Blessed

Last Sunday, we were blessed by great fellowship and heard that the church was blessed by the teaching so I thought I'd post a photo and an MP3 to share the blessing with you. The teaching is from 2 Kings 11-25.

Instant Focus Latvian Translation

If you have trouble seeing (up close or at a distance), put the hole up very close to your eye, and it should sharpen your focus. Keep this card in your wallet or purse and please make sure you read the back.

Someone gave you this card because they want you to focus on the most important issue of your life – where you will spend eternity. How do you find out? Simply pinpoint the Ten Commandments. Have you lied? Stolen (anything)? Blasphemed? Jesus said, "Whoever looks upon a woman to lust after her has committed adultery with her already in his heart." On Judgment Day, will you be found to be innocent or guilty? Heaven or Hell?

The Bible warns that all liars, thieves, fornicators, and adulterers will end up in Hell. But God Himself made a way for you to be forgiven. Jesus suffered and died on the cross to satisfy the demands of God's Law -"For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life." Then He rose from the dead, defeating death. Today, repent and trust Him. Then read the Bible daily and obey what you read. Muziba.blogspot.com

Prayer update

• Praise God for the 2000 people who got gospel tracts and for the 2 girls that repented last month.
• Praise God for the better location for our Sunday morning services near the center of Riga.
• Pray for the provision of $8000 of support in the month of May so we may renew our visas.
• Pray for our church and family to be empowered spiritually to fulfill the great commission.
• For the orphans who we visited May 6th, that God would use us again to teach them about Jesus.

May Newsletter

Dear friends,
The month of May marks the two year anniversary since we moved to Latvia as church-planting missionaries. We are thankful as God has been faithful to provide for all our needs according to His riches in glory. And we are trusting Him to continue the good work that He started here in Latvia. We are writing to share great news and to inform you of a great need we will have in May, 2009.

First of all, the great news: We have been studying through the Bible with twelve disciples (Vitaly and Christa, Janis and Marion, Sergey and Jelena, Leonid and Inese, Artis and Ieva, Agnese and Sveta). Currently I am teaching 1 Kings and our plan for 2009 is to finish the Old Testament. Last week, we moved our Sunday morning services to a bigger venue in the center of Riga and the rent is covered by those who are attending. Our evangelism team continues to give out many gospel tracts every week and we have also been invited to minister to orphans in a village where Sergey has been delivering humanitarian aid. So God is doing great things and we believe greater things are yet to come in the months and years ahead!

Now, we have a great need in the month of May... It's time to renew our residence permits for our 3rd year and one of the requirements is that we prove we have the "necessary substinance" (a minimum of $11,500). This is not the cost of the visa, it's the minimum Latvia expects to be in our savings account for our living/ministry expenses. Because of the economic crisis, some of our generous supporters have been out of work, so our savings falls short. The bottom line is, we will need an additional $8000 by the end of May.


If you are interested in helping to meet this need, the best way to help is to send a check any amount made payable to "Calvary Chapel Monterey Bay" and then mail it to 3001 Monterey-Salinas Hwy, CA 93940. Do not write our names on the check but include a separate note designating "for Latvia" and we will receive 100%. But if you want to donate by credit card online, you can conveniently give to our cause and we will receive 95.25% (because of credit card processing fees). If you can send a one time gift this month it will help us to renew our residence permits for the next year of church planting in Latvia.

Thank you all for your partnership in the gospel.
To God be the glory!
Brenten and the Powers family
www.calvarylatvia.com

Outreach Week - Jesus is Risen!

The snow has finally melted in Latvia and God is opening more doors for effective ministry - but there are many adversaries (see 1Cor16:9).
The week leading up to Easter was a great opportunity for evangelism. I went out everyday for about 2 or 3 hours, trying to give out as many "good person" comics as I can (I had another 3000 Latvian ones printed) they are actually twice as big as the ones we gave out last summer and people are drawn to them. Each day I've had dozens of conversations with individuals who never understood or never heard the gospel before.

