Coffey Family August 2022 Prayer Letter

August 22, 2022 by The Coffeys

Prayer Requests & Praise

I am currently discipling three new families that I don’t believe are saved. Would you pray for their salvation? They have been very open, but still need to realize that adding anything to Jesus is another gospel.
Please pray for our son Chase and his wife Ashely. Chase was recently in the hospital for 6 days with Mono. He is doing much better but is still experiencing pain. They continue traveling raising their support to return to South Africa.
Pray for us as we are considering starting a new church. There’s such a great need and we’re still unsure of our next step in this area.

May be an image of 1 person, standing, tree and outdoors — Chase & Ashley

Quick Updates

Our oldest daughter Emilee will arrive next week for a 3-week visit. I can’t tell you how excited we are to have her back with us. She has definitely been missed since starting Bible College in the States. Adri Bush, my son Luke’s girlfriend will also be coming with her. Having them both here will be a great time.
The South Africa Youth Home is up and running now. We moved the three boys into the new house and property. They no longer have to live in the boy’s dorms at the camp. We still need a lot to furnish the house but at least they have hot water:)
We just completed a 900 sq ft workshop that we will use to help with projects around the camp and in our churches. It will also be used to teach trades to our teenagers in the youth home. Any carpenters, electricians, plumbers, etc are welcome to come to help build and/or teach.

New Work Shop for Camp Rhino and South Africa Youth Home

Medical Missions Outreach and their team of 21 people arrive this week to put on a health and vision clinic at one of our churches. We are hoping 2000 or more people come in for treatment and have the opportunity to hear a clear presentation of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. The last clinic we did a few years ago had over 200 people make professions of faith.

Lighthouse Baptist Church and Pastor Mvume Johnson are hosting the clinic this year. This is one of the churches we restarted a few weeks before Covid and had to close again during Covid. Please pray this will be a great help to the growth of this church.

In other African news, Graham and Olivia Young just arrived in Abuja, Nigeria. We’re very excited for this young couple as they begin their ministry in this needy country of over 200 million people. Please pray for them and pray that God would raise up more laborers for Nigeria and for Africa. Our time is short but the need is great. Maybe God is calling you.

Coffey Family July 2022 Prayer Letter

July 13, 2022 by The Coffeys

Prayer Requests/ Praises

My wife’s ear surgery seems to have been a complete success. We won’t know for sure how much hearing she regained until next month, but things are sounding good, figuratively and literally:) Thanks so much for your prayers.
Please pray for Missionary Katie Dilfer’s South African Visa. She’s ready to come as soon as she has her visa.
Pray for the 30+ Juniors and Teens that have accepted Christ as their personal Savior these past few weeks during our Winter Camp Days.
Pray for us as we are considering starting a new church. We are currently working out of Lighthouse Baptist Church with Pastor Mvume but are leaning toward starting a new church soon.

Quick Updates

Since May, we’ve hosted 4 different mission teams with 75 people in total. God used them here in a great way and really worked in many of their lives. Our hope is that God calls many Gospel laborers from these teams.
This week we are having separate Junior Camps for boys and girls. So far over a dozen boys trusted Christ. The girls will arrive this evening.
2 Weeks ago we hosted Teen Camp days for the boys and girls separately as well. We had 13 young people trust Christ during those days.
Vision Baptist Missions will be hosting the World Evangelism Fellowship on November 8th. You can click here for more info. It’s going to be a great time.

Now that all our mission teams have departed we’re going to be working a lot more on the Youth Home this month. We have 3 teens ready to move in and possibly a fourth. Pray that we find the right house parents for the Home. We have some that can help temporarily but are praying for a long-term solution.

I would like to ask you to pray for Pastor Khona Nohamba and his church Nkandla Baptist Church. Khona recently graduated from our Bible College and is looking forward to devoting more time to building the church.

