Jour D'Ami

In the past, we’ve run a few other friend days, and it’s always exciting to see how many people will invite their friends to come and be a part of our service. We offer a prize to the person who brings the most people to church – A large 50 Kilo bag of rice.
Today was our 3rd Jour d’Ami. Mike had been announcing it for several weeks and reminding our people on visitation to bring their friends. The turn out today was beyond our expectations. There were 61 adults in service. We didn’t have enough benches in the church building, so we borrowed some from the children’s service. Even at that, there were several people sitting on some boards we have stacked to the sides for our construction project.
A lady by the name of Assitou won the prize. She brought 7 visitors who showed up on time, and another 2 who showed up after the announcements were read (the cut-off time for counting visitors).
After service was over, three women (two of them first-time visitors) asked Mike and Douninoma to pray with them – one for health, another for difficulties in her life. But the last one that he prayed with wanted to ask Christ in her heart. We had a meeting planned with her the night before, but her husband asked her to go to a wedding with him. So, when she asked Mike to talk after services, he thought it was to set up another time when she could come to our home and discuss our beliefs of the church and salvation. Her request however, was to accept salvation. She said she was ready to ask Christ to save her right then. Mike explained to her how she could come to Christ and she prayed to accept the gift of salvation.
What a great way to end an already exciting service! Mike preached on salvation. The message was so clear, and 61 adults walked away knowing exactly how to come to Christ. Some of those hearts have already turned to Christ, another one having done so that day. But the seed is planted in so many new hearts. Pray that we’ll have the opportunity to speak with those visitors in the near future, and to see them, too, accept Christ as their Savior.

Sunday School Campaign

During the month of July, we ran a campaign for our children’s ministry. At the beginning of the month, the kids were given a list of 40 verses – some that we had already memorized. Each week, the kids were to come a little early to church to recite their verses to one of the teachers – word-for-word.
On August 3, we announced our winner. A young lady by the name of Mamounata had recited 20 verses throughout the month, word perfect. We brought her and all the other children into the church to present her with her prize. To help her and her family, her prize was some basic supplies that she would need for school – backpack, pencils, pens, notebooks, eraser, and some crayons and color pencils. When we handed her the prize, her face lit up. She is a very timid girl, so the smile she gave us was so very rewarding.
We focus on memorizing verses in our Sunday School. Most of the children who come to church do not have a Bible in their homes. The children love to memorize. It is one of the primary ways that they are taught at school. So, we have the opportunity to put Scriptures in their hands and encourage them to memorize it and keep it in their hearts.