ReUnion in Tennessee

Pastor John Johnson and the River Lake Baptist Church had a great missions conference this past week. While there it was great to see Preacher (Dr. Gray Sr.). He was the guest speaker for the conference. I haven't seen him for a couple of years and it was like old times again. I was ordained by him through the authority of the Longview Baptist Temple on July 4th, 2001. We enjoyed getting to hear him preach and having fellowship with him during the conference. 

On Sunday his cell phone went off while he was preaching, so my wife said, "You owe us a pizza." (It is an old joke from years ago that if someone's phone went off during preaching they owed him a pizza.) He was a great sport about it and bought pizza for everybody on Tuesday night after the service, even though nobody was really thinking that he needed to do that. 

This is Data Patel who my wife led to Christ on Thursday morning while we were checking out of the hotel. She is from India and her and her husband own the hotel. I called Pastor Johnson and gave him her information. By that afternoon the pastor called me back and said he and his wife went by the hotel to follow up. Pastor Johnson told me that when they went by the husband was there and said that his wife had told him that she had trust Christ as her Saviour that morning. Praise God she is not ashamed! Pastor Johnson told me that the husband has an interest to learn more about Christianity. They also have an 18 year daughter who is supposed to ride the bus to church this coming Sunday! Please pray for the husband and the daughter to trust Christ as their Saviour as well. We had 7 saved total for the conference while we were there. 

We flew back from California last Wednesday just in time to catch the Bible study and got to be home for one day before heading to Tennessee. We attended soul winning night at our church and I went soul winning with Say Nay Moo. While we were out we met Sai Lwin and his wife Neng Mon. They are Shan from Burma. They have lived here two years. They are Buddhist but had been schooled in Catholic schools. They said they were looking for a sign to show them the right way to God. I told them God sent them a sign. They wanted to know the sign.... I told them that God sent an America to come knock on their door to show them the Scriptures so they might know how to be saved! They listened to the presentation very carefully as my partner translated into Burmese. In the end they made a decision to accept Christ as their Saviour acknowledging that Buddha can't do anything for them. Praise God for His wonderful grace!

Till the Whole World Knows

Dr. Trieber

 "Till the Whole World Knows" was the theme of the missions conference at North Valley Baptist Church in Santa Clara, California this past weekend. My wife and I were honored to attend this great church for the first time ever in our life. It is truly one of the great churches in the world today. Dr. Trieber was the most gracious host along with their missions director Brother Apusen.

Mrs. Giovanelli

I was privileged enough to able to teach the Filipino Sunday school class in the college chapel auditorium on Sunday morning. It was combined with another class. There was a great crowd in there as I gave some of my testimony and taught a lesson on 1 Kings chapter 7. Then Sunday night I was able to present the Indochina Missions ministry before the church. We were also blessed by the sermon brought forth by Dr. Joe Arthur on passing the mantle.

Bro. Apusen

On Tuesday, I was able to teach a college class on missions. Then we attended the elementary chapel where Dr. Trieber was ministering to their children in grades Kindergarten through 6th. We then attended the High school chapel where Dr. Arthur and Bro. Alvin Martinez were singing "Never Grow Old" when revival began to breakout with the altars filling up. I've never seen a sweeter spirit among the high school age kids than I saw at this church. Then we moved to college chapel for another great service. After that my wife taught the "Ministry Wives" class for Mrs. Giovanelli. My wife felt very honored to do so.

Filipino Sunday Class

For the week I only had one saved. I met Sai who happened to be from Shan state in Burma and spoke Shan, Burmese, and English. It was sweet to see him trust Christ as his Saviour. I also am grateful that North Valley Baptist will be supporting the Indochina Missions. We are thankful for that. I also want to say thanks one more time to Dr. Trieber and his wife, Bro. Apusen and his wife, Bro. Alvin Martinez, and the Giovanelli's plus the rest of the staff for everything they did for us while we were there. May we carry forward with the Gospel "Till the Whole World Knows."

