Praise God that we have the testimony in our hearts, given to us by the Holy Spirit, affirming that Jesus, the Son of God, was slain for our sins and rose from the dead, just as He had earlier proclaimed to His disciples.
And an SGA-supported pastor has an amazing update to share . . .
Glory be to God for giving us the honor to bring the “Good News” to this world!
After the Christmas and Immanuel’s Child activities, our team brainstormed ideas on what exactly we could organize during the Easter celebrations to proclaim the Gospel. We prayed for this need and the Lord blessed us through the SGA staff. A sister from a neighboring town, contacted us and offered ready-made gifts—thanks to SGA for Evangelistic Services. In this, we saw an opportunity to follow-up of the Immanuel’s Child Christmas events, thus giving people joy and hope. The team appreciated the idea and responded positively. We gratefully accepted the gifts prepared for children.
In schools, when lecturing on the prevention of smoking, drug use, and alcohol consumption, we started collaborating with some police officers who have to work with troubled teenagers.
We suggested that they bring together the children they work with so that we could teach them the meaning of the Easter holiday. Typically, these are children from large, disadvantaged, and low-income families. The police officers liked our idea and we agreed to hold the event in our Christian Youth Center “Open Doors.”
Together with the youth of our church, we prepared a program that connected Easter with the Christmas Immanuel’s Child outreach. Parents, children, and even police officers came to our Easter celebration.
At the beginning of the event, we displayed a video of the Christmas celebrations, where those present could see themselves and their classmates. The program continued with a Passover play, songs, and a quiz. The entire audience was invited to join the worship team in singing (if they desired). What a surprise when the audience willingly accepted the invitation to sing praises!
When the celebration was over, the parents approached me and thanked me sincerely for the information they had heard. They testified that it was the first time they had heard such profound truth, and it touched their hearts. They also said it was the first time they had heard songs with such deep meaning. As they listened to the music, the words of the songs penetrated deep into their souls.
I especially want to share about the PDN* police officers — the ones who work with difficult children. One of them was so touched by our service and Christian songs that she did not want to leave. It was obvious that the Lord was moving in her heart. After the service was over, she came up to us and said that we were doing a wonderful job for children and especially for difficult ones. She wanted us to work more with these troubled children in order to reach out as many of the younger generation as possible. Then she said that she would talk to the higher authorities so that they would allow us to minister to more children, because only this approach could help these teenagers and the country as a whole.
At the conclusion of our meeting, we took a commemorative photo. After we said they could now go in peace, the parents told us they would like to stay a little longer since they had enjoyed everything so much. We then invited them to the upcoming Sunday morning service and the evening youth service. They promised to come.
The children came up to us and asked us when we would bring them together again to fellowship with them like this. We assured them that we would invite them to come to our church on June first, when we would celebrate International Children’s Day. One of the parents asked us to talk to his nephew about starting to come to our church since he had been mixed up with some bad company.
We would like to thank the staff of SGA and supporters for helping us in organizing such a festive event. You have served as an instrument of grace in the hands of the Lord to help us navigate these festive days and tell the children and their parents about the Savior of the world.
We now know how to conduct an Easter service, and we will do it again with the children and their parents, should God grant us more days to live.
On behalf of the children and their parents, we thank you all again for your care.
* PDN is an abbreviation for “Legal Activities of Minors” and refers to comprehensive participation in resolving legal issues concerning minors. It includes both rights and obligations.