This was an extremely busy day, from beginning to end.
Jonathan and Jack were due to pick me up from the hotel at 4:30am, so I set my
alarm at 3:45am, giving me plenty of time to get ready and to finish packing.
Actually, I guess I should say that I thought I set my alarm for 3:45am because
I set the time, but moved the switch barely passed the alarm setting, so it did
not go off. At 4:20am, I got a message from Jonathan that he was 10 minutes
away from the hotel. I have never gotten ready and packed faster in my life and
we made it out the door at 4:45am. The drive to the airport was fairly free of
traffic at that hour, so we made it with time to spare. By “time to spare,” I
mean that after having my essential morning cup of coffee, we made it to the
gate to be the last ones on the bus taking us to the turbo-prop plane for the
20-minute flight to Dumguete.
After arriving in Dumaguete, we proceeded to the hotel where
we had today’s venue. The lectures were, rather typically, running on what we
call “Filipino time” – they started about an hour and a half late as the audience
was very slow to arrive. After an opening song and prayer, I preached
back-to-back lessons on “Salvation & the Seed, the Gospel” and “God’s
Inspiration of His Word.” That consumed all of the time for the morning
session, so we broke for an abbreviated lunch time.
After a little more than 30 minutes, we began the afternoon
session with another song and prayer. The first lesson was on “Salvation &
Saul.” We had three denominational preachers (a Baptist, a Methodist and a
Pentecostal) who listened very carefully and respectfully. At times they even
showed a stunned agreement, nodding their heads, as they saw the clarity of God’s
truth refuting their “Faith Only” doctrine. We noted the doctrine was in
conflict with the example of Saul’s conversion and many other NT passages.
Jonathan then presented a lesson on “The Establishment of the Church.” One of
the denominational preachers left at that point, but he seemed very disturbed
over what he had heard. I closed the lectures with a lesson on “Faith, Grace
and Obedience.”
Jonathan then extended the invitation and a song was led. No
one came forward at that time, but before we had a closing prayer, two ladies
made known their desire to obey the gospel. Brother Mario Rubio, who preaches
in the Dumaguete area, asked them to confess their faith in Christ and they did
so. Mario and several of the brethren then took them to be baptized into
Christ.
