December Prayer Letter

 

December 2022

Dear Praying Friends,

A. was saved a few months ago and has grown spiritually ever since. She is a stay-at-home mom and her husband, J., willingly works long hours so that she can do this. They both believe that their biblical responsibility is to raise their one-year-old son in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. They are doing a great job so far!

Because of all the filth that is being taught and promoted in public schools, they both believe that home schooling is their best option. Portuguese law demands that the teacher have at least a bachelor’s degree in education to do this, so J. and A. have been researching how they could do this in the next three to four years before little J. is school age. A. plans to start classes in July toward earning a teaching degree in time to be able to homeschool their little boy.

Please pray for this young family, that God will stretch their limited budget for A.’s education, that God will give her the ability to study as well as care for their little son and that their precious boy would be spared the indoctrination of abominations, violence and immorality that is so prevalent in public schools.

Praying for parents,

Mark Hale

November Prayer Letter

November 2022

Dear Praying Friends,

Thanksgiving is always the forgotten holiday nowadays, but I wanted to share with you some
things that I am thankful for:

 · I am thankful that God loved me enough to save me and that He loves the entire world so much that He died and rose again to save them!

· I am thankful that God called me to preach His word and serve Him as a missionary!

· I am thankful for my godly, beautiful wife who faithfully serves by my side and sacrifices daily to fulfill the great commission. I am truly blessed to have her in my life!

· I am thankful for our son, Joshua and his godly wife, Rachel, who are faithfully serving the Lord in the States!

· I am thankful for the churches that have been established, the preachers who have been trained and the souls that have been won during the 37 years we have been missionaries!

· I am thankful for Christmas and our privilege to celebrate the Lord’s birth!

· I am thankful for every one of you who prays and gives to keep us on the field here in Portugal! Only eternity will reveal all that your sacrifices have accomplished across the world for the Lord!

It is our prayer and deep desire, that each of you will have a blessed Christmas this year and that the new year will bring blessings, victories and many more souls saved for God’s honor and glory! May each one of us seek to reflect Christ’s light to our darkened and hopeless world.

Thankful,

Mark Hale

October Prayer Letter

Dear Praying Friends,

Last year, four-year-old L. looked distressed as Michele taught about the symbolism of the Passover lamb and Jesus Christ, the Lamb of God. He asked, “Why did the lamb have to die?” Michele gently explained to the worried boy and he once again heard the gospel of Jesus Christ in her class as did the other children.

Now, a year has passed and he is five-years-old. L. has asked a lot of questions and heard a lot of biblical answers which have borne fruit. Recently, he told his father, “Dad, I want to worship the Lord like you.” His father explained that only the saved could worship God as their Father and so, he took his son through the Scriptures showing him how he could have God as his heavenly Father. L. bowed his head and in childlike faith, trusted in Christ as his Lamb of God.

Please pray for L. as he continues to grow spiritually and ask many questions about the Bible. Please pray for 13-year-old L. and 10-year-old C. Both of these girls are attending services and listening, but neither have come to a saving knowledge of Jesus Christ yet as little L. has. We have seen three saved recently that you folks have been praying for: 25-year-old L., 22-year-old A. and five-year-old L. Please continue to pray for them to grow in the faith and for these others to soon come to Christ before it is eternally too late.

Praising God for souls saved,

Mark Hale

August Prayer Letter

August 2022

Dear Praying Friends,

Immediately after I closed the service, the young mother came right up to the pulpit and said, “Pastor, I don’t have the joy you talked about in your sermon, I made a religious decision in another church, but I have no peace.” For the past five weeks, A has been coming to our church with some of her family members and they have been listening closely to my lessons and sermons. As I spoke on assurance of salvation, A’s brow furrowed and she became very serious. I thought she might be rejecting biblical truth and choose to leave as so many others have.

When she spoke with me after that service, I sat down with her in our auditorium and opened the Scriptures showing her how that all have sinned. She replied, “But I am not as bad as other people that I know.” To which I said, “Now, compare yourself to Christ.” She lowered her head and confessed, “I am a sinner.” Going on in the Scriptures, I showed her how our only hope is Christ and His accomplished work on the cross and that to obtain the eternal life Christ offered, she had to confess her sin to Him and believe in Him as her all-sufficient Savior. She bowed her head, confessed her sin and begged God to forgive her and save her – and He did!! She looked up with tears streaming down and her face aglow with joy. “I am
saved forever and now I finally have peace!”

