Thursday, June 12, 2008

Canada 6/12/08 a.m.

Everything is going good. I do apologize for not writing yesterday. Not much happened on Tuesday, that is why. I worked in the print shop for part of the morning both Tuesday and Wednesday. I think almost all the work is done. That is the electrical and air conditioning work. There is always something to do at the print shop. Tuesday, I actually got to bind some of the Reformers Unanimous work books. That was quite fun. It was also quite boring, doing the same motion for some two or three hours. You find many different ways to do those motions. I guess that is what a factory job is.

We went downtown London on Tuesday. It began to rain shortly after we got there. I got to talk to one man before the rain came. He was about my age and he was getting his GED. He had dropped out of high school and left home due to some problems there in the home. He was looking for the truth though. I wish that I had more time to talk with him about the plan of salvation but he had to run off to class. He did leave the door open for a return visit in his house. He gave his address and phone number so that we may call before arriving at his place. He did not want us to drive there and not have him home. We left rather early from downtown due to the rain, but once we arrived back at Pastor's house and had lunch, the rain had discontinued. We then went knocking on doors. We did three sets of town houses that were all close by each other. I talked to one young teenager for a while and got to go through the entire story of the crucifixion with him. He said that we can come back as long as his mother is okay with it. That may be the challenge. Sadly, though, I was talking again to a teenager about the Gospel when his father came up and took the flyer from his hand and then slammed the door shut. Oh! how he will reap what he has sown. We got to talking after that of how these parents, especially fathers will pay for not letting their children hear the truth. Let alone the fact that they are the ones that should be teaching their children the truth. What else can you do for those children when their parents close the door. It is strictly the devil working.

The services have been great as well. As I have said, the majority of them were to Christians. They were about giving ourselves totally to God. That is what we lack so much is to be totally sold out to God with no reserve at all. Both Tuesday and Wednesday, we had visitors. An answer to prayer is that a lady named Nicole and her son came out. They were contacted last Saturday I believe by Mr. Stewart in our soul-winning. That shows the direct fruit from our door knocking. Continue to pray with us as we go out one last day, knocking on doors. God says, "You reap what you sow." We are here to be a blessing to this church so if God sends the harvest after we leave, that is okay. We would like to see it now but sometimes God has better times to send the fruit.

Tuesday, June 10, 2008

Canada 6/10/08 a.m.

We did have a great evening at church. Bro. Stewart preached a tremendous message on having a walk with God. He used the example of Enoch and how that he walked with God because of his family and because of his future. Those were the motivation for his private walk and the message concluded by saying that our private walk with God is evident in our public life. Enoch had preached against the wickedness of the world and that the world needed to repent before the coming judgment.(Jude 14) It is as though the Lord knows that we must be cleansed before he does a work in our midst. We are on the brink of a pouring out of God's blessing. We were talking about the 120 in the upper room in Acts 1. If they all waited and prayed for ten days then that means that they waited and prayed for 28,800 hours. We can say about 28,000 taking off sleep and eating time. If you take the 3,000 that were saved immediately following that on Pentecost and divided it into the amount of hours they prayed, then they spent approx. 9.3 hours praying for each soul. If that was the case back then, how much more must we pray and work for one soul today. Possibly the Lord seems fit to send the outburst of souls, after we are gone. We would like to see it while we are here but if it does not come now, the Bible says, "You reap what you sow!" Harvest time will come. After all, it is for his glory and not our own.

On visitation, I went to the first house and had a great talk with a lady who said she was searching. She has had some Jehovah's witnesses coming over to her house, but was open to the gospel, yesterday. She was willing to have someone from Bethel come back and work with her. I feel that it is important to talk to her immediately, as the devil will use the JW's to try and win her over to them. Please pray that she does except Christ. Another lady that I came across shortly thereafter, said that she had studied religion on her own but had never really come to a conclusion. She said that someone could come by but they would have to talk to her husband who was in the same boat as her, no religion. It is an open door. Please pray for that couple as well.

Yesterday morning, we went to the print shop. I finished up some more of the electrical work which took all morning. Bro. Kevin says that we are almost done moving things around and changing wires and all but it seems as if the list could go on forever. As for the weather, it was another scorcher yesterday. I have not been outside this morning yet. When I got home last night, it began to rain and pour. We had ourselves a good old-fashioned thunderstorm. This morning, I woke up to go run and it was pouring again. I do not think that it went all through the night but you never know. Indiana is under water. What would make us any different. Prayerfully, the weather ha cooled down as we plan to go back to the downtown of London. We plan to go around the noon hour so that we may be able to reach the business people with the gospel as they go out to lunch.

Monday, June 09, 2008

Canada 6/8/08 a.m.

