APRIL 2008 UPDATE
Grace and peace,
There’s power in the pure, sinless, holy, victorious BLOOD of Jesus Christ!
We’ve been preaching in the drug rehab center since our last update. Praise God, truly, we’ve been seeing some genuine fruit brought for to His glory. Just wanted to share, real quick, an update from this place, that those of you who are praying for us can lift these things up before the Throne of Grace on our behalf.
MIRACULOUS DELIVERENCE
There is a man named Francisco in this place. He got in about a month ago. Came in as a meth addict (for those who are not familiar with what this is, imagine pure cocaine times five in terms of addictive properties). He was in bad condition. We asked him, “What do you plan on doing when you get out of here”. And he said, “To be honest, I just want to go back and do drugs again”. That’s all he would ever say, even to the directors. I told him that Jesus could set him free, and he began to listen to us. As he sat down in a Bible study with us, he had all these questions. Questions like, “Why are all the thoughts of my heart only evil continually”, etc. And of course we would show him these things in Scripture, and explain to him his depraved heart and need for the new birth through faith in Christ. Finally, he agreed to let us pray for him. I explained to him the reality of the spiritual, of Satan, of demonic bondage, and how Christ defeated those demons, and he agreed to let us pray. As we did, and rebuked those demons, they began to manifest and come out, one after another. The whole process continued for probably about an hour or more.
Before we started, he was a skeptic, and seriously doubted if what we said was true about Christianity. However, when we finished, he was convinced, because he himself understood that demon spirits were reacting in him and coming out by the power of the name of Jesus. When we were done, his countenance was radically changed, and lit up, with a ray of hope in his eyes now. When we came back a few days later, the director, not knowing anything about the fact that Jesus wonderfully delivered this man from demon spirits (all he knew was that we were talking to him), came up to us as soon as we arrived. And he said, “There’s a huge change in Francisco! He would never show any ambition to change, but now he wants to change. All he would say before is, ‘I want to go back to do drugs’. But now he shows hope and desire to change. He would never even want to sit in on a meeting, but has requested to be let off kitchen duties tonight in order to hear you preach”. Praise the Lord!
So we were able to talk with Francisco after the meeting, and asked him, “how have you been, in terms of struggling with the temptation to go back to meth?” And his face lit up! And amazed, he said, “I haven’t even thought about it until you just mentioned it!” You see, it went from something driving and tormenting him continually, and being his only thought and plague all day and all night continually, to not thinking about it once for three days straight! Jesus is still in the business of setting the captives FREE!!! He now shows much hope, much hunger for the Word of God, and much desire to keep seeking God and see his life transformed. Please keep him in prayer, that a genuine miracle of regeneration be wrought out within his heart by the Holy Ghost. He is already a totally different person, but pray that the Lord would have His perfect work and save him to the uttermost.
A CONVERSION
There is another man that the Lord has been working on. When we first started preaching, the Lord just opened his heart to receive the Gospel. Acts 16:14 talks about how the Lord opened Lydia’s heart to receive the Gospel, and that seems to be exactly what has happened here. He has rejected God his whole life. Never read the Bible, nor did he want to. He had a sister who is a Christian, and preached to him a lot, but wanted nothing to do with it. But somehow, he ended up in this rehab center, and says that when we preached the Gospel, the Lord birthed it into his heart to receive the Word and be baptized. Then all of a sudden he found himself hungering after God for the first time in life. He was the first one to ask us of his own accord, “What do I have to do to be baptized”. We spent about 4 or more hours with him earlier on Sunday going through the Scriptures, finding out where he’s at, and it’s amazing. He has been in his free time recalling every single sin he’s ever committed that he can remember, and renouncing them one by one, and asking for forgiveness. We talked about the nature of true repentance, of faith toward God, of baptism, of what it means to follow Christ, and live a life of carrying the Cross, and more, and he seems to be as sincere and ready as anyone can get and by all evidence, appears to have a genuine work of grace within his heart. And he’s hungrier to know the Bible than almost every Christian I know. So Lord willing, we will be moving forward to baptize him in the next week as the first baptized convert in Mexico through this work to the glory of God. Pray that God’s work will advance unhindered!
A DRAWING OF THE SPIRIT
The director guy, Marco, who I mentioned last update as being heavily convicted, is still in a drawing process it seems. The Lord is definitely working on his heart, and he’s changing, but hasn’t come to the place of absolute surrender to the will of God for his life and baptism into Christ. He loves to hear us teach God’s word, is hungry to learn more, is eager to read his new Bible that we were able to give him. He also seems to be growing in the knowledge of God, even if slowly. The problem is that he is always incredibly busy, taken up with the cares of this place. He’s such a precious, caring soul. When we left recently, we were surprised to come outside and find that while we were in, he decided to wash Sean’s car. Please pray that the Lord will continue to work on Him and give him time to study his Bible and truly both find God, and be found by Him.
As the Father knoweth me, even so know I the Father: and I lay down my life for the sheep. And other sheep I have, which are not of this fold: them also I must bring, and they shall hear my voice; and there shall be one fold, and one shepherd. (John 10:15-16).
In Christ – Josef
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