Our Interpreter Gets Saved!

Ta Ma Ner and my wife

Ta Ma Ner is one of our interpreters that we use in our Karen ministry. Many years ago I met her out soul winning and led her to Christ. However, later she said she was previously saved in Thailand. Yesterday, however, my wife started doing a "Grow in Grace" discipleship study with her. The first lesson is on salvation and Ta Ma Ner made a decision to trust Christ as her Saviour. Ta Ma Ner has helped my wife and I led dozens of her people to Christ over the past several years. Yesterday, she told my wife that every time she was interpreting the plan of salvation for us that she was learning more and thinking about it. Now she knows for sure without a doubt she has a home in Heaven. Praise God!
Today we had 120 in Sunday school and two make public professions of faith in Christ with one following the Lord in baptism!

Nicole getting baptized.

Wanting Us to Go to Thailand

Maw Ker

Many of the people of our church want us to go to Thailand with them when they go. This is the case for Maw Ker who I visited today. He is heading to Thailand next month and wants me to go with him and witness to his family. I told him I cannot go right now, but will be going this Summer sometime. My wife and I were in Thailand last Summer and had a chance to lead some of our church people's relatives to Christ. Such was the case with Hsa Sue's family. (Pictured with my wife.) We met her Aunt and Uncle and led them to Christ. We will soon be launching a new missions ministry out of our church. Part of this ministry will allow us to team with our people and go visit their relatives to lead them to Christ and help them find a church. In some cases we will eventually be working to help establish churches in their area if there is no church. This is the heart beat of our church people and I believe the time is right to begin such an endeavor.

Tam Sue and Hsa Sue

Bouncing Back

Son and Daughter-in-law with Kurdish couple

After a five week stretch of low attendance because of -11 degrees, Christmas, New Year's Day, the Karen New Year, and then the Ice Storm last week, we finally had a bounce back. We had 130 attendance in Sunday school which is almost back up to our 2016 weekly average of 135 a week. God truly blessed us with many visitors and a lot of renewed excitement surrounding a solid day from top to bottom. My son and daughter-in-law had a Kurdish couple come that they met out soul winning. Please pray for their salvation. Our Karen route had a solid day and my Sunday school class had very good attendance. In fact both adult classes had solid numbers...

Karen route having a good day

My wife and a new attender

Thursday Night Returns Coming In

The Loopers' had Maryam come today who they met out on Thursday night soul winning. She is from Nigeria and has lived in America only a couple of years. She felt very welcomed at our church and said, she is glad that she has found a church home to attend every week. The Looper's visitor is living proof that Thursday night soul winning brings returns in.

Overall attendance was down today due to the Karen New Year celebration going in our city. We had only eleven Karen folks attend today when we normally have over 50 every week. Overall the spirit was good and we had one baptized at the invitation.The afternoon found Mrs. Painter and I at a Zomi families house who recently had a baby. They sometimes attend our church and had invited us to come to a party celebrating the birth of Paupi their little boy. We saw many Zomi people there that have often attended our church and several that we have won to Christ. Overall it was a very enjoyable afternoon.

First and Final Sights

We have several pictures from the first sights of 2017 to the final sights of 2016 at Lincoln Baptist Church. We start with a picture of our newest Deacon and his wife. Bro. Miller and his wife have been faithful members since 2009. Bro. Miller who works at the hospital recently got his work scheduled changed so he is always off on the weekends now. Once that happened he was easy choice to nominate for Deacon.

Charlotte Rashidi (from Canada) was visiting her family and attending our services on Sunday. The Rashidi's are originally from Congo and have been faithful members of our church since 2010 when I first knocked on their door. I witnessed to Charlotte at the invitation time and she is already saved.

We had a little bit of a new members reception on New Year's Eve for the Dong Tran family at my house with our assistant pastor's family and the Deacon-elect who took office on January 1st. Dong and his family have only lived in America for one month and just got saved and baptized at our church three weeks ago. They are excited to learn and grow.

Bro. Painter took a picture of him and Bro. Williams out soul winning on the last Thursday night of 2016. We ended up having six saved that night. I praise God for faithful people who want to help spread the Gospel of Jesus Christ to our city!

To start out January 2nd the Dong Tran family came over to the church to paint the basement. They said they wanted to serve and they were serious about it! Please pray for this family to be greatly used to help reach the large Vietnamese community here in Lincoln!