November 2008 Bible School, Safe House, Syria, Turkey
We're pleased to report another very successful Bible weekend held at the home we're reconstructing in Latvia. About 40 brothers & sisters and their children attended some very stimulating studies from Brother Tim Dickinson of the Chesterfield, UK ecclesia. Tim as a professional artist gave talks about "The Bible through art", approaching topics such as the flood, Jonah, Jeremiah's teaching about pottery and above all the Lord Jesus through the medium of art. Tim's an absolutely dynamic speaker, as you can see from the photos, his style broke through the language barriers and connected him very well with the audience.
Ezra 5:2, which featured in recent daily Bible readings from the "Bible Companion", spoke of how the teachers at the time of the restoration also helped building the wall, and Tim along with his son Brother Simon laboured for 3 weeks in the building work too:
Duncan also gave a series on the letter of James, which featured lists of discussion questions for the group. You can get the questions at www.bookofjames.info . It was good to see old and young from throughout the Baltics getting to know each other better as they discussed the questions:
Through these Bible weekends, relationships develop. Bro Maris and Br Alexei are from different ends of Latvia, but through regular meetings at Bible weekends have become best friends. Both suffer from advancing years, but Maris manages to read things out for Alexei. Late at night there were loud voices coming from their bedroom- hearing aids out, they were still eagerly discussing things whilst everyone slept!
Great spirit of fellowship, as we ate, slept and studied together:
Bed linen waiting for next time:
The Gospel continues to spread throughout Latvia, and we're pleased to report the baptism and receiving into fellowship of KONSTANTIN and VIKTOR.
We've also been able to undertake a visit to the safe house we operate in Turkey for our Iranian refugee brethren. All is in order there, and we were able to give funds towards its upkeep and have an encouraging meeting with those staying there.
Brother S from Iraq and his family, of whom we wrote in an earlier Carelink, are doing well. The children are now going to school, and we are continuing efforts to get the UNHCR to speed up dealing with their case. Our brother also has got a job and is able to support his wife and children at this time.
After some years of correspondence, we were able to visit and baptize HANNAN, who becomes our first brother in Syria. We appreciated your prayers as requested in the last carelink message. All went well, and yet we must keep up our prayers for Hannan as Syria is a very hard land in which to hold the true faith of the Lord Jesus.
Whilst in Turkey we also met up with br Mehmet in Antakya, Biblical Antioch. He and his wife continue strong in faith, having been baptized 9 years ago we can echo the apostle John's words when he said that he had no greater joy than to know that his children walk in the truth.
With love from your brothers and sisters of Carelinks