July 7,2008

PRISON SERVICE

Things have been going in a bad direction in the prison services on Saturday. The men that are in control of the services are clearly charismatic. The hymns are sung out of the Methodist Pentecostal hymnbook. At most though, we only ever sing two hymns. The others songs are choruses sung to the beat of a marching drum, a tambourine, and an amplified acoustic guitar. All the praying is done with everybody praying at the same time at the top of their lungs. And, last but not least, a few pray or from time to time speak in tongues, including the song leader. So, I have been praying about what to do, and how far to go with these guys. Well, Saturday I had had enough and determined to see just what they would tolerate from me. I have done my best to express my intentions of discipling them and have done several things to express my sincere desire to help them in their spiritual growth. So, I figured I have built enough rapport with them to let them have it straight out. On Saturday I preached on why tongues are not for today. The usual forty men were present. Several had very sour faces, but nobody actually complained or tried to correct me during or afterwards. And, one of the young men who leads the service, who has spoken in tongues, came to the altar. Afterwards he asked prayer. His name is Christian (?). There is very little time to talk afterwards. I am not allowed to stay in there, and neither are the prisoners from the condemned section. Thursday I will find out from Ricardo a little better what the reaction was from the inside. Also, I have been invited to preach in an evangelistic campaign in the condemned section on the 18-20 of this month. I am not sure if I really should. Much depends on their reaction to sound doctrine. Please pray.

Meanwhile there was some sort of shake up with the people who go in for the service on Wednesday. It is a church group that goes in. I don’t know what happened, but it sounds like it had something to do with trying to get people into the prison who are not authorized. I am technically authorized to be in there from 2:30-4:00. However, to be in service, I have been going in at 1:00. This week I will be trying to see the warden about getting written authorization for the full time.

NATHAN’S MINISTRY

Nathan was with the Saints this weekend at their sponsoring church and in the Spanish mission. They asked him to preach, and even gave him a love offering! He was really surprised. It sounds like they had a great time, and he was able to spend some time with Homer and Nathalie as well.

This week he will start flying solo! Please pray for him. He says that he has mastered the landings in the “tail-dragger”, which is more difficult than in a standard three-wheel landing. Also, he has to do a lot of night flying from here on out. I have to admit, we are a little bit nervous about it here in Chile. Please pray for us! ? We’re sure Nathan will do fine!... But seriously, we appreciate your prayers in this.

Donald Heinz
Missionary to Chile

June 10, 2008

Nathan arrived today in the United States without any problems at all. We talked at different times during his trip, and he was even able to call from the airport in Dallas to let us know that he had no snags getting through customs. He even figured out how to use a payphone to call our Pennsylvania Vonage number from Dallas. We’re very thankful for the good hand of his God upon him in making this trip.

Sunday we had another visiting family. This time it was the current owner of our church building. She brought her three boys. We are thankful for their visit.

Father’s day is around the corner. We are planning a Dad’s dinner on the Friday the 13th. Please pray for Gabriel and Roberto’s dads and Patricio that they would come out and be touched by the preaching of the Word.

I was able to get into the prison today. Ricardo wasn’t ready for the study though, because the prisoners were having a service. There were about 30-40 prisoners present. One of them was preaching when I was ushered in to sit with Ricardo. At the end, they asked me to introduce myself and say a few words. Now, you know that preachers don’t ever say just a few words! ? Anyway, I shared my salvation testimony so that they would get to know me. The organizer and prisoner responsible for the meeting, Henrique Ortiz, said that he can get permission for me to be there every Saturday. He also said that they needed a pastor to take control of the meetings and guide them in their study of the Word. I am honored and interested in doing so. However, I know that the vast majority of the Christians in there are Pentecostal. Please pray for wisdom for me as we see where this open door will lead. Henrique will be sending a letter to the warden to get me in on Saturdays from 1 to 4pm. Incidentally, the message was a fairly clear salvation message.

We also distributed about 200 more invitations to the church in Labranza. Please pray for visitors. Also, I was able to find a part in the States to fix our color laser printer to brighten things up. Please pray that gets here safely and quickly. Nelson was the fellow that visited two weeks back, he has not come back yet.

Donald Heinz
Missionary to Chile

March 30, 2008

Our 2nd annual missions conference went very well. The ladies did a great job with the kids, and I was able to get the syllabus ready for our eight hour sessions of An Introduction to Missions. Saturday night we had our international dinner with enchiladas, mongolian beef, and pizza! Pizza? Yes, pizza is a very international dish here in Chile! :)

The baptism went well. It was an absolutely stunning day. However, no visitors came all day. That was discouraging because we had made extra effort to get some there. Well, the Lord knows all about it. So, we'll wait on Him.

Sunday night Danny, our 7-yr.-old, went to the altar for the ump-teenth time. And, as usual, we let him pray, and just determined to ask him what he went forward for later. This time he beat me to it though. He asked me if we could go talk in the counseling room. [Remember he did this in my office too before and got very serious.] Well, he started to tell me that last week he went forward to ask God to forgive him. This week he went forward because he wanted to receive Jesus as a his Savior! Please pray for him. Obviously the Lord is at work in his heart. We will be dealing with him from the Scriptures, and are confident the Lord will finish the good work He has started in him. Amen.

Finally, given the fact that we are still waiting to find out something about the fines on our van, we have decided to start our v acation now, in case I have to travel later. So, this week we will be heading to the Castner's house for some R&R. Next week, we will be doing to repairs around the house and taking it easy.

Donald Heinz
Missionary to Chile

March 16, 2008

Today I found out that the traffic violations are from several different dates all throughout last year, and I only made one trip to Santiago in the van last year. There is a very weird error here, and it comes up with the name of the former owner of the van. There is no telling how long it will take to get this resolved, and how many trips to Santiago. Meanwhile, we will have no transportation.

However, Esteban’s niece just happens to work in the offices of the municipality where most of the infractions were registered. She can get me detailed information on the problem and advise me on where to go and who to talk to to get it resolved! Tomorrow she will possibly be looking into it. Also, I have found parking receipts from Temuco for the days that I supposedly committed the traffic violations in Santiago, and the receipts actually have my license plate clearly marked on them. That will help too.

Diego Soto has been showing quite a bit of fruit lately. The other day he started handing out tracts after school to his classmates in front of the school! He also came to church in a suit on Sunday. Everybody said, Wow… and Amen!

We will be having a baptism on Easter Sunday! Patricia, Diego and our David will be getting baptized. We also have our missions conference Friday and Saturday. I will be teaching an 8 lesson course on the basics of missions.

Thank you for your payers.
Donald Heinz