We helped Khona right before the start of Covid and unfortunately had to close a few weeks later. He and his wife Iminathi have been working hard to restart the church and have been making good progress. In our city of over a million people, there is much work that needs to be done. Pray that we can build a foundation that will last and aid in church planting for years to come.

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Mission Teams and South Africa Youth Home

June 19, 2022 by The Coffeys

We have had a great and full month here in South Africa.

Mission Teams have visited from Ohio, Michigan, South Caroline, and now Georgie. A group from Tennessee will be here at the end of this week. “Group Season” is one of my favorite times of the year. God changed my life on a mission trip when I was 19 years old and I’m excited about people being able to visit the mission field and have the same type of opportunity. Please pray for these groups and for the Lord to call more to the foreign field.

We are getting the new house ready for the South Africa Youth Home. We had the floors tiled and with the help of one of our groups, the landscape looks much better. We still have a way to go, but the young people should be able to move into the house this week.

Hope Baptist Church in Fairfield, OH and Immanuel Baptist Church in Corruna, MI

The groups have done a terrific job ministering in all the churches here in Port Elizabeth. The preaching, singing, and testimonies have been encouraging and I believe they have really helped the people.

The groups have been an extra blessing to Camp Rhino with the safari hunts and fishing trips. Needless to say, our freezers are full, and they’ve supplied enough meat to stock our freezers for at least the next 6-8 months. A lot of kids will enjoy great meals from their gifts to the Camp.

If you would ever be interested in being a part of one of these trips, please let me know. We would love to have you.

Update on Amy’s Ear Surgery

May 27, 2022 by The Coffeys

As many of you know, Amy had surgery on her left ear on May 16th. She went in for the surgery at 7 am, but they couldn’t fit her in until around 1 pm. They finished the surgery at about 4:30 pm and I was able to take her home around 8 pm. It was a very long day for her no doubt.

Since getting out of surgery, along with having her ear taped and packed full of cotton, she’s had to stay at home, avoid loud noises, and not be in a car or lift anything over 10lbs. That actually continues for another week.

This past Wednesday we met with Amy’s doctor for the first time since her ear surgery. The doctor cleaned out her ear and said that everything looks great and things are progressing nicely. Amy has already regained a lot of hearing in that ear, but we won’t know the full results for several weeks. We do know that she’s not deaf and we praise the Lord she has not experienced any vertigo, which is very common.

I can’t thank you all enough for your prayers.

P.S. It looks like we will have full control of the new property for the South Africa Youth Home the first week of June. It’s been amazing to see how the Lord is bringing everything together.

Coffey Family May 2022 Prayer Letter

May 16, 2022 by The Coffeys

Prayer Requests Praise

My wife’s ear surgery was today. Pray she will recover hearing in her left ear. She had 20% hearing in that ear, but after surgery, the doctor hopes she will regain anywhere from 80-90% of hearing. We won’t know for a week or so after the surgery how effective it was.
Please continue to pray for Missionary Katie Dilfer’s South African Visa. It still hasn’t arrived, but thankfully she was able to travel to Puerto Rico where she’s been ministering while she waits. We’re happy she’s able to be a great help there, but we are looking very forward to getting her to South Africa.
Pray for our South African Visa renewals. Our current visas expire in July so we need to renew for new visas this month. Because of covid, this has been a long process, but we’re hoping we can get things worked out soon.
Please pray for the mission teams coming in June and July from four different churches. We hope to be a blessing to them as they sacrifice to be here.

Quick Updates

We had a fantastic time during the last two weeks with a mission team my son and daughter-in-law, Chase & Ashley, led to South Africa. Part of the team was from Hope Baptist Church in Fairfield, OH and the other part was from Immanuel Baptist in Corruna, MI. This was such a great group of people.
There were several young people and a couple of older folks out of this group who expressed a desire to commit their lives to be missionaries. Pray we see many follow through and give their lives to share Jesus on the foreign field. Our prayer is for more laborers.