Please pray for A in her new life in Christ and for the others in her family who are lost but attending our services: J, L, D, and C.

Praising God that He saved another,

Mark Hale

July Prayer Letter

July 2022

Dear Praying Friends,

We have some of the most committed prayer warriors on the planet who unceasingly hold us up before the throne of God in prayer; I cannot thank you dear friends enough for your labors in prayer for us and the ministries here! To keep you updated on some of the people we have requested prayer for, here is the latest:

A – This 89-year-old man is still fighting the conviction of the Holy Spirit and is unsuccessfully trying to take refuge in his empty Catholic beliefs but has no peace and cannot explain why.

M – is coming ever closer to salvation and is asking many penetrating and serious questions to our brother John who is witnessing to him. Please remember M in prayer, he is so close to understanding and is not resisting the conviction of the Holy Spirit.

S – fled our church services under heavy Holy Spirit conviction and has not been back. She heard the gospel many times but refuses to admit that she is a sinner. Please pray that she will be honest about her spiritual condition and come to Christ before it is eternally too late.

L – was saved recently in a late-night talk with his father who led him to Christ. Please pray for this boy that he would grow in his new Christian life and become a man who serves the Lord.

L – was saved over a year ago but has struggled with her new faith. She is very weak spiritually, not reading her Bible nor praying regularly. She comes to church but more out of religious habit than a desire to worship the Lord. Please pray that she will grow spiritually enough to understand her desperate need for the Lord’s daily guidance in her choices and problems.

E – is the mother of L and is very religious. She recently confessed her lost condition but struggles to humble herself before Christ and accept His accomplished work on the cross as the total payment for her sin.

Dr. J – is asking powerful questions and is gradually coming closer to God’s truth of salvation. Please keep him and his family in prayer for their salvation.

Praying with you for them,

Mark Hale

June Prayer Letter

June 2022

Dear Praying Friends,

“Do you have peace?” the self-professed atheist asked me, his eyes intently searching mine. “Yes, I do have peace but only because Jesus Christ is my Savior.” I quietly answered. Dr. J, along with many Europeans, is greatly disturbed by the weak leadership from America and is afraid that Putin will be emboldened in his quest to reestablish the Soviet Union.

Dr. J has had physical ailments recently that required surgery. Both his small children have suffered illnesses and are being treated. His clinic has experienced setbacks and he is afraid for his family. “With all that is happening in the world, how can you possibly have peace?” the surprised doctor enquired. “Because I know that I am safe in the arms of my Savior, so I can sleep in peace at night knowing He is still on His throne.” He shook his head, shaken by my answer but unable to speak further.

Please continue to pray for Dr. J and his family. While his three-year-old son has recovered from his illness, their five-year-old daughter is slow to respond and the doctors are guarded in their prognosis. This once proud and self-sufficient doctor has been shaken to the core by recent events, we are praying that God will use the instability in our world to bring this man and his family to Christ.

Thankful for the peace that passes all understanding,

Mark Hale

April Prayer Letter

April 2022

Dear Praying Friends,

“Pastor, to be honest, we have lost our enthusiasm for the ministry. It is just so hard and we have so little to show for all of our labor...” the young preacher and his wife confessed last Sunday. She has struggled since last year with his call to be a pastor and is still resistant to God’s will, now her husband was questioning if their labor in the ministry was worth it.

I encouraged them to remember that some plow, some plant, some water and some pull the weeds, but it is God that gives the increase. Of course, I wish all of our labors would produce many more saved and serving. Certainly, I wish Portugal wasn’t so enslaved in Catholic traditions. Sure, I wish our 2,000-year-old city wasn’t the center of witchcraft and homosexuality in southern Portugal. But I reminded them of something I have to remind myself of regularly: We are simply servants of the Lord Jesus Christ, called to serve Him where He wants, how He wants, however long He wants and with whom He wants.

I asked them a question I ask myself all the time, “Will this decision [to laboring stop for Christ] result in Jesus Christ saying to you, “Well done, thou good and faithful servant” or will it prevent you from hearing those glorious words from the perfect lips of our Savior? Jesus never promised the life of serving Him would be easy, painless, or without sacrifice, but He did promise to be with us until the end of the world! May each one of us remember that one day, very soon, every Christian will stand before our Lord and Savior; some will hear the approval of Christ; others will stand ashamed.

