Greetings to each of our praying friends,
Thank you so much for praying for our vacation Bible school last week. To see the people of the church get together to do so much of the work was an absolute blessing to our hearts and minds. Our pirate, Morgan, in full garb each day, explained different stories to each of the children about life aboard the Ship of Salvation with the great Captain, "I AM" as the leader of that ship. He taught his own lessons which he made up from different stories in the Scriptures--Noah, the Israelites, Jonah, Peter (walking on the water to Christ), and Paul who was shipwrecked.
For the last day, Morgan wrote a long story, in addition to the Bible story, in which he told a riveting story to the children about how he had lost an eye and an arm (all week long he had a patch and a hook for an arm) in a great battle several years earlier against a great evil captain named "Apollyon." It was along the lines of Pilgrim's Progress. I read the story and Morgan and his brother Christian acted it all out, complete with sword fighting and everything. Even in losing his arm and eye, Pirate Morgan still was able to summon the strength from his Great Captain to win the battle and send Apollyon running mortally wounded. The children were riveted to the story, even the very little ones.
We praise the Lord that we had about 38 different children attend with a high of attendance of 32. The gospel was clearly given and we pray for the Lord's work now in watering and bringing fruit from the spiritual endeavor of last week. Over half of the children who attended were not children who attend the church, so for many of them, it was the first time ever that they heard the gospel.
Liliana, Juana, Reme, Sarai, Abigail, Karina, Bethany, Morgan, Faith and I all had a good time working with the children. It is difficult since our building and rooms aren't really set up for a lot of children, but the Lord was very very good to us. Susana and Mauricio, who attended our special meetings with the BJ team about a month ago sent their two children as well as a few cousins and others the whole week. Susana has attended three or four of our Wednesday night prayer meetings as well. They haven't been on Sunday yet, but this past Sunday her sister and mother both attended. They both are named Ana Flor. They have another church that they have attended up the mountain but it apparently has mostly disbanded and they are thinking about attending on Sundays. They have many family members who also attend so we could have @20 new people on any Sunday. That would be a wonderful problem to have.
Last week we were very privileged to have Miss Cheryl Baker visiting with us. She came to Mentor Christian School and has taught sixth grade since Mike was in 7th grade and when Faith was in 5th grade. Because the week was so busy, we really weren't able to take her anywhere to see anything except VBS, but even there she pitched right in and helped. The kids even would go up and chatter at her in groups and she would just smile and say, "Oh, is that so. That's great." They really liked her. Unfortunately, she had to leave yesterday, the same day that Bethany had to leave. Bethany was a very big blessing to us this summer. There was so much going on that she didn't get to teach much school, but she helped greatly in everything else that was asked of her. The church family was really sorry to see her leave also. She was able to travel to many houses and church each week to give various children and older ones piano lessons. She was eager to pitch in and had a great spirit. Thank you Bethany for all you did for the Lord and us this summer.
Saturday we had a youth outing. It is rainy season right now and when we have torrential downpours, there is a dry creekbed nearby that turns into a stream. Twelve of us on Saturday took a hike in that COLD stream and went upstream. There are some small and not so small waterfalls and it was an exhilarating experience. They enjoyed it so much, and some didn't bring proper shoes or attire, so they all want to do it again next month for our youth meeting. Along side the creek in several places are some very very tall and wide trees. We noticed those and later back at home after lunch we studied Psalm 1 and noted that those who meditate in God's Word are like trees planted by rivers of water. Please pray that each of us would be daily meditating in God's Word and be like those trees to God's glory.
We were missing a lot of people on Sunday. America delivered their second baby (via C-section) on Saturday evening and they were home by Sunday afternoon. !!!!!!!!!!!! Their new little girl, America Priscilla, is really cute. As many of you know, they were married after 6 years last summer and America says that it is totally different now--Jose wasn't around when Ruben was born, but has been extremely helpful now. Please pray for the Lord to continue to work in their family and to make them more like Christ.
