We pray and believe . . . .

Report from Marijan and Slavica -- home church, Toponica, south Serbia:

As I have said before, we meet in the house of a man called Ljubisa, but during our visit another family expressed a desire to meet in their house. This time a few new people came to see what is it that we believe and preach. So, out of 22 adult people (Roma population) in the village, 12 came to the meeting. We pray and believe that all of them will have the opportunity to hear the Gospel.

Stefan was with me. Stefan shared his testimony at the beginning and read a few verses from the Bible which show that life without God has no purpose and that everything this world offers is only fake comfort, which he experienced before he met the source of life. Since some parents alongside their children were present, of a similar age as Stefan, his message attracted their attention. You could see on their faces that they were touched because their family relationships are not as they wanted.

They told us they heard about God from Jehovah Witnesses, but they were not impressed with their talk because they didn’t recognize the honesty and love they saw in us. Stefan’s message and his testimony, as well as good atmosphere during Bible reading, was excellent introduction to worship. We noticed that unlike first time, this time everybody was singing with us. They shared that they enjoyed songs that we sang. The songs were about God sending His Holy Spirit, songs of thanksgiving and prayer for help. As we were singing these songs, many of them were so touched that they couldn’t hide the tears.

Last time as we visited them, we had a discussion about tradition and customs, so we continued to talk about it, comparing faith in tradition and Biblical faith, which comes through repentance. Since people in this village are a bit more educated and literate, they understood what Bible teaches about repentance, so they had some very interesting questions about it. So far none of them gave their life to Christ, but we don’t want to push it, but rather let them to come to that point by themselves and we believe it won’t take much time.

After our meeting, we distributed five New Testaments and as much tracts “Who is God” and “The life of Jesus Christ” and three CDs with Roma Christian music. We hope that next time we visit them we’ll hear that they started to read the Bible. Since we visited them only once, traveling expenses were 1,000 dinars/$13

Short, and So Very Sweet

A report came in this morning from south Serbia. I am pasting below, with photos taken on various trips. All photos are of the Roma community in Serbia, taken by Linking Partners.


We have good news. Yesterday we were visiting the village Toponica. There were people from the village Jasenica and Sainovac.

We were unable to take pictures. People from the village of Jasenica call us today to visit them so that today we spent 5 hours visiting people in the village.

Pray for us as God is leading us to announce the Gospel in this village. I'll Let you know how it was. Marijan and Slavica

This makes at least five villages that are begging for the Gospel to be brought to them, in addition to the church in Prokuplje. Pray for Marijan and Slavica, and their sons Filip and Andrija, as this is a big responsibility. Pray also for the young men who are stepping up to be disciples who make disciples -- David, Stefan, Petar, Danijel, Nikki, and others.

God is in the miracle business!

This post is directly from pastor Marijan in south Serbia. Please note that David is a young man in high school!

FBCSherwood group visiting home church in Zitni Potok, Summer 2012

At the beginning of the month I visited brothers and sisters in Zitni potok. As we were interring the village I had a strong impression of a spiritual pressure. Since David was going with me, I shared with him my „experience“. We immediately new that something was going on in the village. Since we were a bit late (around 5:30 p.m.) first we noticed that whole settlement where Roma people live doesn't have electricity. When we gathered in the house of brother Goran (Rade's father) we heard that they were not having electricity for 36 hours. But their problem was much bigger than we thought. Many brothers and sisters who attend the house group have big material needs. Some of them ran out of wood for heating and an electric heater was the only mean of heating. Since there was no electricity they were in a cold for 36 hours. The reason electricity was turned off is that the whole settlement is not legalized and almost 95% homes don’t have an electricity meter. Officials from Electric Company demanded that each family has to sign a contract for legal introduction of electricity, but it is unacceptable for people who live on 10-12.000 dinars per month ($115 to $138 American Dollars). That’s why Electric Company unplugged the whole electricity altogether.

I am talking about this not to show you the extent of the problem, but to share with you how great is our heavenly Father who changes circumstances when their children pray and makes possible what looks impossible to us.

As I was listening our dear brothers and sisters and their problem, I just couldn’t believe that God would not react to such things..

1.     David had a short, but very encouraging message. He spoke from Mathew 7:7-8. As he was speaking from the Word we were aware of God’s presence and even then our hearts were more and more filled with the power of the Holy Spirit. After that I also shared something from the Word of God about prayer – a kind of prayer that reaches God’s throne and a kind that doesn’t.

2.     In that home atmosphere we were able to smell the victory. We just wanted to praise God and pray for all of us were in the state of expectance. We knew that if we seek God and ask Him for the electricity that He will answer our prayers. We didn’t know how, we just simply believed.

3.     We started with worship and prayers. Many prayers were said in faith, with sighs and cries and tears. In those few minutes we all were in the spiritual battle – all together – grownups, even children joined us in this battle. We prayed as one, confessed, proclaimed and thanked God. Those moments were very special and unique. Many till then never experienced anything like that, they did not know that such dimension, power, anointing and power exist. We’ve received great revelation from God.

4.     We were all in prayer with our eyes closed and nobody noticed what happened (except David who was taking pictures). Little girl called Marija (7) who also prayed out loud in faith. As she was praying all of a sudden she cried out: Electricity! Electricity! When we opened our eyes we saw electric bulbs turned on after 36 hours. This is great miracle. After that we continued in prayer, now even louder giving thanks to God for His faithfulness and goodness.

5.     God answered our prayers and the words David had read just a half an hour earlier came true - "Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you: for every one that asketh  receiveth; and he that seeketh findeth; and to him that knocketh it shall be opened.

            We really don’t know what happened that they decided to give electricity to those people, but we are immensely thankful to God for what He is doing. As we were going home leaving the place, we saw many people amazed about what happened. They didn’t know, but we knew that it was an answer to our prayers.