Ministry News: Free State Bible Church (August 2026)

Greetings brothers, We greet you in the wonderful name of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. Firstly, we are thankful to the Lord for your partnership in the faith with us here in Bloemfontein. Through your continued prayers and support we continue to see the Lord blessing the gospel work here at Free State Bible Church (FSBC). We truly have been experiencing more joyous moments among believers than sad or heartaches moments. Indeed, the Lord has been good to his people. Allow me to share briefly as to what the Lord has been doing among us here at FSBC.

We praise the Lord for the ongoing discipleship for a number of our adherents, most of whom are students, for the purpose of taking up membership. We have been encouraged to see their faithfulness in attendance to the means of grace. And we are encouraged by the spiritual maturity we are observing in some of our members who have rightfully assumed the responsibility of discipling these younger believers. In the past, most of the discipleship work fell on the shoulder of the elders (Pastor Tsholo and I), and now we are happy to see more people involved in discipling others. These one-on-one membership discipleship relationships are progressing well, and it has been a blessing to see that members are taking the work of ministry very seriously. Please pray with us that we will see these efforts bear tangible gospel fruits through baptisms and membership intakes. Please join us in praising the Lord for the recent baptisms of Sister Sinesipho and Brother Tebello. We are grateful that the plastic pool that we use as our baptistry was able to hold the water overnight for us to eventually have the baptisms on a chilling winter Sunday morning three months ago. Sinesipho and Tebello are now members in the church, and they are excited to serve the Lord and his people.

For a very long time we’ve been praying for the Lord to bring more people to our Sunday meetings to fill our church hall to capacity. And slowly we are seeing our prayers answered. Since the end of the June/July holiday break, during which our city of Bloemfontein due to its transient nature becomes very quiet, our Sunday morning services have experienced an increased attendance (averaging 45 adults). Excluding 17 bona fide members we can say that we receive about 28 visitors weekly. Please pray for us to continue preaching the gospel faithfully and for the salvation of unsaved visitors.

The young adults ministry continues to bring vibrancy to the church, and the group has been enjoying the series of studies on the fascinating topic of hermeneutics and eschatology with Pastor Tsholo. May you continue to pray with us that the Lord will use our teachings to shape them for the future dedicated to serve him. We praise God for the second group which has recently started the Veritas College course with me. For the next three months, this group of ten members and adherents will be equipped with tools on how to interpret the Bible in a practical and responsible way for themselves. These skills will allow them to grow spiritually through personal Bible studies and to also serve in different teaching ministries in the church.

The ladies’ ministry continues to be a blessing to the young women in the church as they get the opportunity to learn from older women in the church. Some of the young ladies in the church have been experiencing personal struggles and therefore find encouragement by attending and praying together with fellow sisters. Similarly, the men continue to meet regularly with me and Pastor Tsholo as we read a book together on African Christian Ethics. Pray we will indeed sharpen one another during these sessions.

Please continue to pray for my family as we continue to establish gospel partnerships and raise support for the Kuruman church plant. We praise the Lord for several opportunities we had in the recent months to present our ministry to likeminded churches in Johannesburg. We were received very well by the saints.

The agency that we have partnered with, through which we continue to raise support, calls on you to come alongside FSBC. We believe that God accomplishes his eternal purposes through the local church, and that gospel ministry is strengthened through churches partnering together. While not every church is able to send a missionary independently, every church can participate in missional work. Therefore, we invite you to partner with FSBC as we seek to plant and establish a faithful gospel church in Kuruman, where worship doesn’t exist, hence this mission. Pray for us, get regular updates here, invite us to present our ministry to your church, as we did here, and support us financially here.

Please continue to pray for the Kukunis as Pastor Tsholo continues to shepherd alongside me. As he leads the church and his family, Pastor Tsholo still has a heart-cry for the gospel-needy city that is Bloemfontein. We are grateful to the Lord that he has provided for the Kukunis to meet their needs through like-minded churches over the past few years. Just as it is understandable that the saints who have been praying for us will not cease praying for us, it is also understandable that, at some point, financial support comes to an end, as has now happened with some of our partners. In light of this, Pastor Tsholo has taken a temporary contract work in higher education. However, his desire remains to shepherd the transient flock in Bloemfontein, fully supported by the church and/or gospel partners. Please pray for the Lord to provide for the Kukunis and to continue guiding them through this time of uncertainty. Yours in Christ, Tebogo and Tsholo