Dearest Friends,
IRELAND AND NORTEHERN IRELAND
Today, Heather,Krista, Mykayla, Seth, and I are flying to Ireland . Please ask the Father to get all of luggage safely there. More, please ask the Lord to pour His spirit on this effort. Ask Him to call many to faith. Also, please pray for the Irish band Reality that we will be traveling with across Ireland. On Sunday, we are all doing an outreach together in Bangor, Northern Ireland.
Please pray especially for Sam and Silvana Shaw who are planning and arranging so many details. We have worked together for so many years and there are no words to describe how precious their partnership is to me. Ask the Lord to give them strength and wisdom!
I CAN”T BELIEVE WE GOT A PUPPET SHOW
My faith was too small. Circumstances dictated that the desired solution was impossible. However, the Father gently reminded me that nothing is too hard for Him. You will enjoy this story.
Without success, I tried to schedule a puppet show in the Cape Cod area of Massachusetts. That was where we planned to finish our summer ministry. Heather’s grandparents lovingly offered to host us as we traveled home from upstate New York. A couple of times it looked like churches were going to schedule us, but at the last minute everything fell through. It was the Wednesday before we were to be in the area on Sunday. I didn’t know what to do. We thought we had everything sorted, but at the last minute, we had no show. People contacted their friends in the area, but even those plans didn’t produce a show. I personally had spoken with more than 15 churches. Finally, in desperation, my friend sent an email to a church she found on the internet. Email is not the most exciting way to contact a church, and we were all shocked when the pastor called on Wednesday and asked us to come on that Sunday. I was reminded again of a big truth. We make plans, but sometimes God has other plans. His plans are always better than ours.
When we arrived at the church, it looked like every white New England church you have imagined. The church had existed since the 1700s and their present building has existed since 1837. It was a very large church, and I asked the pastor why they haven’t built a new building since then. I wanted to know why they had not outgrown their building. He told me they had planted six other churches. I like that kind of math.
When I told the pastor at the Congregational church about all our failed efforts trying to find a church, he just smiled. He said “Linda, all the other churches were supposed to tell you no. You were supposed to be here!” The pastor was right! We had the most wonderful day. He gave me ten minutes in the morning service to share the stories about the children we work with all over the world. God poured His spirit on that time. As I looked around the church, I saw many people were crying. Some were weeping. They even arranged coffee after the church service so that we could talk with people and share more stories with them. We had some wonderful conversations with people, and many signed up to receive our emails.
During the pastor’s sermon time, all the children watched the puppet show. Many teenagers and adults who either worked with children or were interested in puppet ministry also came. This church has an active puppet ministry and was very interested in how we used our puppets to share. The puppet director was a very enthusiastic lady who I liked very much. We are already making plans to do ministry together next year. We were given so much more than a show. We made friends and have many new partners in ministry. God’s plan was so much better than my plan.
HOLD US IN YOUR PRAYERS!
In Jesus, Linda for the Ireland team