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Dear CCAM Partners and Friends,

Revelation 3:7-8 “And to the angel of the church in Philadelphia write: ‘He who is holy, who is true, who has the key of David, who opens and no one will shut, and who shuts and no one opens says this: I know your deeds. Behold, I have put before you an open door which no one can shut, because you have a little power, and have kept My word, and have not denied My name!’”

Cambodian Christian Arts Ministry School here in Cambodia has been the Lord Jesus’ open door to rescue disadvantaged kids ever since 1995. But the CCAMS ministry itself has experienced both open doors and shut doors throughout the almost 20 years of its existence. However, there have been overwhelmingly more open doors than shut ones, especially as we have often penetrated triumphantly through seemingly impenetrable barriers by faith in the calling and power of our God!

Back in 2007, Jesus miraculously opened a door for Buntheep, a 12-year-old CCAMS student with a brain tumor, to go to America for medical treatment! Click here to read the archived reports of Buntheep’s miraculous healing. And many other past CCAM newsletters, now posted on our website, testify to God’s miracles on our behalf again and again!

Our perseverance is sustainable especially because we know that God often allows satanic forces to “close” doors in order to test our faith (Job 1 and 2; Acts 12:1-4). These closed doors can be opened by perseverance of faith (Job 42), and also by persevering in prayer to gain victory over the powers of darkness in the name of Jesus (Acts 12:5-17; Ephesians 6:10-18).

But God Himself closes doors, sometimes to protect us from spiritual dangers like pride, as He did for the Apostle Paul in 2 Corinthians 12:7-10. And He also closed doors in Acts 16, perhaps to protect the Apostle Paul from some physical danger, or to deter him from wasting time following the paths he had chosen. In any case, through the imposition of detours, God led Paul straight to His predetermined open doors where the fields were already ripe unto harvest!

Sometimes God’s closed doors may be designed to withhold blessing until His people repent of sin (Isaiah 59:1-2). And God firmly and permanently slams doors shut in the faces of rebellious and unrepentant sinners, as he did in Numbers 13 and 14. In such cases, there are invariably innocent parties who must patiently endure the punishment along with the guilty, until their own blessing comes.

On New Year’s Day 2014, we partnered with Pastor Kakada at a very successful prison outreach in Kompong Cham province. However, the second and third prison outreaches planned for different provinces were abruptly cancelled by authorities. Fortunately, our care packages intended for the prisoners were put to good use by Pastor Kakada for his Youth Retreat and Church Leadership Training in Preah Vihear province. Nevertheless, we continue to pray for God to open new doors for prison outreaches in the future!

As 2014 unfolded, we continued to experience a seemingly never ending stream of difficulties, delays, and closed doors. We had 4 new dances planned, all awaiting Pastor David’s creation of the music, just as he had previously composed the music for our new dances in 2012 and 2013. Although Pastor David was eager to work on these new projects, first he had to move from his current house and build a new one. Construction dragged on for many months. Then, he was faced with serious family illness and eventually a death in the family. Soon after that, his computer crashed! After a long time getting another computer and learning how to use it, he realized that he had to finish compositions promised to other people before starting on ours. And so, nearly the whole year has passed by without CCAMS creating any new Christian performing arts!

In addition to this, our Music CD Production Project has been on hold all year for lack of a manager, and our Video DVD Production Project has likewise been on hold for lack of a trainer.

These closed doors stand in stark contrast to the positively charged open door productivity of 2013, when any obstacle raised against us was swiftly overcome by perseverance and prayer. But whenever any closed door stubbornly persists, we should seek to discern its purpose through prayer, and then respond according to God’s specific leading.

In 2013, and again in 2014, God brought certain members of CCAMS to a reckoning concerning their wrong attitudes. This was followed by their repentance, which sparked a spiritual revival in our midst! Hopefully, the recent 2014 revival may soon release us from some of the blocks currently hindering our work! (Isaiah 59:1-2) Let’s pray like Elijah for the return of God’s blessings! (James 5:17-18)

Another reason for our present situation may be the intensified spiritual warfare occurring in response to so many victories in the past! And also perhaps our previous prayer cover has been disrupted for whatever reason, so that we are left more vulnerable. This year we have not heard from our remote intercessors very often. Please pray that our prayer cover will be repaired, and that even more prayer warriors will report for active duty on our behalf!

