I’m excited to share with you the news from Warsaw again. In late October, our church celebrated “Thanksgiving” or, as it is also called sometimes “Harvest Festival.” Brother Leonid Borisevich from Rivne visited us again, that’s why it has doubled our joy and made it more musical. The Lord sent us many guests, both believers from other churches, and complete unbelievers from the world. There were so many people that we did not have enough chairs for everyone and, in general we could hardly fit in our worship room!
I’m pretty sure that thankfully to these events, our church will soon become even more known and recognizable in the city. During the celebratory feast, everyone could share something edifying for the whole church – song, poem, testimony, thanksgiving to God, prayer, etc. Many participants did this gladly by glorifying the Lord and encouraging others. It was a wonderful time of enjoyment and merry-making of God’s children right in front of His face!
However, the holiday will not last forever – the working days are around the corner anyways. And, the Lord grants His goodness to us in all that, too! This month I had the opportunity to help our sister’s unbelieving husband to do renovation in their apartment. He is drawn more and more to God through his wife, through children, through the church camp, and this time through working together. It was interesting to me to find out his viewpoints on different things by cautiously asking him some leading questions, making his heart melt first and then bringing him to the saving gospel. But it had to be done very gently, taking into account his recent unfriendly attitude towards believers. I constantly pray for him and believe that only God can crush the heart of even such a stubborn and unyielding man!
Lately, we had another event in our church that is really worthy of your attention. Vasily Khripunov, our brother from Sacramento, came to visit us, too. He conducted a seminar on “Evangelism, Mission and Mentoring.” After all, he preached on Sunday, and as he does pretty much all the time, he played his accordion and sang. Brother Vasil has brought us from America a very valuable present, which we could not find in Poland – figures for the flanneograph. As many as three large folders! This is an excellent guide for our Sunday school, which we still run with God’s help.
I’d like to ask you to pray also for our Polish ministry, which takes place on Wednesday evenings. Please ask the Lord to give us more people willing to listen to the Word and those eager to share the Word with others. And, please pray for our new project – “Courses of Intensive Study of the Polish Language,” which is important one and we are about to start it soon. We already have a teacher and a room, and there are already four people willing to study.
Blessings to you, dear friends!
Lovingly,
And with my prayer for you,
Your brother Alexandr Ilyin.
