The Gardner Report
October 2010
Greetings from the Green Mountains!
The work of the Lord is always busy with the routine of home Bible studies, studying for sermons, classes and counseling. It seems the week just gets started and then it’s over already and we are looking forward to another Lord’s Day. A year and a half ago we rejoiced on a summer’s evening to bring four new Christians into the Lord up at North Hartland Lake. It made for an evening of great rejoicing for the Church here. But as everyone knows Satan does not stop trying to find his way into our lives and he just loves baby Christians. About the middle of this past summer we started losing Paul, Patrick and Maria from our South Royalton crew. They just stopped attending services and it was a cause of great concern. Brandon and Amanda and Ray continued to attend regularly as did James and Brandy who were actually a spin off class from Brandon’s outreach. Fortunately Paul and Patrick were working at the local grocery store and I started to visit them at work to ‘encourage’ them to come back. I even took Patrick out for lunch one day and admonished him about the need of his soul. But we could never seem to contact them by phone and nothing seemed to work. Brandon and Amanda were also trying to encourage them.
Interestingly, during their long absence Paul and Patrick both lost their jobs. Finally, we sent a letter to them with concerns about how important it was for Paula and Maria to raise their sweet little daughter in the Lord and how vulnerable they were to Satan when they stayed away from the Lord’s church and the love and encouragement of their brethren. That Sunday they came back to services for the first time in a long time. We rejoiced to have them back and rather than set up an immediate class I decided that we all needed some fellowship time first. So on October 14th we had a reunion dinner at our house and welcomed our brethren home. Amanda and Maria invited their mother, Donna along for the evening and Sharon put on a great meal for everyone. Right after they started coming back Paula and Patrick both got good jobs at the Vermont Castings plant up in Bethel. For me it was an immediate reminder that when we seek the Kingdom of God first…He takes care of us. That is a lesson that I plan to point out as soon as we get our classes started back up next week. Be praying for our young Christians. It does little good to bring someone to the Lord if Satan pulls them back into the world. We are doing everything we can to hang onto these precious souls. By next week Paul and Patrick will be off from a demanding 65 hour a week work schedule and we will be able to get our classes started again. I am sorry to make this all about one topic but this was an important thing in the Lord’s work. “My brethren, if any one among you wanders from the truth and some one brings him back, let him know that whoever brings back a sinner from the error of his way will save his soul from death and will cover a multitude of sins.” (James 5:19&20) Sometimes the ‘bringing back’ is as important as the ‘bringing to.’ Thank you for your support.
With love in Christ, Randy and Sharon Gardner