Ernest & Carmen

"So little time and so little to do." ~ Oscar Levant ~

Now, if only I could say that for myself! *sigh*

The past week hasn't slowed down at all, but I'm finally getting on top of some of this work. I spent tonight sending out stacks of emails and typing up a few bits and pieces. So I figured I might as type for a bit longer on my blog before I got to bed. At least I feel I've done a fair bit today.

I've spent my first 1.5 years at this church focussing on training people and teaching them to read the Bible properly. There's still a long way to go, but I think it's time that I start doing some evangelism stuff with them. Had a couple of meetings recently for both my high school (TG) and for my uni age youth group (EYF). In EYF, we've decided to do a series of evangelism topics, culminating at a dialogue dinner at the end of the year. We'll cover topics like apologetics, other religions, presenting the gospel, starting evangelistic conversations, and sharing our testimonies. There's lots of work to be done, but I'm looking forward to a change in program.

In TG, we've started our new program this term. We've merged our TG and Sunday School time so that the kids have an opportunity to mingle and get to know each other. Not only is Sunday not so intensive, it'll hopefully foster relationships that will make people feel welcome and encourage them to bring non-Christian friends along. We have plans to run an evangelistic Coffeeshop or something like that next year. But seeing we're just starting this new program, we thought it'd best wait a bit before we organise something big like that.

But that's not all for evangelism. I'm organising an information night for Saltlight Productions in a few weeks. I'm inviting people from churches all over the Sydney south area. Hopefully many of them will come along to hear about this exciting ministry and be supportive of it. There's more that Saltlight is doing to promote their CD, but more about that in the days to come...

And last but not least, I finally went out street evangelism this week at lunch time - after about a 2 month break (due to various interruptions). I was rather looking foward to it despite the butterflies in my stomach. I didn't say all that much, but we (I went with a guy called George Mallos) did manage to have 2 good conversations. I'm definitely going to give it a better shot next fornight when I go again.

<< Thank God for giving me strength to get through lots of work and to handle all the stress. Thank God for the opportunity to serve Him and to proclaim the gospel through my church, through Saltlight, and through street evangelism. Pray for the various things we're doing in each group and pray that God will use it to bring His people into His kingdom. Pray also for John and Daniel whom we spoke to and ask that God will soften their hearts and use those seeds we planted in their hearts to bear fruit.>>