Praise the Lord!

We are praising the Lord this morning for answered prayer! We praise the Lord for His safety in bringing Dave home, for the seeds that were planted and for His word that went out, for all of you who have prayed for us!

To God be the Glory, great things He has done....

Great things He hath taught us, great things He hath done, And great our rejoicing through Jesus the Son;
But purer, and higher, and greater will be
Our wonder, our transport when Jesus we see!

We thank you again for your prayers! Please continue praying for these lost souls!

What a Day!

Each and every one  of us has the opportunity to share Christ with those around us. We do this directly or indirectly… Sometimes, we even get to see a little glimpse of how God might be using the seed we planted. What an encouragement and a testimony of God's grace to us!

Today was Dave's last full day in Rome. He was at the Vatic*n for awhile and it started to rain. As he was taking cover, he saw a man he had met last December. This man had just returned last week from a trip to South America. Dave had given him a Spanish John and Roman in December but the man, Antonio, said that he was reading an English Bible, a Good News translation. Dave had an Authorized KJV Bible with him and was able to show Antonio that Acts 8:37 was missing from his translation. He also showed him that "the blood" was gone in Antonio's Colossians 1:14. The last half of Mark 16 was also gone from Antonio's Bible! Antonio was amazed! Dave gave him the Authorized KJV that he had with him.

Thank you for praying for Antonio! Thank you for praying for Dave! Here is a post from last December. There is a picture of Antonio. http://travelinpilgrim.blogspot.com/2015/12/a-face-to-name.html

Do you remember Ali? Dave has been able to meet with him several times on this trip as well. Please continue to pray for his salvation. Dave has been a good listener, but Ali needs Jesus.

Dave had 90 tracts left at the end of his day today and so he decided to finish by placing them in some apartment mailboxes where he had never been. He noticed that there had also been some JW doing the same thing just before him. Praise the Lord for His direction and perfect timing! Please pray that the Holy Spirit would reveal TRUTH to the people in this apartment building.

Please be in prayer for Dave as he travels ALL DAY tomorrow. Please pray for safety and for physical strength. Please be in prayer for our family over the next few days especially. Dave has said he is exhausted and there will definitely be a time of transition for all of us.

Again, we thank the Lord for you and for your prayers!

Tuesday

While many of us are sleeping tonight, Dave will be getting up and getting a head start on the day!

Please be praying he has a productive day Tuesday. This will be his last full day before heading home. As much as we'd love to have him here, we'd REALLY love to see a soul saved! Please pray God will direct each step Dave takes and that many seeds will be planted!

We appreciate each prayer that has been prayed on our behalf. May God richly bless each one!

Birthday Blessings

Today was Dave's birthday!

The report he gave for today was that he was able to go in to Rome on the 6:45ish A.M. train and stay all day long.

Praise the Lord he had the strength!

Before he left, he grabbed a lot of the little Italian tracts we have. Good thing, because there were Italian youth from all over the country gathered near the V*tican 'holy doors' for some kind of special event happening today. He was able to pass out quite a lot of Italian tracts to them.

His time in Rome is running short and he would like to make the most of every opportunity. Please be praying for guidance and direction to be just where God would have him be most useful. Please pray for receptive hearts and for souls to be saved through the truth of God's Word given to them. Three days left and Dave has about 250 tracts left. This is not very many, but it only takes one to make a difference in potentially countless lives.

To God be the Glory!

Reality

Today I sat in the Walk-In clinic with my son as he received stitches for an injury at work. It wasn't in my plans for the day.

This afternoon, I am sitting in the local laundromat while our clothes are being dried because the dryer element has gone out in our dryer. I wasn't planning on this either.

Dave didn't go in to Rome today. He has been so exhausted that it was necessary for him to rest. Had he planned this? No, but it was a necessity.  We do what needs to be done because that's just reality.

What is the blessing from all of this? It's not getting us down! It is what it is and "only by the grace of God, go I"! How much has the Lord already blessed us with that we don't deserve! I'm sure Satan would love to see these affect us in a negative way but God will provide, our child is still alive and Dave can start fresh tomorrow!

As you're praying today, please pray for Jose. He needs the salvation of the Lord and He now has the Word of God to show him how to get it! Thank you for all your prayers!

Pressing On

Who likes to give up in a race? Who sets out to do that?! I have yet to hear of anyone starting a race just to say they had the opportunity to give up in the middle of it! …. and yet, there are those that do give up. Something, somehow gets a hold of them.

At this point in the race…. press on! That's God's encouragement to me, to Dave, to all of the prayer warriors lifting us up… Keep going, keep up the work, keep praying!

I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God 

in Christ Jesus. 

Phillipians 3:14

This man was given a John and Romans in Italian. He's sitting and reading it while on the train.

Dave says that the neat thing about being at the Metro (Subway) stop and passing out tracts is that you never know who will come out of the tunnel! Or how many!  

