Wow, it's been quite a while since I've sent out an update. Thanks to all those who have stayed in touch with us through email. Everything is going well with the Scott family. We're still in Albuquerque and plan on staying here as the Lord has us here doing ministry and fellowshipping in a home fellowship. This last year has been one busy with ministry; open air preaching, door to door evangelism, baptizing new believers, growing together as a fellowship, and we just recently returned from a short trip to Mexico. Here's a short summary of some of these...
CONVERSION AND BAPTISM OF HANNAH
Probably my greatest joy over this past year is seeing my oldest daughter Hannah, and a boy C.J. in our fellowship, being born again and having the joy of seeing them both baptized into Christ. Hannah is 12 yrs old and we've always made it a point with our children to tell them their need for Christ, that they too must be born again to see the kingdom of God, that they must have their sins forgiven through Christ like all who are saved. Since the beginning of the year we noticed that Hannah seemed to become distant and never really seemed to be happy. In fact, she seemed depressed quite often. One Sunday, one of the kids in fellowship told us that Hannah had been doing things behind our back, getting on the computer when we ran errands, watching worldly music on youtube, etc. She had been doing this for a many months, which during that time which we noticed that her demeanor and mood kept getting worse. When we found out what she had been doing we of course where saddened and grieved. I pulled Hannah aside and just asked her about everything she had been doing. She confessed all of it and said she just felt really sad and depressed inside. Lisa and I told her again of Jesus saving power and His readiness to forgive all her sins and give her a new heart. All of our fellowship gathered around and prayed for her. She just began to weep as we prayed. When we finished praying she began crying out to the Lord to save her. Hannah put her faith in the Lord that day and was gloriously saved. The effects of her conversion were immediate. She was completely lite up with joy in the Lord and had a peace about her that she had never had before. Since that day she continues to manifest the peace and joy of the Lord. She continually seeks the Lord on her own, prays for the other children and seeks to reach out to them in Christ. All of her depression and sadness is gone. God has given Hannah a new heart, and where at one time she reluctantly used to listen to others talk about Christ, now she willingly and eagerly seeks the Lord and the things related to the kingdom of God. Not long afterwards both her and C.J. were baptized into Christ.
CONVERSION AND BAPTISM OF C.J.
During this same time period God saved another one of the children in our fellowship. C.J. is Jeff Marshall's son, who is also 12 yrs old. C.J. had been seeking the Lord for quite a while and had had a desire to be saved, and he actually thought he was. However, when he saw the change in Hannah after her conversion he realized that what had happened to her had not happened to him. One evening, myself, Jeff, and Braden were gathered together for prayer when Jeff's wife called and said that C.J. was at home crying. He was crying because his lost state was weighing him down and he felt hopeless and wanted to be saved. We all dropped what we were doing and went over to minister to him. C.J. said he had been trying and trying to be saved, but he knew that he wasn't. I explained to him that he was trying to do something when what he need to do was to believe and received what Christ had already done. I showed him verses that explained that we are to "believe" to "receive" eternal life. By the grace of God He understood that salvation was received by faith and that night he put his faith in the Lord Jesus Christ and found the salvation and peace that he had been seeking. God gloriously saved C.J. and he too has been changed ever since.
Here are some pics of them reading their testimony and then being baptized.
Nohemi is a lady who works at the same company as Jeff (a brother in our fellowship, C.J.'s father). Jeff had the opportunity to share with her about Christ many times at their work place. Before long, both Nohemi and her boyfriend Corey began coming to our fellowship. Since the first time that Nohemi began coming she had a real desire to understand what the bible taught about salvation. She came from a Catholic and JW background and had a lot of questions. So for a couple months we all sought to share with her and she would listen to the word each Sunday. One Sunday after fellowship she began sharing how she didn't think God could, or even should, forgive her for a specific sin that she had committed in her past. She couldn't see how she could let it go and turn it over to God. We explained to her that if Christ had already died for the sin of the world, then why would she hold on to it? God gave her the ability to understand and believe that Christ had already died and suffered for all her sins. A few of us gathered around and prayed for her. After we prayed, Nohemi, like Hannah and C.J., put her faith in the Lord and called on His name for salvation. She went from weeping with sadness to being filled with joy. Afterwards she said she didn't know how to explain it but that she felt better and lighter, and that she felt forgiven. That's how one feels when the weight of ones sins have been removed. She was full of joy that comes from knowing the Lord. Nohemi too has continued on with the Lord, seeking Him from a heart that has been changed. We had the joy of baptizing Nohemi shortly after.