Nico's daughter, Laura, also delivered a baby on Friday. She has no husband and so we are trying to help minister to her in other ways also. She is not saved but has recently attended several of our services as well.
Sra. Gloria continues to struggle with the shingles and now neuropathy from her diabetes. Please pray for the Lord's continued grace in her life.
This past Sunday we were invited by Miss Baker to a restaurant for dinner. We met a Catholic lady sitting next to us who had a terrible experience with a "Christian" group last weekend. There was no gospel given and it was almost like a brainwashing time. We were able to give her the true gospel and she listened and thanked us. Please pray for Rosi as we seek to have more contact with her.
Yesterday, Monday, we were finally able to get our legal residency papers renewed (this has to be done every year.) On our way home in the taxi, we had an excellent opportunity to proclaim Christ again to a man named Antonio that Morgan had previously known. As we said goodbye, we gave him one of our tracts, "Are you a good person, a sinner or a saint," and he promised to read it.
Please pray that we will faithfully and constantly proclaim Christ whenever we have the opportunities. There are so many people in Mexico City that we can come up with excuses as to why we shouldn't witness at different times. Please pray that our goal would be to make Christ known all the time, at each and every opportunity. He is worthy.
Thank you for your prayers. We continue to constantly need and appreciate them.
In Christ,
Mike for all the Goldfii
Wednesday, July 30
Monday, July 21
Goldfuss update (July 21)
Dear Praying Friends,
Thank you for your prayers from the past week. We had an interesting and busy week.
1. Saturday was our monthly men's meeting and we had some very lively and spirited discussion about elders and what they should and should not be doing. We had some problems between some men that came out during the meeting. Pray for the men to deal with those issues in a Biblical and Christlike way. Praise the Lord for the 8 men who attended and for the Lord to continue to raise up men to lead His church here in the future.
2. We had a couple of surprise visitors over the weekend. We had never met them before, but Mr. and Mrs. Daniel Morrell stayed the weekend and were able to be in the cabin. They have a real heart for Jewish people and in our Sunday School hour they gave us a tremendous power point picture display of different places in Israel. Several commented on how that will help them when they read their Bibles and see some of those different places. They were a blessing and an encouragement.
3. Please pray for Marcos, Ruth and Jimena. Today, Ruth's mom was scheduled to have brain surgery to remove a tumor. We haven't heard yet how she did. It is a very intrusive surgery but has become very necessary. Please pray for her as she is unsaved.
4. Today was our very first day of VBS. We were expecting about 7-10 children. We had 26 present and about half of them were children who have never been to church before. What a blessing. Morgan is our teacher this year and he is the Pirate Morgan and he is showing children what the ship of salvation is and why it is needed. It was a very very good first day. We are enclosing some pictures also. There were also about 7 other ladies besides Faith and Bethany to help. Praise the Lord for the help of each person.
5. Tomorrow, (Tuesday), Mikey, Cristiana and Carissa return after being gone for 2 1/2 weeks. They have had a very nice time in Ohio and many from our home church have taken great care of them and spoiled them. They are returning with Faith's sixth grade teacher from MCS, Miss Baker. We are looking forward to her visit also this week. This will be our last week with Bethany here and we and the church people are really going to miss her. She's been a big help.
Thank you so much for your prayers. Please continue to pray for our VBS through the rest of the week.
In Christ,
Mike for all the Goldfuss
Thank you for your prayers from the past week. We had an interesting and busy week.
1. Saturday was our monthly men's meeting and we had some very lively and spirited discussion about elders and what they should and should not be doing. We had some problems between some men that came out during the meeting. Pray for the men to deal with those issues in a Biblical and Christlike way. Praise the Lord for the 8 men who attended and for the Lord to continue to raise up men to lead His church here in the future.
2. We had a couple of surprise visitors over the weekend. We had never met them before, but Mr. and Mrs. Daniel Morrell stayed the weekend and were able to be in the cabin. They have a real heart for Jewish people and in our Sunday School hour they gave us a tremendous power point picture display of different places in Israel. Several commented on how that will help them when they read their Bibles and see some of those different places. They were a blessing and an encouragement.
