A Life in Mission

Hi there everyone,

We had a good outreach day today, and had a very good study with Tina. Thank you all for your prayers.

Here is an entry from my outreach diary for today,

Sincerely, Daniel

Oct 11
Today we went and visited two missing members neither of which were home, so we left the gifts for them. We contacted a number of drop offs, and conducted one Bible study, with Tina.
The study went well, she seemed receptive to what we had to say for the most part. She doesn’t believe that the Bible as a whole is God’s word though, so we have to work with that as well. She liked to get side tracked and talk about these other things that she has experienced from the spiritual world, but I did my best to keep it focused on the lesson. At the end she was talking and stuff, and I was praying about how to tie it up well. As I did so, the Lord impressed me, and so I challenged her to read a little from the Bible each day, I said it doesn’t have to be very much, just one chapter, if she felt like it she could read more, but at least one chapter each day. She agreed to that, and we closed with prayer. After prayer I told her about the seminar, and gave her the flyer, and she reserved seating saying she is planning to come for sure. God Blessed greatly.

Hi friends,

well yesterday was the last day of regular outreach, taking surveys. Next week we are going out each day passing out the flyers for the seminar. We had some interesting experiences yesterday, I will let you read from the excerpt below from my outreach diary. Please definitely keep us in prayer.

Thank you for all your prayers,  God Bless

Sincerely,  Daniel

Oct 8
Today was our last day of regular outreach taking surveys, and we had a number of Bible studies scheduled, but some fell through, and we ended up only studying with one person. We had scheduled a study at 2pm with  JW, but they weren’t home.  Our next study was with a gentleman I will call Jeff, he has been having seizures for some time, but recently he has switched medications and he has still been having seizures and he’s been feeling drugged. Anyway, we went through the study, hitting the main points; but it came out that he wanted to say things but he wasn’t able to express them because he has had brain surgery, and often has trouble thinking. He even made the comment that he wasn’t giving us the right answers, and saying that he felt bad for wasting our time. Of course we don’t think of it as a waste of time. I feel that God gave me words to speak as I told him about the thorn in the flesh that Paul had, and how God’s strength is made perfect in weakness. But he made a comment that concerned me, that is he used the phrase “my God”. He has told us that he believes that God is in everything. Please pray that God will bless Jeff with understanding, and us with wisdom and the right words to speak.
We also had another interesting incident. We had been taking surveys, and we had finished this certain section of the appartment complex that we have been working in, so we looked at the time, and we had another 20 min or so until our last Bible study. So we were kind of divided in ourselves whether we should go do the next and last section, or whether we should not. So we decided that we could at least work on the last section since we had twenty minutes. So we went toward this part of the complex, and I asked Jared if he wanted to do the surveys but he said he didn’t care. So I decided I would keep doing them. As soon as I entered the section, I turned right to my right toward the first house, I can’t explain why I went that way. . .  When I knocked on the door, a man answered the door, and as we went through our canvass he was looking us up and down. Then he suggested we come in and do it with his mom. Come to find out, his mom is handicapped, and is restricted to a wheel chair. So we did the canvass with her. We found out that she wished there was some way she could get physical therapy–the closest place is in Auburn, and they don’t have the money to get tabs on her van, and for the gas to take her there. Part way through the survey this other woman came in, she looked like maybe about the same age as the man, and she said that she would listen in on the survey. When we got down to the question, “have you ever wondered about the Mark of the Beast or 666”, this other woman, her name is Tina, bumped in and started saying all kinds of strange things, like she just got back from a trip in which she met all the apostles, and all kinds of other things that I have never heard of before. She was very interested in the Bible studies though, and also in the prophecy seminar coming up next Friday. So I told her that we could come back next Thursday, we agreed on 6pm. But right before we were going to leave she said “we’ll see you on Sunday at 6pm”!! So I followed up and said, “Oh Sunday? Ok well we can come on Sunday”. So we are going back to study with her on Sunday at 6pm. But here is the clincher; before we left, she asked me if I knew anything about Quakers, what they believe, and what denomination they are. I don’t know much about the Quakers, so I just said that I didn’t really know. Then she said that that was her spirit guide talking through her, and sometimes her guide talks through her and she doesn’t realize what she is saying. . . Then she looked at Jared, and said that she thought that he was a Quaker in his past life. . .  Please pray for Tina, and pray for us as we study with her. Pray that she will come to the meetings, and that she comes to know the Bible truth.

