Dear Pastor and Brethren:
End of Year Review
I like to do a review of each year’s work and blessings at the end of each year and beginning of each new year to see what has been accomplished and to ask the Lord’s blessings for future spiritual and numerical growth. With that in mind, please note the following facts of our past blessings, answers to our prayers up to this point.
During the 2018 year the Lord blessed us with 46 visitors, both first time and return visitors. Of the 46 people who visited, one has remained and faithfully comes to our services. We presently number regularly from eight to eleven people attending on Sunday mornings and six attending our Thursday evening Bible studies. In 2018, the Lord enabled us to add an outreach program of visitation twice monthly to our regular schedule of services. In my own personal witnessing, I have contacted at least 49 Latinos with gospel tracts and a personal word about their need of a saving relationship with God through the Lord Jesus Christ. Four of them have come to our services twice but have not returned.
In 2018, we were blessed with the opportunity to host a Fifth Saturday Fellowship meeting in which some 27 people attended for both spiritual and physical refreshment. We had 23 attendees on Resurrection Day (Easter), when relatives and friends of members came to visit our service.
We now have a weekly bulletin published and a website (gracebaptiststillwater.com) that is being updated from time to time with our articles of faith. Both of these publications are made by brethren who are burdened to do the work involved to produce these publications. In addition, we conduct two prison ministries, one in our local jail on Sunday afternoons and one in the state prison on Sunday evenings. Bro. Dick Gaches and his wife are responsible for these ministries. Bro. Gaches preaches to a number between 75 and 85 men on Sunday evenings in the state prison. We thank the Lord for all of these blessings that He has given us during the past year.
Future Plans Needing Prayer
Brethren, we need the Lord to bless us with numerical growth. Such growth principally comes from the salvation of souls and their addition to the work through scriptural baptism. We thank you for all your prayers and giving to sustain us in the work, and ask that you continue to aid us in this work of establishing a true New Testament Baptist Church here in Stillwater.
By His grace and in loving gratitude,
Tim and Roxanne Parrow