3. Please pray for Marcos, Ruth and Jimena. Today, Ruth's mom was scheduled to have brain surgery to remove a tumor. We haven't heard yet how she did. It is a very intrusive surgery but has become very necessary. Please pray for her as she is unsaved.
4. Today was our very first day of VBS. We were expecting about 7-10 children. We had 26 present and about half of them were children who have never been to church before. What a blessing. Morgan is our teacher this year and he is the Pirate Morgan and he is showing children what the ship of salvation is and why it is needed. It was a very very good first day. We are enclosing some pictures also. There were also about 7 other ladies besides Faith and Bethany to help. Praise the Lord for the help of each person.
5. Tomorrow, (Tuesday), Mikey, Cristiana and Carissa return after being gone for 2 1/2 weeks. They have had a very nice time in Ohio and many from our home church have taken great care of them and spoiled them. They are returning with Faith's sixth grade teacher from MCS, Miss Baker. We are looking forward to her visit also this week. This will be our last week with Bethany here and we and the church people are really going to miss her. She's been a big help.
Thank you so much for your prayers. Please continue to pray for our VBS through the rest of the week.
In Christ,
Mike for all the Goldfuss
Monday, July 14
Goldfuss update (July 14)
Dear Praying Friends,
Thank you for your prayers before the throne of grace on our behalf.
1. Of the visitors that we had for our special meetings, only Susana and their two children have come again. Please pray as we seek to follow up Don Rene and his wife Elvira also, the Catholic couple who seemed to really enjoy the preaching.
2. Please continue to pray for the church.
4. We had the wonderful opportunity to SURPRISE America with a baby shower. She was just thrilled, and her mother Blanca could not say enough about how thankful and happy she was for all of support that the 20 ladies showed on Saturday. (After 12 years here, we are still amazed by things. Blanca said that many times a baby shower is used to put down the person or for everyone to enjoy many laughs at the expense and humiliation of the mother-to-be! She went on and on about how Christ-centered everything was. Her comments were a great encouragement.)
5. We have missed Mikey, Cristi and Carissa terribly this past week. They have gone to Ohio for camp. The girls had a GREAT first week at camp and Mikey goes today. Please pray for their safety and for them to reflect well on our Lord while they are there, and in their lives always. Pray for the Word of God to have a great impact on them also. It's nice for them to be able to get to hear someone else preach besides Dad.
Also, we knew that they helped in the home and with the ministry, but we did not realize the magnitude of their help in both areas. Getting ready on Sunday mornings is much easier with 6 children than with 3 because they help one sibling get ready---and help with dishes. Everyone has commented to us that they cannot believe the difference in church without them. They help tremendously with the younger children. We praise the Lord for our children. They truly are a blessing from the Lord. We have used some of the extra time to do things with the little 3 children that we did with the big 3 children but that are too expensive (and dangerous being in the big city) to do with all 6. It has been fun but as Matthew put it, "Everything is just really boring without Mikey, Cristi, and Carissa---even the fun stuff." :)
Thank you for your prayers and encouragement,
In Christ,
Mike
Thank you for your prayers before the throne of grace on our behalf.
1. Of the visitors that we had for our special meetings, only Susana and their two children have come again. Please pray as we seek to follow up Don Rene and his wife Elvira also, the Catholic couple who seemed to really enjoy the preaching.
2. Please continue to pray for the church.
- Yesterday we were missing about 20 regular attenders. Even though it is vacation time, we do not need to have a vacation from the Lord's house.
- Please continue to pray for Janet as she is struggling with obeying Christ and dating an unsaved man.Jesus and Analilia have been attending now for about six months. Jesus is the man with rheumatoid arthritis and the one waiting for both hips and both knees to be replaced. Since they are unsaved, there have been some problems with some of the different people in the church. Several weeks ago, she asked if she could buy a cake for her two daughters' birthdays and have it after church this next Sunday. In God's providence, they were not present yesterday and I shared their request with the church. I mentioned that I know that some have had problems with them, but since they aren't saved, we should expect that. So we are planning not just the cake for them next Sunday after church, but the whole church is going to bring dinner and we are going to surprise them with that. Please pray that this gesture would show our love for them and that in the Lord's way He would allow us to reach them with Christ's love and salvation from sin.
