Prayer Letter for February, 2007

 

Wednesday, March 21, 2007 Dear Pastors and Churches:

 

"All that are with me salute thee. Greet them that love us in the faith. Grace be with you all. Amen" (Titus 3:15). We are glad for those "with" us here and all those who "love us in the faith!" We see lives being changed and rejoice that the Spirit uses the Word to change people for eternity.

 

Late Report: This present report is unavoidably late. We had scheduled Janet's trip to the neurologist in Hungary so as to leave a week between it and our trip to the east for the 3‑day conference and planned on making this report during that week. But I had another "spell" and the trip to the doctor had to be postponed a week. Immediately upon returning from Budapest we had to leave for the east and the report delayed until after our return. Thanks for your understanding.

 

Medical Trip: We traveled to Budapest, Hungary for a brain scan for Janet since our last writing. This could not be done in Romania. It had been 5 years since her last one and it was past due. The neurologist read the scan, compared the previous one from five years ago, and determined that the remnant of the brain tumor has not significantly changed in these five years! Praise the Lord for this good news. Janet also saw her regular doctor and had blood work done. We learned that she has high blood pressure which is aggravating her dizziness and eye problems. The trip, doctors and medical fees came to a total of $1,293.61 that we paid for out of personal funds and a credit card.

 

Bocsa Meeting: While we have continued to have visitors from time to time since my last letter, their return visits have been irregular. But our "regulars" continue to be just that and so we try to "feed" them the good Word of God. Pray for the various needs of those who attend, please.

 

Filiasi Meeting: There are encouraging events taking place in Filiasi. I believe we shall soon have another baptismal service there. At present there are at least 2 people who see that their immersions are unscriptural and the Brothers there are desirous of having a Church organized when their number has increased by two or three. Pray toward this end, please!

 

Eastern Outreach: The Winter Theological School continues weekly on the subject of grace. We traveled the 500 miles to them - takes 13 hours due to road conditions ‑ and met with 8 preachers for 3‑days. We taught them on the Church, answered many questions on doctrine, Baptist history, ecumenicalism, baptism, etc. When we left, about half of them voluntarily said that they saw their immersions were unscriptural. The others also know what they need to do. Pray for these men that they will do what they need to do. They want us to come again soon and we hope to go.

 

While in the east, I had the privilege of preaching to about 35 persons on Wednesday night and believe I had Divine help in the preaching. I preached on the resurrection of Lazarus ‑ a picture of regeneration. The next evening some of the Brothers along with Aurel and Raul visited a nearby village. One "Gypsy" preacher and Raul and Aurel were scheduled to visit in a home there. The people had invited their neighbors and a total of 9 people showed up. Aurel spoke and Raul preached to these people who had never heard the gospel of the grace of God before, having heard only the Romanian Orthodox religion of works for salvation. What a privilege! Pray for these people. The villages in this area are poor, but "the poor have the gospel preached to them" (Matthew 11:5).

 

Literature: We recently learned an interesting story of how our literature gets around. A Brother in Timis County (west of us) "collaborates" with us in that he requests literature from time to time and then he distributes it. He gave a supply of our literature to a Pentecostal in his village who passed it on to Pentecostals in a church in Gorj County (east of us). Recently a singing group from this Pentecostal church visited one of the Pentecostal churches in Filiasi. Filiasi is the town where we have regular services as you will remember. Now the Pentecostal pastor in Filiasi hates our doctrine and our literature. But the visiting group brought our literature and after the service distributed it without the local pastor knowing what they were giving away. I can only think that he assumed his fellow Pentecostals would be giving away Pentecostal stuff. I am sure he never dreamed that they_ would be giving away sovereign grace, landmark Baptist materials The Filiasi Pentecostals took our literature from the visitors and only after the service did the pastor learn that our literature had been distributed in his church. He was very upset! The next Sunday he ordered his people to return all the literature that they had taken ‑ they were forbidden to have it or to read it! I don't know how many actually returned what they had taken, but this demonstrates how God is able to get our message into hands (and minds and hearts?) where the false religious hierarchy would not allow it if they had their way. And this demonstrates the " communist mentality" that exists in many places where pastors are dictators and true freedom ‑ what old Baptists called "soul liberty" ‑ does not exist. Pray for the people who read our literature! As Bro. Al Gormley told me, literature will go further than you can go and last longer than you will last. May God be glorified through both our preaching and publications!

 

I see that I am just about out of space again this month. We have new people contacting us almost daily requesting our literature and wanting us to come and teach them and preach to them. Pray for us that wisdom and strength and funds will be supplied so that we can produce the literature and travel to these places to help these people spiritually with the truth Some are seeing through the ecumenicalism of the Romanian Baptist Union. Others are seeing the unscripturalness of Arminianism. Thank your for your earnest prayers and your faithful financial support! God bless you!

 

In the cause of God and truth with you,