Dear Family and Friends,
Greetings in the Lord! You may read this letter between the Thanksgiving Days of Canada and US. No matter where you live, we wish you to have a joyous and meaningful Thanksgiving season. Counting every blessing from our Father and giving thanks to Him, we would like to express our sincere thanks to YOU. Your lifting us up in front of our Father not only strengthens us physically and spiritually everyday but also makes us not feel lonely here. Thank YOU for all your continued pr*yers and support to us and our ministries!
Ch*rch Planting
Early this year, we realized the Father’s urge for us to get involved in national ch*rch ministry alongside university student outreach ministries. Since then we started to pr*y for His direction on this matter. In September, we, together with several national believers, planted a ch*rch in a densely populated region of the city. While the core group has just been formed, we continue seeking the Father’s direction and provision for committed leaders to serve the congregation. Please join us in pr*yers specifically for the congregation’s thirst to know Chr*st more and their growth in Him. Recently we launched weekly pr*yer meetings and Nick committed to preach on some Sundays every month. By His grace, we anticipate that ministries of regular congregational pr*yer meetings, Sunday school classes, outreach group, fellowship groups, and worship service would be firmly established during the coming year.
University Student Outreach
In September we extended our university outreach ministries to a polytechnic university in the city. Currently that university has more than 30,000 students. Through organizing various activities in the past two months, we are thankful that we are able to build friendship with some students. We pr*y that the Father draws students close to Himself through our ministries.
STM
In mid-October, a team from Edmonton, Canada, safely landed at the international airport of our city and served together here. After more than 20 hours of flight journey from North America, they took another overnight land trip with us to go to a minority ethnic group area. Since many social problems, such as lack of education, poverty, drug abuse and trafficking, high AIDS infection rate, robbery, alcoholic addiction, are prevalent among the population in that area, the government imposes strict restriction to foreign visitors’ activities there. We praise the Lord for His protection along the way, especially their physical adjustment in the simple environment and lengthy travels. Their services including, but not limited to, spiritual revival meetings, children SS teacher training, book studies and testimonies sharing, seniors’ fellowship preaching, and caring visitations brought many blessings to both local believers and non-believers. In particular, the team held sessions of training to help national workers nurturing the young generation to become future leaders. Their visit and services brought us a lot of encouragement and support indeed.
Despite various challenges of sharing Good News here, it remains our privilege and honor to be Chr*st’s ambassadors in the ministry. We are grateful for every one of our companions like YOU in the m. journey, and be encouraged that G*d is our rock and strength every day.
Your m.,
Nick and Iris