Ministry Experiences

The last post, I gave an update on our progress with Spanish. That's the boring part for me. What have we been using our Spanish for is the exciting part.

It is amazing to witness first hand the growth in this city. Bible knowledge is abundant here. Not just general knowledge, but important bible teachings are understood by many. This is because people enjoy reading the Watchtower magazine so much here. Since so few have access to the internet, reading material is actually read here! The people recognize the points brought out in our magazines are from the bible. Everyday, we pass by people as they read the Watchtower. Not only that, people regularly come up to us asking for the latest magazines. This is how I started one of my bible studies.

One young man named Felix literally stopped me in the street and asked me for the magazines. He seemed even more interested then normal so I offered him a study. He gladly accepted. Let me tell you, I have never had such an eager student. We study nearly every day. Sometimes twice a day! That's right, one morning after our study, I asked him when he could study next, and he said that afternoon! He plans on attending the memorial and hopefully he will start coming to the Kingdom Hall soon. He has had a bad experience in the past with another religion so this has made him a bit apprehensive. But he said he likes that he can make his own decision and is not pressured by us.

Felix asks lots of questions too!

Bree is studying with a woman who had studied in the past, but lost contact with her study conductor. They study every week and she plans on attending the memorial as well.

Bree with one of her studies

When we first started in the ministry here, we could barely understand any thing the householders would tell us. But now, it really is encouraging when we can understand our bibles students expressions of faith.

Speaking of the memorial, it is only 8 days away. We are expecting a massive crowd. The location is at a school in a very central part of our territory. It will be a special night for our congregation as we will be splitting in May. This type of change is quite common here with the growth, but sad none the less.

The last I heard, there were 30 congregations in the city. The population is about 150,000. I have heard from various brothers that the ratio of publishers to population is about 1 to 50. But there is still much work to be done. The rate of those getting baptized here is still growing. Not to mention the preaching that can be done in the rural areas!

On Sunday, our congregation made a special trip to a rural area to preach and invite people to the Memorial. We all pitched in the pay for the bus rental and it felt like a school field trip! Even our dear older ones in the congregation went! Sister Thelma, who needs assistance walking went with us. She was sweating a lot as we walked quite a bit through difficult terrain and I asked her if she was ok. She smiled and said she was fine!

Sister Thelma not letting anything slow her down!

We have seen just in our few months here a number of bible students make progress in the congregation. Several have become publishers recently and will be baptized soon. Because the growth is so much here, many in the congregation are unbaptized publishers making progress. Therefore, much training and assistance can be given to these ones.

Beginning the rural preaching day

New Kingdom Halls need to be built as well. We just received news that a new hall will be built in a few weeks and another one possibly in a few months here in our neighborhood. Each Kingdom Hall in the city currently is home to 3-5 congregations!

Our friend Yoshto from Japan is serving with this group that does not yet have a hall to meet in.

Well, we can't write all that is being done, but hopefully this gives you a better idea of what's going on here!