Thanks for everyones prayers for our move to Boydton, Virginia. What a blessing to be able to move the International Office to this location. We have been settling in to the new office and since my retirement I am beginning to get into a routine in the ministry. Not that ministry is a routine. The daily devotions that I write are such a blessing to me. God uses that time to grow my personal faith and be able to share life with other firefighters. Yesterday at a funeral I was reminded that many firefighters read the daily devotion and have drawn closer to God because of them, praise God. Our team has also been working on creating Bible studies for first responders. One of the challenges I see is that the fire service does not have a lot of firefighters who profess to be Christians. Of those who do, a vast majority are not grounded in their faith. My prayer is that these Bible studies will make it easier for first responders to study the Bible and desire to follow the truths contained within its pages. I am praying that these Bible studies will also help firefighters to meet together for study as well as give them a desire to regularly worship in a local church.
Besides the daily devotions and Bible studies we have been working hard at the discipleship ministry. This project is in its second year and is progressing slowly, but I believe will have great eternal rewards. What a blessing to see firefighters who desire to be obedient to Matthew 28 and find other first responders to disciple. Out team has created the "Train the Trainer" class which teaches first responders how to Biblically disciple others. We are finding that a lot of churches do not teach their people how to disciple. The International Office is working on equipping our members to "Go Therfore" or like we say in our training class "as you are going". Please continue to pray that God would use this ministry in a mighty way as we reach firefighters for Christ and disciple them within their departments. Currently, I am discipling one young firefighter through the internet, but I would like to find several in my area and my new department.
I have almost completed my application process with ABWE and Holly and I are scheduled for two weeks of training in July. On June 4th we will be returning to our old church in Laurel, Maryland for an oral exam. Please pray that we would do well and that God would use this time to strengthen our faith. I have enjoyed preparing for the test and look forward to the training. My prayer is that this new ministry will help to strengthen the bonds between firefighters and local churches. I am always reminded of our mission field of over 1.4 million firefighters in the USA alone. Please continue to pray that God would open doors for us to preach the Gospel to firefighters worldwide.
The Family
We continue to receive blessing from God with our family. Recently we had an opportunity to visit Seth who is stationed in Maryland on an Army base. Andrew was also able to attend and it was a rare opportunity to have all six of us sit down for dinner. What a blessing to see all of our children walking with the Lord and being used by Him. Continue to pray that all of our children would draw closer to God each and everyday.
Prayer Requests
- Revival within the fire service
- Opportunities to witness to firefighters
- Opportunities for me to disciple young local firefighters
- The Barnabas House preparations
- Local chapters in every state
- The missions trip to Mexico in January
