Tuesday, May 04, 2010

Punam

Last week, I was asked to preach a funeral for a 21 year old girl who died, when she fell out of the back end of a truck. I was told her uncle led her to the Lord one week before she died. The uncle was the one who contacted me and asked me to preach the funeral. The funeral would be in the village Punam which is about 5 miles from the work in Kudukudu. I was to preach twice in the village, first on Tuesday night and then again on Wednesday morning. In a village funeral, the whole village attends, so it is a great opportunity for the people to hear the Gospel. On Wednesday morning, I preached a strong Gospel message on Nicodemus. The people listened very intently. For most, it was their first time hearing a clear presentation of the gospel. (There is a church in the village. It is a “United church”, where the people hear salvation is by your works plus Christ. The United Church has strong Charismatic influence upon it. It also lacks much Bible Doctrine.) As I was preaching, it was clear the Lord was working on many hearts. When I finished preaching we buried the girl, and then talked. I came back to the village on Saturday to see if there was more who wanted to talk. A man stopped me, named Maswaton. He is in his 50’s and a member of the United Church. He wanted to know more about II Corinthians 5:21, a verse I talked about on Wednesday morning. I went over the Gospel with him, but he did not put his faith in Christ. This was all new to him and he knew it meant much of what he had been believing all these years was wrong. He wanted to consider what we talked about. He then came to my house on Tuesday morning to talk more. We talked about the Gospel for about an hour. He then said he wanted to receive Christ, which he did!

I have now been asked to come back and preach to the village again, which I will be doing tonight (Tuesday). There is no funeral or other event; it is just to hear the preaching. I am praying many more will turn to the Lord.

“…how shall they hear without a preacher?” Romans 10:14