by Austin Fowler
I want to thank the Eldership at the Forrest Park Church of Christ in Valdosta, Georgia for their willingness to allow me to be a part of the great work of Latin American Missions. I appreciate these men more than they know, and I plan to continue to help them in future in whatever capacity I can.
For 2022, we have two campaigns scheduled. The first one will be at Covington Church of Christ in Covington, Tennessee, on June 11-18. The other campaign will be held in Knoxville, Tennessee, on July 23-30. The event will be a joint effort between Karns and West End. I went to meet with all three elderships in September, and they are excited about the events.
I want to give you five reasons you should join us on one or both of these campaigns.
First, participating in a campaign will develop your evangelism skills. At AMC, we have training to help develop evangelism skills. Half the day is spent in the classroom discussing how to handle the difficult questions, HTH door knocking strategies, and tools to help you be more evangelistic.
Second, attend AMC to fulfill the great commission and live out the book of Acts. In Acts, we read about Paul’s missionary journeys. We need to continue doing what they did in the book of Acts by spreading the gospel in our own communities and helping other congregations spread the gospel. This is our missionary journey.
Third, Jesus’ focus was seeking and saving those who were lost (Luke 19:10). This is the focus of AMC. If you want to be more like Jesus, come be a part of AMC!
Fourth, you will be with the best people all week long. The best people on the face of the earth are Christians. During campaign week, you will make relationships that will last a long time. After the campaign, you will be able to share success stories, encourage one another in your efforts, and be the church!
Last, be a part of AMC to change the culture and help YOUR home congregation. Friends, we need to change something for the church to grow again. AMC wants to be a part of changing church culture to focus on evangelism first. During the week, volunteers learn evangelistic skills and then go home excited to share these things with their elders, preacher, and members.
The cost of the campaign is FREE! However, you will receive door knocking materials and instructional materials during the campaign. If you would like to make a donation towards these when you attend, we will be glad for you to do so. The only cost you will have to attend is your hotel room and dinner each night. We are currently working on finding group rates for the hotels, and they will be posted on our website as soon as we finalized them. Members at Covington and Karns will open their homes to people we would rather cut costs and stay with them. You will make this known when you register for the event.
I hope that you will make plans to be with us for one of the American Mission Campaigns! You can find more information about the campaigns at amc.housetohouse.com. If you have questions, please feel to contact me. My email address is austin@housetohouse.com or you can reach me by phone or text at 706-537-0742. I covet your prayers for this work, and the souls that are impacted by the preaching of the gospel. God Bless!
Mabelvale church of Christ, Arkansas: We welcome the Mabelvale church of Christ to the House to House/Heart to Heart School of Evangelism. We were overwhelmed by the desire of this eldership to focus on training the congregation to reach the lost. The support of visiting congregations was so encouraging. We cannot wait to hear from them!
New Hope church of Christ, Middleton, Tennessee: Cole Wade (preacher) reports, “We are still setting up Bible studies, and we are making the visits. The card writing system is in place, and we have names to contact. Also, our new converts class is set up! We recently had a Bible study with a couple who came very close to obedience. Prayers for us and them are greatly appreciated. The church is still motivated and wanting to grow more than ever. We cannot wait to see what’s next!”
Gilt Edge church of Christ, Tennessee: Daniel Dalton (preacher) reports, “We are working hard at getting everything set up and rolling. It is taking a little time, but we are getting close. We had a benevolent visit this morning. We did the first study with her. She came to lunch and stayed almost all afternoon. She is scheduled to do the second study next week. The study with Steven and Krystle did not happen due to snow and ice. We are scheduled for Thursday for that study. Please pray for our studies. Gilt Edge is more optimistic and ready to work now than I have ever seen. Thank you for the help.”
Eisenhower church of Christ, Odessa, Texas: Allen Weakland (preacher) reports, “God is so good. This Sunday revealed several possible open windows to pursue. One of our members brought her sister to evening worship and it was a delight to see her—please pray for an open door. The young couple that has visited several times informed us that they are expecting their first child—God opened yet another window. Last, we were informed that one of our elderly members who had been in and out of the hospital and rehab had passed away. Please pray for the Rex family. With each cloud comes rain that blesses the earth. Sister Jackie Rex’s grandsons attended evening worship tonight—may God bless us with another open window.”
Oak Hill church of Christ, Covington, Georgia: Tate Sutton (preacher) reports, “Our ladies got our supplies for our new mover program. We will be delivering them this week. I met a lady last week that we will be studying with in the very near future.”
Northern oaks church of Christ, San Antonio, Texas: Mel Hutzler (preacher) reports, “After more organization and decisions were made, we have things headed in the right direction. We continue to give classes and sermons from time to time for evangelism education. We have Bible studies currently taking place, although some studies are spaced apart from one another. We are prepared now for visitors—to take their info down, give them gift baskets, and take them out to eat. At the moment, we are prospecting our contacts.”
