Sitting here on this relatively sultry Saturday (its about 25* – we’ve already had a lot of below 0* here!), I’m as full of faith, and the peace and joy that accompanies it, as I ever have been. There’s so much to testify about that I don’t know where to begin, but I’ll focus on answered prayers for this one……
I think most of you know about my passion for creativity, and especially visual arts, in combination with worship. This summer the Lord spoke more specifically to me about starting an arts-based group and gave me the name “ID” (which has the double meaning of Imago Dei, or our being made in the image of God, and which also gives us our true identity – ID – and capacity for creating- Hallelujah!). So, recently, I’ve been asking Him for Asian friends who are also interested in the arts, for inspiration to create a substantial body of work, and for an opportunity to exhibit the work for His glory.
Well, we’ve now established fairly good connections with another group of “workers” here in H-town, and they have some small fellowships going after being here a few years. I attended for a few weeks and was b1essed to meet many students and believers from our campus. One of these guys is teaching shufa, or calligraphy, of which I’ve become very interested and am showing some promise in (despite being a lefty, when the Asian writing was definitely designed to be written right-handed).
Then, somewhat unexpectedly, last week my tutor took Amilah and I to the Art building on our campus, where we had so much favor and had a lot of fun meeting some art majors. At one point, while talking to a professor and a few students, I started sharing about doing Worship Art at churches back home in the States, and he grabbed one of his students and said, “Oh, you must meet this guy……he’s also a Christian!”
So TsunJie (who has the English name Freefall ; )) started to show us around, and I could tell right away it was a divine meeting. As we talked excitedly about art, he suddenly said, “If you do a lot of work, you can have a show in our building!” and later he mentioned showing our work together. I was ecstatic, and my spirit was nearly bursting in praise of our God!. How faithful He is!
As I sat down to write to you, he also reminded me of another recent testimony, one of a male student I met last year at my campus in another city who just decided to accept Christ.
Some prayers are answered instantly, others in a few days or weeks. Even though others we must wait years and labor for countless hours toward, we can be sure that the Lord our God always hears and always answers our prayers in accordance with His will.
PRAIsES:
*All 5 of us have been experiencing daily opportunities to share about Jesus in our classes, in stores, on buses, and everywhere we go!
*Dad continues to do a deep work in each of us to prepare us for our futures as Kingdom workers
*All other answered prayers too numerous to list here — yours as well as ours!
In His love,
Clive