A Great Start

Mark and I are back on the pioneer list after a very difficult year. Some of you know that I fell and broke 2 vertebrae in my back and it has been a long and difficult recovery. However, I am doing much better and we both decided to give pioneering another try. So starting with the new service year, we started also.

At first we were scared about getting in our time because I still have days that I just have to rest. We have been begging Jehovah for the strength and ability to pioneer. So, let me tell you about our first week in service. How Jehovah knows what we need!

Monday, Sept. 1 met with the group and set out door to door. Found a bible student who wanted to continue studying. Wow....

Then we met a woman at her place of business reading her bible. What question did she have? Can you tell me "who is the faithful and discreet slave." She listened and accepted the explanation we gave her. Another big "WOW." She invited us to come back on Mondays to continue our conversations.

Tuesday, Sept. 2 again we met with the group. Made return visits and started another bible study with a woman who works at a hardware store. She gave us her home address and we will be visiting her on Wednesday nights for the study.

Thursday, Sept. 4. Met with the group and went preaching in San Joaquin. This is a small town on the outskirts of Cuenca that most of the food for the city and country is grown. A lot of agriculture. Met a young lady who just moved from the coast to San Joaquin. She was very interested in what the Bible says about having a happy family life. She accepted the Teach book and invited us back to show her how to study the book. She wants her husband also to sit in on the bible discussions.

Saturday, Sept. 6. Mark goes to work at the institute. On his way out of work, he sees Gino (a young man we studied with 3 years ago) waiting at an intersection directly in front of the entrance of the Institute. After greeting he invites Mark to get in the car so that they can catch up. He is now married and in town to pick up his wife. He says "Mark, I was just taking about you yesterday. My wife's family are involved in a religious group called The Brothers of Christ and we were talking about the book of Revelation." He said his wife was afraid of the book of Revelation, but Gino had said that Mark the man he used to study the bible with really knew the bible and if anyone knew about the book of Revelation, he would. And here he was the day after. So Mark rode with him to get his wife and met her and invited Gino to our house to see me and present his wife and Mark had mentioned that we had a book which discusses Revelation verse by verse. She was very interested. So, when they got to the apartment, after meeting me, we placed the Revelation book and 2 Teach books. Gino had only studied in the Knowledge book. She had many questions and was very sincere. They live quite a ways out of town, but we hope to study with them during the week when they are in town because he is studying in the local university and she is working one block away from where Mark works.

All in all, we started 4 new studies and in total gives us 9 studies. Not bad for the first week of pioneering, huh? Jehovah is good.