2005 September

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In 1st Cor 15:58 it says, my beloved brethren, be ye stedfast, unmoveable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, forasmuch as ye know that your labour is not in vain in the Lord. I hope this ministry update finds you abounding in the work of the Lord. For each minute that goes by, it is yet another minute closer for the believer to be with the Lord. I tend to get a little excited when my thoughts start drifting ahead to that time when I will get to look Jesus in the eyes for the very first time.

The finances were doing so great for several months but then all of a sudden we started getting behind. Last month my laptop computer took a nose dive on me and when I was told that it would be cheaper to buy a new one I just closed my eyes and said, “Lord, the battle belongs to you” and did what they told me. At the time of this writing we are about $3500 behind in paying bills.

The Vice President of MAP and his wife put on a garage sale and gave the ministry all of the proceeds. Several churches raised their support for MAP and one new church added us on for full time support. Thank you so much to all of you who give so willingly!

God continues to bring relatives, friends, and neighbors to our church that are searching for true meaning & purpose in life. When they come we just point them to the cross where we also found the answer to that void in our own life along life’s journey. On a good Sunday we have about 35-40 people in the morning service with about 95% of them being young Christians. It was not until just recently that we divided up into five Sunday school classes that now covers all ages. We praise God for the ones who have taken on the positions of teaching a class.

In August our home church made the trip from Savannah to Mt Gilead (1+ hr drive) to celebrate another year of God’s goodness. We served each other communion and washed each other’s feet. We also spent some time reflecting over the past year and then ended the service with a time of testimonies and prayer. Times like these are far more precious then silver and gold.

Our church plant in Mt Gilead has been going through some pretty hard times lately but I know that we will pull through with God’s help. Satan hit us with a blow that left us in a daze, but the good news is, we refuse to stay down. For well over a year things just went too well—people were getting saved and baptized pretty much on a monthly basis. We were in some sense unprepared for Satan’s attack but looking back we can see where it has made us more mature and stronger in the faith. The scripture that continually came to mind was Ephesians 6:12 For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.

In July we held our second annual board meeting for the MAP Ministry and one of the main topics of discussion was the fact that we need more office space to accommodate the many volunteers that come out on a weekly basis to help with the SonLight Club (Bible correspondence lessons). Since the start of the ministry we have been using two converted Sunday school rooms for offices, located inside our home church. My dream and prayer has been for a long time already that God would give us a place of our own where we could expand in the areas of short term spiritual and secular training. As big as this need is right now, we are trying to keep from putting the cart before the horse. We would like to invite you to pray with us concerning this matter. We are also very open to any advise people can give us.

Daniel, age 17, left his family in PA and ended up at our place for a couple nights before moving on to Fredericktown where he started working with a construction crew. While he was at our place he received a call from his home town sheriff department saying that his dad wants him home. Daniel at this point asked the sheriff to go back and tell his dad that he already cut his hair short. When the authorities got back with him later that night they told Daniel that his dad decided that he is not welcome home after all. Katie comes from northern OH and also stayed with us for a couple of weeks before moving in with a friend. Just last week she called to let us know that she accepted Christ into her life. She has a full time job working at Dutch Heritage which is about 15 minutes south from here.

In photo (1) you can see the USPS baskets filled with Bible lessons and ready to be mailed to our students. Photo (2) shows which states the lessons are mailed to. At this time we are reaching into 32 states and Canada. Photo (3) shows some pictures of our students that they send to us occasionally. Photo (4 - bottom) shows some of our willing and hard working local volunteers, bulk mailings and testimonies from students.

Dear Friends, Greetings to you. My sister Anna won’t be in the SonLight Club anymore because she died July 20. Her birthday would be on Tuesday. We miss her very, very much. She died because a blood vessel burst in her head. She woke up with a headache, then we got an ambulance, and she died a couple hours later in the hospital. Please remember us. She was our sweet sister. Love—Sadie

Note: Anna was 10 years old and was enrolled in the SLC for six month. It was a sad moment for all of us.