“For I am become like a bottle in the smoke; yet do I not forget thy statutes.”
(Psalm 119:83)

In recent months, God has been walking me through a time of leanness in my spirit. Every pastor, missionary, full-time servant, and part-time lay-Christian knows the feeling, a season of intangible gloom in the heart with no traceable cause or reason. The answer has always been to maintain a close walk with God and soldier forward. God is always faithful to part the clouds in His time. In pursuit of this, I have committed additional prayer to this and other needs.

Recently, a Persian pastor and dear friend asked if I would preach to his people on the subject of “Hope.” I said I would seek direction from God on this, and He confirmed it. The passage God led me to was Psalm 119:83, “For I am become like a bottle in the smoke; yet do I not forget thy statutes.” I will not summarize the sermon here, but an interesting thing happened as I was preaching and Mohammad was translating; the power kept going out in his church building. As it happened, this group of faithful Persian believers gathered around his phone in the darkness to hear through the phone’s speaker. The others were listening online without interruption, since it was not a Wi-Fi issue; M___’s phone antenna worked. They were moved by the message and struck by the irony. In spite of darkness all around them, the Word of God was clearly heard, and darkness was powerless to stop it! These people could teach a master class on finding hope in God in lean times . . . but God was kind enough to help my burden at the same time, simply by having me preach! Isn’t God good?!

I want to share a testimony from P___, my Afghani Bible college student. He shared with me this week that he is completing the Old Testament(!), teaching in a K___ school for a few rupees a week, witnessing where he can, and trying to secure student visas to keep from being deported back to Afghanistan. Please continue praying for P___ and N___!

J___ and A___ will be off to Bible college in a month and a half. We will be “empty nesters”! Please pray for them as they follow God’s directions.

My wife and I are seeking meetings in the South/Southwest into next spring. Please feel free to share our website in the QR code, as we share our burden to spread the Gospel to the unreached people in the 10-40 Window.

Missionary #6505