Sickness, Darkness, and God’s Amazing Grace!

Dear friends and family,

Once again too much time has passed since my last update.  Keeping up with newsletters is certainly not my gift, but I hope by the Lord’s grace to improve in this area!  I will write a more comprehensive update on our ministry work soon, but for now I am sending through a more personal update on my health and what God has done through it.

Since my last blog post, I started battling with my health once again.  In February I started becoming sick with what turned out to be malaria, and again it seemed like it just wouldn’t go away! I had malaria 4 or 5 times between February and May, and I was feeling exasperated.  Many of my close friends and family encouraged me to leave Mozambique, and rightly so.  Even I felt like giving up on everything here and leaving, as being constantly sick was becoming unbearable!  I couldn’t function well and I could not do any ministry work whatsoever.  I was just at home most of the time, sick and unable to do anything. This drove me to my knees and I started seeking the Lord earnestly, to know His will. I was desperate, depressed, and weak. As I prayed and sought the Lord, He confirmed to me once again that He has indeed called me to be here in Mozambique. He showed me that I must completely surrender to Him and trust Him fully, even in my health. My parents also reminded me of the many times our family had been in crises in our first years here and the only possible outcome had seemed for us to return to South Africa, but they had trusted the Lord and stayed on. Now 21 years later we are still here, which is a testimony to the Lord’s faithfulness!

My health now became a priority for us in prayer, and we decided to do all in our power to resolve my sickness. So in June I consulted with different doctors and specialists, and they all came to the same conclusion: the number of times I was getting malaria while taking every precaution possible, was abnormal! They said I either have a strain of malaria very resistant to treatment or I have some serious underlying sickness that is compromising my immune system. So in June I traveled to South Africa for a comprehensive medical checkup, and I was honestly expecting bad news. I was dreading my test results as I knew that my liver, kidneys, and other organs would be damaged and stressed due to all the malaria, not to mention the possibility of some other underlying sickness!

That morning finally came when I sat across from my doctor to hear all my test results, and I was about to be amazed. With a puzzled look on his face, my doctor said to me, “Isak, I don’t know what to tell you.  I am looking at your test results, and I am looking at the results of a very healthy young man. There is absolutely nothing wrong with you!  This is really miraculous, but I cannot even tell that you have been sick at all! Your organs are all in perfect health and show NO DAMAGE, even after all the malaria! Your tests all came back with great results. I mean, I wish MY results came back this good!!” I was awestruck. As my doctor sat there all perplexed, I could barely contain myself with the joy and gratitude I was feeling; the Lord had healed my body!! What an amazing, faithful, and merciful God we serve!

To the left is a picture of me taken recently, looking and feeling so much better. I praise the Lord for that! Being constantly sick really took a toll on me mentally, emotionally, and spiritually. Honestly, if I look back over the last year and a half since my friend Michiah’s death, I see a time of deep darkness, grief, and sickness. But I am so grateful for it, as the Lord used all this greatly in my life for my own good. You see, the Lord put me through the fire to show me what I am really made of, and it became clear to me that apart from Christ I am a miserable, weak and sinful wretch who cannot do anything! Christ is ALL!! I have eternal life because He mercifully gave it to me, and not because I earned it; I am forgiven, pure and righteous before God because of Jesus’ sacrifice on the Cross, and not because of anything I did; I can live this Christian life only by His grace, and not in my own strength; it is for Christ’s Kingdom and glory that I must live, and not my own! So the Lord disciplined me in His love, for He saw how my heart had become hardened and prideful. He saw how my love for Him grew dimmer and dimmer, as I neglected the Savior who died for me. Even though everything with ministry was going well, my own heart had become hard, dull, and filled with unbelief. I was not walking closely with my Lord anymore, and instead I was following my own will and walking in my own wisdom. Through this time of discipline, struggle and sickness God has humbled and broken me, and brought me to a deeper place of surrender and trust in Him. And for this I praise Him! I am just amazed at what a wonderful God we serve, for He is faithful even when we are faithless! He forgives us, restores us, and heals us even when we do not deserve it in any way!

