The Better Place News

Did you enjoy praising God this morning? I find it amazing how we all might be in different churches and in different parts of this area, but we are one praising the one true God. Pretty cool!

Anyway, first off, want to thank everyone who participated in the CLMI breakfast last Saturday. We had a nice turn out for this event, hopefully you were blessed as much as I was.

Secondly, attached to this email is our “big” event in October. It’s a couples dinner at Roberto’s with guest speaker Dayle Keefer. If you haven’t taken your wife out for a while, this would be a great time to do it! Not married, how about taking your girlfriend to a romantic dinner? We also have single tickets as well. Mark it down on your calendars and get a babysitter set quickly. (Printable Information for this event is available)

The date is Saturday, October 15th from 6:00 pm – 8:00 pm. Cost is $50 per couple/$30 a single. For tickets or questions contact Mark Summers at 499-4459. The last day to purchase tickets is September 30th.

Hope to see you there! God Bless!

Jamie Sposato

It’s been a while! I hope your July is starting out well. The next Chautauqua Lake Men of Integrity Men’s Breakfast will be on Saturday, July 23rd from 8:00 am – 10:00 am @ Fluvanna Community Church 3363 Fluvanna Ave. Ext. Pastor Roy Ferguson Jr. will be presenting and you don’t want to miss this one! Mark it in your calendars. If you would like to come, please email me or call the church @ 484-0553 to make your reservation.

Here is a testimony I received in the mail from a gentleman who attended a breakfast: “Thank you for a wonderful morning! The breakfast was delicious and the worship was uplifting. The message was exactly what I needed to hear. I didn’t realize how great it is to worship with other men from around our area, I was very encouraged!”

Remember, we are not trying to take the place of your men’s ministry, we want to be a encouragement for your men’s group at your church. Our focus is for men to return to the Lord! We want to remind you let go and let God! Let Him be the leader in your home, at work, in your marriage, and in your personal life. He is the reason we want to get together and fellowship!

Please make every effort to attend this next breakfast and bring a friend who may need some encouragement to come as well. Take care, and God Bless!

Jamie Sposato

Our Chautauqua Lake Region Men of Integrity (CLMI) – a ministry of The Better Place – brought Psychologist/Media-personality/marriage and family expert, Dr. Kevin Leman to Jamestown on Saturday the 16th of October 2010. Our CLMI leaders met for lunch with Dr. Leman at Roberto’s restaurant on Friday the 15th to go over final details for the big day. Then on Saturday they keep Dr. Leman very busy!

The Day of events began with a free breakfast for pastors and their spouses at the Falcon’s Nest in Falconer, NY. After breakfast and a time of worship – led by the CLMI band – Dr. Leman imparted an encouraging and challenging message about leadership. Of course, his message was well seasoned with humor – one of the many reasons for his great popularity as a public speaker and author.

From 1:00 – 2:30 p.m. men from throughout western NY state and western PA gathered in the downtown Jamestown Civic Center to be entertained and edified by the message Dr. Leman brought. This was also a free event. Similar to the morning format, this gathering began with a time of worship led by the CLMI band.

At 6:00 p.m. the Civic Center was filled to capacity on the main level. Over seven hundred married couples and also single adults gathered for an evening of rousing and powerful worship, special music and the unique ministry of Kevin Leman. And it was effective. There were couples who were on the road to divorce who were brought to the meeting by the Spirit of God. They left hand in hand. Other couples who were struggling in their marriages were so positively helped and encouraged by Dr. Leman that they were telling anyone who would listen to them the next day.

During the evening gathering the CLMI presented the first annual “Outstanding Service Award” to a man from the Jamestown area who models the Men of Integrity commitments. The award recipient was Mark Summers from Clymer, NY. The award was a complete surprise to Mark. His wife helped the CLMI leaders to make certain everything was in order to pull the surprise off. – Mark is the treasurer for the CLMI and also the current chairperson of The Better Place Board of Directors.

The CLMI anticipated more sponsorships than they received from area churches and businesses to cover the total cost of this grand day. As a result, this day of events generated a deficit of over two thousand dollars. Nevertheless, whatever the financial anxieties it may have produced, the leadership is grateful to God for all the good he worked through the day. Many lives will never be the same again. – Anyone who desires to help cover the deficit and position the CLMI to move forward with future events may send designated gifts to The Better Place at P.O. Box 532, Jamestown, NY 14702.

Prayer Letter #21

22 October 2010

Dear Prayer Partners of The Better Place,

A couple things we are always endeavoring to do through the ministries of The Better Place is to encourage people to grow in their understanding and practice of prayer and also to spiritually refresh pastors and other leaders in Christian ministry. On the 27th of September, I was privileged to be refreshed greatly myself as my wife Valerie and I attended an intimate gathering with some Western NY pastors and Pastor Jackson Senyonga from Kampala, Uganda. Prior to the official start time, Valerie and I spent several minutes with Pastor Senyonga learning about his ministry and sharing with him about The Better Place. – This gathering took place at the Full Gospel Tabernacle in Orchard Park, NY. During the luncheon that followed the morning meeting, several people were all “a-buzz” because of Delia Knox’s healing. Delia had been a member of the Orchard Park Tabernacle back in the 1980’s when she was college age. On Christmas day 1987, while returning to Buffalo from ministering in a prison in Toronto, Delia was in an automobile accident. As a result she was paralyzed from the waist down and confined to a wheelchair. Now, 23 years later, all the buzz was about the fact that God had healed her. The day before she walked again, a little boy was placed in her lap so she could pray for him, and as she prayed she could feel what she called “sensation” in her legs for the first time since the accident. She knew her healing was on the way. You can read a recent news story about this at, http://www.wkbw.com/news/local/MIRACLE-CURE-FOR-PARALYZED-WOMAN-105482958.html and you can watch the healing as it occurred, on YouTube at http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=delia+walking I suggest watching the thirteen minute video first and then watch the many other videos that were subsequently placed on YouTube. You will see Delia only days after her healing walking all around healing other people. Now that is my idea of an encouragement to remain persistent in prayer!

