Victory Blog

MUSINGS FROM A MISSIONARY HEART

November 2008

Three Blind Hearts

After some small talk with Salvador, he poignantly asked about the Penya Francia idol. (Every September a festival draws over one million devotees to Naga City who worship, carry, and touch this idol. We stay out of town because it is so chaotic.) Kevin read the Ten Commandments with him from Exodus and Deuteronomy and some additional verses from Habakkuk, Corinthians, and John. Then Salvador told this story. Several years ago, his wife was diagnosed with breast cancer. The doctor in Manila was ready to do surgery immediately to remove the lump. Teresa said, “No. I’m not ready. I want to go home first and think about it.” The doctor consented, but replied, “Be back here in a month.” Immediately upon arrival home in Pili, her mother-in-law asked for one of her shirts. The mother-in-law took the shirt to the Penya Francia idol and rubbed the shirt on the idol. She returned it and told Teresa to wear it. She may have done this several times. After a month, she was emotionally ready for surgery. They returned to Manila. The doctor examined her and took more tests. He said, “The lump is gone. Maybe the first tests showed a lump, but that is probably just ‘human error.’” Salvador then asked us, “How do you explain this? We know she was healed. And we know the Penya Francia healed her. I hear the verses you are reading from the Bible. The Bible says an idol is nothing, but this idol healed my wife! We have an eternal debt of gratitude to the idol!”

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Greetings friends,

I just wanted to send along a note to bring you up to date on a few things.

Our tour to Israel this summer was a great blessing. As some of you know, we also had the opportunity to visit Greece and Turkey. We were struck especially by the cities of Ephesus, Athens, and Corinth and it really brought home the reality of the sacrifice of the Apostle Paul and what he went through to get the Gospel out. It was quite convicting. Our relationships with Israelis are growing stronger each year, and I am hopeful that the Lord will raise up a worker for us in Israel some day. Next year we will be leading a group from Ambassador Baptist College on their 20th anniversary celebration in Israel . Please pray for the Lord’s guidance in all of the planning for this adventure.

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October 2008

Dear Friends,

We are very excited about the prospective future of our ministry in Moldova. In eleven months we look forward to opening the Bible Institute in Moldova, which means we are very busy with preparations and planning. Stephanie and I have been in the States since the end of August raising funds and sharing the blessings of God in Moldova. The Moldovan team has been busy working on the property, preparing classes and lessons, as well as all the work that will go into next summer’s camp.

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August 2008

Dear Friends,

There are three things that I want to report on here in this letter. First, we had a great summer camp. There were nearly 3,000 youth and children attending the camps this summer. Of that number, over 1,200 accepted the Lord as savior. We had a wonderful group of counselors this year. The interesting thing was that about half of our counselors were saved in our camp in past years. The camp ministry has produced much lasting fruit these eleven years.

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August 9, 2008

Dear Friends,

The summer is over and I want to report that we had a great time this year. This week was for Christian teenagers and young people up to twenty-five years old. A few unsaved young people wandered in and about thirty of them were saved. Many of the youth this week made decisions to follow Christ, and we were thrilled with the good spirit in the camp. In all we had nearly 2,700 in attendance this year with over 1,200 professions of faith in Christ.

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July 26, 2008

Dear Friends,

We had another great week of camp here in Moldova. There were 388 teens in attendance in both camps with 177 making professions of faith in Christ. There was a good spirit in the camps this week. God just blessed each day, especially in the evening preaching times.

We have three more weeks this summer. As of today we have the funds for next week, but soon I will have the end of the summer expenses. Please pray about this need. I will need more than $20,000 to finish the summer without debt. It would be of great encouragement to me personally to know that this need was met by summer’s end.

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