Watchmen-Prophets-Assembly (WPA)
Supported Missionaries List
Larry Olson
(Updated 4/2/2002)
The following missionary is recommended by Watchmen-Prophets-Assembly. I am familiar
with his ministry, and believe it represents the very best of soil into which to sow your
hard earned dollars.
Contributions should be sent, payable to World Salt Foundation, or, where indicated, the
ministry or missionary listed. Please indicate in your mailing which missionary you wish to
contribute to.
World Salt Foundation sends 100% of your contribution to the missionary you want to support.
We do not hold back a dime of your contribution. We walk by faith
for our operational support, and receive Spirit led contributions toward support of same.
Contributions to World Salt Foundation should be mailed to:
World Salt Foundation
P.O. Box 551
Lake Wales, FL, 33859-0551
Larry Olson writes:
Welcome to Argentina.
We are down to our last couple of days and I finally found a plug
adaptor
for my computer. So most of this letter is going to be a synopsis of
what I
can remember about the last two weeks.
The team that arrived with us consists of 29 people with a very diverse
array of ministries. Most of the group is from the Atlanta, GA. area.
Several are from the Charlotte, NC area, and the rest have their origins
in
Peru, Liberia, Denmark, and England. There are 19 preachers in the
group, a
dance team, some music ministry, and altar workers. Everyone seems to
have
gotten along great, which is really important since one of our main
emphases
here has been to promote unity in the body of Christ and amongst the
local
churches.
The first week we held a simultaneous conference in a number of
different
churches with 4 preachers teaching 2 lessons each after the main sermon.
Every day each group swapped churches. The attendees were divided into 4
groups and chose which classes they could attend. For these two classes
we
all sent in an outline, which was printed up and given to the registered
attendees, but other than that, I chose to leave all my notes and
sermons at
home.
For the last two weeks I’ve preached at least once a day as many times
as 5
times in one day, and I had an additional invitation on that particular
day
to preach the sixth sermon, which I turned down. Yesterday I preached
the 4
o’clock message in a 1000 member Assembly of God church, and was picked
up
and taken to another church to do the 7pm service, and as soon as I was
finished there, I was whisked away to the third church to preach and
minister till around midnight. Needless to say, I am exhausted. By the
end
of the trip we had 30 additional churches asking for preachers to be
sent,
and we had to turn them all down.
We are staying at the Salvation Army Camp in Buenos Aires. As you may
imagine the accommodations are not deluxe, just adequate. My only
complaint
about my room is that it is very, very musty and stinks terrible like
mold.
It is fall here and the weather has turned cold while we’ve been here.
It
has rained almost every day, so it is wet, muddy and humid. My little
concrete room with one window does not have good air circulation and a
wet
towel will not dry out between showers. I’ve finally got them to get the
heater going and it is warm but now the room smells like hot mold.
I don’t know if it is the mold, the change in climate, or a barrage of
new
bacteria from the food and water that has affected my health, but I have
suffered considerably, especially the last week.
All the translators
started
loosing their voices early on. I never completely lost mine, but I did
get
pretty sick. You know, that flu/cold sinus, throat, ear infection with
aches
and weakness all over your body. Yup, that would be me. My vision has
been
adversely affected as well. I dropped out of some of the daytime
activities
to rest up, but kept preaching every night. (So please say a prayer for
me
now).
Everyone has done different daytime outreaches. We had to cancel the
street
ministry because of the rain, but have kept very busy and led allot of
people to the Lord. Some parts of our group have gone to hospitals,
factories, businesses and visited government officials. The hospital
groups
had an outstanding time. I think that they led almost all the nurses and
the
patients in the hospital to the Lord (It was not an evangelical
hospital, if
you catch my drift.) No one turned down his or her prayers for healing.
And
the hospital administrator invited them back.
We had some pretty outstanding pastor’s meetings, too. I was able to
present
the Bible School, More Than Conquerors that I have been representing.
The
pastors took all 100 introductory books that I brought with me. God
really
broke allot of the pastors and spoke prophetically to many.
My most memorable outreach has been in their federal prison. You are
guilty
till proven innocent here. Many we ministered to have never gone to
trial.
The inmates are completely dependent upon outside charity for clothing
and
personal hygiene needs. They told me AIDS is spreading rapidly amongst
the
prison population because of swapping razor blades. So the evangelical
church here is trying to meet the needs in a very practical way as well
as
ministering the Word of God. We were allowed to have 3 services per week
with a set quota of people permitted to attend. This week in the prison
26
people prayed a prayer of repentance with us for the first time and
asked
Jesus to come into their lives and be their Lord and Savior. God is
good.
Many other good things happened in other places here. Members of the
team
were able to pray with several people of some prominence in the
economic/political realms here, including the right-hand-man of the
President. Some prayed the sinner’s prayer, but all heard the gospel and
were blessed.
Argentina is in the midst of her worst economic crisis in history. A few
months ago the Peso was on par with the dollar. When I got here I
changed
$200US into Pesos Argentinos at the rate of 2.3 pesos per dollar. Within
5
days it had dropped to 4 pesos to the dollar so I had inadvertently lost
almost 100 dollars with of purchasing power, because many things are
priced
in US dollars. They did force many people onto a debit card system as a
result of the crisis, (can anyone see the mark of the beast coming?)
