Dear sisters and brothers,
“I pray that in all respects you may prosper and be in good health, just as your soul prospers” (3 John 2). On behalf of the saints at Hope Bible Church, I would like to share with you what the Lord has been doing in our lives since the last time we wrote to you.
The Kukunis
We continue to do life in a new-adjusted way here at home. The children enjoy being at home having the entire house as their playground. What is encouraging is that our daughter, Warona, enjoys doing schoolwork daily and she has now started to enjoy bedtime Bible stories more than ever. The only struggle we have with our kids is getting them to bed at night. They get up very early. We wish it could be the other way around.
Keitu continues to teach maths online although she is on a two-week break at the moment. She will continue to teach online until she can return to their teaching centre soon. They are in the process of preparing to reopen, so please pray that all will go well. She continues to do her devotions throughout the day, as and when she gets time, mostly by listening to my sermons and the audio Bible. She is in Acts at the moment.
I am in the Minor Prophets for my devotions at the moment. I enjoy seeing how God used his prophets to proclaim what he was about to do in the lives of his people. Some of that left me feeling like we still had prophets today, to give us a message from the Lord to know exactly what is happening in the world at the moment. On the other hand, reading the prophets is reassuring because more than feeling like God could speak today, I often come out with my convictions solidified that he is speaking today, for what more can he say to us than he has said? His word is sufficient and relevant. The other discipline that has helped me to stay tremendously focused is by being off social media and not reading the news for three weeks, and that has been good to my soul.
Hope Bible Church
We have been helped by the Lord to not be reactionary a lot, while not ignoring the current events as we seek to be salt and light in Bloemfontein. At the start of the current season, and before the current heated events around the world, we started studying the book of Amos as a church, coupled with daily devotionals through various texts of Scripture. A few weeks ago, we did snippets into church history, looking at some of the key figures the Lord used to reform theology as we know it today.
We discovered that there is nothing new under the sun, because what the saints of old dealt with those many years ago, are similar issues we are dealing with today. We were able to contextualise a lot of what we studied together, Amos being the most applicable. The Lord has used our study of his word to reflect and to help us to glorify him by applying what his word requires of us, and to fear him.
We are now starting to calculate the effects of the lockdown, so please pray that the Lord would be gracious as he enables us to live out the gospel during these difficult, trying times. Things are starting to go back to normalcy, so this is something to be grateful for.
Prayer Points
- Please pray for my health.
- Please pray for the universal church that God would be gracious and make the gospel shine despite our legitimate differences and the ongoing contentions on a wide range of issues.
- Please pray for Hope to remain focused and trust God to lead us in the way he wants us to go. Being in Bloemfontein is a blessing as we are often not caught up in the mix of Reformed battles.
- The world is going through a lot. South Africa is going through a lot. We need salvific healing, so please pray “so that we may lead a tranquil and quiet life in all godliness and dignity” (1 Timothy 2:2).
Tsholo