Thundering Thursday

We are taking the time today to look ahead to Friday, our final ESL lesson.  We will focus on English before the break, and at 8:00, hope to use this time to for Eleanor's testimony, and the sharing of the gospel.  We will be using the Steps To Peace with God, by Billy Graham.  Each person will receive one, and we will go through the steps together as a group, and then again together at our tables.  Please pray for us, between 5:00 and 6:00pm in Revelstoke, and between 8:00 and 9:00pm in Ottawa.  This will be an effective time to reach our students and give them the opportunity to receive Christ into their hearts.  When we say good bye to them, we will also be giving them an invitation to come to the opening of the new church on February 12. 

Tomorrow, the team from Ottawa will have discussions with the Alpha course leaders (Jennifer, Jairo, Efren and Martha) amongst the Colombians. These four have received the Alpha training in Bogotá, but is still new to the program. The Ottawa group has lots of experience with Alpha and could provide this small group with much needed advice and encouragement. The program introduces the gospel in a way that encourages the participants to challenge, ask questions, and debate our faith.  It is nondenominational course.  Jennifer will be facilitating the course here in Colombia. 

El Redil Sur (Sabaneta) is the  new church plant and will have their first service for the core group this Sunday. The first open service will be held Febr 12. Rick has been asked to preach here on Sunday. As this is the first ever meeting of this church this is a great privilege and responsibility.

Tonight we had Vive El Ingles and it went very well. Dries shared a part of his life story about broken relationships and broken people, and how God, through prayer was able to heal the persons involved and mend the relationships. It led to good discussions (in English) at the tables and we invited people to come for prayer after the session. Several people responded and received prayer.

Praises:
1. Praise God for how He helped open the hearts of the students, not just to learn English, but to be open to our spiritual discussion and testimonies. We realise that everybody in the room are open yet, or even likes what is going on, but we continue to pray that God will touch even those hearts. If not now, those will come to Him later.
2. Praise for the continued health of the team, despite minor upsets here and there.
3. For the English Lessons that has been so well received.

Requests:
1. Tomorrow is going to be an important day at ESL. It is the final day of our week here in Sabaneta and the focus will shift from English to the Gospel during the latter part of the 2 hours session. Pray for open ears and hearts. Please check the times as mentioned above for when we will make the Gospel presentation.
2. Pray that the new church will experience growth from the start.
3. Pray that many of the people will respond to an invitation to visit the church services and church office in the mall. Pray that they will respond to an invitation to join the Alpha Course.
4. Pray for Jennifer, Jairo, Efren Giraldo and Martha Alvarez who will be spearheading the Alpha Course here in Sabaneta. It will be the first time it will be presented in the whole of Medellin, with it's over 4 million people.

Pictures will follow...