God On the Move and Us Trying to Keep Up!

02Jan

Dear Friends!

Merry late Christmas to you all and happy New Year! We hope this letter finds you well. We finished our time in Tbilisi Georgia and God greatly blessed every moment of it. Even as we write this letter we are in awe of God’s goodness to us. God has been doing much with us this trip and it’s a great blessing but God has been doing even more in us. We believe God brought us here to help build up the church but He is also using this time to teach us crucial lessons for our future in missions. We have learned so much even in this short time.

One thing that God has really been teaching us is that He calls us to be servants. Too often in the church, leaders are the last to serve. Something that has continually come up in the teaching, conversations, the example of the leaders, and the scriptures is that God’s people, especially church leaders, are to be the servants of all. Jesus said in John 13:14-15 “If I then, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another’s feet. For I have given you an example, that you should do as I have done to you.” God calls us to be humble servants no matter how new or how experienced we are in ministry. This is one of the many lessons God has taught us in a fresh way and we know it is an important one for our lives and future on the mission field.

We also had many opportunities to serve at the church (Calvary Chapel Tbilisi). We helped in children’s ministry, worship ministry, young adults ministry, building projects, English club, etc. In the last letter we sent out we asked for your prayers for Nathanael as he was going to be teaching the young adults. Thank you to all who prayed. It went well and many people said they were blessed by the Word. Olivia also had the opportunity to lead the children’s program for the Thanksgiving celebration. It was a 4 hour long event so it was difficult to keep 20 or so children entertained for that long but she planned a great program and had lots of help from others in the church.

English club is one of the church’s weekly outreaches with the effort to bring unbelievers in to build relationships and ultimately to share Christ with them. While in Tbilisi we led the club a few times. One week a girl named Aitan came to class and Olivia and her hit it off. Aitan is originally from Azerbaijan, and she is Muslim. Olivia was able to befriend her and the next time she came to class she had told Olivia how she is happy to have more Christian friends even though she is Muslim, and that she was interested in learning more about what we believe as Christians. Olivia then invited her to young adults that night and she came! Praise God! After that Olivia invited her again to the woman’s Christmas event at Church where she came and heard the gospel, and not only that she came early to help set up and decorate the church! Olivia was able to have a couple good conversations with her about Jesus and we are just praying she continues to come and learn! Olivia’s parents also had her over for tea and are continuing to foster that relationship with her and invite her to church. Please pray for Aitan’s salvation and that she would continue to come to church and learn more about who Jesus is.

Something else that has been such a blessing for us is the time we were able to spend with Olivia’s family, especially for Christmas. It has been a long time since we were able to be all together for Christmas and we definitely don’t take it for granted. God has been so good to us and we are so grateful for His goodness, love, and grace for us during this time.

As we write this we have just arrived in England and plan to spend 1 month serving at The Church On The Thames with Grantham and Abbey, Olivia’s sister and brother in law. We want to thank you all for your prayers and support during this trip. We truly appreciate all of you and thank God often for you. We are constantly overwhelmed by God’s goodness to us as He has used all of you to encourage and lift us up.

Philippians 1:3-5 “I thank God upon every remembrance of you, always in every prayer of mine making request for you all with joy, for your fellowship in the gospel from the first day until now.”