I hope the year is off to a good start for you. If it’s not, hope you can chuckle at this:
I hate when people ask me what I’ll be doing in 3 years. It’s not like I have 2020 vision!
I may not be able to see 3 years into the future, but I can see the last few months and they are a showcase of God’s presence and activity in this region.
We work with an Persian fellowship here, and during December we had our Christmas party. It was a large event with 70+ people, where believers could celebrate and visitors could hear the Christmas message. We also had a Persian Santa who comically spouted riddles to the engaged audience, and what can only be described as a feast of mouth-watering Persian food. The picture featured is the picture station that the women set up - they had a blast and it looked amazing! During the event we had a time of prayer, and a visiting Kurdish woman was prayed over for her daughter. While praying, our translator felt power go out from her hands, and asked if the woman wished to accept Christ. The answer was yes! Similarly that month, in our regular service we had the privilege of seeing three men come to faith. One man in particular had been coming for months, saying he adhered to the faith of his country and he would never convert. To see him eagerly stand and pray with our Persian pastor was a miracle of God, and the more I’m here the more it sinks in that God has always been this way. He is a God of miracles, not just sometimes but every day in colossal ways.
We are currently visiting a Syrian woman named Mariam* and walking through the book of John. She seems incredibly open, and it is our prayer that her and her husband come to faith together. In our last visit, our translator shared his testimony of coming to faith from the religion of his home country, and we are praying it plants a seed in the husband’s heart. We are also seeking this year to do Discovery Bible Studies with groups in the Persian fellowship, and are eager to see them grow in maturity and see truth spread. Praise be to God for
the things he has done, the things he is doing, and the things yet to come!