Dear Praying Friends,
I am excited to be writing this on a Sunday from my home church! It has been a very long time since I’ve been home at Vision for a Sunday service, but tonight we are having our “Vision Night” to cast our goals for 2011.
January has been a relatively more “relaxed” month, we were only in three states! God has been so good to us in so many ways. We are currently at 22% of our needed support, and we are nearly booked up for the year. If you know anyone who would like to have a good-looking missionary in, let me know. And I’ll send my wife.
God has been teaching me a lot about priorities lately. It is so easy to focus on the wrong things! My heart is in Barcelona, I can’t wait to get there, but although raising support sometimes becomes my priority for my life, it is not God’s. Here’s what God has been teaching me:
1. God’s priority in my life is not building support for my ministry, but building a man for His glory.
He has been so incredibly good to me, patient with my mistakes and sin, and providential in His care for me not just on deputation, but my entire life, and His whole reason has been to make me more like Him and more useable for Him. Ephesians 1:12 says this about our reason for God saving us:
“That we should be to the praise of his glory, who first trusted in Christ.”
2. God’s priority in developing my gifts is not so I’ll be a real snazzy preacher, but to edify His people.
I’m so glad for the opportunity and privilege to get to preach and teach the Word in so many great churches, and to learn about ministry from men of God, and I want to do what God has called me to do to the best of my ability. But here’s the reason God gives gifts within the church:
“For the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ” Eph 4:12
So just as an encouragement to you as you serve God, focus on developing a passion for being who you are made to be: a Christian whose passion is God’s glory, and who looks for places to invest in the lives of others. After all, that’s the Great Commission: teach, baptize, teach!
Prayer Requests:
-More opportunities to win the lost and disciple people while on deputation!
-For God to use us to stir His people to be committed missions goers or missions senders!
-For our health: Elena is recovering from RSV, and I am on week 10 of bronchitis, tired of losing my voice preaching.
-Thank you again for your faithful prayers and support. I can’t tell you how wonderful it is to know that so many love us and the people of Spain.
Yours for His Harvest,
Scott, Melissa, and Elena Newton