February 2017

Dear praying friends:

Over the past couple of months, we have seen the Lord work in many marvelous ways. The doors are being opened in evangelism, new ministries in the church, and a greater consciousness of our responsibility in worldwide missions.

About a few weeks ago, I had an interesting experience with regard to soul-winning. Typically, when one goes to the bank in this country, the expectation is that the wait will be for at least one hour. Whenever I go to the bank, I use it as an opportunity to hand out tracts, and share the gospel with people. This particular day, as soon as I entered the bank, I approached a man who did not look busy, and proceeded to witness to him. After finishing, I proceeded to another man who did not look busy, and started witnessing to him. About a minute into my witness to him, a security guard comes to me, and tells me that I am not supposed to hand out tracts in the bank. So I politely told him that I would not hand out any more tracts in the bank, and proceeded finishing my witness to this second man. After this, I thought to myself: “since I don’t need tracts to witness to people, and it is not illegal to talk to them, I will go witness to someone else.” So I proceeded to witness to another man who did not seem busy. Another security guard comes to me, asking me why I was at the bank. So I showed him my deposit slip. Once that security guard left, I finished witnessing to this third man. About 15 minutes had gone by since I entered the bank, and I proceeded to witness to another man (there were dozens of people at the bank that day). As I started witnessing to this man, a security guard comes to me and says, “follow me.” He takes me directly to the teller and asks her to take care of my deposit. I end up spending 20 minutes in the bank, when I normally have to wait for an hour! The sad part is that people are becoming more increasingly threatened by the Gospel, even if it is presented in a discrete and polite way. Please pray that we can continue having boldness in sharing God’s Word.

Also, please pray for our annual mission’s conference in a couple of weeks. The church (Tabernáculo Bautista), where we worked our first two years in the country, is getting ready to send its first foreign missionary. We are honored that this missionary (Jorge Arias) will preach at our conference. Brother Jorge is scheduled to go to Nicaragua around the end of February. It is exciting to see a Salvadoran who is being sent by a Salvadoran church. We pray that one day, the Lord would give us the privilege of sending missionaries from our church in Santa Ana.

Since the year started, we have made some changes in the schedule of our church. We now have a Sunday school hour on Sunday mornings. During this hour, the church divides itself into four different groups (adults, teenagers, children, and infants). We are thankful that there is a man (Mauricio) in our church who has been trained to minister to the adults. We are praying about ordaining him to the ministry in the near future, and having a Sunday school class will give him an opportunity to hone his teaching skills. As God raises up more faithful laborers like Mauricio and his wife, the church can divide itself into more groups, and it will allow us to be more effective in reaching others. As always, we thank you so much for your faithful prayers and support.                                           The Cernas