Five years of displacement has taken its toll on Syrian refugees living in Lebanon, but many have met Jesus and discovered eternal hope.

Believers bring a positive identity message to teenage girls living in a remote village.

Workers with support roles in OM's Near East Field -Lebanon, Jordan, Syria and Iraq - find opportunities to engage locals and share truth with friends.

Amidst ongoing unrest, OM supports IDP communities by sponsoring food distribution through local partners.

When a small team decides to focus more on church planting, God brings people into their lives in unusual ways.

Women in the Near East pray and prepare Bible stories to share with local friends through creative opportunities.

By paying rent for a small school run by a partner church, OM provides education and biblical input to children of displaced families.

Since the Syrian war began, OM workers have served alongside locals, including Muslim background believers, to spread hope amongst desperate people.

Two workers share their motivation to keep going when they encounter disappointments in ministry.

OM workers from Latin America discuss the similarities and differences to Arab culture.

OM Near East launches a one-year Arab internship programme to equip local believers for long-term ministry among the least reached.

HE has created elegant fine-dining dishes in some of the most reputable restaurants in Scotland, but chef Paul Tamburrini he is now facing his harshest critics – his family.

Travel and tourism have become casualties of coronavirus lockdown, but one travel writer has found a new way to highlight Scotland's beauty, writes Deborah Anderson

The Chaotic Scots Traveller Kay Gillespie delivers her Top 10 places She's dreaming about in Scotland

REACTION poured in following the death of rock 'n' roll pioneer Little Richard, who died yesterday at age 87.

A long-time resident of Trench Town, Donnette Dowe has seen the trials of urban life up-close and personal. Like many inner-city Jamaican communities, crime, teen pregnancy and poverty are rife.The 50-year-old mother of five children (ages 26, 24, 21, 16 and 12) is director and tour manager for Trench Town Culture Yard, a renovated tenement which was once home to Bob Marley and his family.

IN dark times, begin by giving the Prime Minister a bit of credit. Unlike a certain predecessor, David Cameron has accepted that there needs to be an honest, public argument over the case for an escalated war in the Middle East.

Glasgow City Council has a keen sense, it seems, of what is or might be controversial. When the rest of us imagine that a handful of words to mark a long-distant historical event could never be more than anodyne, the council is alert to the affliction of controversy. It is a condition to be avoided at all costs.

IT isn’t often that a rousing speech on socialist internationalism is rewarded with a full transcript in the Spectator. In fact, it never happens. The Tory Party’s newsletter is funny like that.

If modern lives were measured in unprecedented weather events, we would all be 200 years old. Defences against floods that were supposed to happen every other century are being overtopped in the space of a few winters. The victims surveying ruined homes and businesses are ageing fast.

If modern lives were measured in unprecedented weather events, we would all be 200 years old. Defences against floods that were supposed to happen every other century are being overtopped in the space of a few winters. The victims surveying ruined homes and businesses are ageing fast.

THE Treasury has bombarded us all week with facts, figures and forecasts making the case for the UK to remain in the European Union. Its big report, on Monday, warned Brexit would tip the country into a year-long recession, resulting in up to 820,000 job losses within two years.

"Everyone hates politicians," the MSP observed. We were chatting about the EU referendum and she was explaining why the polls were showing a rise in support for a Leave vote.

It didn't take long for the list of warnings about Brexit to start coming true.

The accepted unit of measurement for long books is War and Peace. Library shelves bend and buckle under the weight of bigger doorstops, but it's Tolstoy's classic that has become the shorthand for a hefty tome.

Cairngorm National Park has moved online to give armchair visitors a flavour of a Highland spring, finds Sandra Dick

Scotland will not adopt the Prime Minister's new coronavirus slogan which drops the 'stay at home' message, Nicola Sturgeon has confirmed.

LEARNING from the problems and delays over PPE and testing will be essential to getting the vaccine strategy right, experts say.

Wise words

What if the lockdown was lifted and nobody came? A lot of people seem quite happy with life under Covid, especially educated middle-class people on social media who are happily swapping Spotify playlists and recipes for sourdough bread.

The paths around Hoolet are hard trodden these days, as the village takes its daily gulp of fresh air. Along hedgerows, down tree-lined avenues, through the woods and by the stream, legions of boots have stomped, marking out time. With almost no rain for six weeks, the lanes are dusty and tracks that were made by tractors, horses and bikes in the February mud have solidified into treacherous ruts.