During the third quarter of this year the Chautauqua Lake Region Men of Integrity held their third regional breakfast of the year, people have continued to be healed at our Healing Rooms (including one person who was healed of stage 4 cancer), we held the third day-long session of our Regional School of Prayer in Gerry, NY, we held the two-day intensive fall Agape Prayer Ministry School in Warren, PA, and I was privileged to teach at a morning workshop in Fredonia, NY. I have run out of words with which to praise God for his faithfulness over and over at everything we do or are involved in. “Awesome,” and “Amazing,” and “Powerful”, and “Transforming” etc all start to sound trite after a while, but all are true. How great is our God! – God answers your prayers.

Speaking of “Transforming;” that is one word that has been used to describe the experience people are having as they read My Gospel. This book has been available since the end of June and the very positive and praiseful responses to the book have been both humbling and encouraging to this author. My Gospel, Companion Study Guide and the booklet, First Step to Adventure have been available since the 1st of October and people have been purchasing these, along with the primary book, at workshops, schools and other gatherings where I have been able to make them available. – All of this is an answer to your prayers. – Our Webmaster will be putting a printable order form on our site that people can use to order all of these books plus some other books that The Better Place sells at a discount rate. I’ll let you know when that us up. Meanwhile, anyone may order My Gospel at Amazon.com or barnesandnoble.com or christianbook.com.

You prayed for the day with Dr. Kevin Leman that our Chautauqua Lake Men of Integrity sponsored (16 Oct.). Thank you; God answered! The breakfast meeting for pastors and their spouses was sparsely attended, but nevertheless, a true spiritual uplift for those who were present. (Here is a perennial problem in North America: Pastors are too busy wearing themselves out to take time out to be refreshed. Keep praying for pastors!). The afternoon gathering for men only in the Jamestown Civic Center was well attended and most of those men returned with their wives for the evening meeting when the Center was filled to capacity on the main level (the balcony was not open to us). We know of couples who were on the road to divorce, who the Spirit brought to that evening meeting and who left hand-in-hand. We know of others who were struggling in their relationships who were talking to anyone who would listen the next day about how immensely God had helped them through Dr. Leman’s presentation. There were over 700 people there and everyone was touched by God. – God loves to answer your prayers. – I met with the CLMI leaders just today and, while they were sharing all the praise reports, their treasurer also had to report that ticket sales and gifts to support this event fell almost $3,000 short of all the expenses (publicity, Dr. Leman’s travel and honorarium, free breakfast for pastors, Civic Center rental, insurance, etc). You can help to answer their confident prayer by sending a designated gift to help with the cost of this very effective event. (Their budget was established with an expectation of more sponsorships than they received).

It’s a new season: After a fairly intense week of seeking God regarding next steps for The Better Place – on Tuesday morning14 September God directed me to Proverbs 24:27 which says, “Finish your outdoor work and get your fields ready; after that, build your house.” Now, God gave that to me in the middle of a pastors’ prayer meeting, so I couldn’t deal with it right away. But later that day I asked God how he wanted me to understand it and he told me that all of the “hermit crab” ministry we have been doing (using facilities that are not our own) has been a season of preparing our fields. And now it is time to build our house. That means much of the ministry we initiate will be off the calendar for 2011 as time and energy that used to be directed to those things will now be directed to fund-raising and the purchase of land and the development of the campus. – It just so happened that The Better Place Board of Directors had a meeting schedule for the ensuing Saturday, so I asked them to listen to what the Spirit was saying to us through Prov. 24:27 and, with one voice, they all said the same thing I had heard. That is good confirmation. Doors that have been holding the finances back which have not opened prior to now are about to open and the money needed for the campus and the endowments is about to come forth!

The Board decided that anyone who contributes $200 or more to The Better Place during November and December will receive – as a special thank you – a complete My Gospel set; the book plus the Companion and First Step. At full retail price, that is a $36.97 value.

Please pray:

For doors to open with financial provision for the development of The Better Place campus; [see, http://www.thebetterplace.org/the-better-place-facilities.cfm ] – also check out “TBP Price Tag” and “Phasing in the Ministry” under the “FINANCE” tab on our web site.

For our Board of Directors as they gather for a two-day meeting at Camp Findley on Nov. 19-20

Regarding a meeting I have with the Warren, PA Ministerial Association on 11 Nov. to present the Agape Prayer Ministry

For me as I preach at area churches most Sundays and represent TBP in the process

For God to use the My Gospel books according to his purposes

For the finances and ministry of the Chautauqua Lake Region Men of Integrity

For the ongoing ministry of the Healing Rooms and Director, Mary Ann Dahlbeck

For Agape Prayer Ministry sessions that are on-going throughout our three-county region

Thank you for your faithfulness in prayer!

Your partner in the adventure,

Roy L. Miller

Director, The Better Place, Inc.

Roy@TheBetterPlace.org

716/488-9918

Employer ID #83-0362390 NYS Charities Bureau Reg. #20-49-47

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