Beloit church of Christ, Kansas: Dustin Doughtery (preacher) reports, “We have some great news—two of the hot contacts I reached out to on Monday said yes to the studies. One is my friend Jason that I baptized in August of 2020, and now his wife has agreed to a study. Keith and I had an evangelism meeting last night to plan some upcoming events, all first-time events that have never been done here before including a county fair booth, VBS, and gospel meeting. We are going to be spreading seeds all over our local area this year. So far this week I have offered five Bible studies and received four answers of yes. I am working on getting them all scheduled.”
Lafollette church of Christ, Tennessee: Ben Shaffer (preacher) reports, “We had a great week of work. On Tuesday a lady with stage 4 lymphoma agreed to study the Bible. We are hopeful to begin on Thursday. I finished Back to the Bible book 1 with Mike Johnson, who is the nephew of the one baptized last week. Also a brother who had been wayward for years was restored on Sunday.”
Siwell Road church of Christ, Jackson, Mississippi: Derek Broome (preacher) reports, “We had a great week this week at Siwell Road. We made some good contacts with our new movers’ baskets. We have several new contacts for our congregational contact list. Also a lady reached out to the congregation about some of our services offered in House to House/Heart to Heart. We were able to help with benevolence and information on the church. We invited this lady to services. Praying continually for open doors.”
East Main church of Christ, Murfreesboro, Tennessee: Brad Rowley (elder) reports, “We continue with several ongoing Bible studies. Tim Hayes and Sam Boyd started a new Bible study (OBS) with Luke Carlton, who was the young man that was baptized last week. One of our members, Carolyn Young, works with feeding the homeless in Murfreesboro. Carolyn frequently produces contacts for Bible studies. Mark Isenberg (elder) will start a new study this week. Seth Ferguson (college minister) and one of our college students are cultivating the soil with a MTSU student in hopes of another new Bible study. Our compassion card team #1 met yesterday and wrote 84 cards. Members on the card teams are excited to be a part of this important work. We are still working on the card writing process. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.
“Our administrators, Jon Mitchell (minister), Wayne Lankford (associate minister), and I meet every Monday morning at 9:00 to review the in-process and new contact cards. We are thankful to have Gerry Whitacre meeting with us to help develop our process. Our new contact card has a section to document what has been done each week. The administrators will email team leaders for action to be taken (cards, food, service projects, etc).
“We are happy to have Avery Bayes and his wife Laura as our new Family and Youth Minister at East Main. Avery and Laura will be a very important part of educating and developing our young people to become disciples. Avery is a talented young man in many ways and is an awesome song leader.”
Rock Valley church of Christ, Tompkinsville, Kentucky: Jason Thompson (preacher) reports, “We had one response today for prayers, and one that requested to be re-baptized this evening. A couple in their twenties responded to the invitation Wednesday night. They had been living together unmarried. We had prayers to restore them, and then married them after Bible study was over. It has been wonderful. Just finished Bible study with a young Christian couple desiring to learn more. God is so good. Hope you and the family are doing well.”
Chase Park church of Christ, Huntsville, Alabama: Pat Cowden (preacher) reports, “We had a really good first study with three neighbors of one of our members. They are very enthusiastic and thankful that we only use the Bible in our study. One of the prospects said they have an ongoing men’s study where he attends, and they almost never open the Bible. He really appreciates that we use only the Bible as our guide. We have a second study scheduled for this coming Thursday evening. Our card ministry is going strong as is our New Mover ministry. Things appear to be looking up as we (hopefully and Lord willing) come out of the pandemic.
In addition, one of the men who we have been studying with off and on since the summer is going to bring a friend with him who is attending a denomination. He said, “She is not being taught right and I want her to hear the truth.” He is not far from the truth himself and Lord willing will obey the gospel. Please pray for us as we live for Him each day.”
Deerfoot church of Christ, Birmingham, Alabama: Richard Harp (preacher) reports, “Just finished the first book with Liam and Cheyenne Greer! This has been a couple of years in the making! We have another Bible study going on as well. Another possible opportunity. This is an answer to prayer. Our custodians are a husband and wife who are not members and on Thursday we had an impromptu study (based on several questions) where they indicated interest in studying further. We gave them Bibles. We are hoping that the study will happen soon.”
Warner Robins church of Christ, Georgia: Dave Domingue (elder) reports, “New Movers’ program WORKS! Reginald T. received a new mover’s basket along with an invite to visit WRCOC two weeks ago. Yesterday he came to worship with us! More follow-up to come. Here is a little feedback from Marie, a recent convert who is attending our Growing in Christ class: I am enjoying my study Bible I received [Apologetics Press Defending the Faith Study Bible]. It makes my study time so interesting. And as always, my church family makes me feel so welcome. We also moved our Pew Packers to follow Sunday AM worship—this is proving to be a great success. The kids enjoy coming forward and giving praise to God—the parents love it too!”