They
have three different kinds of internal currencies in circulation at the
present time. I think that there are “international interests”, which
are
pushing for the dollarization of all of Latin America. They are supposed
to
make an important economic announcement this week, but I kind of doubt
that
it will every make it into the controlled American entertainment
oriented
press. As of today they can only take out about $250 per week from the
bank.
Those with money suffered the greatest losses. Suicides have resulted.
The
mobs completely destroyed the main bank offices downtown, which now have
iron walls around them. Mostly the frustrated and angry have taken their
pots and pans down to the banks and government offices and banged on
them
for hours on end.
The poorer class may not have had money in the banks but have been
devastated nonetheless. Jobs have vanished. One brother was making over
$1000 / month last year. Now with the devaluation he is making less than
$200 / month! Try surviving on that, folks! I gather that there is a
mass
exodus of not only capitol from the country, but people as well. I’ve
also
heard that a good many of the Argentinean Jews may be going back to
Israel
as a direct result of their financial ruin.
Argentineans are late night people. Seldom do we get out of church
before
midnight. Usually we eat and talk till 1 or 1:30AM and we don’t get to
bed
until after 2. I’m not a very good late night person. What a stretching.
They are really lovely people. I’ve enjoyed being here. A good many of
them
are from Italy and the Spanish language as it is spoken here actually
sounds
a little Italian to me.
Many Germans and other Europeans have come here
as
well, which gives Argentina a different, more European flavor to their
culture and faces, compared with the rest of Latin America. They also
practice that little European kiss on both cheeks. The poverty here is
severe in areas, but generally driving around BA, it still looks more
prosperous, cleaner, and a little saner than most of what I have seen in
Latin America.
Every night we have people get saved in the services. I’ll share a few
of
the more outstanding things with you. The night I was the sickest I’ve
been
in years, I preached in a tent church about fasting, and as I was
finishing
my message the Holy Spirit came down on me like I’ve never had in my
life in
a church service. I started to weep uncontrollably for lost souls. I
couldn’t even talk, so I called everyone down front to pray and just
went
around howling and crying on everyone’s shoulder. The burden for the
lost
came down on the whole church. Before the evening was over, a good many
were
weeping and praying for God’s mercy on those who do not really serve
Jesus.
It was overwhelming!
I think every time I prayed for the sick we had about 80% which
testified of
an immediate cessation of all pain in their bodies. (While I remain
miserable. You know that’s the Lord.) In one church in a rough
neighborhood
I gave an invitation for salvation and there was one young man leaning
in
the doorway of the church who was unsaved. He refused the invitation and
said that he did not believe that Jesus rose from the dead. So I invited
the
sick to come forward to receive prayer. Half way through praying for the
sick this same young man that in the doorway was before me now asking to
be
prayed for. He said he had continuous pains in his heart. We prayed for
him
and he experienced an immediate relief from all pain, after which he
repeated a prayer for faith with me to receive Jesus into his spiritual
heart and turned his life over to serve the King of kings and Lord of
lords,
whose name is blessed forever more.
When you start praying for the sick many times you get some pretty tough
cases brought to you. I remember the one person that broke my heart the
most
on this trip. It was a little cripple boy that was born severely
deformed
and doubled over at the waste so that he could not look up or in front,
just
straight down. I reckoned him to be about the size of a two-year-old,
but
figured he was probably actually closer to 4. After church the Pastor
told
me that he was actually 12 years old and mentally completely normal. I
took
that poor kid and embraced him and just wept. May God restore the gift
of
the working of MIRACLES to the church in power!
Last night I had THE MOST EMBARRASING thing happen to me in the pulpit
that
I have ever experienced in my entire life! I was in one of the larger
churches in the area here preaching to over 200 people. The TV camera
was
rolling. Every eye was fixed on me. To dramatize a point about the devil
and
how he speaks, I leaned over this lady and pretended to be the devil
talking
to her. I put the microphone right up to my mouth, used that evil
sounding
voice and snarled and snorted into the mike. Well, I’ve been sick for
days
now and my head is always congested. When I snorted into that
microphone,
unknown to me, I blew snot onto the mike; and when I pulled the mike
back
this big nasty string of snot was connecting my nose with the microphone
in
front of all those people just a couple of yards form the TV camera for
all
the world to see. I could have died! I grabbed the snot with my hand and
scraped it loose from the mike and quickly turned my back to the
audience
and cleaned myself up! If God wanted to humble me that night, He surely
accomplished it. I couldn’t wait to get out of that church and go hide
somewhere. We still had a good service and I managed to regain my
composure
and finish my message.
Well, boys and girls; how many of you would like to be a missionary and
accompany Uncle Larry on one of his future trip?
We’ve got a couple more services to go. They send me to a different
church
every night; thank the Lord I don’t have to see last night’s church
again
for a long time. On our last day here I guess we are going shopping, and
I’m
going to try to gather up any clothing that the rest of groups is
willing to
leave behind for the poor as we leave.
Thanks a million for your prayers and God bless anyone who gave money,
cloths or time to help me on this trip.
Blessings,
Larry
Larry R Olson
PO Box 248
Moreland GA 30259
Larry Olson Ministries International
PO Box 611
Salem, OH 44460
Stephen L. Bening
Director and Treasurer
World Salt Foundation
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