God---Showing Up and Showing Out!

This is Hiroko. Suzuki she is a very polite woman that appreciates the opportunity to improve her English. We love sharing stories about our country and families. She has good language skills, so it will not be difficult to study with her.

News Flash! Guess who wrote the post above? That`s right....Phyllis! She keeps trying to tell me she doesn`t know how to give reports so this morning she took a leap of faith and tried blogging! Phillip, Tammy, and Derek, I know you`re proud of your Mom. God`s growing her in many ways on this journey.

Phyllis and one of her new readers. Phyllis has a couple of readers in the John and Acts books. Those are the more advanced books for readers who are either more proficient in their language skills, have gone through the Luke book, or have some religious background. Phyllis has discovered two or three ladies with very sharp insights about God and his plans for each of us. As I hear Phyllis studying with her readers, I see their relationships growing closer. One woman even brought in pictures of her trip to New Zealand after Phyllis told her about her tour of the same place. You should have heard them giggling like school girls! Ha! Ha!

As I stated before, Phyllis and I have devotional time each morning before we start the day with readers. We prayed to get in more readers and God has answered our prayers favorably! We each have 14 readers now....amazing isn`t it? We actually should have more (the limit is 15 per person), but Jeanne and Marlin have taken on 4 because of their limited English. So that leaves this LST Campaign with a total of 32 readers. Thank you God! He really showed us his trust in us to do his work by sending so many readers. Now, daily we put all our trust in God to step us through each day of showing Jesus to the readers. We asked and God showed up and showed out in bringing us so many tender hearted people!

One woman told me the first day how she didn`t want to hear about God while she learned English. I just smiled and nodded my head. The next day, she shared with me some life struggles and wanted to know if I have or have had any struggles. We shared how everyone has struggles and if we pray and rely on `God`, he shows us how to overcome any situation. Yoko, just looked at me and her eyes became teary. She thanked me and I asked her if I could pray with her about her new beginning with LST (and secretly God). She agreed. We were on the second lesson in Luke about how God can do anything to fulfill his plans. She told me she`s excited to read the next lesson. God....doing his thing!

God never fails us. I have a reader who`s been a Christian since he was 17 years old. He`s now 63. This man is a semi-retired teacher at a Law Technical School here. I was very nervous about working with him because of the knowledge he already has. I sat down and prayed before he came to his reading session Wednesday. God had my back! I think I enjoyed Todayoshi`s session more than the other 5. Yes, I had 6 readers yesterday (It`s Thursday morning here). Todayoshi enjoyed the Luke book because he gave him more basic English practice and we were able to go deeper into information about Luke and some of the accounts he wrote about. My new friend wanted to know if all women in Arlington know the bible so well. Ha! I told him at Woodland West, we love God and his son so much that we all want to know as much as possible about our loving God so the women study just as much as the men. His eyes became as big as saucers! Ha! I threw out names such as Glennell West, Emily Moss, Leisha Norwood, Pat Sayen, Nita McFarland, Ruby Herron, my sister (Ree), etc. etc. We prayed and gave all the glory to God.

Our first party will be Saturday the 21st. It`s a Texas/Western Cowboy theme. Pray that the social will be fun and a good way to help connect the readers to the members of Tomobe C 0f C. That`s what we are hoping God will do is connect these two groups together inorder for the readers to become Christians one day and for the membership to grow.

Today, Jeanne is taking us on a tour of a little shopping area in Kasama (right outside Tomobe). It`s our day off so we get to explore. After having so many readers Tuesday and Wednesday (marathon days), we need a little break.

I will send out another post soon with much information about the Rays. This couple is busy all the time. Their little church is full of action all the time! Marlin is Hallie Johnson`s cousin.

Bye for now....keep the prayers coming.