J O N      &      S H E R R I      L U N O W

LUNOW UPDATE - JUNE 2007

We are honored to introduce to you the work to which the Lord has called us. Since we’ve only been with PWM a few months now, we’d like to give you a bit of background. I, Jon, grew up as a missionary kid from Irian Jaya, Indonesia where my parents did Bible translation, medical work, and church planting. For high school I attended Faith Academy in

Manila, Philippines; and for college--Moody Bible Institute in Chicago, IL where I majored in missions and also played basketball under the great coaching of Rev. Greg Gaffney (now a long time friend & missions partner). While at Moody I met Sherri (from Michigan), who played sports and was also interested in missions. We found much in common and were married a few years later, heading toward mission work in Indonesia. During our 5 years of deputation ministry, God gave us 3 wonderful children—Ellie, Ethan & Adam (who are now 17, 16 & 15 years old). Since our visas to Indonesia were denied twice, God rerouted us to the Philippines where there was still plenty of need for urban church planting in the large cities. We spent a year in Manila, almost 3 years in Tarlac City (north of Manila), then were invited down to Davao City on the southern Island of Mindanao, by a Filipino pastor friend, arriving there in Feb. ’99.

Since then we have been working at planting churches, using the house church model in order to spread the Gospel more efficiently & effectively. This involves building relationships, starting evangelistic Bible studies in homes with a focus on whole families using chronological method from Genesis, one-on-one discipleship during the week teaching obedience in the foundations of the Christian faith, leadership training for facilitating Sunday fellowships, and overall training of making disciples as Jesus modeled and the New Testament teaches. We call this local fellowship HCFD (House Church Fellowship of Davao), whose vision is simply to make disciples and group them into a network of interdependent house churches throughout Davao City. Some of the principles or values HCFD operates by are:
      1. Bring the church to the people
      2. The resources are in the harvest
      3. Reproduction
      4. Simplicity
      5. Spiritual gifting
      6. Function, not position.

We praise God for the birth & growth of this local fellowship and for the many changed lives for His glory! There is still much work to be done!! Currently we are preparing to return to the USA for a one-year furlough (June 06-June’07) in which we hope to travel & visit with our supporting churches & families, as well as obtain some much-needed rest. We’re looking forward to meeting some of you in the PWM family. We’ve also been burdened for the people of Greece, and have carried a long-time vision of going there to make disciples. The people of Indonesia have also remained in our hearts. These are possible future ministries — we are seeking God’s direction. Thanks for your partnership & prayers as we press on in the Gospel.