Hi everyone,

Things are moving along here, the evangelistic series is soon to begin. We will be passing out brochures for the meetings next week all week, then the meetings begin on Friday night.

I haven’t had much free time so far, I’ve been kept pretty busy. Thank you for all your prayers, God Bless each one of you,

Sincerely

Daniel

PS below is a exerpt from my outreach diary for yesterday. It will give you a little taste of what we have been doing.

Oct 4
Today I felt a little discouraged and Jared was very tired, but we went out and tried to reach a couple of our DVD contacts for the follow up survey, one didn’t answer the phone, and the other said that they were sick and not to come today.
We dropped off all of our droppoffs about 12 in all for today. Some in the trailer park, and some elsewhere. The manager of the trailer park didn’t seem to be home today, or at least he wasn’t out and about.
We went to see Ronald and he was on baby sitting duty, so he said he didn’t want to study, and so we talked for some time, then later just when we were leaving, his wife pulled in. She had looked at the drop off Bible study that we gave him last week, and she saw that there was a whole series, and she wanted to get the whole series: she said that they didn’t have the number one number one and two studies anymore, so we gave her that one. As we came back from the car, we saw Ashley coming to visit them, and when we left she stayed and visited with them. Ashley lives just a few houses down accross the road, and she knows SDAs, and doesn’t agree with them for what ever reason, she didn’t want to get into it when we took the survey with her. She agreed to Bible studies but later flaked out. And today I asked her about it, and she just confirmed that she was not interested, that she was content with her church. But we are just praying that she doesn’t influence Ronald and his wife regarding the seminar coming up, we are praying that instead that Ronald and his wife may have a good influence on her.
We knocked on doors for a while also between Bible studies, and took two surveys and got two Bible studies! One drop off and one in home. Then we came back to the trailer park to study with  the JW that we had scheduled but it was dinner so we agreed to come back at 2pm on Thursday. He is my study, so I am definitely praying about that. . .
We also had the chance to talk with this lady that was also on our list to study with at 5:00, her name is Debra. She seems pretty open, and we were able to talk with her for some time until her father called, then we prayed with her and left, to knock on doors as above. Then later after the JW fell through for today, we were going back to the car and she was on her porch smoking, so we stopped and talked with her some more. She seems very open, and has looked for a church that keeps the Bible as the ultimate authority, and hasn’t been able to find one. We didn’t tell her that  we were SDA and I’m looking forward to studying with her very much, she is Jared’s study.
We went to visit another couple that we have been giving drop off Bible studies for 4 weeks or so now. He is very much opposed to Christianity howbeit some of his family is SDA, and they are always trying to talk to him. We have been able to talk to him also, I was able to share some of my personal testimony and reasons why I believe that God is real. We went there today and found out that her grandson was just killed in Afganistan yesterday, so they are getting ready to have the funeral in Penn Valley since that is where he grew up I guess. We told Richard that we would be praying for their family.
This Thursday is the last day of regular outreach before the evangelistic series starts. Next week we will be passing out flyers for the evangelistic series.

Hi everyone,

I can hardly believe that AFCOE is almost already half over, and I haven’t hardly put anything up here. I’m sorry I haven’t kept up with this page.

We have been doing outreach in Penn Valley, and have found some interests, and gotten some Bible Studies. We have 2 studies that seem pretty solid, and we have several others that either we don’t have a set time for or we haven’t studied much with yet. We have quite a number of drop off studies.  I have been encouraged by the experiences that we are having.

Please pray for us here at AFCOE, pray that God will use us to reach many people, and pray that we will draw closer to Him. Please pray that God will give us strength for our studies, because we have been very busy with everything. . .

God Bless you all,

Daniel Hill

Hi everyone,

Today is the first day of outreach. We have been practicing our canvasses on each other for 2 weeks now, and so I think we are ready.  My outreach partner is Jared Miller, from Georgia, and I’m thankful to have him as a partner. Please pray for outreach today and next sunday, that God will guide us to those people that the Holy Spirit has prepared.

We had Samuel Pipim here mon through Wed this week. He had some very good points to make about our church and how higher criticism is causing trouble in the church. We can’t say that part of the Bible is inspired and other parts are not, that just confuses things. We have to take the whole Bible as inspired by God, and not try to reason away God’s inspiration. He really dug to the root of the problem.

God Bless you all,

Sincerely,

Daniel