An Amazing Time at Amazing Grace

We spent this past weekend at the Amazing Grace Baptist Church in Wichita, KS with Pastor Richie Haley. It was truly an amazing weekend. We went soul winning on Saturday and I was able to lead a Vietnamese man to Christ named Shon. Then I ran across Sudi who was from Congo. He spoke only a little English, so I called a man from my church back in Lincoln, named Blaise and had him speak to Sudi in Swahili. Blaise witnessed to him, but Sudi told him he had previously trusted Christ. I was thankful to have access to Blaise so he could help me make sure Sudi was saved!

Then on Sunday morning I was able to teach a home and family lesson to the men while my wife taught the ladies on prayer. I preached during the morning service to a great crowd of 89 folks. This is good since Pastor Haley has only been there a year and half. The church had about 20 folks in it when he took it. Then in the afternoon we went soul winning and I was able to lead a Spanish man and a Vietnamese lady to Christ. After soul winning I preached in the evening service to another solid crowd of 86 people. That is excellent attendance, especially with no bus ministry. I felt like Pastor Haley is doing an amazing job! Please pray for them as this church continues to go forward!!!

Adventurous Trip to Grand Junction

The trip from Delta to Grand Junction ended up being an adventurous one, I will tell more about that in a moment. I wanted to say what a great meeting we had Wednesday night at the Gospel Way Baptist Church with Pastor Chris Hanks. I was able to present the Indochina Ministry to their church that night and then I went to speak to the Master Club group. Very good group of young people. I also enjoyed listening to Pastor Hanks preach an excellent message out of 1 Samuel 17. A special thanks to the church for the all the wonderful things they provided us while we were there.

Now I want to mention about our trip there. My daughters asked several times if we could go out of our way a little bit and drive over the Grand Mesa on our way to Grand Junction. So I decided to do it and figured I would just take highway 65 over. Only problem is I got distracted with a phone call and made a wrong turn off of the highway on another nice paved road. The only problem is the road didn't stay paved and eventually didn't stay nice either. I have posted a picture of the road while it was still considered a road and not a cattle path. We got to a point when there was no turning around anymore and it became apparent that I would be in trouble if we got stuck or slide off, both of which almost happened. We continued to go higher and higher and there was little road and much melting snow and a lot of mud. I was driving a Mercury Milan that is low to the ground and the vehicle almost got high centered several times. As we continued to go we encountered large steep hills that were muddy and snow packed. If we slide to one side it is a ditch that will severely damage our car and if I slide off the other side it is a cliff going into a lake. Our phone service went out and at one point while going up I began to ask the Lord for a push. Praise God he gave me one and we finally made it over. We prayed and my wife and daughters were no longer having fun, we just wanted off of this mountain now. We did make it to Road 121 and then eventually back to highway 65. We were thankful for the safety the road gave us and were glad to be in Grand Junction. Thank you for your continued prayers for our safety, especially when the danger comes of our own stupidity. Ha,ha, ha....

Missions Sunday in Olathe

My daughter singing

Aydett and her granddaughter

We spent the weekend at Bible Baptist Church in Olathe, Colorado. Pastor Gabe Skillo is doing a fantastic job there. He had Pastor Rossi from the Lighthouse Baptist Church of Cheyenne, Wyoming in as his guest speaker. He also had Evangelist Bob Walker in to present his ministry.

It was exciting to spend the Sunday with them. I was able to speak during the Sunday school hour about Indochina Missions and Brother Rossi preached the morning service. At the invitation there were two folks baptized.

Then in the afternoon we rode the soul winning bus and I was able to go soul winning with Brother Piotrowski and my wife with Mrs. Piotrowski. God blessed our efforts and we each had one saved. By the way, I want to thank the Piotrowski family for hosting us. They were great host.

After soul winning we had the evening service. It was a tremendous blessing and my daughter Rebekah even sang in the special with the pastors wife. I am glad the Bible Baptist Church is in Olathe trying to reach this part of the valley for Christ.

Before I arrived in Olathe, I spent a couple of days with Pastor Steve Johnson from Lighthouse Baptist Church in Aurora. We did some soul winning while I was with him and I was able to lead two people to Christ. One lady named Aydett was particularly open for the Gospel. I spent a good while explaining the Gospel to her and at the end she bowed her head and trusted Christ as her Saviour! Praise God!