Mission to Montenegro newsletter
Blog entry for 19 September 2013
September 2013 Mission to Montenegro Newsletter
Great is the Lord, and greatly to be praised;
And His greatness is unsearchable.
And His greatness is unsearchable.
One generation shall praise Your works to another,
And shall declare Your mighty acts. Ps. 145:3, 4
And shall declare Your mighty acts. Ps. 145:3, 4
It is fitting for the upright to praise Him...
- The highlight of the past month: Stan travelled to Serbia to officiate the wedding of two dear young people, B+R. This is the fifth wedding that Stan has overseen in the past few years. Not only is it a joy to bring together another young couple united in Christ, eager to serve Him, but to participate in the establishment of a Christ-centered wedding ceremony/theology, showing forth the beauty, richness, and joy of wedded love and life founded on Christ and His Word.
- Fall brings the renewal of our regular Church activities: Student Bible studies, one-on-one studies,and Ladies' Meetings are all starting up again to complement our weekly Sunday services and midweek prayer meeting. We are very excited that the teen meeting has been resumed after a yearlong hiatus with a new group of young unbelievers.
- Samaritan's Purse hosted a training conference for Balkan national teams, so Stan travelled to Sarajevo with 5 others from Montenegro for the event. Samaritan's Purse did a good job of outlining their vision and helps regarding distribution. Another highlight was meeting a pastor from Bosnia whose mother attends our Niksic fellowship.
- We are expecting a team from OM this month who will be in Niksic for a bit over a week. They are planning to help out with physical projects, such as helping our widows with hauling and stacking firewood, as well as participating in our normal outreaches such as English Conversation Club and Bible studies.
- There continues to be an acute need for work opportunities for believers. Montenegro used to export a significant amount of medicinal and culinary herbs before the wars of the 90's, and that trade has never been resumed. Milan and Stan will be going on an exploratory trip to a major natural product trade fair to investigate the possibilities.
- The Lord greatly blessed Vicki's trip to see Milijana settled at university and to enjoy spending time with four out of five children.
With great love and appreciation for your ongoing prayers and support in this great work of God,
Stan and Vicki Surbatovich
Mission to Montenegro
Prayer and Praise Bulletin Points:
- Praise God for bringing together B+R, that their marriage ceremony was a testimony of God's love, and for the many people who were encouraged by it. Pray for their new life as a couple, for wisdom and grace as they begin wedded life.
- Praise God that there is a season for everything, and that now is the season for the rhythms and routines of weekly and monthly bible studies and fellowship events. Pray for those of us leading these studies and pray for those who come to hear: that believers would grow and that the unbelievers would hear and respond to the Word of God.
- Praise for the continued ministry of Samaritan's Purse Christmas Shoebox outreach in MNE and for those people willing to serve on the national team. Pray particularly for Stan as the main co-ordinator because he will have an increasingly heavy workload regarding the project as the Christmas season draws near.
- Praise for the excitement and energy of the OM team coming. Pray that they would accomplish the physical projects without injury, and that they would both encourage and be encouraged as they engage in active witnessing.
- Praise for God's leading Milijana to the right university and the ease of her settling in. Pray for all our children, both those working and those studying, that they would serve God wholeheartedly right where they are.
- Pray for Stan and Milan's trip, for wisdom to evaluate the information they gather, and for the church and their families while they are away.
- One way to support the ministry is to consider donating frequent flyer miles as we must provide transatlantic flights at Christmas for our three children currently at university. If interested, please contact us at stan.surbatovich@gmail.com for more details on how you might help in this practical manner. Thank you so much.