Greetings from the Walti Family in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ who was and is and is to come! By now, you should have received our stateside prayer letter (sent out quarterly, thanks to some of our sweet supporters) which shared about some of our journey to visit churches earlier this summer. We also hope you enjoy our completely revised WaltiWorld Blog with new design and family picture.
We hope this next update finds you and your family doing well and experiencing the blessings of our Lord. Now, we have just returned from a trip to Sicily, Italy where we were able to visit 3 different evangelical churches (Messina, Milazo and Rometta), meet with other missionaries and pastors, break bread together and have some great fellowship, do a little witnessing and evangelism and even get some time for us as a family on the beach! [make sure to see the picture slide-show above!] And a very special blessing for us this summer was having Bethany back in Italy for a month, allowing us all to be back together again for the first time in a year. We thank God for what the Lord has done in her life.
Tomorrow, we head for Genova to do evangelism in the city and near the port, reaching Italians and passing out tracts to the naval workers, including many Muslims who come in on the ships when they come to port. We will be meeting with many of the Christian leaders in the city and Jeannette and I will have opportunity to share our testimony with the local believers. Then it's off to Canelli on Sunday, an 1hr and 30 minutes from Genova, to attend church and for Lee to bring the message in Italian! Then on Monday, we'll go to La Spezia where we will meet with local missionaries and then, a group of Christians in Sarzana that were asking for a missionary family last year to help them reach the city for Christ. Two weeks from this weekend, we will be heading to Avellino, near Napoli, to meet the believers in the church there, do evangelism and Lee will also preach for the church.
We continue to seek God's wisdom and direction for our next assignment. On one hand, we pray every day for more faith. On the other hand, we've never been more full of faith that God will perfectly provide for us. Maybe, you know what we mean when we say that being here, God has had a way of faithfully chipping away at anything and everything that might draw us away from Him. At the same time, He has invited us to be a part of discovering His will for our future as a family in Italy.
I began reading a book I actually bought nearly 3 years ago but just picked up again recently, called, "To Be Told: God Invites You to Coauthor Your Future" by Dan Allender. The book helps to describe a lot of how I feel lately about what God is doing in our lives. He doesn't always answer my prayers, to give me perfect clarity for the future. He hasn't made each step clear on what our family is to do or where we are to go. But what He has done and is doing is invited us to be a part of a story He is revealing day by day. Often, it's not as quick as we'd like but it's always in His perfect timing. And it always is consistent with how He has made and gifted us and the story He's been crafting all along. Allender writes,
"You are a story. You are not merely the possessor and teller of a number of stories; you are a well-written, intentional story that is authored by the greatest Writer of all time, and even before time and after time. God is a being who loves to reveal and who invites us to join the process of revelation by calling us to ask, seek, and knock. God always intended for His children to join Him in completing creation. We are not inanimate entities that merely reveal glory but living stories that are meant to create glory."
Every trip we have taken this summer, every church we've shared a testimony in, every place where I've had the privilege of preaching a message, every person we've met, believer and unbeliever, is an opportunity for us to continue our story. A story of glory for the only One who deserves it. Allender continues, "Our life theme is the significance of our life as seen by those who are close enough to sense how our life either reveals or fails to make known the character of God." I REALLY like this.
I know that none of us can determine perfectly where God is leading us in our lives or where we will be down the road in our future and our pursuit of greater peace, joy, love fulfillment, satisfaction, purpose...and most importantly, our ability to glorify God. But what we can do...what God is inviting each of us to do...if we will agree...is to help bring meaning and value to each chapter of our story by participating with Him. Each of us are gifted. Each of us are called. Each of us are telling a story. And if we use our gifting, calling and each opportunity God grants us to tell a story of Him and of His glory, then even if and when we don't know what the future holds, we will still get to see and experience the blessing of coauthoring what our lives say about Him to others. We all know He is SO worthy of a good story. And you ARE that story. We ARE that story. And each of our stories are being read every day. We should do all we can to tell a good one! A story of the great I AM!
We leave at 7am in the morning. We would so appreciate it if you would lift us up in prayer. Please pray for safety. Pray for wisdom and discernment of God's will for our next assignment. Pray for the hundreds of Italians and especially, the Muslims, we will encounter on Saturday..that the gospel will go forward and those we meet will move closer to Him (even get saved). Also, please pray for us as we meet the church and believers in Canelli on Sunday and I'd greatly appreciate it if you would pray for the message to the church that I will deliver. And then later, as we travel and meet the other Christians and missionaries in the area south of Genova.
But most of all, pray with us and we will pray for you...let's commit to all pray...for a story in and through all of us that will proclaim the great God that He is and the great gospel grace He offers.
And from the bottom of our hearts...thank you, thank you, thank you so very much for your very much coveted prayers and your kind and generous support...all of which is our lifeline to continued ministry.
Love from the Walti's,
Lee, Jeannette, Bethany, Hannah, Jacob, Elijah and Abby
2 comments:
As soon as I saw your post total, I thought, "Oh, I ought to tell them about that book by Dan Allender that I've been reading!" I guess I don't need to, since you've already discovered it!
Oops, I meant post title, not total. Typing too fast for my own good!
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