It’s A New Year With New Opportunities!

Dear praying friends,
“Bonne annee!” Happy New Year! We hope this finds you well and thanking God in advance for what He will do in 2020!

We had the great privilege of being together as a family for the holidays. Words cannot describe what we were able to experience as a family; to see the commitment of each child to make an effort to be here, to see how God has provided for them, to see how they have grown in their walks with the Lord, to have the great joy of seeing our grand-daughter (and for our daughters, their niece!) for the first time, to relive our family Christmas “traditions” again, well, It is understandable if we have a touch of the “after holiday blues” this weekend!

It occurred to me that we did not give an update about our Christmas program. Once again God intervened in so many details. The kids performed wonderfully after we had almost given up hope on that. There were nearly 15 people who came because of invitations we had distributed around town (as opposed to none the previous 4 years!). *** A side note; I went back to the building the next morning to make sure everything was in order. The service man was already there and thanked me for cleaning up so well. “The only thing,” he informed me, “was that you forgot to lock the building!” My heart sank! I guess that is why we keep up our policy with Angel Insurance which is available only to God’s children with special clauses for simple folk! Psalm 116.6 KJV

Some of you prayed for P and S’s marriage 18 months ago, as they were not fully adhering to our counsel to build their relationship on principles from God’s Word. P called on Monday saying they were finished, and divorce was imminent. We went to lunch and P admitted he had gone back to dabbling in the occult. I told him what Jesus said in Matthew 12 about the demon that is cast out and when he comes back, he finds a clean place to live and invites seven other demons to come with him. P was visibly moved. Yesterday I went to read the Bible with him. We started reading in John 1 and when he came upon the name of Jesus “who takes away the sins of the world” he began to stutter. He apologized and said he was having trouble seeing the passage and speaking. I told him this was normal because demons tremble at the name of Jesus and they did not want him to say His name. P said the sorcerer who cast the spell said nothing would be able to counteract it. I assured P that she was wrong and by the power of Jesus’ blood, he could be free from Satan’s power. His text messages today show He is reading the Bible and excited about what he is reading. Please pray for P. Please pray that God heal their marriage. I have committed to reading the Bible with him two times per week.

We continue to pray that God would raise up godly men who would be leaders in our church. We have spent a lot of time and energy in the discipleship phase the last 3 years. We are thankful for the growth we have seen but we do not yet see the spiritual maturity needed for spiritual decision making in the church. Sonya and I believe we need to refocus our efforts to reaching out to make friends and take them to heaven. We want to finish well.
1. We are very sorry that one of Sonya’s students will no longer continue English lessons thus cutting off contact with the family. The little boy was also regularly reading the Bible with Sonya and had trusted Christ as his Savior. Please commit him to the Lord for spiritual growth in spite of the circumstances.
2. Sonya has been asked to be president of the music association that has immensely helped our girls. Although not a big time commitment, it requires that she be more precise with the details instead of leaving administrative stuff up to others.

Thank you so much for standing with us in this ministry. We are very grateful for your part in praying for us. May God bless you richly through our Lord Jesus Christ,

Kenton and Sonya