Letter of Recommendation

Paul said in II Corinthians 3:1-2 "Do we begin again to commend ourselves? or need we, as some others, epistles of commendation to you, or letters of commendation from you? Ye are our epistle written in our hearts, known and read of all men:" The Apostle Paul did not need letters of recommendation to the Corinthians because he had ministered among them for over 18 months. Unfortunately, many of you have never experienced our ministry and therefore we thought it would be helpful to provide for pastors and churches a letter of recommendation to evaluate our ministry. Our Pastor, Tim Leaman, has written a letter which you can access through this link http://www.scribd.com/doc/7809249/Letter-of-Recomendation1. It is our prayer that this will be beneficial to you. Thank you for taking the time to review this information.

Aaron Shipe

Introductory Letter

Dear Pastor,

I want to thank you for the opportunity to share with you the ministry God has called my family and me to. As a pastor myself, I know that your time is valuable so I trust this information will be helpful in getting to know us and our ministry.

After completing college and seminary at Pensacola Christian College, I had the opportunity of serving as assistant pastor at Pensacola Baptist Temple where I was ordained in 2002. In September of 2003 we moved to Maryland and for the past five years my wife and I have served at the church we both grew up in, Calvary Baptist Church in Westminster, MD. I have had the privilege of serving as assistant pastor under the godly leadership of Pastor Tim Leaman. We had every intention of continuing to serve there indefinitely, but through a missions trip to Tanzania and several Scripture passages like Psalm 67:1-5 and Revelation 5:9-10, God has directed us to the unreached Datooga tribe in Tanzania.

The Datooga are a distinct tribal group with a population around 150,000. They are separated from the population at large by language, culture, and location, and as a result, less than 1% actually knows who Jesus Christ is. It is our desire to preach among the Datooga “the unsearchable riches of Christ”, so that in the ages to come all the peoples of the earth will praise His name. Lord willing we will be partnering with veteran missionaries Rodney and Lynn Myers as they continue their strategic ministry to the Datooga.

We are just beginning the deputation process and would greatly appreciate the opportunity to present our ministry to you and your church. We would love to minister to your church in any way you would desire.

Thank you for your service to our Lord and please feel free to call on us at any time.

Yours in Christ,

Aaron Shipe

Doctrinal Statement

I believe . . . What follows those words is of utmost importance, for what we believe determines how we live. To that end, I have uploaded a pdf of my doctrinal statement. I trust this will be helpful in understanding our desired ministry to the Datooga. Click on the following link to download the pdf http://www.scribd.com/doc/7769628/Aarons-Doctrinal-Statement

The Shipe Family Brochure

Click on this link to access a brochure about the Shipe Family and the ministry God has called us to. http://www.scribd.com/doc/7431894/Brochure-Updated-Font

"Here am I send me"

"Lord, here am I send me."
Those words uttered by the prophet Isaiah were the theme for our just finished missions conference at our home church, Calvary Baptist Church in Westminster, MD. What a great weekend with several great missionaries! We praise God to see the quality of missionaries He is calling and equipping for the foreign field. Veteran missionaries like Bob and Becky Hein to Australia as well as "fresh recruits" like Matt and Michelle Conrad to Hong Kong, Daniel and Jennifer Arnold to Germany, and David and Stephanie Gross to Moldova. We also praise God for the many benefits of modern technology. On Friday evening we had the privilege of having a video conference call with our missionaries Ron and Heidi Caasi in Indonesia--Skype is a beautiful thing! What a blessing to so freely communicate with those serving God half-way around the world!
Well, Lord willing we will begin our deputation process in just a few short weeks as we prepare to reach the Datooga tribe in Tanzania. Perhaps my next post will explain more about the Datooga and why we feel God is calling us to reach them with the Gospel. Until then, Maranatha!