Sit back and listen ….

is what the Lord seemed to tell Mary Kay and me (Fred). We were in the middle of our second session of our first student church.  We meet with 8 graduate students, all men, who have been reading the Bible from several months to over a year.

This time, when we started prayer, everyone wanted to participate, and the one man who was afraid to pray last time, he prayed a few times!

It seems just one or two of them are Christians while others are thinking seriously of commitment.

This time we asked them what they had been reading, and then one shared from the Sermon on the Mount. They talked and shared illustrations.

So wonderful to see the Spirit of the Lord teaching them through each other!!

Another ‘preChristian’? shared about how much the worship song “10,000 Reasons” really encouraged him during the week when he was hard pressed.

Please pray that the Spirit will continue to have freedom to teach them the Scriptures, and that commitments would come leading to new births!

We met her at our yard sale to welcome new international students. We also offered classes in English, dinner, and English Bible study, when she heard about the Bible study, she responded

That’s exactly what I am looking for!

Susan (not her real name) was from China; she shared how her grandmother is a Christian, and recently her parents were ‘washed’. She was born in China when there was the one child policy and so when she came along as the second child , her parents hid her by sending her to her aunt’s home.

Praise God,her aunt was a believer as well!

But she is now married and her husband is not interested in God and so she was too fearful to go to a church. But recently, since her parents were “washed” ( baptized), she has had a desire to turn back to God.  So when she saw a chance to study the Bible, she was so excited.

The yard sale was all worth the trouble just to reach her!!!!

“Can you …? Can I …? I mean, how would I pray?” –These are the words from a near Christian, an international friend, you can call him Ray, who has a health problem that he really wants to overcome. He has been with us for three years; he attended a retreat, and church once. I (Fred) found out that God was still calling him!

I shared with him the Lord’s Prayer, that Jesus’ teaching assistants also wanted to know how to pray. He said he had little faith, I told how a man took his sick son to Jesus, and he had little faith too, but he asked Jesus to help him. We had just read of the three men in the fiery furnace in Daniel. He said he didn’t have their type of faith (of following God no matter what), but that if God would only get him out of this problem, then he would follow Him forever.

“Faith comes from hearing”

I shared, and that best comes from reading the Bible, just as he had studied the Daniel story with us. I did pray for him, and I encouraged him to keep reading in order to have more faith, and to keep praying the Lord’s Prayer in principle, for example, that God’s kingdom would be here on earth just as it is in Heaven.

Keep praying for Ray, that God’s kingdom would live in him!

“I look forward to seeing Abraham in heaven some day” was my response to one of my students.  She then asked me the question, “Do only special people get to go to heaven?”  Oh what a joy to share with her that heaven was a place for her too as she read for the first time John 3:16:

God loved the people of this world so much that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who has faith in him will have eternal life and never really die.

This is a student that wants to meet together twice a week — as she is so hungry to learn!

Yes, yes, yes and yes!

were the answers to my question about a Bible study!

We have gotten to know four guys over the last year (or years), and after coming to Charleston, they were all interested in learning about the Bible!

We had a great time in Charleston, but we didn’t have the quality time with many of them that we desired. But we have been praying and they are eager!

Not only that, but a young Christian has joined our advanced English Bible study, a second person (non-Christian) said they want to start in April, and a third young woman ‘found out’ that Mary Kay teaches the Bible, so she asked for Mary Kay to teach her!

We have never had so many opportunities at once! Your prayers are being fruitful beyond our belief!

— that was not the actual question, the real question was more meaningful and less cliché. A young man explained that his grandmother, a dedicated Christian that raised him like a mother, was nearing death. He had read a lot of the Bible to her because she was illiterate, but he himself was not a Christian. He wanted to know:

What can I share with her from the Bible to give her comfort and prepare her for her future suffering and death?

Wow! I certainly asked the Holy Spirit for help! I shared from Corrie Ten Boom and suffering, to God’s judgment of people, both the righteous and unrighteous from Ezekiel 18, and lastly how the thief on the cross found forgiveness (Luke 23:42)

Then he said, “Jesus, remember me when you begin ruling as king!”

His two friends listened actively as I asked them questions about how they think God would judge the world.

Do pray for these Three Friday Friends and our Bible study! I think God desires to touch many through them.

“I stopped reading the Bible when I got halfway through Leviticus,” a new, ardent student shared with me. His friend in China had given him a Bible. So he was very open to reading the Bible with me (Fred). Not only that, but he brought a friend, and then another friend! (I gladly gave permission to this “Cornelius”. )

“Have you ever read the Bible?” I asked the new student. “Well, kind of. My grandmother is a believer, but she couldn’t read, so I read it for her. I didn’t understand all of it though.”

Now there are two eager “Ethiopian” students who want to understand what they read!

Keep us in your prayers!

“I sure hope that my mom can come to know about Jesus.” Our friend has just learned about Jesus this last year, and she is thinking about her mom visiting from China and what will happen. She continued: “My mom is a Buddhist, but it is because it is the only thing they -my parents – have to choose from.”

Grace intervened! Our friend from Korea shared about how her parents were Buddhist and she had prayed for her mom 10 years. But now her mom is a Christian, along with her father, and grandmother! She spread hope!

On another note,

Yesterday, our other friend returned to China. When he was 15 or 16, he tried to read the Bible, but he couldn’t find one. In the last two months he has become an ardent student, of both the New and Old Testament. Before he left, we spent time answering any questions:

“I have a question, how do I teach my small son about the Bible?” Yes, he may not be a Christian yet, but he wanted to share what little faith he had with his wife and one year old son.

We found a children’s Bible with a DVD! He was very excited to get it. Now he returns with two Bibles, one for himself, and another for his wife and son!

Thank you for helping us water these small seeds of faith! Pray that they may mature and bear fruit!