Visitors include a family of four who are members of the church in Nicaragua. They also include a family of four that is being reached out to, and four men who are coming consistently. A couple from a nearby church is considering placing membership with us.
School resumed during the second week of the month. This usually affects attendance.
Combined contribution (AM + PM) for the month was $1430,99. Expenses went up to $1160,80.
A 14-year-old girl was baptized on February 2nd. She is the result of God’s work through the Northwest Bible Study. She is a young girl who emigrated last year with her mother from Cuba. Her mother is also studying with us. Instrumental in this conversion was my daughter Ester who reached out in a significant way to this girl and helped her feel at home with the rest of the members.
A 47-year-old man was baptized on February 21st. He is also from Cuba, but he has lived in Costa Rica during the last 15 years. This man happens to be a music professor in a Heredia high school. We are looking forward to his contribution to improve our singing. Even before he was baptized we had asked him to teach us music lessons to improve our singing (see video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dSHmQS0haeM) We continue to do this on Saturday at 5:00 pm, before the Leadership Training session. This baptism is also a result of God’s work through the Northwest Bible Study.
A 50-year-old Costa Rican woman was baptized on February 28th. She is the result of God’s work through the efforts on three ladies led by Damaris García (widow of Freddy Astorga). It is great to see members of the church learning to do evangelistic work.
The three people baptized are now being grounded in the faith by the same people who brought them to the Lord. We continue to reach out to them so that their needs continue to be met.
The group “Men with Problems” continues to meet every week. There was an average of 6 men present. We created a support net by means of our cell phones. We keep in touch during the week to ask for prayer during times of need. Prayers are answered as we see the Lord’s peace that transcends all understanding guarding our hearts and thoughts in such times, when otherwise we might have lost our sobriety. Now we are working on ways to implement the following teaching:
“… speaking the truth in love, we will in all things grow up into him who is the Head, that is, Christ. From him the whole body, joined and held together by every supporting ligament, grows and builds itself up in love, as each part does its work” (Ephesians 4.15, 16)
We are learning to work as individual parts that are joined and held together. The goal for this growth is stated in verse 13 as “the whole measure of the fullness of Christ.” So, when we get together we speak the truth in love, and truly help one another towards that goal. Only people who truly attain "the whole measure of the fullness of Christ" or are truly making progress towards that goal, can actually inspire others to want to listen to the gospel and become members of His church.
During the days of Walter’s departure, Michael Montalvo, Bammel’s Connecting minister, has been here, and it was exciting to find out that we are essentially doing the same things as ministers (we are essentially obeying the same Master). It was great to get to share a little bit about the work and how we felt.
We also had the visit of David Jones, the youngest of Walter's sons. His participation in the funeral services was moving, everybody was touched by his remarks regarding how much Walter had influenced him to give him direction in his life. David made a significant contribution to this work out of his appreciation for this ministry in which Walter was involved so highly. He also helped Myrna get her vehicle situation solved and took care of her online banking.