The picture quality is not the greatest on these pictures. We apologize! 

Prayers Answered!

Dave ran a good race yesterday!! More importantly, tracts were passed out to many spectators. One man at church made a comment about being creative. Yes, sometimes we have to get out of the box. Thank you for your prayers!

Dave had some thoughts of his own to share....


As I was running the marathon yesterday, I heard Queen and 'We are the Champions' playing around 11 miles or so. People were singing and running. Freddie Mercury, of Queen, died because of an Aids related illness. He was a sodomite. Some claim that this popular song was a song of triumph for sodomy. I began to think, 'They almost have their wish. They have taken control in this world.'  Then I thought, 'They can have this world, I don't want it. I'm  pressing toward heaven!' Ephesians 2:2.

9 miles later, I heard AC/DC and Highway to Hell. I remembered a time when, as a teenager, I went to a Lutheran camp. We were so proud to be playing this song on someone's 8 track. I am so thankful for how God has saved me and continues to change me. Praise God. He is so good. And I also thought about these lost souls singing to these songs, having no clue just how lost they are in regards to this life and eternity. They need Jesus.

God changes lives. He changed mine. He continues to change me. And I am so thankful!

Even though I make mistakes, He is faithful and merciful. His strength is made manifest in my weaknesses.

2 Cor 12:10 Therefore I take pleasure in infirmities, in reproaches, in necessities, in persecutions, in distresses for Christ's sake: for when I am weak, then am I strong.

Holding Down the Fort

This is our little bit of home. We grow here, learn here and sometimes fight our battles here. Battles to keep a marriage strong....battles to keep our kids from going the way of the world, but today was a spiritual battle for me. 

We're holding down the fort here. We're taking care of needed things that come with owning a home, raising a family, raising food to feed that family..... Life goes on but in my mind I wondered why WE had to take care of it all...a selfish thought, really! For a brief moment, while things were going a bit sour and the enemy had me down, I thought to myself "Why do I have to take care of all this while Dave is in Italy?" See how sinful I am! But it was just one of those fiery darts the devil likes to throw. The battle may still go on but we're holding down the fort. 

Dave has his battles in Italy as well. Please pray for him Sunday. While we're all sleeping, he'll be running a marathon and passing out tracts while he's at it. When we wake up and head to church, he'll be recovering. It's when you're tired emotionally, physically that Satan likes to get you. Please pray that Dave keeps his armour on!

We ALL appreciate you helping us in the battle! 

The Popes Way or God's Way

The pope declared 2016 as a year of Jubilee. He opened four doors in December 2015 to kickoff this special year. Anyone that wants special indulgences simply needs to pass through 4 different doors of churches found in Rome. 

In November 2015, God confirmed to me that He wanted me to pass out tracts during the first week of Jubilee. God lowered the price of the airline ticket to a price that I had been praying about. During that December trip, I prayed that God would confirm our annual Spring trip. There were enough wonderful experiences in December that I decided that the Spring trip was confirmed. I also prayed that the door would close if I wasn't supposed to be here. 

I'm here. The door didn't close.

Thank you Lord for using me.

He's Hit the Ground Running!

Praise the Lord that Dave has arrived safely. He had a good flight and except for an inflamed back and legs, he's felt fine. Thankfully, He brought some ibuprofen. Please be praying that he recuperates well before Sunday… the day of the Rome Marathon… more on that in another post.

Dave has hit the streets of Rome with no time to waste! Please be praying for John, a man from Poland. He was very happy to get a John and Romans in his own language! Rev and Lisa are a couple from England. They are not saved but they were willing to take some DVD's. Adesso is a man from Italy and he threw his tract in the trash but Dave was able to talk with him after that and Adesso took a DVD. We pray that God would use these tools to reveal more of Himself to them.

We are well on the home front. Our children have good attitudes about all of this and we are making it a point to pray for dad often during the day. We thank you for your prayers for us as well!

Italia!

And he's off! Our prayers go with him and he's not alone! What a comfort to know the same God goes with our whole family....on two different continents!

God's Ministry will Prevail

I sat in our church this Resurrection Sunday and couldn't help thinking about what last year was like… and the year before that… and the year before that…. It has been several years since we were here in the States on this day. God has His reasons and we trust that.

We have been praying that we would all be able to go to Italy this April. So far, that doesn't look like it will happen. God has His reasons for that too and we trust HIM.

God's Ministry WILL prevail. I would like to tell that to Satan's face as we go through different spiritual battles this week! We may not always be used by God in the ways that we think or even want to be used, but He is still working and His ministry still continues. We want to be in HIS will… whatever that might be.

God's will is that Dave go to Italy this April. Alone…but not alone. We will be helping him through our prayers and encouraging him in any way we can. Will you join us?

…. and maybe,  God will work a miracle for some of us to join Dave in person as well. With God's timing, there is always time for what His best is.