Then were there brought unto him little children, that He should put his hands on them, and pray: and the disciples rebuked them. But Jesus said, Suffer little children, and forbid them not, to come unto me: for of such is the kingdom of heaven. ~Matthew 19:13-14
Greetings to you brothers and sisters. Thank you for your support and prayers for our ministry here in Vietnam. Also, we thank the Lord for providing an opportunity for us to participate in a local one-week day-camp here held by the leprosy church, Rock Mountain Evangelical Church. There were about 40 children, ages 3-12, plus a few teens. The theme of the camp was “The Word of God,” how it is a living; powerful; righteous; and always fulfilled word and is preserved by God till today.
We took part in helping with some of the games and couple of lessons with the aid of a Vietnamese interpreter. We learned that from all children attending there was only one child from a complete family, all other children come from a divorced family and at a young age many already had to go to work. Also, the camp was empty but parents of many of the children were uneager to allow them to come to the Christian camp, so church members had to go to their homes and bring the children to camp every morning.
On one of the days, came a man and started yelling at one of the counselors. Turned out he was the father of one of our teen campers and he was against her coming to the camp and to church altogether. Further we found out that he used to be ill with leprosy and attended this same church because the church helped him and his family a lot, but after everything got better, he left the church and turned against God. When this incident happened during camp, we got together with others inside the church and prayed for the man, and praise the Lord, he left and his daughter stayed till the end of camp.
After the camp, we talked with the pastor of the church if we may use the site of their church to make kids’ camp in the future, since they have a big park-like area. It surprised us when the pastor said no, explaining that the government controls closely all activities of all the churches here especially when involving children and that in the beginning of each year they submit to the government a plan of all their camps, programs, events, etc. in advance for the year. They are not allowed to do anything in addition to the plan or they will be fined or worse, the church would be closed. Therefore, please join us in prayer for not only the churches to have freedom of spreading the gospel, but so there would be no restriction for children to come to Jesus. May our Lord bless you all!
Ministry in Vietnam – Tatyana Yevstratenko