Sunday, April 6, 2008

God Is Keeping the Door Open!

Thank you so much for praying for tonight! We have good news. First this is the letter that Jimmy sent out in an email update if you did not receive it. At the bottom I have the rest of the story.

Dear praying friends and family,

Thank you so much for the emails and response we received. God worked because of your prayers for us tonight.
Fernandez, the voice for the Town Council came into the meeting asking us to leave until June, and then we could request a vote in the next town meeting to be let back in. That did not sound good since it was in the last town meeting that they voted to kick us out.
He spoke for the first 20 minutes about how we had just come in and started this work and were leading everybody along with our ideology from America. He said, “Our religion is Marxism and Socialism and we don’t have a God.” His next 20 minutes were all the reason he didn’t like churches and the sneaky ways they brainwash you. I explained why we had come and that from the beginning we had gone before the town council to receive permission and kept them informed of what we were doing so we could avoid these problems. He is new and did not know about this, and Tania was there to affirm it so that took care of point number one.
I agreed with him that many churches fight and say they are better than everybody else. There are a lot of problems in churches and he is right to ask me questions about who I am. The truth is that every man is equal. We have all sinned and Jesus died for us. The difference between Christians and non-Christians is that we are sinners that have been forgiven. I also reminded him that everybody is free to choose and some of my best friends in the village are people that don’t believe in God. I don’t show favorites just because somebody comes to the Bible Study. So that satisfied him with point number two.
He then asked if I was going to bring in large campaigns from the States and convince everybody to pray a prayer as a large group to start a church. I said no. He said ok, Point three.
After that he changed his mind and said that we would leave things the way they are right now. They are finally going to let me attend the next town meeting in June. The town can ask me anything they want until they are satisfied and then we can stay. At the end of our meeting today I actually saw his heart softening towards us. You may never know how much your prayers moved God to work tonight.
Thank you so much,
Jim and Shelley Dinsmore

We were able to have both Bible studies tonight at their regular times. We had two new ladies come. One was Rosalia!

Towards the end of the council meeting, Ofelia’s husband showed up. He started complaining about us causing him to fight with his wife. He said that Ofelia comes to our Bible studies and he doesn’t want her to and that causes them to argue. Jimmy did not even have to say anything, Fernandez, who started off against us, told him that was a personal problem that he needed to take care of on his own.
Rafa, one of the town council members’ son who received a Bible tonight for attending faithfully. One of the other kids took the picture for me... not bad!

As soon as we arrived in New Horizon two of the town council members’ sons were there to help us unload our stuff for the Bible study... one of them received a Bible tonight. They told us that Marc, the Spaniard who started all of these lies, is leaving New Horizon for good in 10 days. Just the thought of this was a huge encouragement to us. Marc has been there for several years. We will see what happens.

Please understand that Jimmy having the opportunity to speak to the town council and later in the town meeting is a huge blessing. This is what we have always wanted. We are not hiding from the truth. Our biggest fight is Marc’s lies and what other people have told them what following Jesus is supposed to be.

Please rejoice with us and with the many people in New Horizon who get to make their own decision about God.
Some of our people tonight, the kids take much better photos than I do!

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