Dear praying partners,
It’s been a while since we sent out one of our prayer updates. We thank you for your faithful prayers anyway. We have been in the totally different (for us at least) school routine at Mentor Christian School. Each of our three oldest, Mikey, Cristiana and Carissa, all made the honor roll in their classes. Even Cristiana, is doing very well in all of the subjects that she can take. It is still very difficult for her to read on her own, but when others read to her, her comprehension is excellent. Her dyslexia has helped her to overcompensate by observing and listening— probably just to survive. She gets high A's when asked questions verbally. Cristi has done much of her work in school with the help of high school students who read to her while she answers the questions. We do see some small improvements in her reading skills also. We praise the Lord that she takes these challenges very maturely and seeks the Lord for help. Please continue to pray this year that it would be a help to get Cristi where she needs to be or at least well on her way there. Thank you.
We have been very busy in this first quarter of the year. With all the different changes, we have enjoyed being at our home church, Bible Community, for a good number of services. We have spent a lot of time getting our presentation put together for furlough— slide presentation, prayer cards, children’s poem, messages, etc. Faith has been overseeing all the kids’ activities and homework for school, has had the chance to speak for several ladies’ groups that are closer to home, and has been a traveling trooper on the weekends that we have been out in other churches. Mike has been to a pastors’ conference in NY, spoken several times in school chapels, tried to get caught up with some correspondence, taught several Spanish classes, helped in a Bible institute, etc.
We both are preparing a group of teens from Bible Community along with our three oldest children to go on a missions trip to Puerto Rico to help the Pfaunmiller family for a week in July. It is interesting to be on this side of the mission team experience after being the missionary that has received teams. Pray for us to have wisdom to help these young people. We consider it a challenge and a privilege to be able to guide these teens as they seek God’s will for their lives. The team will be from July 3rd to July 10th. It is a blessing to be able to help our home church in this way.
We have just finished putting our schedule together for the rest of this year. There is only one church left to schedule. We have 26 different churches that support us and we will be visiting 5 others churches also. This makes for a lot of traveling just about every weekend. We have been traveling up in the Erie, PA and Mayville, NY area for the last month visiting several supporting churches there. The good thing is that this area is actually closer to Mike’s mom’s house than many of our churches in Ohio. It is a challenge for the kids on Monday morning when we get back each Sunday night around 11 PM. Pray for the children as the busy schedule never ends. We praise the Lord that they are plugging along and have wonderful attitudes about serving the Lord together as a family.
We have heard excellent reports from Mexico of the church being faithful. Three new families have been faithfully attending. Praise the Lord! Ruben and Heidi Zartman have been doing an excellent job! One sad note is that our friend, Marek, who used to attend our church very faithfully, apparently committed suicide several weeks ago. Marek was Ruben Zartman’s best friend when Ruben was growing up in Mexico City. Ruben is now our furlough replacement. Ruben had about 8 or 9 opportunities to preach and present the gospel during the all night vigil and other times with Marek’s family who is unsaved. You can click here to read one of Ruben’s weekly updates to let you know how things are going from his perspective in Mexico City.
Thank you so much for praying,
We depend on you and thank you for all you do for us.
In Christ,
Mike for the rest of the Goldfii
Wednesday, May 3
Update from Ruben Zartman on the Work in Mexico City
Hello Everyone,
Attendance was a bit down on Sunday, but I felt that we had a good service nonetheless. Sra. Ofelia, of whom I have written before, brought an unsaved niece, Sonya Barragán. She is married to a Chilean man, but hopes to be able to come while he is away. As we were taking prayer requests tonight this woman was mentioned, and it seemed that the fact of her husband's chilleanness suffices as an explanation to people that she can only come while he is away. I rejoice in knowing that our God can save even a chileno. Sra. Ofelia also brought a younger lady called Alma, this evening. Supposedly she has just been saved (I got the impression that that was this afternoon) and has a very big but unspecified problem. I am planning to go see Alma tomorrow. Please pray about that, as well as for Sonya's salvation.
