Thanks for your prayers over the Christmas season.
On Dec 19th we headed 2 1/2 hours north-west to Paysandu for Faith Baptist Church’s Christmas program. Felicia sang in their children’s choir. Jo Anna played a special using her violin, and both of us participated in a quartet. It was a blessing to once again see the believers their and to see their continuing spiritual growth. After the music and a brief sermon, the young people put on a short play about the true meaning of Christmas. Afterwords a traditional time of refreshments and fellowship was had.
On Dec 27th our family from Paysandu was on hand to help us with our second outreach event, and our first Christmas banquet at a local hotel. Around 60 people were invited from the community to our celebration of CHRISTmas at a local hotel. We had three goals. First, we wanted to invite and get to know more people from our community. Especially those from the middle and upper class. Second, we wanted to give a clear presentation of the Gospel and have a non-threatening environment for spiritual dialogue. Third, we wanted to develop more contacts for future Bible studies.
Jo Anna did a great job organizing the dinner for around 50 people. It is amazing to me the amount of planning and detail that goes into pulling off and event like this. Of the approximate 60 people that were invited we had a total of 18 that came. (Considering the 10 percent rule this didn’t seem too bad. However, in the future if we were to host something similar I would look for a different location than a hotel. I was informed that culturally hotels seem to be associated with the rich and elite, and are thus seldom visited by those of other levels of society.)
Of the 18 that came, 9 were family members. Three were from Felicia’s pre-school. One was the father of a previous contact. One was a member of our group. Two were family members invited by the member of our group. One unexpected guest was the receptionist from the hotel. In addition, I also had an extended spiritual conversation with two more maids in the back while prepping the room for the event.
Over the course of the evening we interspersed food with conversation about who we are, what a Baptist is, how we can serve them, and what it means to celebrate the birth of the God-man. At the end of the evening we handed out slips of paper requesting personal information along with the opportunity to sign up for a free Bible study. Two guests indicated that they would like to start a Bible study! Praise the Lord for this fruit and for the opportunity to have some excellent conversations with guests from our community.