Riverbend church of Christ, Georgia: Austin Fowler (member) reports, “Another great Bible study on Thursday night! We covered book number two with Ansley. She understood the worship of the church. When we got through going over what the Lord wants in his church as far as music, she asked the question, then why do all these other people use instruments when the Lord just wants singing? We are going to do study 3 on Wednesday night at the church building during Bible study because my cousin goes back on call starting Thursday, and we did not want to put it off longer than we had to. Jason Duggin’s study number two with Bob Bethel got postponed a week due to a scheduling conflict. They are going to study Thursday this week.”
Coldwater church of Christ, Kentucky: Luke Puckett (preacher) reports, “As many had this past week, we too dealt with winter storms. We had a lot of ice. This was hard on us due to the tornado that came through in December. We had more downed trees and power lines. We also had to cancel two Bible studies due to the storms. We were able to reschedule them for this week. We continue to focus on turning our contacts into prospects. This past week, we sent out around 150 compassion cards to several contacts and prospects. We are hoping this will show them that we care about their struggles and open doors for us.
“As usual, we are still working hard on our tornado relief. We appreciate all those who have helped us use this devastation as an opportunity to evangelize. We have several great contacts and prospects from this.
“Our plan this week is to conduct two Bible studies. One is finishing book two, and the other we will begin book one of Believe the Bible. We will also follow up with some contacts we have by phone and visits and continue to build relationships by sending cards.”
University church of Christ, Montgomery, Alabama: Faires Austin (elder) sent this update on last week’s evangelistic efforts:
1. “We began a weekly Bible Study today with the residents at the Eastdale Retirement Community. Since last spring, we have had a number of the Eastdale Retirement Facility to ride our church bus to Bible Class and worship services. We have a number of men to bring a 30–45-minute Bible lesson to these individuals every Sunday at 3:00 p.m. We also have singing, prayer, and a Bible lesson. We had a total of 14 residents and five of our members in attendance today. We feel confident that attendance will grow. This is an opportunity to reach men and women with the pure gospel of Christ. We anticipate some will request a private study with us.
2. “Our card ministry and New Movers Ministry continue to grow.
3. “We recently found out that a group of Christians in Michigan tuned into our Evangelism Seminar last fallwhen you spoke, and they along with others across our nation are regular participants in our Bible classes and worship services. We just do not know what good is being done when we have over 250 plus households that tune in weekly to hear God’s word. Remember, there was a young man last fall in Arkansas who was converted to Christ by watching your seminar and our services.
4. “We began our Firm Foundations Bible class this Sunday morning. We had a great class and good participation.
“A church that doesn’t evangelize will fossilize.”
Corinth church of Christ, Corinth, Tennessee: James Parker (elder) reports, “We were not able to have the study last week because of the weather. We are going to have our study tonight! Yesterday we had a couple visiting with us. They are a young couple and have just moved in the area. Steve and Cindy as well as one of our other elders and his wife took them out to lunch. We are seeing where this will go!”
Jacksonville church of Christ, Alabama: RJ Tracy (college minister) reports, “It is going well with Payton. He is very grounded in his beliefs, and I did not know that he is a youth group leader at the church he is with. I think his big focus is on the fact that he gets to experience (“feel something”) when he goes there (it is a non-denominational light show church). He loves Jacksonville, but he thinks we are all the same, so I do not think studying with him will be too hard. He seems very honest. The new convert studies with Chloe are going great!”
Cowetta church of Christ, Oklahoma: Keno Shrum (elder/preacher) reports, “We finished our second study with a young woman yesterday evening. She has been asking a lot of questions about why she would have been taught wrong at “her church.” However, she has readily accepted what she is seeing through our study. I feel good about her response to the study so far. She has sincere questions but is truly interested and is seeking the truth. Please keep her in your prayers! Have a great week. I will let you know how the third study goes this week.”
Monroe church of Christ, Georgia: Charles Harris (preacher) reports, “We had a baptism Sunday. There are several studies taking place. I plan to preach your sermon, “Jesus: The Politically Incorrect Evangelist,” next Sunday and will begin preaching through BTTB the following Sunday. Lots of good things going on here at Monroe.”
New Hope: “We are still setting up Bible studies, and we are making the visits. The card writing system is in place, and we have names to contact. Also, our new converts class is set up! We recently had a Bible study with a couple who came very close to obedience. Prayers for us and them are greatly appreciated. The church is still motivated and wanting to grow more than ever. We can’t wait to see what’s next!”
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