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Church Planting in Mexico
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March, 2006 Dear Faithful Supporters, Well, winter is almost over (at least for us J). It’s starting to warm up here. Although we still get out the sweatshirts at night, the forecasted high for today is in the 80’s! It’s hard to believe that we are into March already! So far this year has been packed. In January, we met as a team to set some goals for this year. Some of our goals include reaching 20 new people for Christ and preparing 2 small group leaders. Our complete list of goals can be found here on our website. We are excited to see what God is doing here in the church. We just finished another evangelism class, and it’s great to see the people getting involved in evangelism! Almost every family has become involved in one way or another. They have been reaching out to their unsaved family and neighbors and inviting them to church and special activities. We have had several visitors come already this year, our average Sunday attendance has grown from about 30 on Sundays to 40. Another family came up with the idea of inviting neighbors over to their house in the evening for a marriage study. Texcoco is a very hard city, and most people won’t come to a Christian church even if invited, so they decided to invite them over to their house first, and use that as a stepping stone to invite them to church for the Valentine’s banquet. They invited 5 families over the first night, but unfortunately no one came. The second night, they invited 4 more families, with the same result. They were very discouraged after this. Even though we are disappointed with the results, we are VERY happy with their efforts. To learn more about the culture through this family’s testimony, click here. For our Christmas program, we had about 65 people in attendance. Our people did a great job acting out the Christmas story, and we also had a skit based on the Family Feud where the “contestants” were asked questions about the true meaning of Christmas. Everyone seemed to enjoy the program. The gospel was given, and we’re trusting God to continue His work in the hearts of those who attended. During the Christmas holidays, a couple in our church introduced us to their neighbors named Braulio and Gina. Braulio was driving when he was hit by a car running a red light, and a person in the other vehicle was killed. Even thought it wasn’t his fault, because of the corruption here, he could go to jail unless he pays thousands of dollars that he doesn’t have. He is still fighting the system. They were very depressed, and didn’t know what to do. A few weeks later, his wife, Gina, had a miscarriage. Bryan and Rolland went to talk to him after the accident, and Susan and Jo Ann talked to Gina after the miscarriage. They have been very open with us, and she has been reading the Bible that we gave her. They came to the Valentine’s banquet, and we are hoping that they will attend a Bible study with us soon. For Valentine’s day, we had a special Valentine’s Banquet for the couples of the church and also for visitors that they invited. Almost all of our families came, as well as 4 visiting couples, including 2 families who came for the first time. We had a marriage study and presented the gospel. We are excited to follow up on these new families. Thank you to all who prayed for Rafael and his family. They have once again returned to church, and have been faithful in church services and Bible studies since the end of December. On a sad note, Pablo returned to church a couple of weeks ago to inform us that he will not be returning. He is going back to the Catholic church because going to confession makes him “feel” good. In family news, our “hotel” has been full lately! Two weeks ago Susan’s cousin and family came down to visit us. We had a great time showing them around our part of Mexico, and really appreciate their help in setting up for a conference that our team hosted here in Texcoco for the missionaries in the Mexico City area. That conference took place the day they left. And the following day Bryan’s parents flew down. Two days later Bryan’s brother and his wife came in and we all spent a week vacationing on the beach. It was nice to spend so much time outdoors. Everyone left this past week. Josh and Caleb had a great time with everyone. Now it’s back to school! Josh started first grade in January and is doing well. Caleb enjoys “playing” school and is practicing drawing circles and some letters. In other exciting family news, Susan is pregnant! She is due in the middle of September. Everything seems to be going fine with the pregnancy. The baby is growing well, and she just has one week to go to hit the second trimester. The nausea has improved a lot in the last couple of weeks! Thank you so much for all of your prayers and financial support. You are an important part of our team in Mexico. (2 Corinthians 1:11a, Philippians 4:17) Praises:
Prayer Requests
In Christ, The Nevin Family
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