Making Blood Brothers

We had wonderful services yesterday.  I was still feeling lousy, but really burdened to pray for the salvation of the lost that would come to the morning service.  So, I spent about 30 minutes that I normally spend making the final touches on the auditorium in prayer instead.

God answered the prayer!  The service went great, and during the invitation 3 people came forward to be saved.  Two of them had consistently told me they were already Christians, but I knew they weren't because they never had any type of real salvation testimony.  The third was a wicked man, a very drunk old man that I have come close to physically beating on 2 occasions (he was drunk and wanted to beat his wife for no reason and I stopped him).  He finally came to church and was gloriously saved!  There was also a great time of testifying and rejoicing with some others in the church that had already been saved.  I rejoice knowing that even though I have nothing to do with these people other than Jesus Christ, we are all covered and washed in His pure blood, making us blood brothers!

Sunday night we finally got a family to let us have a Bible study in their house.  We didn't really tell them, though.  We just showed up and they invited us to eat, and then I got out the Bible.  We studied together with much rejoicing, crying, and conviction until 11:30.  We hope to continue in this manner as long as we can.

Last Saturday was a great day too.  It was New Years Day, but I called for volunteers to come work.  We had a great group of 5 men and 5 ladies that came and worked all day, and we nearly finished all of the work that needed to be done.  Today, Monday, the 5 men came back to finish up but after working 6 long hours outside, we still weren't able to get everything finished.  Such is the work here--it never ends and if it does, something will tear up and there's a completely new task to be done.

The final count isn't in yet because I haven't had time to do the math, but it appears our monthly support may be as high as 80%!  I still feel we need to raise our goal, though, especially after this last round of disasters to the property.  We need to be able to take care of all of those emergency expenses without going broke (like we did this month).  The church is already paying it's own bills, but still not in a place to be able to pay for "big" things that it needs, like a completely new roof and roof seal.  All in good time--we are averaging 40 on Sunday and 30 on Wednesday, but for the people to be able to take on tasks like the roof (about $5000) would take about 200 people tithing and giving offerings for about a year.  So, yeah--we may need to raise our goal.

Bro. Rogelio, who got saved last February, is making great steps of faith and allowing The Lord to work in his life.  I'm very proud of him and his family--I am sure he's going to be our first pastor.  He's also facing a great deal of opposition from his super catholic family.  They have what is called a "Niño Dios" (Child God) which is supposed to be Jesus.  They put him in a manger but then they cook and do things for him, worship and pray to him, and it's all abominable blasphemy.  Well, Rogelio's family did the celebration and Rogelio didn't go, for the first time.  That night, somehow the idol fell and broke his head off, and the entire family blames Rogelio because he didn't come to worship it and give it gifts.  When he laughed at them (as I did when I heard the story) they nearly kicked him out of the family forever.  They said "So now you're acting like a Christian," and he responded "I AM a Christian."  He makes me so proud!

So we're keepin' on keepin' on.  Pray for us, for laborers and for God to keep the wolves away.  They always prey on baby sheep and I had to run one off yesterday in the midst of the victory.  Pray for the people to keep on going in their Christian walk.

I will post our latest prayer letter when I have the time.  Thanks for your time!

God's great!

What a God!

We stand amazed!  What a wonderful and gracious God we serve.  Last Wednesday, we had 29 folks in the service, an increase of 10 from the previous Sunday!  Glory!  I preached on "Jesus's Prayer Requests" and we all had a marvelous time.

All last week, my stomach was bothering me and finally the worst came late on Thursday night.  After that came to pass, I got some kind of cold/flu starting on Friday, then just getting worse and worse until Sunday.

Sunday was a great day, as I was reminded that God is strongest when we are weakest.  We had such a great service.  It was our "Fiesta Navideña" and we went all out.  A grand total of 42 people came, and 2 adults got saved!  There were numerous first time adult and child visitors.  We gave away the Christmas Shoe Boxes of Joy, ate tamales and cake, and really had a great time.

My body finally had had enough by Sunday night.  The fever rose real fast and high and kept me awake for half of the night.  It finally broke and I was able to sleep, and now I'm too foolish to stay home and rest.

We plan on mostly just taking it easy this week.  We've been working so hard since we got here and we're finally about caught up.  We have soul-winning/visitation on Tuesday, services on Wednesday, and Noche Buena (Christmas Eve, which in Mexico is more important than Christmas) on Friday.  Back to soul-winning on Saturday and starting all over on Sunday.

My family is so happy to be in Mexico.  We need more support and it's going to be the hardest ever to leave if we have to again.  We lack about $500 to be at our goal--it isn't much but getting support during this recession isn't easy, especially moreso to raise it for Mexico.

Along that lines, let me say I'm glad God isn't sending us to a country in the 10/40 window that already had their chance to be saved and rejected it, or some godless European nation that has forgotten The Lord.  There is so much fruit in Mexico!

Praise God for the opportunity to be here!