I was going to start with all of my frustrations but then yesterday in church at Riga 1, I was reminded of lots of good things happening here. And maybe some of them I can pray are connected to me being here. Summer at Riga 1 is usually slow and in fact, the corps leaders hinted at cancelling worship meetings. But, that didn't happen. So, I walked in Sunday morning and saw several people who are new to our congregation. They are young adults who have been invited by Misha and Arturs (now known as Archy). These guys have found their mission - evangelism and discipling. It's so exciting to watch them. They set up a drop in cafe the first week I was home and every night they had some new people and lots of good conversations and fun. It's from the cafe that we have new people in church. They are quite an assortment - piercings, black coats, computer geeks and more. Not exactly what we have known in our corps, but they are like the community around us. If you had seen Archy just a few months ago, you wouldn't have believed he would be the one to do this. I could barely get a conversation out of him and we thought his greatest contribution to the corps would be to run Power Point. But, the Lord got a hold of him and gave him a vision. And Misha has just been waiting for someone to join him in his passion for evangelism.
We've had a mission team from the UK this month and they have added to the guys enthusiasm and vision. Also, my small group came almost every night to the cafe and I think they'll join right in. The rest of the corps and Pestisanas Armija better watch out! One of my group girls said last week that she thought she might be an officer! How cool is that? It's a brand new possibility for her and I believe God has a great plan for her. I also met with one of our middle aged candidates who is ready to come to training and start learning. Then visiting our corps with the mission team has been fun and encouraging.
So whatever the frustrations with organization and language - God is doing some exciting work here and I'm glad to be part of it. (more on the frustrations next time)
Ata - Evie
1 comment:
I happened to randomly find you out here in cyber-space and for a couple of days now I simply can not shake the feeling that you might benefit from my church's little blogging community.
So I invite you to check us out by reading the "My Friends at Hope" links at http://freshflowers01.blogspot.com/. Lani is one of our original bloggers and a dear and wonderful sister in Christ.
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