Day 2 Sunday 7/22/2007

We enjoyed a wonderful service at the Armenian Baptist Church here in Ashtarak (See Susie Q.'s previous post!). The love of Christ indeed, transcends all borders. Brooks introduced our team, every member shared their name, Hamille gave her testimony and Jamie preached a message on Revelation 12, very timely in many respects. We were delighted to find that our Armenian brothers and sisters in Christ also love to sing. We sang about 10 hymns throughout the entire service! They sing with gusto, praise the Lord!

After the service, we met many believers. They were so warm, hospitable, loving! We had a good time of fellowship, we got to know many of their names. They were very encouraging also! They said they would pray for us and our ministry. We also said that we will pray for them. We were honoured to hear that our translator had also experienced wonderful healing from the Lord. This young woman, when she was young began to pray to the Lord, and God healed her skin disease. They shared other stories of amazing grace from God that other members of their families have experienced. Indeed, many members of this church are related!

Interestingly enough, on the way back from the church, we met a Jehovah's witness who tried to persuade 2 team members to visit their center (nearby) for coffee. We could not understand her words, and were later told by an Armenian national that she was a Jehovah's witness.

We had a team meeting, talking about the logistics of our first day in Sevan. We now understand that the local church leadership in Sevan dearly wants us to have a VBS - and that was their vision - which is a slightly different focus from the Armenian national leadership. As we are also keen on going door-to-door, we have agreed to keep that aspect with the same focus and intensity. Leila's plans for VBS are underway and paying-off, John will co-lead games, Susan and Hamille will lead music, Armenian church nationals will teach Armenian Christian children's songs and translate with many other logistics roles and the rest of the team will rotate in teaching the bible lesson and verse of the day and the crafts activities. Emily is the first to teach and she has prepared very hard for that! We meet each day to discuss our plans for the next day, about our concerns and we pray at these meetings.

In the evening, our Canadian friend joined us for dinner (as we often see him during the meals and enjoy fellowship) - and he exclaimed that one of his many friends in the city saw us at church this morning and has invited all of us over for dinner. Four of us were able to go, so in the evening, our Canadian friend led us down the road and into a large apartment complex, we met many Armenians along the way and stopped and chatted. The buildings are very old and economic situation here is almost dire. Some family heads have to work 7 days a week, 10-12 hours a day, just to make ends meet.

When we entered the Armenian believer family's apartment, we were met with delightful tea and snacks and we enjoyed fellowshipping with this family and their friends. They were very interested in our ethnic backgrounds, they wanted us to sing, they shared many pictures of their family members, we also enjoyed learning new Armenian words from them. God Bless this hospitable family! We are told that they always invite foreigners over to fellowship. We thanked them and we were certainly invited to return! We returned to the seminary, and retired for the night.

PRAYER ITEMS:

Please pray for these wonderful believers at the Armenian Baptist Church and their church in general:

Pastor Edic and his wife Astgik, Annie, Armine, Susan, Rose, Ann, Alla, Kristina, David, Daniel, Jacob, Aaron, Lilia, Valer, Robert, Varditer, Nina, Cegam, Samuel, Manual, Lucina.

Please pray for this wonderful, hospitable Christian family and their unsaved friends:

Humest and her husband, Satenic, Artak, Armen, Roman, David, Artavazt, Siran.

LEARN SOME ARMENIAN!: (given in phonetic pronounciation)
*Good morning = Bari Lu-is
*Good afternoon = Bari Yereko
*Goodnight = Bari Geeshir
*Yes = Ayo (formal), Ha (informal)
*No = Votch (formal), Chey (informal)
*This is very tasty = Shat Ha-mauva
*Please/Your Welcome = Hon-trem (roll the H with frickative, roll the "tr" the normal way)*Friend = Enkir
*Wash cloth = Serrani shor