What an amazing month! Seven days before we needed the full $113,000 to purchase property for the South Africa Youth Home, we only had $23,000. Within a few hours, that number jumped to $68,000. By the next Sunday, the Lord provided and we had the full $113,000. Praise the Lord!

Thank you all for praying and thank you all who helped us reach our goal by giving financially. We anticipate seeing what the Lord will do in this new ministry.

I will be emailing updates out on a more regular basis to keep you informed on the remodeling progression to get the new house ready for our teenagers. If you are not on our email list and would like to be, please send me a note to add you.

I’m still in a little shock seeing how the Lord provided. There were times of doubt that we would really be able to do this, but little by little the Lord kept confirming to us that this was His will. Please pray for wisdom as we go forward for Him.

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$45,000 Matching Offering for the South Africa Youth Home!

April 26, 2022 by The Coffeys

One of our ministry partners has committed to match up to $45,000 toward the purchase of the property and house. Please pray this news will be met quickly. The cut-off date is May 7th. We were told another cash offer has been accepted if we aren’t able to come up with the funds. We are still short $35,000 of the $113,000 we need. Go here https://visionmissions.org/give and select Africa Youth Home- Mark Coffey.

We are flying out tonight to return to South Africa.

I’m praying we can raise this money in the next week to give us time to transfer everything over to South Africa before the deadline.

Please pray we raise the needed funds in time.

On another note, please pray for my wife’s upcoming ear surgery on May 16th. It’s a serious operation that could allow her to regain hearing in her left ear or she could possibly lose all her hearing in that ear. There is also a high risk of vertigo.

4 of the young people already staying at Camp Rhino plus little Ano, one of our pastor’s daughters:)

This would be the first official house for the South Africa Youth Home if we can raise the needed funds.

You can also keep up to date with the youth home at our new website for the home.

Coffey Family March 2022 Prayer Letter

March 14, 2022 by The Coffeys

Would you consider committing $1000 to be one of the 100 churches to give towards the Africa Youth Home? We are needing $100,00 by the end of April for this purchase. It is the property right next to Camp Rhino, which makes it a very strategic location.

The asking price is around $113,000, and we’ve already raised about $13,000. I know with prices going crazy in the States and really around the world with fuel and inflation, this is a tough time, but we know this youth home is going to help a lot of young people who don’t have anything.

Prayer Requests Praise

We will be back to the States for our Annual Missions Orientation in April. Pray this is a productive time with our new missionaries. We’re also planning to raise funds for the Africa Youth Home. Pray we can raise $100,000 in a month:)
Please continue to pray for my wife’s ear surgery. The date has been set for her to have surgery on May 16th.
Pray for Missionary Katie Dilfer’s visa to arrive. Unfortunately, it didn’t arrive in time and she had to cancel her tickets to South Africa for the end of February. She is hoping she will be here no later than the end of April.
As soon as we get back in April, we also need to apply for new visas. Pray we can get those worked out as soon as possible. There’s been a back log and some have waited over a year for their visas.
We are thankful for those who gave to replace the things that were stolen in January. We have bought almost everything back now.

Quick Updates

We’ve started construction on a new building for Nkandla Baptist Church. Pastor Khona & his wife Iminathi are excited about having a larger more permanent building.
This last week I was in Nigeria with Graham and Olivia Young during their survey trip. They will return in July to work full-time under Missionary Mark Holmes for their first two years. Please be praying for them and Nigeria. There are very few missionaries to Nigeria for over 220 million people. We badly need more missionaries in this country.
This past month, we’ve seen two guys that I’ve worked with for years walked away from the Lord come back to church. We praise the Lord and pray the Lord continues working in their lives to make them more like Him.

Nigerian Style with Graham and Olivia Young

In church news, the main church we are working in now, Lighthouse Baptist Church, has been having more visitors. Pray, we see more saved. There are so many without Christ. New Life Baptist Church is still struggling unfortunately in the more affluent part of the township, but Vision Baptist is doing well.