So please join me in thanking and praising the Lord for what He has done and continues to do in my life. Please pray for me that I may be revived, that my heart might be filled with a passion and love for the Lord Jesus, and that I would live fully surrendered to Him for His glory! And I want to thank you all who loved, supported and prayed for me during this difficult time. I don’t know what I would have done without you, and I thank the Lord for you! One particular friend the Lord greatly used in my life is Hunter Combs. He and I recently spent 2 weeks together as he was teaching at a Bible College not too far from us and then he came to visit us here in Xai-Xai. You can read about our time together here: missions-to-mpumulanga-and-mozambique

I am now full-time back in the ministry work and Lord willing I will be sending you an update on the ministries here soon, as there are some exciting things happening! I can’t wait to share it all with you, but for now I will close here. May the Lord bless each of you and cause His face to shine upon you in this day!

Love in Christ,

Isak for the Westraads

News From Mozambique

Dear friends and family,

It has now already been two weeks since Michiah and Isaac Lancaster returned to the USA.  We thank the Lord that He brought these two young men to visit, as they were a help and encouragement to us.  We are so grateful for the precious time of fellowship we had with them!  The photo on the left was taken as we said goodbye at the airport.

While we are on the subject of the Lancasters, June 19 marked the 1 year anniversary of Joy and Seth joining our team here!  In one way it feels like it has been much shorter than a year ago that they joined us, yet on the other hand it feels like it has been much longer.  They have become part of our family, and we are grateful to have them with us.  We have learned so much together!  Joy & Seth, we are grateful that you followed the Lord’s leading as He brought you here, and we pray that the Lord will continue to lead you in His perfect way, and that He would cause much fruit to be born in your lives here in Mozambique.  Friends and family, join us in giving thanks to the Lord for sending them here!  And please pray for them, that they would grow in their love for the Lord Jesus, and that they would be pure and useful instruments in the Hand of our Lord.

Over the next few weeks some of us will be doing some travelling, so we would appreciate your prayers.  My father and Seth will be attending a pastor’s conference in Maputo (capital of Mozambique) on the 17th and 18th July.  I will be going for a week of Early Childhood Development training in South Africa, starting next Monday.  Then on the 22nd of July I will be leaving for 2 weeks to house/dog-sit for someone at a town called Bilene.  Though I will be doing some work while there, it will also be a time for rest and catching up on some reading.  Please pray for the Lord’s protection and blessing in our travels.

In regards to ministry, the Lord has been good to us.  This 3rd quarter with our children at the Learning Center has gone very well so far.  It is a delight to see the children learn so well!  Yet more than just gaining knowledge and education, it is our greatest desire that each of them would come to know the Lord.  Please pray that for them.

The weekly Bible classes we hold for children at a Nazarene church have also been going well.  In the winter we usually have less children attending, yet even so we have had over a hundred almost every week.  It also has been encouraging to see how Joy and Seth are progressing in the language, as the children are understanding them better now than when they first began teaching.  In June we had a special Sunday for the children, it was altogether a 4 hour ordeal.  I am glad we expected a crowd and had helpers from the church, as about 400 children came!  They had a BLAST though, and we are so grateful for the Lord’s help.  We played games, had puppet shows, singing, and Bible lessons. It was a blessing! I am including a few photos of that at the bottom of this post.

Our Sunday afternoon Bible study for young people has also been blessed by the Lord.  Recently there was a time we were praying about whether to continue with it or not, as most of the young people seemed too busy to come.  We are grateful to say that the Lord has been bringing the young people again, and we believe that He wants us to continue with this group of about 20.  There are several of them we believe are truly saved, and we ask you to please pray for them to grow in the Lord.  There are several who also attend but are not saved.  They are seeking, but don’t know the Lord yet.  Some of these include two ladies who are twins, who have lately been very convicted and seem to be seeking the Lord.  Also one teenage girl, Delfina, started coming a week after her young mother’s untimely death. Please pray for them!