A couple pics from Nohemi's baptism:
Over the past year I've spent time open air preaching and evangelizing door to door. Sometimes the brothers come with me, when they are able, but much of the time is me going by myself. In Albuquerque there really aren't too many place where you can open air preach to large groups of people. Albuquerque is a "big small city", or a "small big city", however you want to look at it. I believe that in Albuquerque and the surrounding cities there are about 750,000 people. Thankfully there are a couple places where people regularly gather that provided an opportunity to preach and pass out tracts. For a good portion of the year myself and a brother or two would go to the local government buildings in the mornings and preach the gospel. The medicaid and social services offices in Albuquerque open at 8:00 am. However, people are usually lined up outside starting at around 7:30. So about three times a week we would show up and pass out tracts to those in line and then open air preach for about 20 minutes. The Lord seemed to really bless these outreaches. So many people seem to listen and then even ask questions when we were finished. I think out of all the times that we preached at these places we only had one instance in which a non-christian got upset and verbally confronted us. We did however have one instance in which we were told to stop preaching, but it was by professing Christians! One of the brothers had gone to preach one morning. As he was preaching a church van pulled up and people got out and started handing out coffee and donuts to the people in line. The pastor came over and asked the brother if he would stop preaching because they were there to just pass out food. So this pastor wanted this brother to stop preaching the gospel. Sound's like something Satan would want. Thankfully the brother didn't listen to the pastor and continued to preach salvation through Jesus Christ. It's a sad day when the main opposition you get to preaching the gospel comes from professing believers. All in all, these times of open air preaching have gone really well. We've been able to plant a lot of seed regarding the truth and have been able to meet with some people one on one to share more about Christ.
In addition to preaching I spent a lot of time over the summer going door to door sharing the gospel of Jesus Christ. In the past I haven't spent much time going door to door. I've mainly done one on one evangelism on the street and have open air preached. I'll had to admit, I was a little hesitant about going door to door here in the states but felt the Lord would have me do so. So for several months I loaded up on tracts and went door to door in pretty much all the surrounding neighborhoods and apartment complexes around where we live. To my surprise, for the most part, I actually had really good responses and some in depth and meaningful conversations. I was also able to visit several households more than once where I was able to continue to preach Christ and leave resources with them. Through all this, we've had people visit our fellowship ( most coming and going), but nevertheless giving us an opportunity to share more about Christ, salvation, and the age to come.
Here's a Pic of Joel passing out tract where we open air preach:
Myself, Lisa and Braden recently returned from a short trip to Mexico. We spent about a week and a half visiting brother Noe and also visiting a brother who is in jail in San Diego. I think over the course of the trip we drove about 5,000 miles! We first drove to Texas and dropped the kids off with my mother so they could visit her and so she could watch them for us while we were gone. Then we turned around the the next day after dropping the off and came back to ABQ and then left a couple days later to drive to Rosarito/Tijuana Mexico. We were able to rent a small one bedroom apartment from the lady we rented our house from when we were there before. We spent most of our time fellowshipping with Noe, exhorting him in Christ, and ministering together with him. The Lord spoke to me before we went on the trip that Noe needed to understand the grace of God. You would think that ever believer who has received the grace of God would understand the grace of God. But that's not true. I think many believers don't understand God's grace and live under false condemnation (I did myself for years). Noe is a good, sincere brother who loves the Lord. But Noe, like I used too, often finds himself feeling condemned as if he's never good enough for God. Not that he questions his salvation or lacks the joy of the Lord, but sometimes when all we hear is preaching sin and God's hatred for it we can get a wrong view of God. What I mean is, is that if we are always looking at ourselves, then we are not looking at Christ. When we continually focus on our imperfections, our shortcomings, the flesh nature that resides in us, we can become hopeless. There's no hope in looking at oneself! We need to keep our eyes on Jesus and we will find ourselves continually growing in the grace of God and walking in victory. I told Noe that if a believer often lives with condemnation that there is something about the grace of God (the Gospel of God's grace) that they don't really understand. Too often believers focus on their sin nature. How often I've heard believers almost boast about being a "wretched man" etc. It doesn't take much faith to declare your imperfections and shortcomings. However, how many believers have you heard that declare with joy that they are the righteousness of God in Christ? I don't think many believers understand the glorious truth of imputed righteousness and how it affects their relationship with God. There is such a freedom in knowing that you are perfectly accepted by God, that God is for you and not against you, and that just as God saw Christ as sin, because he became sin for us (imputed), that God in like manner sees the believer as righteous in Christ. If you've never really studied imputed righteousness, there are a couple books I will recommend that you can get, and they are free. I'll post the info and the link towards the bottom. So, we spent several days ministering to Noe, digging in the scripture etc. We had such a good time and Noe kept texting me after we left sharing how much he was ministered too by understanding imputed righteousness.
