Kasalehlia! Summer is here and with it our many exciting summer activities! It’s been a few months since our last prayer letter and though many times we sat down to write a letter, we just couldn’t put into words what is in our hearts. We have been faced with some tremendous attacks from Satan on our ministry these past couple of months. We never dreamed we would face some of what we have had to face in recent weeks and while we wanted your prayers through this time, we didn’t even know where to begin in explaining the situation. Rather than go into details of the events here, I will simply say that Satan is using culture and tradition here to cause people to openly defy Bible principles and our stand. Through much prayer, seeking of Godly council, and searching the Scriptures, we have been able to slowly see hearts soften in our church and village. Please band with us in prayer that all will be resolved and hurt hearts will heal. And above all, that our church will stand as a testimony of Christ’s love and forgiveness. Pastors, feel free to contact us if you feel you can pray more effectively in knowing more specifics of the situation as I do not feel at liberty to speak of details in an open letter such as this. A special thank you to those of you who have prayed for us through these times.
Let me back up just a bit. Just over a month ago, we began to feel God pressing on our hearts to move forward with our church building program. As you may know, we began to pursue this last August, but then needed to put our plans on hold due to the medical emergencies with our daughter. Since that time, the church has continued to grow, and quite frankly, cannot realistically grow anymore in number with our current building. We are filled to overflowing every Sunday! Praise the Lord! We have no Sunday school classrooms or nursery facilities; all meet outside at this point and are often even forced to take cover in the church van on rainy days! A new building is a very real need. We began to talk more about this and through several “circumstances”, the Lord showed us it was time to move forward. We made the decision to announce this to the church, our supporting churches, and praying friends and families. That very week, the “problem” broke out in our church!!! This was a clear attack from Satan to stop our moving forward with the building project! We believe with all our hearts that God wants us to continue with our plans for the new building and we are asking you to band together with us in prayer to make this possible! Again, pastors, please feel free to contact us for more details on the building project. We would love to see this building completed before our next furlough, which is currently scheduled approximately a year from now!
Summer is full as usual! Our Bible Institute classes are now out for the summer. We’re thankful for the 35 students that completed this semester! We’re taking a brief break before starting classes again in August and now looking forward to our exciting summer ministries. This Friday we have Bro. Tom Pennington and his son Corey coming from Alabama to help us out. We’re looking forward to having them here! July 16th begins our week of youth camp. Our theme this year is Honoring God. Pray for these young people to come back with changed hearts! VBS is scheduled for July 30th – August 3rd. Last year we reached our goal of having 100 children in attendance and seeing many saved! We look forward to seeing what God will do this year! We do have a request for our summer ministries: we would like a Big Ball to use for games at both camp and VBS. If there is a church, youth group, or individual that would like to take on the project of donating one and shipping it out to us before our youth camp, we would be thrilled, as would our young people!
Our family is doing well. Susan is trying to get the school year finished up with the children. We started very late due to taking Kaylinn to HI for medical treatment so we’re a good bit behind our usual schedule. Kestra worked ahead and finished already! Katrianne should be done by the end of the week, and both boys have a couple more weeks left to go. They’re all looking forward to a summer free from studies! Kaylinn has done well in recent months. She’s good at giving us frequent “scares” of course. We have found now that she has a heart murmur. The doctor doesn’t feel this is serious but just something to keep an eye on as she grows older. Thank you for all your prayers for our little princess and for all of our family.
A quick note before I close: I’ve had many requests recently for prayer cards! We have had a recent photo of our family done and are in the process of having one designed and printed. Once that is done we will be sending out to each supporting church and any individuals that wish to have some as well.
We do thank you all for your prayers. We could not be here without them! Thank you for your love and support.
Because of Calvary,
Rickson, Susan,
Kaleo, Kestra, Kyler,
Katrianne, & Kaylinn