- Lately we have noticed some underlying problems between faithful people in the church. We have been doing a series on Biblical and Sinful anger and yesterday was how to deal with Biblical anger from Matthew 18. We basically dealt with the first principle of going to people personally and reasons why we don't and what it takes for us to do it. It was encouraging to have several people say afterward, "That sounded like you were preaching right at me." :-) I wasn't, but praise the Lord that people are applying His Word to their lives. Please pray that they will take care of these issues personally, that those who are confronted would submit to God's Word and that there would be harmony and peace in the church among brothers and sisters in Christ.
4. We had the wonderful opportunity to SURPRISE America with a baby shower. She was just thrilled, and her mother Blanca could not say enough about how thankful and happy she was for all of support that the 20 ladies showed on Saturday. (After 12 years here, we are still amazed by things. Blanca said that many times a baby shower is used to put down the person or for everyone to enjoy many laughs at the expense and humiliation of the mother-to-be! She went on and on about how Christ-centered everything was. Her comments were a great encouragement.)
Also, we knew that they helped in the home and with the ministry, but we did not realize the magnitude of their help in both areas. Getting ready on Sunday mornings is much easier with 6 children than with 3 because they help one sibling get ready---and help with dishes. Everyone has commented to us that they cannot believe the difference in church without them. They help tremendously with the younger children. We praise the Lord for our children. They truly are a blessing from the Lord. We have used some of the extra time to do things with the little 3 children that we did with the big 3 children but that are too expensive (and dangerous being in the big city) to do with all 6. It has been fun but as Matthew put it, "Everything is just really boring without Mikey, Cristi, and Carissa---even the fun stuff." :)
Thank you for your prayers and encouragement,
In Christ,
Mike
Wednesday, July 2
Goldfuss update (July 2)
Praying Friends,
Since Bethany was here last week with the team, we thought we'd let her give you her point of view of the past week and then I'll add a few more things at the end.
Thanks Bethany,
We really had a good week of meetings. We had three new families attend. Rogelio (two nights) and his wife Irene (one night) attend another church but said that they really enjoyed it. Mauricio (2 nights) and his wife (one night) Susana also said that they really enjoyed the preaching, but they also attend another evangelical church in our area. Rene and his wife Elvira attended all three nights, came to the church fellowship on Saturday and also came to the services on Sunday. He told us that they are Roman Catholic but don't feel comfortable in their church at all. It was really neat how a good number of people went out of their way to make them feel welcome and they didn't understand that at all. I mentioned to them that we aren't perfect in our church, but we are a group of people who have been wonderfully forgiven by God because of the Lord Jesus Christ. Please pray for them to return this week, for the Lord to open their eyes to the truth and to draw them to Himself in salvation. We also were privileged to have Cristi and Carissa's friends Cherrie and Atanea. I believe this was the third time they have been able to come to church with us. The big blessing about that was that the two girls' oldest sisters (Brooke and Sharon) also came after making friends with several of the BJ girls at the Saturday get together. Pray for the salvation of all four of these girls.
Our three nights of meetings started at 7 and usually ended about 9, after which we had a church supper each night. We arrived home each night around 11 PM or later. It was a very good time but very exhausting too. The weekend was pretty difficult with all the sickness. Pray for lasting fruit from the past week.
Cherith has gotten sick today with the vomiting and diarrhea that plagued so many. Please pray that she will be able to get over it and that no one else in the family will come down with it if the Lord so wills.
Mikey, Cristiana and Carissa are planning on leaving on Friday for Ohio for two weeks of camp. Please pray that they will be healthy and have safety in their travels. Pray that they will be a blessing and reflect our great Savior wherever they go.
