From an Aug. 14th email from Pastor Chito:
In the past, it was very hard for people here to open their house for Bible study. We usually knocked doors and people would looked at us with disdain and rejected us. This in turn compelled us to pray harder for people to be more receptive to the gospel. We prayed earnestly early in the morning (Daily Dawn Watch), and we even had prayer jogging at 4:30AM to 5:30AM praying for the place that we passed through.
Praise God to see people becoming more and more responsive to the Good News, not only house to house but in throngs. Indeed, the field are white for harvest. This is what happened to our market site ministry.
Aside from the large numbers of children being taught with God’s Word and fed every Saturday afternoon, now we have Bible study too for adults and youth. Ministry is complementary – because we used E2E program in opening Bible study for adults. And now, we’re using Bicolano Audio-Bible in our Adult Saturday Bible study. We first sing 2 or 3 hymns, prayed and then played 2 chapters, now we start with the Book of Matthew. We then ask them to share what they have understood or they could ask questions too. Three or four insights or questions from them, then proceed to the next chapter. After that, we ask them for their prayer requests and prayed for them. We also gave them New Testament Bibles (after they answered a booklet ANG SAGOT {THE ANSWER}, a 12-pages booklet which has lessons on SIN, THE WAGES OF SIN, THE HOPE-CHRIST, MY RESPONSE), so that they could go over with the chapter while audio-Bible is being played. (By the way, since we’re on the E2E program, we have lot of Bible Listening Groups {BLG} that needed Bibles, both in Bicol and in Tagalog – could we request Bibles from FCBH office?) I think that this approach is very effective. Primarily because this is Bible expository, studying the whole Bible and the listeners would easily develop skills in handling/explaining the Bible. Many of our small groups are now using the audio-Bible. After Bible study, snack is served for all – that is: children, youth and adults. We then go the Sis Emma’s house for our (teachers) snack and gives us 100 pesos for gas. God is so good for opening a ministry like this one, and many others. Thanks for your prayer.