Some weeks ago, I was driving home from Thursday visitation when a young man in his mid-twenties shouted to get my attention. When I stopped, he asked me, “Pastor, can you please pray for me?” I asked him for the specifics of his prayer request; to which he answered, “I just need prayers.” After praying with him, the Lord led me to ask him about his salvation. This opened the opportunity to witness to him; after which, Shaun trusted Christ as his Saviour!
Interestingly, Shaun knew perfectly well who I was, though I had no clue who he was. What I later found out was that he lived in a yard (yard = several houses), which my family and I had visited several times before. About a year ago, we invested several weeks in visiting, witnessing, praying, and hoping that some of the residents might come to Christ and eventually come to church . . . but that did not prove very productive.
Though it seemed our time and efforts were wasted, little did we know that we had planted seeds that came to fruition at an unexpected time. Shaun got saved as a result and started coming faithfully to church and to the weekly men’s prayer meetings. He has also brought members of his family to church on an almost weekly basis. So far, eight of his family members have attended our church services. It’s clear that it was not God’s plan for us to reach the family but to use Shaun to do so.
The following verse was an encouragement to me in this seemingly hopeless situation:
“Therefore, 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 Corinthians 15:58)
FAMILY UPDATE
We thank God that we are generally doing better now; however, over the past few weeks, we have gone through a season of illnesses and doctor’s visits. Our youngest child first got sick. Before we knew it, someone else got sick, and it continued that way until eventually, every one of us got a taste of it. We thank the Lord that we are doing much better now.
We had an electrical storm recently that knocked out the power lines in our area, causing power surges that burned up much of the electrical equipment and components in our neighborhood. We thank the Lord that no one got significantly hurt, though we lost a few of our household electrical appliances as a result.
MINISTRY UPDATES AND PRAYER REQUESTS
• We had our Kids’ Blast at church in late August. From that event, 9 little ones trusted Christ as their Saviour!
• Recently, almost every week, there is a new death announcement in our ministry, mainly loved ones of our members. God has given me the opportunity to use these losses to bring some people face to face with the reality of death and eternity.
• The health service has advised that there is a dengue fever outbreak in our country. People in our ministry have already been affected by it.
• We mentioned our ministry’s need for a 12- to 16-passenger van/bus in previous prayer letters. God has provided through some of you toward this need, for which we are very thankful, but we still have not reached our target. Please continue to pray for us as we seek to reach this needed goal.
Thank you for holding the ropes for us. We would certainly appreciate you and your ministry to us!
The Oral Anderson Family