Africa Youth Home & Short Trip back to the States

February 28, 2022 by The Coffeys

For the month of April, I will be back in the States for our mission board’s annual orientation. I’m looking forward to being with all our Vision Baptist Mission’s missionaries on deputation and on furlough. Pray the Lord blesses this time.

I’m also using this time to present the ministry of the new Africa Youth Home in churches. If you would like to have me back in to report and update your church on the Youth Home, please just let me know. I still have a few dates available, but we will head back to South Africa on April 26th, Lord willing.

Several have reached out to me concerning gifts their church has already given or committed to give for the Africa Youth Home. As soon as I have a total, I’ll let you know. I am praying for 100 churches to commit $1000 by the end of April to make this Home a reality. We are trying to raise $113,000 in total with over $10,000 already being promised.

Would you consider being a part of helping us impact these young people?

Thank you for your prayers and thank you for partnering with us to impact South Africa with the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

New Missionary Soon to Arrive…..we hope:)

February 9, 2022 by The Coffeys

Katie Dilfer is a missionary with BIMI coming to work with us here in South Africa. She’s almost completely raised all her financial support and purchased her tickets to arrive here as a full-time missionary on February 24th.

My wife Amy (left) with Katie at the Addo Elephant Park

Her only holdup at the moment is her visa. She’s applied for her visa in DC and hopes to get it back any day now. Please pray with us that she won’t have any problems obtaining her visa and will be able to take off without a problem.

Katie came on a short-term mission trip just a few years ago. She had no plans at all in being a missionary and she almost wasn’t even able to make the trip. God worked during that short trip and now she’s coming back full-time.

We are very excited to have her here. She’s a very capable young lady that will be able to assist us in every area of our ministry. We can’t wait to have her here.

Coffey Family February 2022 Prayer Letter

January 29, 2022 by The Coffeys

We need your help and prayers. We’re stepping out to start the Africa Youth Home.

This past week I went to look at a property that is for sale right beside Camp Rhino for the start of this ministry. It has a 4 bedroom house and 20 acres of land. By faith, I went ahead and made an offer for the property for $100,000. The asking price is $145,000 so we’re waiting for their answer. Needless to say, we don’t have $145,000 or $100,000:).

20 Acre property with a 4 bedroom house beside Camp Rhino

We have four 16-year-olds living with us now at Camp Rhino. These teenagers have faced much hardship and loss. We want to help more young people like them, but we need your help.

We need at least $100,000 to start if not $145,000. All the teens we have up to this point have been a part of our church’s ministries for years now. We have 2 more teens that need to be here now, but we just don’t have the room or the staff. Would you consider playing a part?

1st Day of School – My daughter Addison is with Ano, a pastor’s kids with the Micky shirt on, and our 4 new teenagers, Sisipho, Dumisani, Liso, & Elethu.

Pray Requests and Praise

Our Bible College starts back this month. Please pray for the 9 full time students who are studying for the ministry. There are another 15 students who are taking part-time classes in our Bible Institute. Please pray especially for this aspect of our ministry. All of our ministries are pointed toward training young people for church planting. We can’t produce lasting change here in South Africa without more churches.
Please continue to pray for my wife’s ear surgery. She has a hearing test this week and an appointment with the ear surgeon on February 22nd.
Pray for Lynette Osborn who is coming to work with us in the ministry, specifically in the Youth Home. She has 40% of her support and is hoping to be here in January 2023.

Quick Updates

This past week our house was broken into while we were sleeping. About $5000 worth of equipment was taken. We are so grateful that $4000 has been committed toward replacing that equipment so far. We are also installing a new alarm system that will hopefully deter that from happening again.
We are also thankful that $2200 has been committed toward the $3000 shortfall we had for our camps this year.
Currently, we have 4 teenagers who are living at Camp Rhino. They are the start of our Youth Home Ministry. If you would be interested in sponsoring one of these teens please let me know. A full sponsorship is $100 per child per month. This provides basic essential needs along with covering food and housing cost.