Today in the late morning, the men had the privilege of sitting in the prayer meeting of the pastors of the Vladimir region. These are men who faithfully serve & preach the Gospel in hard places where many Americans would leave because the “numbers validating success” are not there. Thankfully they worry about being faithful than the American idea of successful. They are an inspiration to us to preach the Gospel to all nations. Please pray for the churches in Vladimir (Владимир), Murom (Муром), Sobinka (Собинка), Kovrov (Ковров), Alexandrov (Александров), and Kalchuguna (Кольчугюно), that they would continue to have open doors of ministry and endurance through the hard ground. Pray more laborers would go out to the harvest and even pray of coming over yourself.
After lunch the whole team traveled to the main park in Vladimir and split into two teams to pass out tracks and share the Gospel. Though we saw some walk a ways down and throw away the tracks given to them, we pressed on knowing our job is to share and the results are up to God. A few prayed to receive Christ and we pray, if true, that they would grow in their walks. Yulia (one of the Russians) spoke with a friend from school she hadn’t seen in a while and later her boyfriend called Yulia to make sure the church here wasn’t a sect as they plan to come! Yulia had been praying for her friend for a while so we are excited to see what the Lord will do there. Darrell also had a chance to witness to a Jew who spoke English and “happened” to have a small booklet about the Messianic prophecies found in the Old Testament that the guy wanted to read so Darrell gave it to him. Pray for that man as well.
In the evening, the ladies hung out together while the men traveled over to Roma’s home for men’s fellowship with many from Vladimir as other Calvary churches in the region. Mike was able to share a message from James 5:7-12 and afterwards Tanner led the men in “From the Inside Out” so in just the short time we’ve been here the whole team has been able to use their talents and gifts to glorify the Lord and bless the believers here.
Tomorrow we plan to do more outreach at the park as well as perform the drama for the first time. Pray for receptive hearts as we go out. Thus far no sickness from the team (and yes Darrell has had more to eat than his normal peanut butter and banana diet and he is healthy as well!). Thank you for your many prayers. Our prayer is that you to would go ’til the whole world hears!
~Mike Massey
Calvary Chapel Lynchburg Missions 