Some things remain the same in 2014. We continue struggling to make ends meet with inadequate monthly financial support. Praise the Lord that many long-term donors continue to fulfill their pledges, and that we have added some new pledged donors along the way, but we have also lost donors due to death or personal financial difficulties. However, we did experience a temporary boost during the summer months this year through the special fundraising of one of our partners and his friends and associates. But overall, the downward spiral, which began back in 2008, just seems stuck in the downward direction!

We have been praying that God might raise up a grant writer to connect CCAM with the financial resources of Christian Foundations. But this also represents another closed door, because a grant writer who volunteered to help us earlier in the year was later sidelined by an accident and unable to continue her work, although we continue to pray for her healing.

Gioia, Noren, and Kelsey keep padding the monthly financial deficits from their own personal resources, as we urgently pray for God to stabilize our finances! Other missionaries who have experienced financial reversals have closed up and gone home, but we refuse to give up! We are called to be here, and there is still much work to be done! There is still hope, because Our God still reigns! Besides, if CCAMS should cease to exist, what would happen to all of the rescued children who now call CCAMS their home?

This year, we have been plagued by many illnesses, partly because of the record high temperatures, and partly because we have had no funds to pay for the yearly flu shots. Other things that have only gotten worse with each passing year are the overcrowding of our facilities and the frequent flooding, both from exterior storms and from burst pipes inside the walls of our houses! Not only that, but the electrical wiring in our houses is very old, so many outlets no longer function, causing us to stretch extension cords long distances to access power. And the decaying electrical wiring hidden inside our walls and attics also presents an imminent fire hazard, especially if it should be disturbed by gnawing rodents!

For the past few months, we have been searching for new facilities in Phnom Penh, but so far to no avail. We can barely pay the rent we owe now, so how could we cover expenses for better facilities? Good question! That’s where our undaunted faith takes over, expecting God to do another miracle!

And there has still been no financial breakthrough for building our proposed ministry center in Kompong Chhnang province. We already own over 3 acres of land there, surrounded by a perimeter wall, just waiting for the funds to build the buildings! Only God can make this happen! Click here to read more about our proposed center.

So please pray for God’s miracles to rescue us, and for His open doors to bless us once again! Also please join us to express our thanksgiving for how the Lord has sustained us during such difficult times. Even though some of our most important work has been blocked, other valuable projects have nevertheless been blessed.

In 2014, we launched our CCAM Facebook page! Three new children’s books were completed, now ready for publication! Gioia and Noren created lyrics for four songs! Through a large donation, we were able to purchase new drums and costume material for one of the four planned dances! CCAM partnered with CANA to host a Christian Arts Seminar in August! For this event, Gioia developed 2 teaching PowerPoint presentations! A documentary of the seminar is now posted on YouTube! As an outgrowth of this event, CCAM has organized Creative Ventures, a local Christian Arts Fellowship, holding monthly meetings and maintaining a Bible teaching blog especially designed to meet the spiritual needs of Christian artists! We received two more disadvantaged kids needing a home! Four CCAM senior students took the 12th Grade Government Exam and two passed! Two more students registered to take the same exam in 2015! Kelsey designed, printed, and organized distribution of our very first CCAM Wall Calendar, plus revised, printed, and distributed to students and staff the updated CCAM School schedules! Pastor Kevin Kane, a new CCAM Advisory Board Member, and a dedicated networker for our ministry, has worked tirelessly to introduce CCAM to as many new people as possible during his many travels, while also gathering in financial donations along the way! In addition, here in Cambodia God recently sent Dr. Albert Shim to volunteer his doctoring skills part-time to care for our medical needs! Praise God for all of these blessings!

Even as I was writing this newsletter, a major breakthrough was reported! Pastor David has completed and submitted to us the music for one of our new dances entitled “Enter His Gates with Thanksgiving”! This is the dance for which the new drums were purchased and for which the costume construction is almost complete! Although originally planned to be introduced at Thanksgiving, perhaps by God’s grace it may be ready to present at Christmas!

Last week, we performed at the EFC Conference, therefore postponing our family celebration of Thanksgiving until Sunday. On that special day, we all thanked God through prayer, song, and dance, as well as by decorating the empty cross with our own personal origami “letters to God.” After that, Sophun preached and administered the Lord’s Supper.

We pray that all of you have enjoyed a wonderful Thanksgiving holiday!

The CCAMS Family

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