Thank you for your prayers, we needed and continue to need them constantly,
In Christ,
Mike for all the Goldfii
Since Bethany was here last week with the team, we thought we'd let her give you her point of view of the past week and then I'll add a few more things at the end.
Hello!
This past week, we knew that many of you were praying for us. Thank you!
About 11:00 last Sunday night we were waiting at the house for the BJU missions team to arrive. It was raining and it had been a few hours since we had heard from them. As we were talking and waiting the power went out! It had been a long day and we had gotten back late. We couldn't help but laugh. The power going out seemed to add the final touch! We got the homemade, chocolate ice cream out of the freezer and ate it by candlelight. (I put nuts on mine.) We finally decided at about 15 minutes to 1:00 to see if we could get some sleep before they showed up. I took my candle up to my room and had just blown it out when they arrived about 1:20. That was the beginning of the week. :)
We had special evangelistic services Wednesday-Friday and Dr. Saldivar preached an excellent series of messages on Jonah while the college students went with the children for their own service. Each evening everyone stayed after the services for a meal provided by one of the church families. I enjoyed being able to spend time talking with the families in the church while we ate. It was a great way to get to know them better.
On Saturday there was an open invitation for the church (and anyone else) to come to the Goldfuss home for lunch, games, music and a devotional. Because of that on Friday we all worked hard around the house getting everything ready. On Saturday morning, two of the girls on the missions team had food poisoning of some sort--and we still aren't sure from what. We couldn't pin it down on one thing--someone in the church said that it could have been from the pollution. After that nothing really went the way it was planned. :) Those of us who were feeling well. . . and the numbers were dropping pretty quickly. . . set up for the giant lunch.
In the end about 10 of us had to stay home from church on Sunday for one reason or another (double ear infection, upper respiratory infection, food poisoning. (I was part of the latter group.) Thankfully Mrs. Goldfuss was here to nurse us all back to health! She had to give a number of shots. . . I had two. It wasn't much fun for anyone, but she did a great job! It was better to get the shots than to be miserably sick for days!
Please be in prayer for the Goldfuss family as a few seem to have cold like symptoms.
Becoming His Mirror,
Bethany Winchester for all the Goldfi
Thanks Bethany,
We really had a good week of meetings. We had three new families attend. Rogelio (two nights) and his wife Irene (one night) attend another church but said that they really enjoyed it. Mauricio (2 nights) and his wife (one night) Susana also said that they really enjoyed the preaching, but they also attend another evangelical church in our area. Rene and his wife Elvira attended all three nights, came to the church fellowship on Saturday and also came to the services on Sunday. He told us that they are Roman Catholic but don't feel comfortable in their church at all. It was really neat how a good number of people went out of their way to make them feel welcome and they didn't understand that at all. I mentioned to them that we aren't perfect in our church, but we are a group of people who have been wonderfully forgiven by God because of the Lord Jesus Christ. Please pray for them to return this week, for the Lord to open their eyes to the truth and to draw them to Himself in salvation. We also were privileged to have Cristi and Carissa's friends Cherrie and Atanea. I believe this was the third time they have been able to come to church with us. The big blessing about that was that the two girls' oldest sisters (Brooke and Sharon) also came after making friends with several of the BJ girls at the Saturday get together. Pray for the salvation of all four of these girls.
Our three nights of meetings started at 7 and usually ended about 9, after which we had a church supper each night. We arrived home each night around 11 PM or later. It was a very good time but very exhausting too. The weekend was pretty difficult with all the sickness. Pray for lasting fruit from the past week.
Cherith has gotten sick today with the vomiting and diarrhea that plagued so many. Please pray that she will be able to get over it and that no one else in the family will come down with it if the Lord so wills.
Mikey, Cristiana and Carissa are planning on leaving on Friday for Ohio for two weeks of camp. Please pray that they will be healthy and have safety in their travels. Pray that they will be a blessing and reflect our great Savior wherever they go.
Thank you for your prayers, we needed and continue to need them constantly,
In Christ,
Mike for all the Goldfii
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