Gospel News — Jun-Aug 2012

BELGIUM

We're delighted to report a number of baptisms of Iranians in Belgium over the last year. The baptism of Mustafa was a deeply spiritual occasion, with him recounting a wonderful testimony of God's calling Him to the Truth. Our brother began reading the Bible from curiosity in Iran, many years ago. He then moved to Belgium, where he has been living many years. He got involved with the Jehovah's Witnesses, but came to see many errors in their approach as he's a very careful Bible student with a good knowledge of the text of Scripture. He wanted to be baptized into Christ, but not into their organization.

Our brother works in a shop selling Iranian and Middle Eastern food. After one of the first Iranian baptisms we performed in Belgium, Duncan entered the store along with brother X, because X wanted to buy some Iranian food for a small baptismal celebration. Mustafa asked him: "What are you celebrating?" and X answered, "My baptism into Christ". This was a brave thing for an Iranian to say to another Iranian given their generally Moslem culture. Mustafa explained his connection with the JWs and dissatisfaction with them, and from then onwards studied the copy of Bible Basics which X gave him, and the ways of providence came to a happy point when Mustafa was baptized. At the baptism we had a lot to be thankful for and stood in awe of the Lord's ways and the grace of His calling:

There is a tendency with many of us these days to read books or articles about the Bible more than the Bible text itself. Mustafa sets us all a good example in this. He's a great Bible reader and fan of writing notes in his Bible. During the baptismal discussions there was a point he needed to clarify, and

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we referred him to the relevant section in his Farsi Bible Basics. Our concern is at times that people can read this instruction manual more than the Bible itself, and Mustafa really showed a great example by re-reading the relevant section of the book and comparing it closely with the Bible itself, and only then adding some more notes to his Bible. The photos show a significant sequence: