While the ending of one year and the beginning of another provides a great opportunity to analyze one’s efforts and accomplishments, we find it useful to do such evaluating more than just once a year. As we near the six-year anniversary of the Grace Baptist Church in Milan, we have already, for some months, been contemplating what we could do better. Is our labor wisely spent? How can we reach more people? How have people in other Baptist churches in Italy come to Christ?
Several months ago while walking downtown with a visiting pastor, he brought to my attention the amount of people on their phones. He asked me how many of them I thought would give me five minutes to talk to them, and how many would not even accept a tract? However, they do see the things on their phones. What do I have available for them to see on their phones?
Several months ago I got a call from a fellow missionary in a different city in Italy, letting me know that a lady had contacted him and was looking for a church in Milan. He passed her number on to us, and we contacted her. She was here looking for God about the same time our family was finishing deputation. She had come across sermons online from Dr. Hyles and Lester Roloff. She got saved listening to their sermons. She had never attended a Baptist church when she came to ours for the first time, but she was already well educated from the sermons she had listened to. She, her husband, and their children have been coming faithfully to church. How many others like her have questions and might similarly get saved through the internet?
Another attempt at a furlough has been shot down. Given the limited amount of preachers who speak Italian and could fill our pulpit for several months and given the violent car sickness which my son experiences (we haven’t owned a car in Italy), the hopes of a furlough in the near future seem dim. Even if it were possible, when would we be able to get to all of our supporters in Arizona, Alaska, Florida, New Hampshire, Canada, and Mexico in a limited furlough?
Technology and social media have increased to the point where they can and have been used to accomplish both of these tasks. Promoting Christ through the internet can bring people to salvation. We as missionaries can be more visible to our supporters. We are and always will be confrontational soul winners, handing out tracts and preaching the Gospel, but we feel like there are people out of our reach who might listen to other methods as well. Pray for us as we make progress towards these goals.
Missionaries to the people of Italy,
Christopher, Amy, William, AnnMarie, and Charlotte Yetzer