January 2024 Australia, Brazil, Ukraine, UK, Winter Welfare
AUSTRALIA The amazing response to the Gospel in Perth WA continues; this week brother Mark's swimming pool was again in use as he baptized SHANE, who had been searching for the Lord for a long time. And is very impressed with the idea that our sin is from within and not to be blamed on any external entity. There seem so many in Australia who are searching for the Lord but find "church" impossible to navigate and we eagerly seek to reach them and help them into the true body of the Lord Jesus:
BRAZIL Pleased to report the self-baptism of DIEGO after studying our material online. God bless him in his walk.
UKRAINE Do pray for brother Serhei in Ukraine. He was another victim of the huge bombing and rocket attacks on Ukrainian civilians over the Christmas / New Year period. Our brother is now in hospital looking at his injuries and sent us these photos. The cuts are surgical cuts made to relieve the pressure of debris and shrapnel lodged in his legs. You can see him in his baptism photo in Winter 2018, in freezing cold water.
In other news, sister Ludmila and her husband remain in intensive care with burns in their lungs and many other injuries as a result of the direct hit they suffered, which totally destroyed their home leaving it as a burnt-out shell. These are hard times for our dear ones in Ukraine, especially with the temperatures so low. Brother Mark Hawkins and Duncan will be going to Ukraine next week, Lord willing, on a pastoral visit to do what they can in these and other hard situations. Please pray for their mission.
Carelinks are open to your donations towards this very difficult situation. Sister Natalya, sister Ludmila's daughter in law, writes:
"My dear friends, we don't know how to thank you, and this is unexpected for all of us, we are very embarrassed to accept so much help from you, our dear brothers and sisters, and we are shocked by your noble deed ... you are workers of miracles through God, thank you for helping us. we accept this help from you with great gratitude and we are grateful to God that we have you and that God brought us together, in the name of the Lord, and united us in Faith and love for him and for each other. we cry from joy, we continue to pray, we believe in the best, for the ways of the Lord are inscrutable. God bless you all, you are always in our hearts, and in our prayers, we love you all".
UK
What a great evening in Brixton at sister Saida's home baptizing a very dear elderly lady, KATHLEEN who lives walking distance from Saida's flat. Kathleen is just so lovely; her son was murdered 20 years ago, and she moved to London and turned to the Lord. She just loves the Bible. After studying with the JWs and seeing through them, she wanted to be baptized, but not by JWs, just into the Jesus whom she so loves. So, when she encountered our Croydon Church meetings online, she wondered if we'd baptize her. She lives in a flat with no bathtub, and rarely gets outside as she uses a walker and is on blood thinners which make her feel very cold in the cold weather. Sister Saida lives very near, and she has a bath in her flat. So, this dear old lady was willing to take the chance of allowing Duncan and Daniel, two strangers she'd never met, come to her place, pick her up in the car and drive her to sister Saida's flat- again, a lady she'd never met- and let us immerse her in Saida's bathtub. She took the "risk" in total faith. And, no surprises, there was such joy and relief for her when we had finished the baptism, and all was indeed quite fine, and she knew she was in good safe hands. The Lord knows His people and connects us. And what a joy to see sister Saida so full of the things of the Lord Jesus since her conversion from Islam, her Bible is so full of her notes and bookmarks!
And a great day with the Lord and brother Julian up in Liverpool, baptizing MATT & NAOMI and LINCOLN,
video of Lincoln's baptism at https://youtu.be/uy4pr5JQWmQ
Lincoln was a brave man, he was so eager for baptism, he only had cold water so filled the bath with cold water. We started boiling the kettle to just take the edge off... and it was a very cold day anyway. But he gave up boiling the kettle, he was so eager to be baptized. His testimony is just amazing. He was introduced to the Bible by his fiancée who then died before they could marry. He began reading a verse here and there... but as he says, he went on to read not a verse but a chapter, and then a book... he loves the Bible so much. He's begun telling other people about his new faith, and they call him "the preacher". He loves his NEV Bible with commentary which you can see in his hands here. He just had so much joy to finally be in Christ. We then drove some way to Matt and Naomi, lovely middle-class people in a nice village in the countryside. And again, the same joy as they were baptized into the Lord they had come to know and love. And our joy was even more full with the online baptism of WILLIAM in Scotland, again after connecting online with Croydon Church in a Pub.
WINTER WELFARE
This has been a very hard week for our dear brothers and sisters in Eastern Europe, with parts of Latvia where our brethren are getting down to -27 C. Do pray for them in all the difficulties this causes especially for the older ones in village homes.
PRAYER POINTS
- For our plans to visit Ukraine
- For brother Sergej, sister Ludmila and her husband and others hospitalized after the air raids
- For those recently baptized
- For those in inadequate accommodation struggling with the extreme cold in eastern Europe
With love from your brothers and sisters of Carelinks