Behind enemy lines!

Thou therefore endure hardness, as a good soldier of Jesus Christ. (II Timothy 2,3) After living on the mission field this verse has developed a stronger meaning for me. It is true that all Christians are soldiers in the Lord's army and they are all to endure hardness as a good soldier. However, I've learned that the mission field is like a soldier going behind enemy lines. The devil is strong in Croatia. He controls people by their religion, and by the pleasures of the flesh. Now I know he does that everywhere. This has been his method, he doesn't change it because it's been effective.

I must say that I've seen him fight harder here than anywhere else. This is his ground and he doesn't want to give any of it over. Every inch we've taken away from him we've had to battle for it. Every soul that's been won out of his grasp we've had to battle for it.

Just this week we've seen him battling again. One of my memebers, a gypsy member, told me that if one of the kids keep coming on the bus route that he would not come back. How sad is that! In the words of my good friend, Sam Ward, he needs to get over himself! Another way he fought this week was through one of the parents, they don't want their kids going to a Baptist church so they forbid them to come.

This week we've faced a week of battles. We will endure hardness as a good soldier. Dear Christian we are in a war for the souls of men and women; boys and girls. Let us all endure hardness as good soldiers for the Lord Jesus Christ! Let's go behind the enemy's line and take back what belongs to our Captain!

No man that warreth entangleth himself with the affairs of this life; that he may please him who hath chosen him to be a soldier. (II Timothy 2,4)

Day of ministry!

Every Saturday we've been able to play soccer with the kids that have been coming to church. I hope that through this they will see that I care about them. For the last three weeks we've had an average of 15 boys. Today my wife picked up a few of the girls. They wanted to come and watch.

It was good that they came, because my wife will teach them to love Jesus!

It's been hard keeping up with them. I was completely out of shape before I started playing soccer with them. After the first Saturday I hurt all over. After three weeks I still hurt all over. Hopefully next week the pain will reside. On a positive note I'm sleeping really good on Saturday nights!

I praise the Lord that He has put me in the ministry. I hope and pray that I can make a difference in the lives of just one of these boys!

God answers prayer!

I just wanted to share with you a blessing that I received this week. We are getting close to finishing the New Testament in Croatian. For you that may not know we have been translating the Bible into Croatian for the last few years. We are now just about done with the New Testament and I began to pray about finding someone to print it. About two weeks ago one of our supporting churches contacted us and said they had a man out of their Church who was a printer, Bro. Treadwell. Bearing Precious Seeds had sent a press to a church in India for them to use. So the church in India needed someone to run it. Bro. Treadwell left for India to run this press.

He contacted me a few days ago, and said he wants to help us print our Bible for free! Praise God! He told me that he believed God wanted him to do this and had already begun raising the money for the paper that will be needed. I about had a shouting fit when I got the news! Is anything to hard for the LORD?

Back to language school!

I knew I should have paid better attention in school. I never knew learning was that important. As a missionary I've really learned that language is so important. Without it we cannot communicate the Gospel effectively to those who so need to hear it. For the last 10 years I've been trying to learn Croatian, it is a difficult language and mastering it has proven difficult. By God's grace it's coming along and I'm able to communicate effectively the greatest message ever told to these dear souls.

So why am I back in school? The answer is because there is a population of souls within Croatia who have their own language. Now it's true that most of them can speak Croatian, but their mother tongue is not Croatian, but a Romanian dialect. After driving through the village God convicted me and told me to try to learn their language. What a door that could be opened if I could speak to them in their own language. Just imagine how many more people could hear the Gospel. What an opportunity before me!

What about the opportunity in front of every American! How many different language groups live around the Dallas Fort Worth area alone! What if Christians tried to learn Spanish, African, Chinese and etc. I know the cliché, they live in America, bless God they need to learn English, and they should. But why can't we learn their language while they are learning ours so that we could preach the Gospel to them. Immigration is not only a problem it can be a great opportunity! It all depends on how we look at things!

Maybe you can't ever be fluent in another language. I don't think I can be either, but we could learn enough to preach the Gospel to those who have never heard it! Maybe if we turned the television off 1 hour a night and spent the hour learning Spanish or Chinese. How much could we accomplish for the Kingdom of God!

Easter services!

Yesterday was a great day for us in Croatia! We had four visitors, and two first time visitors in our church. This is not counting the kids. Bro. Rich allowed me to preach to the children during the service. I used to do this all the time in America, and I'd forgotten how much I enjoyed it. I think I like preaching to the children more than the adults.




There was no one saved, but all in all it was a great Easter service!