Praise be to God when He opens the eyes of an unrepentant sinner for the first time! Especially when it is the child of a pastor. A pastor tirelessly shares the Gospel message with many men, women, and children who God has placed before him in each new day. He longs for those people with whom he shares, to see the loveliness of God’s message of salvation. He rejoices with each new proclamation of faith. But when it’s his own child, living in his own home, it brings even greater joy and excitement!
I have no greater joy than to hear that my children are walking in the truth (3 John 1:4).
SGA-supported Pastor Mikhail shares with us in the story below of how his daughter’s eyes were opened for the first time, in understanding all that she had been previously taught but had stubbornly refused. As she shared about her new heart with great excitement, we can only imagine the true joy that Mikhail felt as he listened then, and must be feeling now, as he watches his beloved daughter soak in the Scriptures and apply them to her life.
“She reads the Scripture with great hope now, asks questions about the text, and wonders at the way she did not see anything of this before.” Please pray for Xenia and that she will continue to draw closer to the Lord.
Peace be unto you, precious brothers and sisters!
The Year 2024 is over. It was the year of God’s mercy and His longsuffering to this generation of people living on earth. It was the year of the Gospel being preached so that every person who lives and has not been reconciled with God can become a part of His family by listening to the Word of Truth and believing in the sacrifice of Christ.
I will write a few lines about the ministry, of which God blesses us to be a part. I will start with the most joyful event for our family—our senior daughter Xenia has reconciled with God! This year, during the Advent time, my wife and I decided to explain to our children the core of the Gospel and to do it in detail. At the same time, we asked God to open their hearts to receive the Good News. The deeper we penetrated this topic, the clearer it became to us that Xenia was becoming less obedient and drifted away from us emotionally. We have never seen her in such a state before during the eight years of her stay with us (she is our adopted daughter). She frankly said that sin was attracting her strongly and she could do nothing about it. Our words, that only Christ could fight with her sinfulness, did not find any response in her heart. She said again and again that she could do nothing. We asked our friends in the church to support us in prayers for her soul and pray too.
Then once all of a sudden, she told me while smiling, that she had repented!! I could hardly stop her. She was talking and talking, saying how wonderful it was to understand, that God had forgiven her sins! How wonderful it was to pray and see how He answers! She reads the Scripture with great hope now, asks questions about the text, and wonders at the way she did not see anything of this before. The life with God is so wonderful! Xenia began to attend the course, “Fundamentals of Faith,” and is looking forward to the classes. More of that! A friend of hers, a girl, who used to be indifferent to God in general, seeing changes in Xenia, began to attend the church regularly and also began to study the course.Glory be to God for His mercy to us sinners! I pray and wish most of all to see how all our children will become God’s children! Xenia, at 16, has become our first child who really has experienced a meeting with God.”