October 1, 2016

My wife and I have been in the States for exactly two weeks now and it’s been a busy and blessed two weeks. I am typing this from the airport in Los Angeles. My wife and I are heading to the Midwest for one month. I will be in nine different churches in four different states during that time span.

Please pray for this to be a fruitful trip!

We just concluded the Missions’ Revival at Pacific Baptist Church in Long Beach (Pastor Steve Meyers/Pastor Joe Esposito) and Pacific Baptist Church in Monterey Park (Pastor Kyle Beck). Pastor Meyers and Pastor Beck, along with their staff, are doing a great job. As always, it was a wonderful time. It was a blessing to see so many brothers and sisters in Christ who I had the privilege to labor with for 18 years. Both of the churches had great crowds, a great spirit, great singing, and a great response to the many messages. I preached a total of nine times in seven days for the two churches!

Please pray that God will continue to bless and use both of these churches in this matter of the Great Commission!

In addition to preaching for the two churches, I had the wonderful privilege to teach a four-day intensive at Pacific Baptist Bible College and preach for their chapel service three times. It’s always a blessing to teach and preach for the college, but I do believe this year might have been better than ever. My nephew, Joseph (Pastor Joe’s eldest son), and my son Jeremy are doing a great job in the college. The students were extremely attentive and many made decisions. Many of them are seriously considering serving on the mission field!

Please pray that God will raise up many young men and women from PBBC to be faithful laborers for the great harvest fields of the world!

I also had the privilege to preach for our Pacific Baptist Grade School chapel and our 7-12 grade chapel service. My wife and I were the school administrators for almost 18 years at Pacific Baptist School and it’s always a blessing to go back and see how the young people have grown and matured.

Please pray that God will use these young people for His glory!

Of course, another blessing of being at Pacific is to be able to spend time with four of our five children and 12 of our 17 grandchildren. Denise and I have a daughter who is married to a pastor in Central California, but our other four children (three married) are staff members at Pacific Baptist. My youngest daughter Joy will be getting married in about two months, and Lord willing her and her future husband Chris will be going to serve in the needy harvest fields of China! The picture below is two of my three sons and SOME of my grandsons. 🙂

Of course, I also had the opportunity to visit with my brother, Pastor Joe, a few times while in the area. It’s great to see him smile when something funny is said and give a thumbs up concerning ministry reports. While we are definitely grateful for the progress God has allowed him to make over the past three years (he wasn’t supposed to survive the first 24 hours), we are still praying for a full recovery. We are all grateful for your continual prayers for Pastor Joe, his wife Mary, and the rest of the family!

Please continue to pray for Pastor Joe, Mary, their family, and the Pacific Baptist Church family!