Dear Pastor and Church,
Praise the Lord for His goodness! We are off to a great start in this New Year. This past Saturday I got to go out soul winning with a Dustin, a young Marine who recently surrendered to preach. This was one of the situations that the Lord used in our lives to lead us to start the Freedom Baptist Church here in Yuma. I have been praying for God to call young men out of the military into His service. What a joy it was to go out with this young man. God allowed us to see 2 precious souls trust Jesus as their Saviour. Dustin was excited, as it was the first time that he had seen anyone get saved out soul winning.
We will begin to travel again in three more weeks. We have many Faith Promise Missions Conferences that we will be preaching, as well as looking to help a couple of churches get more churches started.
God is allowing me to teach a Thursday night Bible-institute class at the church in Yuma. I thought we would have about 5 interested in the class. To my amazement, we had 19 register and take the class. We are teaching on the life of Christ. It is so exciting to see people of all ages taking this class. The youngest is about 19, and the oldest is over 80. What a joy it is to see people, no matter their age, interested in learning more about our wonderful Saviour!
We ask that you please continue to pray for my daughter Laurie McCoy. She had another stroke just before Christmas, and the doctor said they want to operate in the near future.
I am asking you to please pray for upcoming meetings. Please pray for more meetings this spring. I have two weeks that are not filled yet with conferences. Please pray for safety as Crystal and I travel.
I want to thank all of you who sent a special offering this Christmas. I want to thank all of you who sent a card or a gift. They all were such a blessing.
God bless you as you continue in His great work. We look forward to seeing many of you this spring.
Sincerely,
Joseph O. Elwell