I want to start this report with few prayers which were prayed.
“God, thank you for hearing my prayers and helped us to get the chairs so that we can now be sitting in the church” – these are the words of thanksgiving spoken by one girl named Andjela. Few months ago she saw the need for chairs in the church and prayed for that.
“Jesus, keyboards and chairs are the sign that you have not forgotten us and our church. Thank you for that.” – Caka (13 years old) with much trembling in her voice, but full of joy prayed these words of thanksgiving to our Lord.
In this short period our church has received something new. The whole church rejoices over new keyboard and chairs, but the joy is even greater because we know it is God’s answer to our prayers. Our faith has been renewed because of this and raised our zeal for God and it can be seen in our prayers. This “miracle” has opened our heart to be more assured as we pray to God and as His name has been praised for that.
The problem which started some time before the team from America arrived is increasing, but this problem and the “battle” is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places.
One week before we organized Children’s week we noticed that some children stopped attending the church. Since we were preparing for the team’s coming we did not react immediately and were not aware what was going on. When the Children’s week started we were shocked with the number of children who came, since we know that many more were aware of this event. We expected many more children for we know that children like “Americans”. They (both children from the church and children who don’t come on regular basis) were asking the whole year through when will Daniel, Kate and Bethany come again. The problem which started then and still exists are another group who call themselves believers, but are not. These people have been watching our work for a long time, especially our work with children since the children’s work is most visible.
Since the beginning of the year we had few public performances with children and young people, regular Sunday school for children. During summer we also started to help children with their homework, mathematics, etc. Before going to the church, children gather in Roma settlement and few of our young people go to take them safely to the church, so when bunch of children – two by two without noise or any trouble – go through the settlement, it is hard not to notice them. Because of this few new people started to come. When we asked them what motivated them to come to the church, they said that they like very much what we are doing.
Now we have this problem with this group of false believers. They rented premises in the middle of Roma settlement where they gather together. Almost every day they go from door to door telling people not only what they believe, but lies about us, our church and our work. They see us as a “threat”. They started to waylay children on their way to our church, telling them that we don’t teach them right doctrine and that we are trying to fool them. They managed to persuade some children not to come to our church anymore and now they go to their meetings. They were not able to persuade other children so they talked to their parents. We are very encouraged because those parents, even they don’t attend our church, they stood on our behalf and said that they believed us and that that was the reason why they let their children to go to our church.
Few people who started to attend our church few months ago also stopped coming because the seed of lies has been planted in their heart. Many people from Roma settlement are confused. That’s why we have more difficulties in preaching the gospel and inviting people to come to the church.
This is first time we face this problem and it seems that this is the most difficult problem we ever faced in our work so far. It is very hard and we are very frustrated. We now recognize in our hearts something we never thought about. Our zeal and fire for God was always priority in the life of our church, but now see there is competitive spirit in our hearts, especially among youth. We are praying and trying not to pay attention to that, but it is getting more difficult. That’s why I’m writing to you to pray with us for this concern of ours.
I know that this is “transitional” period which will leave a trace in our lives, for the burden we carry is quite heavy and I’m sure that we will not forget it for a long time. We have not had any contact with them and we don’t intend to.
We told our church members about this problem and warned them to be careful not to fall for lies and provocations, but to cling to the Lord and to show with their lives and acts especially to the people who live in the area where this other group gathers, truth and to fight evil with good.
There are seven families which attend our church so far (eleven grownups), 10 young people and 22 children. (Before this problem arose we had ten families – 15 grownups, 12 young people and 34 children. The consequences of this problem can be mostly seen in the work with children.
This has disrupted us significantly, but slowly we are coming back to what we are called: to preach the gospel and raise disciples. Some six weeks ago we have started studying Colossians with young people once a week for one hour. This is another concrete step toward building workers in our church. We couldn’t imagine how this would challenge David, Pera, Niki and Milos. Since we started to study this epistle (we do it very thoroughly, verse by verse – the materials you have transferred into my computer have helped me a lot) they allowed the Word to mold them, renew them and opened their eyes to see God, church, ministry and mission in a different way. We spend lot of time studying on our own. We find different things and then we share our thoughts and findings. Those truths we find out at our study we share with others too. Niki, David and Pera had opportunity to share them with others few times when we visited house groups. So far this is functioning very well, but we wonder if we will be able to continue with our studies when school starts.
During one Bible study meeting God put in Pera’s heart to go through the streets of our town and pray for the revival. This is big thing for us for we were able to understand what God is saying to us and to do what He asks us to. Pera organizes street prayer once a week. He made a monthly plan for each area of the town. We are all very excited about it. After this revelation we are full of expectations and are more opened for the Lord and His voice. We are aware of a danger that can come out of human wishes, but for every revelation we have God’s Word and we can discern about everything.
We have been very active throughout whole summer (except few weeks when almost everybody was at work). We had our regular services, youth meetings, different activities with children, visits in villages; fellowship with the American team was something very special for us and many other things. This kind of church life has had great affect on our faith and our understanding of God.
We also started to drive people from other villages to the church. Before service I drive to get them to the church and afterwards, before driving them back home, we enjoy fellowship in our home (we talk about the service, ministry, work, etc.). We see that this encourages their spiritual growth. Bojan and Vanja, couple from Jasenice, attend our meetings almost regularly. Vanja even started to pray at our meetings. She started to read the Bible regularly and teaches her children about God.
Since Bojan and Vanja were regular at our services, we visited them only once in August. David was speaking from the Epistle to Colossians that time. Bojan and Vanja are very interested to hear about God, church. They enjoy fellowship with other brothers and sisters. They are trying to change things in their lives according to what they learn from the Bible and thus build positive atmosphere in their life.
We are now focused on this couple because we want to equip them for the work in that village in future. Next step is to invite some people to their home for Bible study and prayer. We are aware that things don’t happen overnight, but we trust our Lord and depend on the guidance of His Holy Spirit. Around middle September we plan to start children’s work in that village in the house of Bojan and Vanja and we hope this plan of ours will work. We want to be ready for everything we might face there. We pray for that and ask you to join us in that prayer.
We attended Roma camp which was held in Soko Banja by the end of the month. It was organized by the church from Leskovac. David, Pera and Milos were there with us. David and I were involved in the worship team. We enjoyed the fellowship very much.
I want to finish this report with happy and good news. God willing we will have baptismal service by the end of September. The whole church is very excited about it, because we did not have a baptismal service for a long time.
May God bless you and keep you.
Yours in Christ
Marijan and Slavica
Youth helpers. A walkway in the Roma mahala. Children who are ministered to by the church in Prokuplje. Crowds standing in the church.
