Our family shares at pt chevalier Baptist church

 August 2009 

In some ways the month of August has been an encouraging month for our family after the discouragements we had in July. It has been encouraging for two main reasons.

1st, Kathy visited her own doctor and it appears that her operation may now have been more successful than it was previously thought. Although she prolapsed again, it appears to have lifted up a little. Her specialist who did the operation said that this could still happen.

2nd, As a family, on August 30th, we took part in a service at Pt Chevalier Baptist Church which is in Auckland. Early in July, I had gone with Jeremy, Matthew and Isaac to introduce our ministry of Families Walking With God to them. Kathy & Priscilla were unable to come, due to Kathy recovering from her operation. At that time, our three sons shared about the blessing the daily Quiet Time had been in their lives, and I preached and we did a practice run from Psalm 1 on how to have a QT. It went well with people sharing what they believed the Lord was saying to them from Psalm 1.

This time Kathy & Priscilla shared what a blessing the QT's had been to them. Kathy spoke about how before the Billy Graham Crusade in 1959, her mother had

pre-crusade counselling training on how to lead people to Christ and follow them up. A year or two later, when Kathy was 8, her mother prayed with her to receive the Lord, and what was so important, her mother continued to pray with her each day. At the 1969 Billy Graham Crusade, Kathy, aged 16, went forward to make a Lordship decision to follow Christ. She was subsequently discipled by people from the Navigators, who gave her a passion to have a daily QT, memorize Scripture and to make disciples.

When Kathy spoke this last weekend, she shared what a huge encouragement spending time with the Lord has been to her each day, despite the trials and disappointments we all face. She read the two QTs she had had on 2nd, 3rd August, which are in the July newsletter. I felt that what Kathy shared was a huge encouragement to the folk at PT Chevalier Baptist. The reason it was an encouragement was because no Christian is exempt from trials and trouble. Kathy is still full of joy in the Lord, despite not having her prayers answered in the way she would have liked.

Matthew also preached a message entitled "God And." Matthew is now nearly 22. When he was aged 15, he got very passionate about the Lord. He would go to bed early and sometimes get up at 4am to have his QT and to read devotional books. He was particularly blessed by A.W. Tozer's books, especially "The Pursuit of God." For about two years, this passion of Matthew's, to know God, continued, but then gradually other things such as sports, material possessions & computers assumed 1st place in his life, ahead of the Lord. Nearly a year ago, Matthew started to return to his first love of the Lord Jesus.

In his sermon, he spoke about how Jesus Himself is our greatest reward and the need to discipline ourselves so that He becomes our deepest joy. Kathy and I were so encouraged with Matthew's message. Because of this I decided to include it on this website. Click here to view his message entitled "God And"

Click to read more newsletters