In addition to studying the scriptures together we all went to preach at one of the open markets and at a drug rehab in Rosarito. Brother Noe and I took turns open air preaching and he translated for me while I preached. While we were both preaching this young man stopped and listened to us the entire time. In fact, his friend tried to pull him away but he wouldn't go and instead listened to the gospel. When we were finished we went over and talked with the young man name Luis. He said, "It seemed like everything you were saying was specifically for me". We shared with him a little more and invited him to come over to our apartment the next evening for dinner. Luis showed up the next evening and he had questions about Jesus and salvation pretty much from the moment he set foot through the door. He had heard about Christ but knew that he was not saved. We were able to have dinner together and share the gospel with him for several hours. He then began praying asking the Lord to save him. Afterwards he said he was filled with peace and wanted to continue to meet and know more about the Lord. We told him that we would shortly be leaving and that he could continue to meet with Noe. I don't know if Luis was born again that night, time will tell, but the Lord definitely let him "taste and see that the Lord is good".
We also had the opportunity to go with Noe to one of the secular rehabs that he preaches at in Rosarito. It was very similar to other rehabs that I've preached at in Mexico. They are basically run down buildings that you wouldn't want to spend a night in. They usually teach an AA and NA program and they sometimes let believers come in and preach. Brother Braden (from our fellowship) had an opportunity to preach and teach these men about salvation in Christ. So many of these men said they were trying to live the Christian life and that they just kept struggling and were telling us how hard it was. And of course it was hard, after probing you realize that none of these men had ever been born again. They were trying to walk the narrow road without going through the door! In other words, they were trying to live the Christian life apart from having the life of Christ in them; they had not been born again. They kept telling us all the things they were "trying" to do. They had got the cart before the horse. We tried to help them see that Christ has already done all the work and that we are to believe in and receive Him and what He has done. We were able to share with these men for a long time. We were thankful to Noe for letting us be part of the ministry the Lord has given him at the Rehab.
In addition to visiting Noe, we were able to visit brother Fernando who is in jail in San Diego. If you've read our newsletters in the past you may remember me mentioning Fernando. He's a brother (a new believer) who was deported to Mexico that we met the last time we were there. He was never really able to find a fellowship to be part of. He ended up in jail because he gave into the temptation to cross the border because he wanted to be with his wife and two kids. Of course it wasn't the right thing to do, but he went ahead and tried and was caught. So he is in the San Diego detention center awaiting trial. We were able to visit with him shortly and encourage him in Christ. If you would please keep him in prayer. There is a slim possibility that he could be released and even be allowed to stay in the U.S. That would be best for him since his wife and two kids live here. We tried to encourage him to be content with whatever happens and just trust in the goodness of God.
All in all it was a good refreshing trip. Noe is a brother who really has childlike faith in the Lord, who's always talking about the Lord, laboring in the gospel, etc. He encouraged all of us greatly. The tough part about the trip was that as soon as we dropped off our kids in Texas they all got really sick. In fact, they spent the whole week and a half in bed with fevers, sore throats etc. So we got back to ABQ and went to pick them up and returned home the next day.
Pic's:
Enjoying the word with Braden and Noe:
Brother Ismail is still doing very good. I email with him regularly and we still support his ongoing ministry among the Hindu's and Muslim's in the surrounding villages where he lives. I'm hoping and praying the Lord makes a way, in His will, to visit him next.
RECOMMEND BOOKS
As I mentioned earlier there are two books that I highly recommend. I have been extremely blessed by reading these two books by Horatius Bonar. He seemed to have an wonderful understanding of grace and righteousness. Both of these books have helped me greatly in better understanding these truths. They are:
1. God's Way of Peace
2. The Everlasting Righteousness
I believe that you can get a copy of both of these books for free from:
www.mountzion.org You can also just Google the titles and find copies that you can read online if you want. The first book is a wonderful explanation of the gospel, and the second is a wonderful explanation of imputed righteousness.
There's so much more I could share and write, especially since it's been so long since I've sent out an update. But I'll keep it short and Lord willing will send out more frequent updates. If you would, please keep our family and fellowship in prayer.
May the Lord bless you....
IN Christ,
Sean & Lisa Scott
preachingjesuschrist.com
preachingjesus.wordpress.com