Dear friends,

My heart rejoices and I give thanks to God for your prayers. His mercies have been so abundant toward us in the past two months. I did not know how I was going to cope with the work after the Lord saw fit to send my co-workers, the Maxson family, to a new work in Blantyre. I am conscious of your prayers as I find my sufficiency in the Lord.

Evangelism

Our street evangelism in the town center has revealed to us what enormous challenges we have before us in seeking to bring people to the knowledge of the truth that leads to salvation through faith in Jesus Christ. The majority of people we witness to are devoted church goers, and yet they express both gross ignorance of and great hunger for biblical truth. They want to hear more of the gospel, but they will not come with us to church when we invite them. They will not miss from attending their own churches where they are established as good members with no marks of the work of grace in their hearts and lives. They have difficulties submitting to the radical change of mind, heart, and lifestyle demanded by the Gospel, which they have not heard of in their churches, yet they desire to learn more if they can be taught at their own convenient time and place. I have thus arranged to have evangelistic Bible Studies with a number of people as follows:

• Tuesdays - During Lunch hour, from 1:00 to 1:45 PM, I meet with Chrispin T. and Benson N., both working in a drug store in town. Mr T. wondered whether there was any real need for him to be "a born-again" when he was a good member of his church. Mr N. is a "backslidden born-again" who thinks he will get back to the Lord some day. In late afternoon, from 3:00 to 4:30 PM, I meet with Mr and Mrs W. who belong to the Seventh Day Baptist Church. Mr W., a primary school teacher, has so appreciated the Bible studies that he came to attend our church Bible study and prayer meeting last Wednesday, and the adult Bible Class and worship service last Sunday morning.
• Thursdays - Charismatics have taken advantage of the spiritual hunger of the people and established "inter-denomination fellowships" in various residential areas. Mr W. is chairman of one such a fellowship which meets everyday from 5:30 to 6:30 PM. He has desired that I should avail his fellowship the Biblical teaching that he has found to be a blessing to his own spiritual life. I have agreed to meet with the fellowship on Thursdays. Last Thursday was my first meeting with this group of about fifteen men and women. They were not offended at my doctrine and expressed happiness that I will be visiting them every Thursday.
• Sundays - In the afternoon, from 3:00 to 4:30 PM, I meet with Mr L., an elderly business man. He goes to his church in the morning and opens his shop in the afternoon. Since we have no church activity in the afternoon I meet with this man at his shop and he is very keen to learn.

Training of workers:

The need for all church members to participate in the work of the Lord has meant that I put in place the following training programs:
• Bible Class Teachers program - This has enabled a good number of members to confidently get involved in teaching children and youths Bible classes on the Lord's Day, while I teach the adult Bible class.
• Homiletics program - Two young men who are church members have heard a call to the ministry of the Gospel and I am helping them to develop their preaching gifts.
• Leadership program - This is aimed at preparing men for leadership in the church with a view to have some qualified to occupy the office of Elders.
• Evangelism and Follow-up program - This is to encourage and equip all church members to witness for Christ and to follow up people who have interest in learning biblical truth for the salvation of their souls.

The Ministry of the Word:

• On the Lord's Day - The Bible classes are following the shorter catechism approach, adapted to the different age groups. In the worship service I continue with preaching through the Gospel of Matthew.
• On Wednesday - We are tracing the Lord Jesus Christ in the Old Testament.

Our needs:

• Books - We are in need of two sets of basic books for use in the Homiletics Program. These are; Scripture Sculpture by Ramish Richard, Vine's Complete Expository Dictionary of the Old and New Testament words, Holman Bible Dictionary or equivalent, and an exhaustive Bible Concordance.
• Communication - We are currently handicapped in the area of communication. We can not readily access e-mail or internet. Our e-mail provider Chancellor College (Chanco), has had the dial-in equipment out of function for several months now, with little hope of it being repaired again. With an old desk-top PC having a non-functioning USB port, we can not subscribe to a wide-band internet facility. Thus to send and receive e-mails we have to take the computer to Chanco and connect it directly to the server. This we are able to do once a week. As for messages on web sites we are unable to access them.

Brethren pray for us:
1 For fruitful Evangelistic Bible studies - that God may give spiritual understanding of His truth to the people, and bring them to a saving knowledge of Christ, as we follow them;
2 For more church members to be involved in conducting evangelistic Bible studies;
3 For the Books to help in the Homiletics program;
4 For a lap-top to enable us access wide-band information technology for easier communication.
5 For wisdom and spiritual strength to cop with the growing demands for the work of establishing a biblical church in Zomba.