I would like to close with a few prayer requests. Please pray:

• for the Lord to give us a greater love and passion for Himself
• for the Lord’s leading as we make decisions over the next two months in regards to ministry next year
• for our health, as my mom and brother Juan both had malaria recently
• for the children at the Learning Center, that they would learn well and especially come to know the Lord
• for the Bible classes, that the Lord would send His Spirit to work among those precious children
• for the Bible study, that the Lord would caused His children to grow and that the lost would be saved

Thank you, dear brothers & sisters in Christ, for your love, prayers, and support.  We thank the Lord for you, and we pray that the Lord would bless each of you richly.

Below are the photos from Children’s Day party at church:

 

~ Isak Westraad

J&S — Arrived

Brethren,

Praise the Lord with us, Joy & Seth Lancaster have rejoined our team here in Xai-Xai, Mozambique!  They traveled well and arrived here safely this morning, we thank the Lord for that.  Attached is a photo of the younger ones in our team, my parents asked to be excluded from this photo as they are very tired from travelling.

 

The Lord has been so good in leading these precious fellow-laborers here, and we thank the Lord for them.  Thank the Lord with us, brethren! He is so good.

 

Please pray for our whole team, that the Lord would give us all a spirit of love.  Pray that the lost will see Christ in us, and in our love for one another.  Pray that we each may grow in holiness, Christlikeness, and maturity.  I recently read the quote below and it really impacted me.

 

“Out of 100 men, one will read the Bible, the other 99 will read the Christian.” ~ D.L. Moody

 

Love in Christ,

Isak for the Mozambique Team

 

 

“After these things I looked, and behold, a great multitude which no one could number, of all nations, tribes, peoples, and tongues, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed with white robes, with palm branches in their hands, and crying out with a loud voice, saying, “Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb!”” ~ Revelation 7:9-10

Prison Outreach – Praise the Lord!

Today we had another outreach at the prison, I was able to preach there, and it was such a blessing! Upon my arrival I was grateful to see the translator I had was a good one.  They sang for me a few songs and a hymn, prayed together, and then asked me to share the Word with them.  I was almost moved to tears as I saw these men, about 50 of them, sit down on their shoes on the dirty floor of the prison to hear the Word of God preached.  These men, who are rapists, murderers, and thieves.  These men whom Christ loves, and gave His life for!  How are we different than them?  We are ALL sinners, and whether we have lied or murdered, we are equally guilty and Hell-deserving before a holy God, and need the perfect righteousness of Christ.  

I preached on Matthew 13:47-50, the parable of the net thrown into the ocean bringing in a varied catch of fish.  It showed how one day death will overtake each of us, and we will stand before a holy and just God.  We will be separated, like the fish, some will be kept and others thrown away.  The perverse will be thrown into the Lake of fire, and the just will enter their rest.  “Now who is just?” I asked them.  “No one….” they replied, shaking their heads.  There was a quietness and seriousness among the men as I spoke.  I went on to explain how they can be just by what Christ did on the Cross, that He took their sin upon Himself, and offers them His righteousness.  What a glorious truth!  Praise the Lord for what He has done, for the salvation He so freely and undeservingly bestows upon us!

I was able to briefly share my testimony also, how the Lord saved me.  The men really appeared to be touched, and after I had preached 7 men knelt down and started praying quietly right where they were, while the others sang a closing hymn.  I didn’t ask or invite them, I only told them to come to Christ and trust in Him if they know they are lost.  I know many of the other churches who do outreaches there say you only have to repeat a prayer and you’ll be saved, instead of telling them to trust Christ, but either way I pray those men would truly trust Christ, and be saved.  

It was a very encouraging time, and I want to thank you all so much for praying for this ministry.  I felt the Lord’s help and leading very clearly in my preaching, the room was quiet and peaceful (unlike last week), I had a good translator (also unlike last week), and there just was a general attentiveness and seriousness during the meeting, and a real spirit of love.  During the meeting the men brought me an old plastic bag, put it on the ground next to me, and told me to put my things down there so I can have my hands free.  So kind!  

Please continue praying for these men and for me as we minister to them.  Pray that they may be saved!

“God made Him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God.” ~ 2 Corinthians 5:21

Update on Biblestudy ~ from Anneke

Hello everyone!

