Wallace’s Missionary Prayer Letter August 1, 2019 (Jun. ’19 & July. ’19)
Dear Pastors, Churches and Friends,
August 1, 2019 (Jun. – Jul. ’19)
Greetings in Jesus’ Name from Mexico City! I reported two months ago that we were able to get rid of the circus tent roof on our church, and we now have a real roof – just in time for the rainy season. Since then we have finished cement flooring, tile, and walls to expand our new auditorium area. Now we just need more benches. I started a new soul-winning training program, and we have 15 new people who have a burden for souls and want to learn how to reach others with the gospel. Lord willing and with His help, this should aid us in filling our new auditorium. My desire is to accomplish what Jesus said in Luke 14:23, “And the lord said unto the servant, Go out into the highways and hedges, and compel them to come in that my house may be filled.” Pray for a need that we have for a steady supply of gospel tracts and Romans. We go through about 6,000 pieces of gospel material weekly. I would like to one day have a literature distribution ministry into southern Mexico and northern Central America, but as of now we don’t have a sufficient amount for our own church’s needs.
I have given a small quantity of Bibles to a national pastor named Roberto. Please pray for his family. His son, Josué, was kidnapped two months ago and thankfully found alive a few days later. However, just a couple weeks ago his wife, Reyna, was kidnapped, but she was released alive after he paid the ransom. Normally kidnapped victims are not released and usually killed even if ransoms are paid, so God was very merciful in these cases. A lady in our church named Veronica is one of Mary’s newest guitar students. After leaving the church last month and getting on the bus at the corner, armed gang members demanded money of her. When she said she had none, they started shooting, and fortunately she was not hit. Mid-year crime reports for Mexico were released in July, and records continue to be broken making these six months the worst ever and on course to be the worst year ever. Homicides have increased by 25% in the last six months with over 100 murders daily. In the last two months we have had earthquakes, and our volcano is still very active with violent eruptions causing the pollution to be much worse. My recent heart stress test revealed that my arrhythmias are caused by the bad pollution. I also found out two weeks ago due to the poor sanitation that I have a bad case of parasites and my intestines are infected and very inflamed. Pray that my healing will be much quicker than Mary’s as she struggled with parasites for almost the whole year last year.
We still have first-time visitors come regularly, and people continue to be saved weekly and baptized. A lady named Laura recently came and was saved. The next service she brought here friend, Aureceli, who was also saved. Angelina who was recently baptized brought her niece, Irma, last month who heard the gospel and was saved. What a blessing! We also have people saved regularly while out soul-winning. I had to let my assistant pastor go recently. I was away at another church not too long ago and Irineo, our first convert saved in this new area about three years ago, preached in my absence that Wednesday night. As we train our people for the ministry, pray that God would give us the right man to take over our church as we plan to take our furlough next year. Apart from the regular routine, we recently took a group to a week-long music camp. We also recently had a wedding for a newly saved couple in our church. Our VBS starts on August 5th, and we have passed out 10,000 invitations. Please pray for this event. Also pray for Mary as her parents’ businesses and family are going through a real heart-breaking trial at this time. Though the year is more than half over, there is still time to visit us for a mission trip if any are interested. Thanks for everything! We are “… your servants for Jesus’ sake.” 2 Corinthians 4:5.
Bro. Mike Wallace & Family