St. Paul’s, Summerville, Family Invites You to Partner with Them in Upcoming Opportunity
We are excited to announce that Kristin and I (Jeff ) have been invited to serve in Cairo, Egypt! I have applied to be the minister to the English-speaking congregations at All Saints’ Cathedral in Cairo, just a taxi ride away from the pyramids. This is an 18-month opportunity to be immersed in the “hub” of the Province of Alexandria. After 18 months, Archbishop Samy Fawzy plans to send us westward to serve in the Diocese of North Africa.
The Diocese of Egypt is an amazing and vibrant diocese! This YouTube video (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=un-NrmG1yGA) shows just some of the miraculous things being done. The Jacobs family is grateful to be invited to play a small part in it! Please pray for this wonderful diocese and the diverse opportunities we will have to serve the Lord.
Though I will be working at a church, our family will continue raising their own funding through SAMS; we are blessed to be at 35% of our goal for recurring gifts. Please pray with us for 100 more people excited to give recurring gifts of any size.
Why are we raising funds when we will be working at a church?! First, I’d humbly refer you back to the video mentioned above to see all the ways that the Diocese of Egypt wisely stewards God’s gifts to them. Second, I would like to share a story to paint some perspective and offer my reason.
When I visited with Archbishop Samy in 2019 as part of my seminary education, he took us to several sites mentioned in the video above. He took us to the hospital in the video where we saw several floors full of refugees seeking medical help for everything from malnutrition to injuries incurred while fleeing for their lives from war and persecution.
We left that hospital and visited Anglican schools in the slums of Ras al-Soda and Sidi Nasser. One of the schools found that their students were suffering badly from malnutrition. The diocese began an initiative that provides a spoonful of molasses and one meal every day, one dairy item once per week, and one meal with some meat in it once per month. This regimen has brought the kids out of anemia, rickets, and dangerous levels of malnutrition. This is just one small piece of a massive diocese, and we want to support their efforts in any way we can. Moreover, by bringing together a team of people in the Anglican Diocese of South Carolina to go with us, pray with us, and give with us, we further our vision of seeing a church diverse, the Church united. When you team up with us, we believe it is one small way we can bring together more unity in the global Anglican Communion.
It is this enormity of both the need, and the efforts to meet those needs, that leads us to ask the church here in North America to send us prayerfully and financially to the church in North Africa. I know it will mean sacrifices for our family and possibly for yours, as well, but this is part of the exciting call God places on our lives.
We love you, and we are so excited to see what God is going to continue to do in the universal Church. Thank you for praying for us and for making this adventure possible.
Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be glory in the Church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen. (Ephesians 3:20-21)
Meet the Jacobs
Jeff and Kristin live in Summerville, SC where they attend St. Paul’s Anglican Church. They served in North Africa for two years where they met and fell in love. Jeff has been on staff at St. Paul’s since his ordination in May 2020. They have three children, one born on April 25. They look forward to answering the call God has placed on their family when they move to North Africa in September 2022. They are actively looking for people to go with them to Egypt, pray with them for North Africa, and give sacrificially with them to the Kingdom efforts in Egypt. They would love to come share their story at your church, small group, or over coffee. You may contact Jeff and Kristin at FatherJeffJ@ gmail.com for more information or to be added to their quarterly “Ember Day Newsletter.”
by the Rev. Jeff Jacobs, St. Paul’s Anglican Church, Summerville
