Greetings to you, and praise the Lord!
Thank you for your prayers and support. I thank God that He has given me this opportunity to share with you about what God has been doing in my life. I would especially like to share with you about my Christmas . I am sorry that my update is late. Thank you so much for praying for my Christmas program. The Christmas program provided an opportunity for me to share the Gospel with the people who attended. 

Our Christmas Program

In our area, Christmas is the time when we can share the Word of God more openly. By God’s grace, our Christmas program this year went very well. When I think about past Christmas programs, I had to do everything for the program by myself. For example, I had to arrange and plan everything, do all the preparations for the program, cook the Christmas dinner, etc. I used to pray that someday I would have other people come alongside me and help me, so that we could divide the work. This year we planned the Christmas program together as a church; we divided the work, and everyone helped in some way. The church members divided the responsibilities–some of them did the decorating, some led rehearsals for the children’s dance, and some of them cooked. As I watched all of this, I was thanking God that this is what He calls His church. I used to be the one who did all of the work, but this time, all of the church members did their part. 

This year for the Christmas program, we visited many people’s homes and invited them personally. I was concerned that everything might not go as we had planned, but thank God, everything went well! I am really glad, and I have been blessed to see all of my church members grow in the Lord. I love to see God working in their lives and how God is even blessing their family members through them. God is increasing the ministry!

In my church, there is a couple who are getting engaged. I am very excited for them–this will be the first Christian wedding from my believers! Neither of their parents are believers. The couple came and talked with me about this three years ago. At that time, both of their families were against the marriage. The main reason their family was against the marriage is that the families are from two different castes. Both families were angry with me, because the two of them attend my church regularly. Their parents blamed me and said that I was the reason they saw each other every week and then planned to get married. I talked to the couple and told them they must keep their relationship holy. I told them they should be an example for the church and for their families. I prayed and believed that there would come a time when the families would be in favor of the marriage. Thank God that now both of their families have agreed with the marriage, since they were good testimonies to their families.

Thank God that he has given me some new families in my church. He also brought one family that comes from nearly 40 miles away! One brother in my church shared the Gospel with the family. Then, they really wanted to come and see what the church was like. They came, and God gave me the opportunity to share the Word of God with them. They received the Gospel that I shared! The brother who had first shared the Gospel with the family was baptized only a few months ago. He had come to faith in Jesus long ago, but one day he came to me and asked me what baptism was. After I shared about baptism with him, he replied that he believed in Jesus so he wanted to get baptized. He was very excited to get baptized. Seeing this brother’s excitement reminded me of the story about Phillip and the eunuch. When I read the Scriptures and see incidents like them in my church, I really get excited!

Prayer Requests:

  • Pray for me, as I am traveling to a nearby country to visit my friend. Pray that I will have safe travels and a blessed time there.
  • Pray for all of the new people who have heard the Gospel, that they will accept Jesus.
  • Pray for the couple from my church who are getting married. Please pray that their marriage will be blessed and that their families will agree with their Christian wedding. Also pray for all of the government approvals–they will have to get many documents approved by the government to have a Christian wedding.
  • Pray for the brother who got baptized recently, that he will continue to grow in the Lord.

God bless you,

Pastor 12