The very first people that I spoke with on Tuesday were 3 young women sitting at a bench outside Riga's Central Station. They spoke English but I used as much Latvian as I could. They thought they were good enough to go to heaven but after going through the 10 commandments they understood they are guilty and destined for hell! So then we shared the good news of what God did for them so they could go to heaven and what they must do to be saved. One girl still had questions about the Bible but the other two were ready to turn to Jesus from their sins and trust in His death and resurrection to justify them. "The law is our schoolmaster to bring us to Christ" (see Galatians 3:24). We prayed together there under the spring sun outside the train station. It was a great beginning of 6 days of evangelism.

But not everyone was as receptive. The second day on the train into Riga, I tried sharing with 7 different people and was rejected 7 times. No one sitting around me wanted a gospel tract and some spoke harshly against Christianity. So I got up and tried again with others, but still more cold shoulders. It made me upset and I started to question if I should go on that day or not. But God encouraged me with 1Peter chapter 1 and chapter 4. After reading that, I was ready to reach out again, counting it a blessing when I am insulted as a Christian. Each day, God sent at least one helper from our church along with me. Marion, Agnese and Christa faithfully shared the gospel with hundreds of people too. However, besides the faithful few, and inspite of all the tracts and invitations, no one new showed up at church Sunday

We'll continue meeting in Riga Sunday morning for English service and in Ogre Sunday afternoon for Latvian service. Both groups are small but growing in their knowledge of God. There's a total of 14 adults and 8 kids (including our family). Everyone is enjoying going through the Old Testament and finding Jesus. I taught the book of Ruth on Easter, showing how Boaz could be compared with Jesus Christ, as a kinsman redeemer. Plus a devotional about the evidence and importance of the resurrection of Christ.

We trust that the word of God will not return void. He is glorified through the preaching of the gospel. It's a blessing to see people repent and put their faith in Christ but you never know how many people we will see in heaven because they repented after they read a tract or talked with us. The test for effectiveness is not how many people show up at my church this Sunday but how much glory God gets on judgment day, and I think that sometimes he keeps us from seeing the fruit of our labors right away so that our joy and our crown will be in heaven. It is disappointing when no one new shows up at church but we need to be encouraged by looking to the Lord to keep our hand to the plow, not growing wearing in doing good, knowing that we will reap if we do not loose heart (Galatians 6:9). His word will not return void (Isaiah 55). Our labor in the Lord is not in vain (1Cor 15:56). He has appointed us to bear much fruit that will remain (John 15).

So that's a short update of what's going on here. I'd love to receive an encouraging comment from anyone keeping up with this blog. Thanks for reading!

Deborah a 13 year old evangelist in England is a great example

The BBC did a documentary entitled "Deborah 13: Servant of God". I think it is a GREAT example of how children should be raised in the ways of the Lord. She is turning out to be a great witness for only being 13 years old. It moves me to tears of joy to see her love for the Lord and concern for the lost.

"Hear, O Israel! The LORD is our God, the LORD is one! You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might. These words, which I am commanding you today, shall be on your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your sons and shall talk of them when you sit in your house and when you walk by the way and when you lie down and when you rise up." Deuteronomy 6:4-7.

May God continue to speak through her to all who watch. Actually Atheists have posted it on youtube and sharing it with eachother to say how horrible it is. Well it's horrible for them because they cannot argue against a 13 year old girl who knows the truth and has experienced the reality of God's forgiveness and is demonstrating His love by preaching to those on their way to hell.



There's a moment when the reporter asks, "What if Hell doesn't exist?" Deborah answers, "Then I'll die and I'll go to the grave and that will be it, but what if it does exist, what will happen to you? If I die and that's the end, when then it's probably a waste of my life but I'll just be dead, but if you die and there is a hell you won't just be dead."