One size fits all? How wrong you are

Source: ftw.usatoday.com - Saturday, May 09, 2020
Justin Gaethje put on a show in front of zero fans Saturday night at UFC 249 in Jacksonville, Fla., winning the interim lightweight belt with a fifth-round TKO victory over the legendary Tony Ferguson after referee Herb Dean called the fight with just over a minute to go. But when it was time to get the belt from UFC boss Dana White, Gaethje wanted nothing to do with the impressive hardware as he quickly tossed it aside before talking to Joe Rogan in the Octagon. Why would he do that? Because interim belts in the UFC are pretty silly and Gaethje doesn’t want to waste his time celebrating an accomplishment that now sets him up to fight for the real lightweight belt against Khabib Nurmagomedov who still owns the belt and is one of the greatest fighters of all time. Look at how Gaethje treated his belt: Justin Gaethje tossed aside the interim lightweight title belt he won at #UFC249 "I'll wait for the real one." pic.twitter.com/GBxD1RUemj — ESPN (@espn) May 10, 2020 Seriously, he wanted nothing to do with that thing. He evenly let his coach leave Octagon with it: . @Justin_Gaethje truly wants no part of that interim belt. His head coach Trevor Wittman had to carry it out of the octagon. #UFC249 | More: https://t.co/N8mXceTwxO pic.twitter.com/MBDvMIHG1h — MMA Junkie (@MMAjunkie) May 10, 2020 Now that is one of the coolest things I’ve seen in the fight game for quite some time. Sure, we haven’t seen fighting in quite some time, eithe

Source: www.washingtontimes.com - Saturday, May 09, 2020
BEIJING (AP) - Yao Ming, the former Houston Rockets star and now president of the Chinese Basketball Association, says the league has three options for resuming the season that has been on hold since Feb. 1 over the coronavirus pandemic. Yao said the league might play out the full schedule; ...

Source: www.reuters.com - Sunday, May 10, 2020
British Prime Minister Boris Johnson will set out a five-tier warning system for the coronavirus in England on Sunday when he outlines the government's plans to begin slowly easing lockdown measures, British media reported.

Source: www.justjared.com - Saturday, May 09, 2020
Kristen Wiig is the host of the season finale of Saturday Night Live ! The 46-year-old Wonder Woman 1984 actress hosted the Mother’s Day episode remotely from her home. During her monologue, Kristen took the opportunity to wish her mom a Happy Mother’s Day. “This is the Mother’s Day show and at SNL it’s a very special time to celebrate moms,” Kristen said. “Unfortunately, like a lot of you, I can’t be with my mom this Mother’s Day so I hope it’s okay I tell her I love her.” “You know I’ve been thinking lately, I don’t know if I truly appreciated my mom the first 45 years of my life, but this year I’m feeling especially grateful for all the things she taught me, preparing me to be a mom myself,” Kristen said before showing a plate of raw chicken breast. “Things like breastfeeding, babies love that chicken, she would always say that.” Kristen ended her monologue by thanking all the parents supporting their families during the pandemic. “So I do want to thank my mom and all the moms out there helping us get through this and have been there,” Kristen said. “We thank you so much, happy Mother’s Day. Thank you moms and thank you dads.” Find out when Wonder Woman 1984 will be out in theaters .

Source: www.washingtontimes.com - Sunday, May 10, 2020
OAKLAND PARK, Fla. (AP) - There is nothing like a big smooch, gentle touch or a wet nose nuzzle with a happy dog. But social distancing rules, due to the impact of COVID-19, has created a barrier between those in need of canine therapy visits and those special pups that ...

An OM worker in Bosnia shares how the enduring faith of two elderly women of God has inspired her to also persevere to the end.

Teens attending TeenStreet Europe in July will raise money for a project to bring reconciliation to the ethnically divided youth of Mostar, Bosnia and Herzegovina.

A family in need receives free firewood and, for the first time, understands that God is bigger than their needs.

A scholarship from OM Bosnia gives a young woman from a needy family the chance to go to school.

OM worker Jael shares about believers in North West Bosnia growing in faith and learning the joy of giving.

Providing disadvantaged children with backpacks brings the gospel into homes in remote Muslim villages of Bosnia-Herzegovina.

Daniel Ottoson (US), who serves as a site leader at an international congregation in Finland, enjoys seeing Finns and foreigners serving and loving Jesus together.

In postmodern Finland, an international church in Helsinki preaches God’s Word as it is and challenges its congregation to ‘get into the Bible’ daily.

In an area of Tampere, Finland, seemingly shrouded in hopelessness, one teenager and her father reach out to un-churched youth struggling with alcoholism and depression.

Church planting in Europe takes steps forward in cooperation with Wales Evangelical School of Theology, where OM workers receive proper training for the work.

OM strives to give 'church' a whole new meaning in the land of the Finns.

An Iranian refugee surprises a long-term worker by stating his desire to become a Christian.

Teemu Laitinen (Finland) serves as the Bus4Life driver in Ukraine, Hungary, Moldova and Romania.