 

I wanted to write an update on yesterday’s Bible study. 

We had it in Pedro’s mother house this time. She lives right next to Pedro. We were joined by Pedro’s brother and sister and his sister’s son, who is 19. 

Isak used my flashcards last time when we had the first Bible study, but he wasn’t satisfied with this. He decided to do simply a study on the Gospel and to read verses in Bible that explains this. So, we all sat in a circle, everyone with Bibles, Shangaan and Portuguese, and Isak started explaining to them the holiness of God. The present condition of man before God. The nature of man according to the Bible. And the consequences and judgment of sin. When I sat there, I just praised the Lord. Here we were sitting in a typical Mozambican reed house with a group of people who read very poorly sometimes, think and speak very simply, but they were reading the Word with us! And really listening and taking in what Isak was saying. Many times, especially with young people, you get such a bored, ‘when-is-this-going-to-be-over’ attitude. But not yesterday! They were asking questions and making observations. When Isak had explained about sin, Pedro’s brother made this conclusion. “So, for man sin is not a problem. It’s his daily bread, his daily life” Meaning this is his condition before God.We told him that’s exactly how the Bible describes each of us. Then Isak explained to them the solution to sin. Christ on the cross, being punished in our place. He touched on this briefly and wants to go into more detail about what happened at the cross next week, Lord willing. He wanted to speak about sin first of all and the depravity of man before a holy God. They have to see the problem before they can comprehend the solution! Before they can appreciate the diamond, which is Christ, they have to see it against the black silk of their sin, if I may use Paul Washer’s illustration.  

Pedro asked us, what if you are saved but you sin again, then God must punish you again, right?

We told him, no, if the Lord has saved you, you are forgiven forever. All the punishment for your sin fell on Christ! Not a drop of it falls ever on the believer! I told him this was the most amazing thing to me when the Lord opened this up for me. I am free! There is no condemnation ever! But we told him that the true believer will love the Lord because of this and serve Him, not go out and sin because there’s free grace. Isak explained to him God’s correction of His children and the difference of it from God’s wrath. This just awed him. 

Pedro might be saved. He speaks of when he was in sin and how the Lord saved him and changed him. Please continue to pray for him and his family. He said that his wife wants to come, too. 

Isak said that the Mozambicans need this: simply to be taught the Word of God. Not someone giving them some more ideas, there are more than enough of these. 

But to see what the Word of God teaches. To hear the Gospel explained to them from the Word. This is so needed! 

Thank you everyone for your prayers! The Lord really carried and helped Isak yesterday and we are so thankful. May all who come to this Bible study come to a saving knowledge of our Lord Jesus! 

 

~ Anneke

News from Xai-Xai

 

Dear family in the Lord

I want to share a bit of what the Lord has been doing here; thank you so much for your prayers for us, truly the Lord is the Answerer of prayer!!  The Lord has been so good to us.  

 

Firstly, we are finally able to start our first literacy center! I am not sure if all of you have heard about this new area the Lord has been leading us into, so I will share. The education system in Mozambique is extremely corrupt and overall just really bad, and its very common to find children in grade 4 or 5 yet unable to write or read at all!  This has been a burden for Anneke especially, and she started praying about opening a literacy center especially for children like this.  This would be year of extra classes for the children, teaching them English and also how to read and write; with that it will of course be a wonderful opportunity to share the Gospel with the lost children, and help and encourage the saved children! The Lord gave us more and more assurance that this is His will, and recently the Lord finally opened the door for us to actually begin the process of opening it! We will start the actual classes towards the end of October, because its only then that we will be able to use a classroom at a local Weslyan Bibleschool.  They will let us use it until around February next year, so during that time we plan to secure premises of our own.  Anneke is very excited about getting started! We will have 30 kids total, 15 in the morning and 15 in the afternoon.  We want to teach the children to be able to read the Word of God for themselves, and we believe this will be a wonderful way of sharing the Gospel with these children.  Please continue to pray that the Lord will guide us every step of the way, as we look for premises (we will most likely have to build) and also as we choose the first 30 students. We also have had a lot of opposition just in our circumstances, so we truly appreciate your prayers that the Lord will just carry us through this time!  Anneke will be our first teacher, but if the Lord opens the door we would like to open more literacy centers like this in our area…..it truly is a great need!

