What’s up doc?
Janvier amène, règle générale, de la nouveauté. Pour nous, ce fut sous la forme de nouvelles rencontres et nouveaux contacts. Nous avons commencé à visiter différentes églises de la région afin de pouvoir discerner où Dieu veut que nous oeuvrions dans l’avenir et pour agrandir notre réseau de frères et soeurs en Slovaquie.
January often brings novelty. For us, it came in the form of new meetings and new contacts. We have started to visit different churches in the region to discern where God would want us to get involved in the future and to widen our network of brothers and sisters in Slovakia.
An event, in January, allowed us to do just that. From the 9th to the 15th, a week of inter-church prayer meetings, where believers from different churches met, every evening, to hear the word of the Lord on particular subjects and commit them to the Lord. Family, authorities, persecuted believers, were all brought before the throne of grace as an assembly, and in small groups. What a blessing it was to go deep in prayer in this manner, night after night, with other believers!
We do our very best to stay aware to God’s leading, to be a blessing for others. And, He does direct! I have a little story to share with you. While visiting a church, I had it on my heart to join, on the guitar, our two friends who led worship (piano and drums) there. Unknown to me, I was an answer to the prayer of the young mother playing the piano. This young woman, mom of two youngsters, leads worship, at the piano, every Sunday and felt a certain discouragement. My involvement that Sunday, was an answer to her prayers from the very eve, where she was asking God for heartening. To see her gleaming face while she shared this in front of all the church was touching, and I praise the Lord for the privilege to take part in blessing this sister.
Learning in order to serve better.
In the last newsletter, I spoke about two young men, Peťo and Miško, who wanted to know more about God. They are not alone. I, also, have at heart to deepen my knowledge about God and the Scriptures! I guess many of you heard it said that the more we learn about God, the more we realize how little we really know about Him.
With that thought and with a desire to be more equipped to do the work of the Lord, I looked at the options available to me for continued Bible education. I wanted to equip myself to better counsel teens and young adults biblically. With the help of our mission director, I finally chose to pursue a masters, online, with a Christian university in the States, Liberty University, in Virginia. In September, I, thus, started to take a couple of courses, while continuing our ministry with youth. For the moment, things are going well, even though it is challenging! Please keep me in your prayer. God willing. I should get done in spring of 2023.
I am waiting on Peťo and the other young man to get back to me with a time they can meet to do more in-depth bible study.
2021.
Our heart thanks the Lord, He allowed us to close the year 2021 with slightly more than our annual support calculated by JET. It is always a vibrant testimony to see the faithfulness of our brothers and sisters who give regularly, but also to see how God puts on the hearts of many to give a unique gift, at the opportune time. All this together allow us to continue serving Him in Slovakia.
We thank you from the bottom of our hearts for being involved with us, in different ways, in our ministry! For 2021, we received, on average, 87% of our monthly support. Our God is faithful and takes care of His children, would it be you in Canada or us in Slovakia.
He holds the world in His hand, we can trust us for the things of today and tomorrow!
Kids keep on growing.
Yes, they do, and it is beautiful to see that they blossom as well. Samuel took an interest in singing. Ezekiel started learning guitar, with help from dad. Rosalie continues to be passionate about drawing and craft. For Laurianne, it is piano that she enjoys discovering with mom and dad. I started to teach them music as a part of our homeschooling program and hope to be able to communicate with them this passion of mine, and share it in playing together at some point in the near future.
We are blessed with an intermittent white carpet, mild winter weather and are thankful for it. The kids are happy that they can do, now and then, snowmen and slide! We always get surprised with everything suddenly being white in the morning, it is always exciting as if it was the first snow of the season!
Philippe and Isabelle