Monthly Prayer Letter - August 2007

Dear friends and family,

This month has been a interesting time of transitions for our family and work. Vanessa started her Senior year on the 14th of August. We drove up to Chiang Mai about a week before school started to work on Vanessa's Visa paper work and take care of some medical items for school. Vanessa also had all of her wisdom teeth pulled at that time. We were able to celebrate Vanessa's 17th birthday even though she was still pretty much swollen. Please keep Vanessa in your prayers she has a very busy Senior year. She is on the student Council , sports editor for the school as well as singing for school chapel. Vanessa will be traveling with the school volley ball team to the Philippines in February to take pictures and write a report.

We have experienced some great challenges with spiritual warfare this month but have also seen some great victories.
The Burmese people are very fearful of sprits and have lived in fear of them their whole life. A couple weeks ago on a Sunday morning we went to a cell group about 2 hours from our home to worship with a group that was in need of some encouragement. When we arrived the leader of the group approached us and said there was a lady present who had a spirit in her. The lady had lived in Yangoon and made a promise to a spirit that when she was 50 the spirit could come to her. She had not eaten or drank for about 3 days and she was nearly catatonic. We met the family and they were worried about her. We started our worship service with the woman present. We could feel this tension in all of the family. We stopped our singing and we started praying for this woman. The lady started talking in a strange voice and told us the demons name. Pastor C. asked her if she believed in Jesus and she said yes but so does the demon (James 2:19). We started praying for her and the demon would not leave because she had invited it into her. She would not say the name of Jesus nor would she tell the spirit to leave. She was not able to stay among us for long she keep coming and going from the house the whole time we were present. As we left we were all discouraged because of what we had experienced but we knew God was in control and there was a lesson we could learn from this. We knew this would really dishearten Pastor C. We had to help Pastor C. come to a biblical understanding of this event. As Christians we understand we have all power and authority in Jesus to speak out demons, but in this case the person invited the spirit into her life and she has to be the one to invite Christ into her life to release that spirit. God used this situation to help clarify a truth for Pastor C. Believing in Jesus and asking Him into our life's through repentance are two very different things. Believing in Jesus will not save one as we saw the demon believed also. Wow how many people do we know who believe in Jesus? Have you ever taken the time to share with them how Christ can change and transform their lives. We spent a lot of time in prayer the next couple of days especially for Pastor C. for he was having trouble sleeping and he felt he has failed the people as the spiritual leader.

God is so amazing before the weeks end we started seeing life's being changed for Christ. We have seen in the last 10 days or there of 10 people come to the Lord and want to give their lives over to His control. This started last Thursday we went to a cell group about 45 minutes away from our house and Ben taught on Luke 15. After Pastor C translated it 3 people said they wanted to accept Jesus. Friday, we went to another cell group about 11/2 hours away and we told the same story and 3 adults accepted Christ. Sunday, we drove nearly 2 hours to another site told the same story and we saw 4 people accept Jesus. Praise God!
If we can encourage you in any way remember God is faithful and will not stop searching for those he loves. The joy is seeing God's faithfulness as we humble our self's and allow him to work though us.

Prayer Request:
Vanessa- As she gets into the routine of school and all of her extracurricular activities in order. Pray that she will grow in her walk with the Lord throughout this school year. Pray for her to stay focused as she gets ready to take SAT and ACT tests that are required for colleges.
Shawn- Last year Shawn lost some monies that he had gotten in the past. Shawn went into the Registrar's office and told them that he did not want to take any more loans. The school told him that we (his parents) could take another loan out. He told them that was not possible and if the tuition went up more he might have to look at transferring to another school. The Registrar's office was able to find some more money for him which was a praise. It was about half of what he needs to cover next terms tuition. It is also a prayer request that he would be able to get a job during the summer that would allow him to make enough money to get through another year. Also pray for him this school year as he is in leadership in the BSU at CSU. Pray that he would stay focused and continue to persevere through the college life.

Ben and Brenda- Continue to pray for us as we face trials in our life. Pray that we will continue to lift up Jesus among a people who live in fear of the spirits. Pray that we would work through some of the transitions in our job as we seek new team members. Pray that God would be glorified as we teach and train Burmese nationals to do the work. Pray we would have people join our team whom God has called and gifted especially for the work.

Pray for all of our cell groups and their leaders that they would catch the vision of starting new works in new ways. Pray for favor from the government as we work within the scope of our visa. Pray for safety as we travel and teach. Pray for new opportunities to share and expand our influence among the Burmese living in Southern Thailand. Pray for teams as well as workers

In the Lamb,
Ben and Brenda Murry