Ecuador Blog

I hate to tell you all this, but I have been a little discouraged lately. Marco (Nathan’s study) took a job as a security guard in Quito (two and a half hours from here) so he hasn’t studied or been to a meeting in a month. His daughter, Dayana, the one who joined to school has also stopped studying and coming to the meetings. She says her grandmother doesn’t give her permission. Well, I didn’t want to tell you all this, because I want this blog to be a source of encouragement, not discouragement. So I’ve been praying to Jehovah to not lose my joy in the service and I’m extremely excited to tell you that he has answered my prayers!!

A week ago Thursday, one of my bible students came to the meeting and brought her husband!! He has never even studied, but after the meeting they both said they really, really liked it. This past Thursday I went to do her study and asked her if her husband wanted to study too. She said “Yes!” So, Nathan conducted the study and the husband (Luis) had lots of good questions. He even asked what they need to do to be able to continue coming to the meetings! They own a little store and they sell alcohol and he was worried about that. We talked him through it. He also said that he used to attend the Evangelical church and he said they told him that Jehovah’s Witnesses don’t believe in Jesus. I told him they’re wrong. He said, “I know! Last Thursday at your meeting I could see how much you all love and respect Jesus. I knew right then, they were wrong.” He said that him and Elena have both decided that they are going to study with us and they are going to set aside every Monday and Thursday to attend the meetings!! But, wait! That’s not all…

This past Thursday a woman with two small children came in to the meeting and sat in the row in front of us. I gave her a bible and my Kingdom Ministry to follow along with. I also tried to help her keep the kids quiet during the meeting. She got frustrated about twenty minutes before the meeting was over and got up to leave. I followed her outside and introduced myself. I asked her if she was studying the bible with anyone. She said, “No. I just came because my friend from the gym invited me.” I asked her if she wanted to study the bible. She said yes, but she needed to talk to her husband first to see if he also wanted to study. She told me she would talk to him that night and asked if I could come by Friday morning. You bet I could! I went by Friday about 12:30 and she took me up to her apartment and introduced me to her husband and the whole family sat down and we talked about the study. They said they had talked about it and decided to study together as a family. Then the husband told me that he doesn’t like religion. I asked him why and he said he used to be Catholic then he was an Evangelist and he thinks they all say the same thing. I told him he was going to learn a lot because we are very different from other religions. He asked me what the differences are. I told him I would just give him one difference from each religion to get him started. I asked him what Catholic churches have inside them. He said saints and idols and virgen Maries, but he never believed in saints. I had him read Ex. 20:4,5. Then I asked him what the Evangalists think happens to people after death. He said they believe this life is just the beginning and after you die you get your real life in heaven. I had him read Ps. 37:10,11 and Ecc. 9:5,6. They were both pretty intrigued by that. They said they would study on Saturday mornings, because that is the only day he has off work. I told them about the Saturday afternoon meeting and they said, “Ok. We’ll study here in the house at 10:00am and then we’ll go to the meeting at 4:00pm on Saturdays.” How cool is that? Jehovah answered my prayer in abundance!!

Today we went to our third Sign meeting and the Book Study conductor asked Nathan to say the prayer next Sunday! Can we say “over-achiever”?! No, really, I’m very proud of him!!!

We love you all very much,

Jennifer