Nr.85 ended with: “And then a door opened to start a second work in a town east of Antwerp called Beerse, how exciting,,,,,,,,!” (See richardandmarina.net)

A group of young people from Holland was with us for a week of Bible study, prayer and evangelism. The girls used two bed rooms on the third floor of our house, while the fellows slept in our church building. After Marina had a break down, her younger sister came from Canada and stayed with us for about 6 months and was a tremendous help. Several times we went to Beerse with the team to go from door to door. It resulted in a few contacts which we followed up. Christians in Antwerp also had some connections in Beerse and Operation Mobilization had done some evangelism there and gave us the name of a couple willing to open their home for a weekly Bible study and thus the first step was taken. I started driving to Beerse every week for this study and some visitation.

In the mean time the work in Antwerp continued to grow. We had quite a large Sunday school and even Marina’s sister who didn’t speak Dutch helped out and so did our oldest daughter Rosa who was 9 years old. In the old building which, with a lot of work we had fixed up to use as a church, the pre-school children met in a small kitchen, there must have been about 24 of them, a crowded place indeed! A little boy of about 3 was very proud of his father’s big Bible and took it into the dry cleaning store where his mother worked and showing it to people would say, “Daddy’s Bible says, God cares for you”, a verse he had learned in Sunday school. We also had the joy of seeing a prostitute coming to know the Lord and stopping with her activities. People who have never been involved in starting a new church, especially with all young converts, have no idea of the joy and excitement experienced!

But the Bible says that this world is Satan’s territory and that he opposes the work of God and we experienced that too, but we never expected it to come in the way it did……! (Go to Musings)