Leave your favorite Deborah Drapper quotes in the comments. And if there are any athiests here, try to answer the questions she raised rather than attacking a 13 year old girl or her family.

Creation vs. Evolution in Latvia

200 years after the birth of Charles Darwin, Latvia is divided when it comes to deciding what to believe about the origin of life. According to this Diena news article, when asked which position residents believe, 43% of Latvia's population answered that God (Intelligent Designer) created life on earth, 32% believe life on earth showed up by natural processes of evolution (Darwin's theory), 25% said it's hard to say or had no answer.

It's not hard for me to say. As I wrote on my facebook status on Darwin day, I'm not fooled by the arguments of evolutionists who suffer from the Darwin delusion. It really is a ridiculous theory that atheists BELIEVE and preach as scientific fact, but when you hold them to their own definition of science they cannot claim anything about the origin of life on earth because it was not observed or tested in a lab. Life does not spontaneously appear from non life. You don't get order and design out of a big bang. What caused the big bang? Atheists cannot account for the laws of physics, logic, thermodynamics that they rely on, but these laws can best be explained by the Law Giver. If there is a creation, there must be a Creator. The irreducible complexities of everything from DNA to the human body to the solar system cannot be accounted for by "billions of years gradual changes". With a little common sense and sceptical inquiry you can spot many serious problems with such a theory. What came first the chicken or the egg? How did a new species evolve and reproduce with out a mate? You cannot prove that one set of bones ever had any offspring much less is related to some other species!

The Bible gives us the most reliable answer to "where did everything come from?" in Genesis 1. God told us Himself that in the beginning, He created the heavens and earth and everything that is in them in 6 days. And it was all very good. God should get the credit for the great things He has done.

So then why do many believe in evolution and not the Creator? I think Jesus answered this best in John 3:19-20 "And this is the judgment, that the light is come into the world, and men loved the darkness rather than the light; for their deeds were evil. For everyone who does evil hates the light, and does not come to the light, lest his deeds should be exposed."

The problem is sin, man's rebellion against God's authority. Adam brought sin into the human race as a result death entered the world because God is faithful and holy. Even though God gave us a conscience and the 10 commandments, no one has lived up to them. Even though what can be known intuitively about God is evident to us in creation, men have chosen to worship created things (giving credit to nature rather than God), being willingly ignorant (that means dumb on purpose) in order to suppress the truth because if they acknowledge God, then they have to answer to Him and they don't want to turn from darkness to light because they love their sin too much.

The solution is actually what they are running from: the light, the truth, the nature of God being just yet merciful. When someone stops running or fighting against God and turns to hear what God is saying, the heart can be changed. Jesus Christ came into the world not to condemn the world (the world was condemned already) but to save the world. We deserve the wrath of God but Jesus died in our place so that we could be saved. We must all die but Jesus is the Way the Truth and the Life, we can come to the Father through Him. You must repent (have a change of mind, heart and life) and believe (trust in, rely on, cling to) Jesus Christ as both LORD and Savior. Then you will be born again spiritually, and you should grow in new life and one day enter eternal life in the kingdom of God. That is the good news of the gospel.

But if so great an offer of salvation is neglected, all that's left is a fearful expectation of judgment. Hell is real, it's painful, tearful, and eternal. No one knows the day of their death or the day when Jesus will come back to judge the world. Therefore God is now commanding everyone everywhere to repent, leave your sin, follow Christ. Darwin is dead. Jesus is alive - believe in Him.

Pray for the Lord to give us an opportunity to speak to more people on Creation vs. Evolution in Latvia. I know that the teaching of evolution has tripped many people up and it must be confronted with Biblical truth and good science. If we want people to take the gospel seriously then they must be able to take the Bible seriously, starting with Genesis. There are many here who are still undecided when it comes to the origins question, if only they had more knowledge it wouldn't be so "hard to say". The proverbs say that people perish for lack of knowledge. If they know the truth then the truth will set them free!