Monthly Update - June 2016

Making a difference update, from the recovery field – May 2016 edition…

We had 45 in attendance to hear a wonderful testimony of God’s grace on May 27th, by a lady who went from childhood abuse, to addiction to alcohol and drugs, to salvation and freedom from bondage; who is now a pastor’s wife! We also had some special music prior to the testimony by Jessica, she was a huge blessing! It was a spirit led evening, and one of the ladies in attendance made a profession of faith, hallelujah! We will be having another powerful lady speaker on the final Friday of this month as well (6-24); all of our testimonies are recorded and can be available upon request.

On the Final Friday of July, we plan to have an “Invite a Friend Night”, as we attempt to break our attendance record of 62. Our goal will be to have 100+ people that night, to listen to Bill Corum’s testimony (prison minister and author of The Ultimate Pardon). We will also have a professional singer that night; Mandy Dunlap and her husband, so start planning who you can invite.

We will be having a Life Issues drama on the last Sunday of July (7-31) at HBF’s morning services, called “A Monkey on your Back”. We have the script written, and will begin practicing this Saturday morning (6-11), please pray for this event.

I know that I reported on the garage sale last month, but I wanted you to know that the total ended up being $3167, I think! I’m giving you a link to the video that we produced, so that you can see some of the activity that went on during those two days! Thanks again for everyone’s donations and support: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zyto4Hha-Ys.

We are working to get our trifolds updated, to reflect new pictures of our group and a couple of special students, along with more current drug and alcohol stats. Once we get the trifolds updated, we will begin working on our main annual fundraiser, which is our Recovery Walk (previously called the Next Step Walk). Our walk will be on September 3rd this year (the Saturday before Labor Day), and we are already receiving coupons / gifts that we will raffle off, and some that we will give as door prizes (one gift that we’ve received has a value of $260!), so God’s good hand is upon us again!

Heartland Baptist Fellowship had their church in the park on 6-5, and the person who gave their testimony, Bryon Calloway, used to be addicted to alcohol and meth, but by God’s grace and truth he has been made free, and will be going to Zambia Africa with his wife and son, as a missionary, in October of this year! Bryan will be speaking at our Final Friday event in August this year, so we will look forward to hearing from him again then! Life Issues had several people who attended HBF’s outdoor service, and a couple of our folks heart were stirred by the message (my heart was stirred too) and they went forward and received counselling at the end of the service, so God was at work in our midst that day!

We have signed up / registered and paid for a booth at the Burnt District Festival again this year, and we’ve purchased our own 10’ X 10’ canopy for this and other outdoor activities. This was a much needed tool that will get used several times each year, and I was thankful that we can now afford to own one instead of borrowing them from different people!

On the people front, it has been another active month in our ministry; just the logistics of hosting two weekly meetings, providing childcare, snacks (usually a full meal), transportation, etc., in addition to large and small group preaching / teaching, can be taxing, so I’m glad to be surrounded by a very gifted and giving team! In addition to our meetings, we have over 10 people involved in HBF’s discipleship, and another half dozen folks who are going through our Life Issues programs, which occur outside of regular meetings. We honored 3 more people with our Life Issues alumni status last month, and one man who is in prison completed our TATs program, and one of our ladies just completed TATs with one of our sponsors, so we were excited to award her a certificate of completion, a victory tag, and a Life Recovery Bible! “…The harvest truly is plenteous…” (Matthew 9:37), I got an email from a new lady who’s coming this Friday, I got a phone call from a mom who wants help for her daughter, and we got a man referred to us from HBF, all this week!

Sincerely, Steve Fleshman – Life Issues pastor and founder, Proverbs 4:23…