospel to each person he comes in contact with. He tries to rely on the Holy Spirit to use his words and actions to witness to others. He listens and expresses his love and concern by showing genuine interest in the seafarers while trusting the Holy Spirit to lead him into truth while guiding his footsteps, actions and words to minister to the needs of others. As chaplain he tries to demonstrate the Cross by loving others as Christ loves us and gave Himself for us. As I John 3:16 says "This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers." Seafarers are often lonely people and respond to the love Chim shows in tangible ways. He provides transportation, companionship, time and energy that seems in endless supply. He has been available to help seafarers in any way he can. When strict security keeps many on board without shore passes, Chim visits them and tries to care for their needs. He prays for them, has services for them, gives them the cell phones to use and provides phone cards to call their families at home. He hands out Gospel literature, Bibles, DVDs and CDs. On October 20th Chim left for an extended time in New Mexico and the job of taking care of family business. He has postponed this trip many times because of seafarers needs. His fervent prayer involves asking the Lord to sent someone to help him care for the needs of this ministry. Please join us in this prayer and also that the work in New Mexico would be accomplished quickly so he can come back to the ministry he loves.
The Lutheran Church of the Cross in Arcadia provided an opportunity for LMM to receive 29 copies of Chinese New Testaments and Psalms from the Chinese Book Inc. This was an answer to prayer as the opportunity to speak to Chinese seafarers continues to increase. Thank you for the blessing this represents and Pastor Charlie Wang for being the connect the Lord used. On October 25th Chim was invited to speak at Lutheran Redeemer Church Leisure World in Seal Beach but since he was in New Mexico on business I took his place. I shared the mission and short vision of LMM in the Mission Moment portion of the service. It was a beautiful day and we had a wonderful time at their delicious Bratwurst Octoberfest Luncheon following the service. Another speaking opportunity is scheduled for November 8th at St. Stephen's Lutheran Church in Granada Hills during their Education Hour at 10:30 am. More about that next month.

Last Sunday, August 30th, we were invited on board the APL Illinois. (APL stands for American President Lines. ) Chim was ask to preach. He's done this before on this vessel. Strangely, this time, in the middle of his talk someone started asking questions about why we were trying to convince them that "God was angry and sin was bad"! He wanted to know "What is sin, anyway?" Chim gave a good calm explanation and the meeting came to an end. Turns out the man who ask the questions is into witchcraft! There were 19 men at the meeting and I was proud of how Chim demonstrated Christ's love to this man. He spent the day running around taking the crew to different locations, BestBuy, Cosco, etc. I helped out by taking the crew from another ship to do their errands.

Chim has been busy daily with seafarers. He drove one to a doctor's appointment to see a specialist in Tustin. That was a great opportunity to talk to him about spiritual things on the drive.

We've had 4-5 men from the crew of another ship here the last two nights for dinner and games. One of the seafarers gave Chim a tee shirt and me some Christmas decorations. How thoughtful! We gave them the Mexican Train Dominoes game set we'd been playing for the past 2 evenings!

Christmas in July 2009

Last Sunday (July 26) Chaplain Chim, Fay and Usha visited the Lutheran Church of Our Savior in San Bernardino for their annual Christmas in July shoebox gift drive for the seafarers. This church has been very faithful in caring for the mariners in this fashion for many years. Praise God they have a heart for this ministry. This year between early and late services, we were treated to a lovely sausage and hotcake breakfast as the church also raised funds for the youth's Christmas program.

On Monday Chaplain Chim and Fay went on board the MOL Presence to hold a service for the men there. About a dozen seamen came including the Muslim captain. He was very gracious to us and he heard the Gospel message along with the others present. We have an invitation to return next time their are in port. We are praying for help in this ministry. We'd love to be able to visit many more ships but manpower is down. However, the Lord's power is always up! Join us in asking Father for more workers for the harvest.

An APL ship came to port on Tuesday and the chief officer invited us on board. The morale has been very low according to the crew and they ask Chim to pray. This brand new ship was involved in an accident on it's maiden voyage. The captain was held responsible and was replaced (even though this ship was at anchor at the time of the accident). After having a conversation with the Chief Officer and Chief Engineer, Chim felt spiritually uncomfortable on this ship. The crew and officers were very concerned and ask for prayer. Chim prayed against the power of darkness and blessed the ship and ask for peace and guidance for the staff and crew. Please join us in praying for them and a very sick family member of one of the crew who's suffering from a very low white blood count.

