I remember a preacher saying (and I think he was paraphrasing John Bunyan), that our prayers
should be like shooting an arrow. When the archer shoots his arrow, he doesn’t point it aimlessly into the air and shoot the arrow in any direction, but he aims, fires, and hits the target. And this is how we ought to pray, praying specifically for needs, not generally but prayers that are targeted. It is for this reason that we hope to produce the ‘Highland Prayer Focus’ on a monthly basis (or there abouts) so that we might keep you up to date with what is happening within the work of the Faith Mission in the Highlands, so that you can join us in praying affectively for the work.
Tiree
In the middle of May, Jeff went out to Tiree with second year Faith Mission Bible College student, Kyle Parks for a week. We held gospel meetings each night and did door to door visiting each day.
One word would sum up the trip; ‘hard!’ Whilst we generally expect a cold response on the doors, there was a real sense of darkness. We had also hoped to hold an after-school club during the week, but this wasn’t very successful. On the first day we had four children, but unfortunately we had no children coming along the rest of the week.
Despite this we knew the Lord’s help and were encouraged by a number of good opportunities to share with people on the doors, with one person asking for a Gospel of John commenting ‘I will read this.’ The meetings were small in number, but we believe the local believers were encouraged, and we praise God that a Roman Catholic person asked for a Bible after our last meeting.
Point tent mission
On the last day of May, Jeff headed over to Lewis to begin setting up the tent for the Point tent mission. It was great to have Donnie Macleod, Stewart Megaw, and Jonathan Gould (part time FMBC student) over to help with the tent set up. We are looking forward to FMBC students Reuben Hutchinson and Debs Bailey joining us along with John Kirk, Karen Cameron, and John Buchanan. The tent is now up, thanks to a good squad of men who came down to help, and our first meeting begins on Sunday night (4th June) at 7.30pm. We would really value your prayers as the mission continues over the next two weeks. There will be meetings each night at 7.30, a coffee morning on Friday 9th and 16th of June, a young people’s meeting on the Friday 9th at 9pm and the closing meeting on Sunday the 18th June. Please pray that many unsaved from the local area will come into these meetings, pray for Donnie Macleod, Robert Murdoch and Jeff as they share the preaching burden between them. During the second week of the mission, we also hope to hold an after-school club during the afternoons for primary age children, pray the young lives that come along would be impacted by the gospel and bridges might be built with the parents and that they would even come along to the evening meetings.
Above all, we would ask you to pray that we would see the Spirit of God at work during this mission. We can plan a programme and put a tent up, but unless the Spirit is at work it is all in vain.
We deeply appreciate your prayerful support and look to the Lord for the two weeks ahead realising that it is ‘not by might, nor by power, but by my Spirit, says the Lord.’ (Zechariah 4:6)
Yours in Christ
Jeff and Sarah Townend