 

Another area the Lord has been giving me a greater burden for, is to get good Biblical literature here in Mozambique. Thank you Mona Leiter, Tressa Lancaster, and Seth Lancaster for all your help in finding out about sources to get Christian books, Bibles, New Testaments, and Bible portions for here. we were able to find a Christian bookstore in Maputo, capital of Mozambique.  I know of only 1 other Christian bookstore in the whole country!  Anyway, this one in Maputo which is 3 hours away from us, has some fantastic books in Portuguese including several by Paul Washer, John Piper, etc.  so we are very excited about this!!  We hope to make a trip to Maputo soon to buy some books to give to several professing pastors in our area and other educated Mozambicans.  

 

A very big, new thing that has happened, is that we started our first adult Biblestudy among the Mozambicans in the 14 years we have lived here!! Wow!  It all began about a month ago, when we were talking with a young Mozambican man we know, and the conversation turned to spiritual things.  We were just AMAZED by what he was saying, as he was just talking about regeneration and asking questions about how one can be free from sin and witchcraft, etc.  I suggested we do a Biblestudy on Sundays, to which he readily agreed.  The first Sunday we were to have it, his cousin died and he had to go the funeral.  we then postponed the Biblestudy to the following Sunday.  So on the next Sunday, he lets me know again that his employers called him and they urgently need him at work right away, so he wouldn’t be home again!  We were praying now that the Lord would not allow Satan to hinder this Biblstudy, and again the Biblestudy was moved to the following Sunday, which was last Sunday.  I texted him that morning and asked if everything was still set for the afternoon, and he said yes; we were thrilled!! We got there at 2pm, and as Anneke and I sat down in his home he shook his head saying, “Satan really wants to keep this Biblestudy from happening.  Just a while before you came, a friend called me, asking me to come there quickly even though his house is quite a distance away….I wasn’t sure exactly what time you would be here so I almost went.  I felt an unrest and decided not to go, and just a few minutes later my children ran in to tell me you had arrived.”  

Praise the Lord for His mercy in not allowing Satan to stop it!  On the night I decided that we should start this Biblestudy, I had a very severe phyiscal demonic attack.  It was very frightening, yet the power of Christ was just shown in that and He truly is greater than all the power of darkness combined!

Oh I thank each of you who were praying for this Biblestudy, as it was my first time of ever giving one…..I was VERY nervous.  But I can say that the Lord truly just came down and helped me, and I know 2 Corinthians 12:9,10 is true! ” And He said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for My strength is made perfect in weakness.”Therefore most gladly I will rather boast in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me. Therefore I take pleasure in infirmities, in reproaches, in needs, in persecutions, in distresses, for Christ’s sake. For when I am weak, then I am strong.”

The Biblestudy lasted for about 2 hours, and it truly was just wonderful!! Pedro was just soaking it all in, and he was very blessed by it! For the first time in his life, he actually heard about the Cross and what Christ did there for us.  Our conclusion after the Biblestudy is that he might already be saved, or he is very close;  he says the Lord has changed him very much and he knows he has Jesus in his heart…..and he truly just seems to have a childlike faith.  But i cannot say for sure, it may well be possible he is just seeking on this stage.  PLEASE do pray for him, that the Lord will work greatly in his life; if he is saved, pray that it will be clear to us and that the Lord will cause him to grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ; and if he is not saved, pray that the Lord will work the miracle of salvation in him, and that he will be SAVED!!  

Also please pray for me, I feel so unqualified for this, and it is a heavy responsibility.  Please pray that the Lord will help me, that He will just give me great wisdom, humility, grace, and just fill me with Himself, so that I will be overflowing with Him! Let it truly be Christ speaking through me, and not my words!

 

Thank you again so much all, for your wonderful prayer and support.  May the Lord greatly bless and help each of you in this day.

 

Love in Christ,

Westraad family