Nothing great happened in the visitation today for me. Most of the people were not home. It is custom, I guess for Canadians to be out on Saturday morning. There were a few city wide yard sales today and many smaller ones as well. The people that were home were not very hospitable to the visitors to their country. A few cussed me out, and others were just plan rude. Don't they know that I am a visitor. No, not really, they just don't want to here about Jesus Christ which is quite sad. Tony met a Palestinian lady today. She was actually born in Bethelehem and moved over here just a few years ago. There are so many muslims in this area. The majority of the people here are just that. This lady seemed to be one of them, but she was anti-muslim. She said that the muslims in the North America are here because they have been forced out of their countries because they have committed something foolish against their religon or country. That was something interesting that they said. Well, she had a testimony of salvation, but they were not completely sold on that testimony. She did come Sunday morning and said that she will continue as long as she can get a ride. That was a blessing.

After visitation today we went over to Sarah's house with her family and some of the other youngins in the church. We played three games of voleyball and then played hockey for two hours. Those girls put us to shame. Bethany and Melissa are good at hockey. I stayed at the corner by the goal because there is a pride thing in the fact of getting body checked by one of those girls. I think you know what I mean. We lost the first game, but that was a warm up. The second game we won 6-4. That was the only one that counted. After taking some criticism from David and Sarah Unger on how to play, we did have a great time. I tried to ask myself how we could play hockey for two hours, and the only answer that I could come up with was that we were with a bunch of Canadians. Wow! We were exhausted so what did we do? We went and sat around a campfire for a while. We had hot dogs, chips, cherries, cookies, and much more. It was good except for when the dog ate Tony's cookies and drank my milk for the cookies. Well, Saturday was more of a day to relax. We had a great time. These people here are so caring for the work of the Lord. It is always a blessing to see that there are other churches other than Fairhaven that desire to see the work of the Lord furthered with a true earnestness. Oh, that we can see more churches with the same yearning to see souls saved.

Canada 6/7/08 a.m.

It is amazing to see God take someone from the world and transform them into something totally different. Of course, he has done that with all of us but sometimes it seems to be much more drastic of a change. There was a Chinese couple that lives at the university housing and has been coming to church for a while. They are not saved but when they heard that we were going to there housing, they asked if they could go door knocking with us. They went with Pastor Unger and being Chinese it concluded to having good contacts. They are not saved though. Pastor Unger said that it takes an average of about six to eight months to see a Chinese person get saved because they are taught that there is no God while they are growing up. They are taught to be an atheist. We are praying that they will be able to come out next week and hear the Gospel and get saved.

I wanted to tell you a couple of the experiences that I had yesterday. I was able to talk to a young teenage boy for a while. I went through the Gospel a little with him. He had just gotten home from school so he was antsy to go but he said he would love for someone to come back by and talk with him about salvation. On a sadder note, I was talking to a soft teenage boy. He had the most open heart that I have ever seen. I felt as though the Holy Spirit was leading the conversation. About five minutes into the conversation, the boys dad came up and asked what this was. He snatched the flyer from the boy's hand and said, "Were not interested in that." He then slammed the door shut. I was so shocked. I felt so bad for that boy. He will have to live with that thought for the rest of his life. Lastly, I did get to go downtown London last night and was able to talk to a man from Sudan. He was in London for two weeks on break from school in Toronto. He had a clear plan of salvation. I could tell that he was saved. He said that he had not done a good job in it but believed in practical Christianity. As far as living a life that shows your Christianity. I asked if he would take some of my tracts and pass them out. He said, "Just give me a few of them because I have not been good at it and I don't want to waste your paper. I will pass these out though." He took four of them and promised to pass them out. It was a good visit with him right on the sidewalk.

Well, today we are going out for a little bit this morning and then going out again after lunch. This afternoon will be a bit relaxed and then we will be going to Sarah's house at about 5:00 tonight. I am looking forward to it. We are supposed to have a bonfire but I don't know if it is too hot or not to have one. Then we are to play hockey or volleyball or both. I don't know if I am ready to be put to shame by some of these girls.

Canada 6/6/08 a.m.

We definitely are having a great time up here. Time seems to fly by so quickly. I cannot believe that it is already Friday. Yesterday, was same as usual. We went to the print shop at about 8:00 and did some work there. We cleaned out a room full of leftover shelves and other things, then put a shelf up on the wall and lastly began running conduit for electrical wires. I did not get it all done so I asked if Mike S. would be able to come in today and help me finish it. We also went over to the church in the morning and picked up (not literally pick up but rather put in a trailer and truck) a copier and a shrink wrap machine to bring back over to the shop. They are about two miles away from each other so it is not too bad.

After lunch, we went back out to our normal areas to knock on doors. I talked to one fella originally from Jerusalem. He pretty much wanted to argue about why Christians in general have so many different versions of the Bible and how anyone is qualified to translate it. I think that he just wanted to argue. Then I came across this one lady who says she is looking for a church and knew of Bethel Baptist. She said that she will most likely come out next week. She was a nice lady. Invited me in and gave me a glass of water. I was kind of nervous going in because we visit here by ourselves. I just stood in the doorway and she gave me a glass of ice water. Very nice lady. I am praying that she comes out next week.

After dinner last night, we all went over to Western Ontario University and knocked on doors in the university housing. There were so many ethnic groups and it caused quite the language barrier, but we did have quite a few good responses. Pastor Unger met a couple in the complex that he has been working with and they are from China. They are not saved but had asked him if they could go with him when he visited those houses. They went and it opened many doors for their team because they could speak Mandarin Chinese. They should have a good group coming from their apartments next week. Praise the Lord, eh!