June Opportunities

For the first time Chaplain Chim was able to attend the annual Southern California Synod meeting. This year it was held June 5-7th in Thousand Oaks on the Cal Lutheran campus. He was able to share a ride with LMM Board of Director's Ron Nelson. They enjoyed the opportunity to spend more time together. Early Saturday morning Fay and Usha drove up to the campus in order to help Chim, Ron, and LMM Board member, Mary Stewart, represent LMM in a 3 minute skit presented to the assemley's members. Ron introduced the skit and we all acted as seafarers (donning watch caps and jackets as costumes) waiting to be picked up by Chim with the blue LMM van. We each gave a very brief message of what LMM's services meant to us. Like Fay said, "I really appreciate going to Chaplain Chim's home and having the opportunity to use the computer and a home cooked meal". Usha said something like how much using the phones and having the phone cards available enabled her to call home to India. In her bit, Mary told how she liked to hear Chaplain Chim's testimony and learn more about God. The skit gave a very brief overview to the assemly's body of what LMM means to the seafarers. Over the weekend, we had a table representing LMM with Christmas shoe boxes, knitted watch caps with instructions and posters with photos of seafarers at different times. We were able to talk with visitors to our table and speak more indepth about this ministry.

The NAMMA (North American Maritime Ministry Association) conference was in Houston, Texas, from June 9-11th. Thanks to the courtesy of LMM's Board of Directors, Chim was able to attend. Fay accompanied him for free (as a spouse) and was also able to spend time with Sister Virginia Sharma who also went to the conference. Virginia seemed to know everyone there and it was a great seg-way for her to be able to introduce Chim as the new Chaplain. While in Houston we were hosted at the Norwegian Seafarers' church for dinner the first evening. There were lots of meetings with good and interesting speakers but the keynote one for Chim was Dr. Robert Creech's address called "Transformed by Chirst and His Community. He also brought the following day's chief address. That evening there was a chartered dinner cruise around the Port of Houston. We were very pleased to be able to see the Port of Houston and compare it to the Ports of LB/LA.! We were very thankful to finally meet Janet Swanson who we have been hearing about for years. She works at the Port Huyenme Seafarers' center and has done some amazing things for the mariners. We missed the banquet on the final evening as we had to drive to Dallas for our flights back to LA. Chim made new friends and contacts and has already heard from the Executive Secretary, Lloyd Burghart of NAMMA. Rev. Andy Krey ask Chim to lead worship service the last morning which he was honored to do. He spoke about Jonah's discouragement after being used by the Lord God in Nineveh to turn the people to repentance. The NAMMA conference was a time of refreshing and connecting with the Lord and other seafarer ministries. A time of sharing discouragement and reconnecting with our vision from the Lord for seafarers.

It was great to see Sister Virginia again. She has lost some weight, had a heart stent placed and seems to have much more energy following her surgery. She is doing very well in her new home along with her daughter, Lauren, and son-in-law, Mike. They have two new adopted dogs since our last visit together in August '08...one with only three legs called May Lean and as Virginia likes to say "May Lean" or "May not"! May is a Boston terrier. The vet said she had been hit by a car and had her leg broken in 2 places. It had happened perhaps a week before Virginia found her and rescued the poor animal! May is thriving under the fellowship of the other dogs and Virginia love for her! Vishal, Virginia and Vinay's son, is also living in Dallas with his wife Ritu and loves the opportunities Texas offers. They just bought a new 4 bedroom house only 10 minutes from his work and 10 minutes from the shopping area. They are very close to Virginia and the whole family gets together frequently for birthdays, holidays and visits. It was great to see them all again.

Since Chim received his TWIK card he has been able to board the ships again. He's making it a priority to try and visit at least a ship a day along with all the running around he does for the seafarers. We had 3 guys here on Wednesday evening for ice cream sundaes and some fun together. Chim gave his testimony and DVDs with the Gospel message to the fellows.