November 2, 2013
Greetings from Taiwan:
“And the Lord added to their number daily those who were being saved.” (Acts 2:47) What prefaced this daily addition? If you look back in chapter two, it’s not difficult to see how the church grew daily. There was an empty tomb, there was preaching and the presence of the Holy Spirit, there was repentance from sin (Are we still preaching that?), there was baptism, there was devotion to the Word, devotion to worship, breaking of bread, there was sharing among the fellowship, house to house gatherings and the larger gatherings….Do you find yourself kind of making a check-list in your head as you read this list? “Got that! Check. Yikes! Needs work. Amen!” In short, we see the church BEING the church!
Sometimes being the church is not always easy, and in fact, it is often messy. People’s, even Christian’s, lives are often messy, aren’t they!?! This past week was one of those weeks. Thank you for praying!
It seems I’ve been asking you to pray for several weeks concerning the “8 Miracles of John’s Gospel” booklet. We WILL go to print this week. I have also begun re-working the 3 x 10-lesson “Bridge of Life” series for booklet form. All of these booklets are/will be used by church members in a Bible storying format, with the questions specifically designed to bring out the application of the “thirty must know, must share stories from the Bible.” Please pray for Joanne Hwang and I as we put these booklets together.
Again this year, Baby Jesus has no place to lay his head for our live nativity. Please pray for us to be guided to an ideal location here in Taichung — kind of like the wise men were!
Team Leaders’ Summit will take place this next week, in Louisville, at Emerald Hills. Please pray for all the TL’s from all over the world as they gather for a meeting that takes place once every two years. We chose not to return this year for TLS. Two reasons: we just got back to Taiwan from Gloritrek, and we are preparing the church here for disengagement — busy days!
Sports & English Camp is just around the corner — July 13-19 — of next year. To remind us all of that, and the good things that S & E has and is doing, Team Expansion featured it in their annual “TELL Magazine.” You can read it and even download it at: http://web.teamexpansion.org/#/news/tell-magazine .
Thank you for your partnership with us! May you BE the church this week!
All for God’s Glory Among the Nations,
Dave & Brenda Atkin