Canada 6/5/08 a.m.

The service was great last night. Tony preached on being a watchman for the Lord from Ezekiel 32 or 33. I don't remember exactly. What is neat about that is that was the same sermon that I was thinking about preaching before Mr. Stewart decided that they were going to preach. It was obviously what God wanted preached. After they were told that they were preaching, i started looking at a different sermon so obviously it was God's will for that sermon to be preached. Mike preached on having our house in order for the return of the Lord. They were both tremendous blessings and encouragements and challenges to me.

Well, today I am going to help Bro. Kevin, Sarah's dad, do some electrical work over at the print shop. The other guys will be working on a book that we are going to put out for new Christians by Andrew Murray. What we are all doing is taking about 5 chapters and making questions from the lessons that we can put at the end of each lesson for the reader to answer. That way they are accounted somewhat for what they read. I did my chapters yesterday while Tony and Mike studied for their sermons, so, Bro. Kevin asked if I could do any handiman work and help him today. Any ways, after that we will be going to the university housing about 20 minutes away an will be passing out tracts there. I look forward to it.

We are all looking forward to going to Sarah's house on Saturday where we will have a bon-fire and then play hockey and capture the flag. That will be fun. The hockey is for Tony. The school was playing Monday when we got to church and Tony wanted to play with them but it was time for lunch so they said that they would get us playing sometime.

Canada 6/3/08 p.m.

We had a great time today. We just got back from the print shop. I went visiting with Elsa's brother tonight. He is so funny and I think that he had a good time. At least I enjoyed being with him. After visitation tonight, we went back over there to do a few last things. The weather is similar to Indiana. It is humid and has actually been raining tonight rather hard, too. We finished visitation a little bit early due to the rain. Tomorrow, we will be all working on a booklet for new Christians that they would like to print. They want us to read the lessons and make about 10 to 15 questions for each lesson to put at the end of the lesson. We will then go out door knocking until the service tomorrow night. Mike Simmons and Tony Young are preaching tomorrow night, so it should be a good service. I am looking forward to it.

I wanted to tell you about a little girl that I saw tonight. I thought you might like this story. She came running up close to the little apartment that I was standing at and stopped by a flower garden. I followed her gaze down to the ground and noticed a bird that had died there on the ground. Being the little child that she was, i thought it was just some bird. As her friends came running up she pointed at the bird. Then she looked at me and sadly said, "I was taking care of that bird." She almost started crying. It was just some bird that she caught and had been feeding it. It got loose and then ended up dying. I asked if she had named it and she said, "No!" Then she quietly turned and walked away with her head down. I felt so bad for her. I got to talk to her dad though for a little while about salvation though. He said that he would like someone to come by later to talk to him but he was moving and did not know where to.

Canada 6/3/08 a.m.

Yes, we did have a safe trip to Canada. We stopped to pick up Dustin near his home in Lansing. Bro. Stewart, Christopher, Elsa, Dustin and myself all rode together in Bro. Stewart's van. Tony Young and Mike Simmons drove together in Mike's car. There was no problem crossing the border for our vehicle but Tony did not have his birth certificate so they gave them a little bit of a hassle but after a letter was sent by Pastor Unger, they let them go through. Once we got to the church, about two o' clock, we ate lunch at Pastor's house. Then we had a prayer meeting and put together a few brochures that we are passing out this week. Then we went and viewed the print shop and my what a place they have there. They have quite the setup with printers and copiers. Then we ate again. Lasagna for dinner at about five o' clock. Last night we had a good group of people go out knocking on doors with us. It was a blessing. We got a lot accomplished. The main purpose of our canvassing is just to invite the people to the services but a few people had good contacts and visits with some people. I had one descent visit with a teen age boy. He was quite nice but said that he was busy. There are a lot of people from India and muslims as well. We are staying with a family right on the block that we have been and will be canvassing all week. They are a sweet couple. Elsa and her brother and dad came over last night after visitation for a little bit. He is ten yrs. old. Anyways, the couple came over from Jamaica about twenty five years ago or so. They have a great testimony of how they found the church as well that I will have to tell you sometime.

Today, we are going to go over and work in the print shop for a few hours. They are moving all their boxes and things into another unit for storage so we are going to help them. This afternoon after lunch, we will be going out door knocking again.

We had a tremendous day yesterday on the visitation trail. There was a lot of houses where no one was home. At least they are able to see the tract and brochure. I did get to talk to another fellow from Jamaica for a little bit. He was interested until I asked if I could show him some Scripture. I talked with a man originally from South Africa. He moved here so many years ago. He was a Muslim so I told him the story of how Nicodemus came to Jesus by night because he was unsure of what his friends would think of him if they saw him. The man listened intently. Muslims are not the group that you can win in one day's visit. It will take time. I talked with one other lady who had been to Bethel Baptist of Simco. I don't know where that is but it is the church that Pastor Unger had been at originally before moving here to London. I am going to try to find that house again today. Pray that I can.