This is an update that Dad just wrote:
What’s happening at PAFCOE? We’ve been busy! The
five-week “Mysteries of Prophecy Seminar” ended a week ago, with 84 baptized
(79 on Sabbath and 5 earlier), and more planned for the end of April. One
of our students, Jowel, had 15 of his Bible study interests baptized! He
was thrilled.
One of those fifteen was a lady named Beth. Her
husband, working in Saudi Arabia, had attended Adventist schools when growing
up, but was discouraging her to join the church. His father, Beth’s
father-in-law, is a stroke victim, but had been studying the Bible with
Jowel. When PAFCOE started, Ayolani Hill, an AFCOE graduate that has been
teaching home remedies here at PAFCOE, took some of her students to his home,
and began giving him treatments. Amazingly, he began to recover feeling
in the side of his body affected by the stroke. He decided to get baptized,
along with his granddaughter Bethany, Beth’s daughter.
When I visited in their home, Beth told me that her only
hesitation for baptism was her husband. As we talked, I ask her, “Beth,
if Jesus came here and asked you, ‘Beth do you love me?’, what would you tell
Him.” Without hesitation, she responded, “Yes.” I replied, “and if
He were to ask you, ‘Beth, do you love me enough to get baptized this
Sabbath?,’ what would you say to Him?” She smiled and said quietly, “I’d
have to tell Him, ‘Yes.’”
Beth together with her daughter and both in-laws were
baptized a week ago in the blue waters of the ocean. Her father-in-law
was one of the last baptized. Four pastors carried him out into the ocean
in a plastic chair, and gently buried him, chair and all, in the water.
The baptism spot was behind one of the local Adventist
churches in the southern part of Iloilo City. It was a beautiful
location, and a beautiful baptism. You can read more about it, and see
pictures at www.pafcoe.blogspot.com
, Teresa’s blog. You can also view our video updates at www.pafcoe.org or on YouTube. Just type
in “pafcoe” to see video updates for each week.
Now that the Evangelistic series is over, life has slowed
down—slightly. We are doing follow-up meetings for the interests once a
week, along with our students doing follow-up visitation and Bible
Studies. Classes at PAFCOE during the day, still keep us busy.
It has been a thrill to have a team of twenty-five students
helping out with this past series of meetings. Teaching classes during
the day, and conducting a full-scale evangelistic effort in the evenings, has
left little time for anything but the absolute essentials. And even those
were crowded out occasionally! We apologize for not sending a report last
month.
Now our focus is getting all the details together for the
Student Seminars that will take place during the month of May. There are
nineteen sites across the Philippines, along with two more locations where the
PAFCOE staff will be holding meetings. This is part of the PAFCOE
training we offer here—sending the students out either singly or in pairs to
conduct their own evangelistic efforts.
Excitement is running high among
the students, along with a few threads of fear about doing their very first
evangelistic series, but all are really looking forward to the experience.
The student meetings will all be conducted on a
“shoe-string” budget, but we praise God for the “shoe-strings” He has sent, and
we are moving forward with our shoes tied! The participating churches are
covering the costs of food, housing, and transportation for our PAFCOE
speakers, and we are praying that God will multiply the loaves and fishes.
Again, thank you for your prayers and support!
Your friends,
Pastor Lowell, family, and team,
PAFCOE (Philippine Amazing Facts Center of Evangelism)