Which will you be?

Laboring for His approval,

Mark Hale

March Prayer Letter

 

March 2022

Dear Praying Friends,

The Russian shells dropped indiscriminately on their cities, destroying homes, government buildings, schools, hospitals and all the infrastructure of modern civilization. Many sheltered in dank basements with little to no food or water. Never knowing when a bomb, missile or artillery shell would destroy their hiding places and kill them and their terrified children, they had given up hope of longterm survival. But then a civilian convoy of passenger cars or vans was organized and they took their chance to escape the Russian army and seek safety in the west.

Portugal is a long way from the terrible war raging in the Ukraine, but not far enough away to not be impacted by the rising prices (gasoline approaching $10.00 per gallon and food rising in prices overnight) and the influx of over four million refugees, most of them women and children, into western Europe. Our small church prayed about how to help and had the opportunity to purchase food and personal hygiene products for these women and their children. Our assistant pastor and I spent the morning purchasing desperately needed supplies and literally filled our van. We took these supplies to the local fire department who were organizing trucks to take food, clothing and necessary items to Poland where the majority of refugees are coming. It was a great blessing to our church to help, a great testimony to the firefighters and a serious opportunity for all of our church to look beyond the walls of our church and see the suffering and dying here in Europe.

Please pray with us as more and more Ukrainian refugees stream into Portugal, that God would give us more opportunities to help these terrified women and children with the necessities of life, but also that we can find a way to share the good news of Jesus Christ with these people who have seen death up close and personally.

Seeking the lost,

Mark Hale

February Prayer Letter

February 2022

Dear Praying Friends,

It was just past midnight, and all through the house,
Not a creature was stirring, except for my spouse.
“Just one more thing,” she promised herself,
“Then it’s to bed, for the sake of my health.”

While I lay sleeping, just a few yards away,
She mounted that ladder, but not the right way.
The crash was loud, and grew even louder,
Echoing inside, like a bomb of gun powder.

I jumped out of bed, and ran toward the clamor,
Wishing for a gun, a knife or a hammer.
But no intruder, had entered our house,
It was my sweetheart, my night owl spouse.

She lay on the floor, with the ladder and stuff,
Gravity had won, but my wife is still tough.
I helped her up slowly, looking for clues,
But thank God she made it, with only a bruise!

No midnight tasks, await her again,
She’s promised the ladder, to correctly extend.
I want to thank, everyone one of you,
For praying for us, as you faithfully do.

I’m thanking our God, for my precious wife,
For keeping her safe, and sparing her life!
So Michele, if there’s one more task,
Please wake me up, you just have to ask!!

Thankful for God’s protection,

Mark Hale

January Prayer Letter

January 2022

Dear Praying Friends,

We recently received this report from our son, Joshua, who is serving the Lord in Missouri with his dear wife, Rachel as they prepare to be church planters in the future. I thought this would be good to share:

“Tonight Rachel and I arrived home from a trip to Walmart. I opened our entryway table to put my keys and wallet away only to reach into my empty pocket...I had lost my wallet! We searched everywhere for it, took flashlights out and searched inside and under our truck, but no wallet. We drove back to Walmart and they helped us look. No one had returned it, so I, being the optimist that I am, assumed it was stolen. I locked the cards and kissed my cash goodbye. Rachel drove since I didn’t have a driver’s license anymore...We arrived home discouraged and I was stressed at the thought of someone walking around with my ID. I was frustrated and upset, but my dear wife prayed. Rachel finished praying and looked down and sure enough, somehow, my wallet had fallen out of my pocket when I was carrying
groceries in earlier and had landed under the couch. My wallet, my stupid little wallet, was found! I had learned two lessons. First of all, be more careful and secondly, be more like my wife and go to my Heavenly Father for help. Tonight was stressful, but most of all humbling. Thank you, Lord, for teaching these lessons to your son!”

As we begin 2022, may each of us learn this lesson: No matter the circumstances, no matter the storms, no matter the problems, let us seek our Heavenly Father!

Looking unto Jesus,

Mark Hale