Ghana, West Africa  June 13, 2008

Good morning to all!

Forgive me for not updating you guys in so long! 

No surprise, the Lord continues to accomplish his marvelous work in building his Church despite the gates of hell and their attempt at keeping the lost people caught up in their churches.

The Lord has been very gracious to us, and has seemingly given us a little key in witnessing here in Ghana.

By way of illustration: The other day I was running some few errands around Tarkwa getting more copies of our discipleship book when a gruff and burly police woman abruptly stopped me on a busy street corner with the question, “Where are you going?”  (About this time the proverb about dwelling on the corner of the housetop popped into my head..)

After recovering a little bit from sheer surprise I managed a meager, “Uhhh.. home?”

Without waiting she quickly continued with increasing gruffness, “What are you doing here?”  Without thinking I answered her with a simple, “Well I uh, I’ve come to preach the gospel!”  A bit taken aback she paused for a moment and calming down just bit, commanded me, “well preach to me then!”

So I dove into it!  I began to question her about her salvation and whether she was ready to face the Lord, and like the many people I had talked to before her, she gave the answer as if scripted:  “I go to the [insert one of hundreds of denominations in Ghana, in this case, Methodist,] church!”  She quiet confidently continued to tell me how she prayed and read, bible, tithed etc..

And as I have become accustomed to asking--no matter the person’s status whether it be pew warmer, song leader or senior pastor!--I simply asked, “Is your heart righteous?”

A simple question enough, yet one that illuminates the lack of foundational understanding in a tender way instead of bashing them over the head with all the false doctrines in their denomination.

(That comes later;)

At this point in the conversation this woman who up until this time seemingly enjoyed resembling a brick wall, under the gentle hand of the Spirit, broke down and began to confess that as she has been going to church all this time yet her heart has not come to be righteous.  Without my prodding Nana told me how she has a terrible problem with anger, she loves money and she has a problem with alcohol.  Then, as sincere as I have ever seen someone, she asked “do you have the medicine for me?”

All this time there had been a group of men standing around, who at first were cowering behind Nana, but now stood there incredulously at the night to day change!  

We praise the Lord, this is simply one out of many many similar testimonies.

We have now come to start our second five week discipleship program.  There are four men and one woman from Tarkwa here currently attending, with a few more who visit from time to time.  Most are somewhat young in the Lord, but very eager to hear the Word.  Please pray for Matthias, Seth, Samuel, Mathew and Dora.

We continue to go out evangelizing two to three times a week so please keep us in your prayers!

We just had Brother David Kangni visit us from Germany, he and James were the instruments the Lord used to bring the HVM school to pass.  He is praying about moving back down here to Ghana to further assist with the school.

We are all healthy for the most part!  I was a little sick with malaria like symptoms, however turned out to be nothing—thank the Lord!

I hope you all are doing well and staying encouraged in these last days, you are always in my thoughts and prayers.

Your fellow laborer in the harvest—timo