Please continue to pray for Silvia and Tere (two sisters, spoken of in Update # 5). On Sunday Silvia was in tears as she was telling me about all the turmoil in her family, and the burden she is carrying. Her son did something to her granddaughter, and somebody called the police; she arrives home, knowing nothing, and there is all this turmoil; her husband, in the meantime, had engaged in the tremendously useful activity of coming out to the bus stop to wait for her. As I said previously, she is a new believer and is under a huge amount of strain.
Tere was able to bring two of her grandsons to church the other Sunday (another one is a pretty open and aggressive homosexual) and seemed very pleased that I invited them to play squash (as soon as I find the squash court supposed to be located near the church: I looked today but it was not on the street I'd been told). Having spoken to several people about this, I think there will be much fruitful opportunity to spend time with kids and teens in that setting, and their relations seem very thrilled. Please pray that the times I have with various young people in the avenue will bear fruit. I don't expect them to be helped simply by standing in a court with me and hitting a ball. It is rather my hope that I will be able to establish and develop a relationship with them by hanging out together in a relaxed environment.
I have never before run into so many problems in so many families. The vicious cycle of sin has been unchecked for too long here. Please pray that God will work through His word to transform these situations, to redeem many of these young people out of the bondage of sin and enable them to establish godly families. I need prayer as well. I have never been so called upon to deal with so many extremely trying and complicated situations from a Biblical perspective. At the same time, though, that these people bear burdens that I can hardly imagine, they are filled with humility, gentleness and concern for others. Just tonight a couple ladies were assuring me of how highly they think of Heidi and how much they care about her and miss her when she isn't there, even if their communication with her is still limited by language constraints. The more I learn both of the burdens that these people carry and of what they have in their hearts, the more I am convinced that being useful to them in even a small way is an exceedingly great reward.
Ruben
Attendance was a bit down on Sunday, but I felt that we had a good service nonetheless. Sra. Ofelia, of whom I have written before, brought an unsaved niece, Sonya Barragán. She is married to a Chilean man, but hopes to be able to come while he is away. As we were taking prayer requests tonight this woman was mentioned, and it seemed that the fact of her husband's chilleanness suffices as an explanation to people that she can only come while he is away. I rejoice in knowing that our God can save even a chileno. Sra. Ofelia also brought a younger lady called Alma, this evening. Supposedly she has just been saved (I got the impression that that was this afternoon) and has a very big but unspecified problem. I am planning to go see Alma tomorrow. Please pray about that, as well as for Sonya's salvation.
Please continue to pray for Silvia and Tere (two sisters, spoken of in Update # 5). On Sunday Silvia was in tears as she was telling me about all the turmoil in her family, and the burden she is carrying. Her son did something to her granddaughter, and somebody called the police; she arrives home, knowing nothing, and there is all this turmoil; her husband, in the meantime, had engaged in the tremendously useful activity of coming out to the bus stop to wait for her. As I said previously, she is a new believer and is under a huge amount of strain.
Tere was able to bring two of her grandsons to church the other Sunday (another one is a pretty open and aggressive homosexual) and seemed very pleased that I invited them to play squash (as soon as I find the squash court supposed to be located near the church: I looked today but it was not on the street I'd been told). Having spoken to several people about this, I think there will be much fruitful opportunity to spend time with kids and teens in that setting, and their relations seem very thrilled. Please pray that the times I have with various young people in the avenue will bear fruit. I don't expect them to be helped simply by standing in a court with me and hitting a ball. It is rather my hope that I will be able to establish and develop a relationship with them by hanging out together in a relaxed environment.
I have never before run into so many problems in so many families. The vicious cycle of sin has been unchecked for too long here. Please pray that God will work through His word to transform these situations, to redeem many of these young people out of the bondage of sin and enable them to establish godly families. I need prayer as well. I have never been so called upon to deal with so many extremely trying and complicated situations from a Biblical perspective. At the same time, though, that these people bear burdens that I can hardly imagine, they are filled with humility, gentleness and concern for others. Just tonight a couple ladies were assuring me of how highly they think of Heidi and how much they care about her and miss her when she isn't there, even if their communication with her is still limited by language constraints. The more I learn both of the burdens that these people carry and of what they have in their hearts, the more I am convinced that being useful to them in even a small way is an exceedingly great reward.
Ruben
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