December Newsletter 2019

2019 is past, 2020 has come.

I want to take the first part of this newsletter to issue a hearty THANK YOU for all of you who have partnered with me in this ministry. The Lord spoke to the heart of many of you, and you gave. This has meant a lot to my family, and not just in a financial sense. To know that you care about this type of ministry and about our family encourages us greatly.

I thank God regularly for the many blessings that the Lord has heaped upon me. I have a wonderful and beautiful wife, five amazing children, a roof over our heads, along with all the necessities of life in abundance. And I should not fail to mention that we all enjoy good health, a blessing we too often take for granted. It is only proper to close out 2019 with thanksgiving both to God and to you, who have been an essential part of our lives and ministry. Thank you.

And now for 2020… 2020 is mysterious to me. I’ve always looked at the year 2020 as the far-off future, full of wonder. But now it is here. What should we think of it? Have we progressed in knowledge and technology as to solve the world’s problems? Has mankind become wise and overcome the hurdles of the past? Have we moved past barbarism to a civilized life free of crime and danger? The answer to these questions is too obvious to need to be stated. We have, like Solomon said many years ago, just simply worked ourselves in a circle of all the same things that humanity has done for all of history. We wear different clothes and have different gadgets, but the heart of man is the same, sin is the same, temptation is the same, all the vain efforts of man are the same, and, thank God, the gospel is the same. The problem of the world is still sin, and the answer is still Jesus.

However, we do live in a society that is increasingly irreligious and more unchurched than ever before. I ought not to be, but I am still shocked by how little the general populace knows about God and the Bible. This is especially the more true among the younger generations. Most of their knowledge of God is from television shows and movies. Even the college-aged Jews I encounter are shocking ignorant of their own history. Among the many people I have encountered on the streets, I find that they do not have a fair and balanced understanding of religious and philosophical facts, but a one-sided view shoved down their throats by pop-culture and anti-God college professors. This is especially evident in what we like to call ‘drive-by mockers,’ that is, individuals who like to shout out some skewed idea of why they think the Bible absurd or God immoral as they quickly walk by. Those individuals unfortunately do not stop to speak with us, but thank God, many others do. And in 2020 I hope to reason with many more people on the streets than ever before. With the help of the Holy Spirit, and with your prayers and support, I believe we can do just that.

In Review

Throughout 2019, I have been privileged to bring the gospel to many who might never step into a church and to many who step into churches that would be better left empty. Below are some pictures of some of my encounters over the past year.