Dear Brethren in Christ,
Greetings to you in the precious name of Lord Jesus Christ our savior. By the grace of God I returned home safely completing my 2 months visit to USA. It was pleasure visiting you all, must thank you all for your kind invitation and hospitality when I visited your place. I firmly believe that my visit helped to strengthen our relationship, I praise God for blessing me to visit you all.
Faculty meeting:
Right after my return from USA we held a faculty meeting in the second week of June, A meeting we usually hold once in every two months to discuss about how is everything going, where we at and how students are learning etc., normally It takes a combined effort to train up the young evangelists, in this process sharing of ideas and experience has been always been a very useful thing. All our faculty was present for the meeting, it was more than three hours of discussion and sharing of things and doctrinal issues in the Church in this area. We all have made a firm decision to stick to the N.T truth of preaching Christ and His only Church.
Part of the meeting, I was glad to update them about my visit to Lake Houston & Strickland Church of Christ, meeting with the Elders and also about my reporting to the Church. All the faculty members were very happy with my visit and how you all felt about the school. Of course our faculty is being appreciated very much for their doctrinal stand and their cooperation in training the Men.
Student’s Schedule:
Preachers Training program is going on well, present students are doing their best in learning and acting according to their learning. Let me brief you about how our students spend their day. Actually, student’s time table starts at 5:30 in the morning. They began their day with a devotional first, then cleaning their dormitory etc., We are trying our best to instruct these future preachers to discipline their body by following the time table; also instructing them to use their time wisely.
We are very much concerned about our students memorizing the Bible verses, of course we encourage them to study/read the Bible every day; in addition to this they memorize one verse from the Bible every day. One of the faculty is always watch them doing this, after each of the student quote the scripture that is written on the black board they conclude that with a prayer then proceed for lunch.
10th Anniversary:
What a blessing, we rejoice in sharing this exciting news. it has been 10 years since we started the Preaching school in Visakhapatnam. Of course we have to wait for another year to celebrate our 10th Anniversary association with Bear Valley. However, its time to celebrate. We are going to have a Preachers meeting on the eve of this 10th anniversary. We are inviting all the teachers and faculty members and old students for this special occasion. We praise God for this blessing of running a preaching school for 10 yrs at Visakhapatnam, where ours is the first full time preaching school, it is certainly blessing. It was a great history of 10 years preachers training at Vaisakha; a preaching school that is sending full time ministers to reach the unreached millions.
Evangelical News:
Brethren, We always feel very proud of our graduates who are working for the Church full time, even though their finances are not up to the mark, they have changeless enthusiasm which is giving some wonderful results; we appreciate their efforts so much. They share with us, their evangelical efforts of preaching, holding personal Bible studies, door knocking and also the results which is the addition of souls to the Lord’s Church. Attached are the pictures that you may like to see, we are very happy to share these with you.
“So the church throughout all Judea and Galilee and Samaria enjoyed peace, being built up; and going on in the fear of the Lord and in the comfort of the Holy Spirit, it continued to increase. “ Acts 9:31
Voice of Truth International: We are so thankful to the brethren at World Evangelism, especially sister Betty Choate for sending their Magazine regularly. We receive them without any problem, we are distributing them with our students and preachers in this part of Andhra Pradesh. They have been a great literature, helping our students to understand God’s wisdom, also helping them to prepare to teach/reach others. Very helpful gospel tool, thankful to all the brethren who are behind this in several ways.
Thank you so much brethren for your prayers which is a great strength for us to work for the Lord. We do thank the brethren at Strickland for overseeing our work and for also sending brother Jerry Bates to teach & Check on the work. Especially we thank the brethren at Lake Houston Church of Christ for their trust and confidence in the preaching School. We appreciate their continued support and encouragements. We also thank the brethren at Bear Valley for accepting our school as their extension school. Do thank all the brethren who made this possible. We are mindful of all the brethren, like Denny Petrillo, Bob Turner, Ralph Williams, Steve Wiseman, Garry Fallis, Keith Kasarjian, Mark Reynolds and sever other wonderful Men of God who made this possible.
With all your prayers we continue to strive for His cause, we love you all so much in the Lord. God bless you all. All our students, faculty and staff members pray for you daily.
In Christian Love
M. Samuel Raju, Director
M. John Dean
For Visakha Valley Bible College
Visakhapatnam, India.