NEWS

Praying for Macedonia Dear brothers, this one has also past. We refer to the Macedonian-Albanian conflict that caught our breath for more than a month, thinking that this has happened only 160 km away from Pogradec. It looks like the military man of UÇK(Albanians of Kosovo) are retreated and the situation in Macedonia is going back to normality. However, our task is still to pray the Lord for the situation in the Balkans, until a reorganization of all these countries is reached in all the levels. So far this is not reached, the possibility of a new conflict will always be at the door. Anyway, all this succesion of events allows a lot of missionaries to enter these nations (where is not possible to preach the gospel in public), not only to help the people hurt from the destruction, but most of all to preach that "Word" that is the power of God for whoever believes. This was the theme of the last convention, which we missed for this year, because in May we are to visit our German brothers. However, we will also have the opportunity to visit few comunities of the central Italy and we are also going to be present at the missionary Committee in Grosseto. In the three last days of March, we went to visited a mission 60 km away from Pogradec, together with the young people of the villages, and it was a great blessing for all of us. Besides climbing on the mountains, playing with the ball, and making friends with the local brothers, we also had three splendid meetings in the church, sharing with them the Word, the Lord's Supper, testimonies and songs unknown for them, because we translated them from Italian. The work is making wonderful developments, regarding the spiritual growth of some of our brothers. The most faithful readers of "INFOMISSION" already know that one of our main prayers of the moment is that all of them can receive the baptism in the Holy Spirit. On this context, we want to inform you that the Lord has immediately answered our and your prayers. Actually, we are sending the testimony of a very faithful young boy, from Stropcke, who has been greatly blessed by the Lord. We need to find funds for him and other boys, to have the possibility to send them to the Bible School here in Pogradec, which is going to start again in September. This will realize our objective to prepare servants for the work in Albania . I believe this will be possible through your help. These days our co-worker, Ardi, has finished the time in the Bible School. We were at his diploma ceremony, where Sandro was invited to preach. We want to thank, in a particular way our American brother, Tom Myers, who made it financially possibile for Ardi to attend the Bible school, as our co-worker. Thanks to Irmgard Bierwisch (missionary secretary of the churches in Germany) we have some contacts with a Spanish church of the Assembly of God of Andujar. They are constantly praying for us and they have prepared an advertising board for the mission Albania, in their hall. We also want to thank all the Spanish brothers. This is all for this time, but remember that we can send to whoever wants and who has an e-mail address, a brief updating in the month that "info mission" is not published. You can so, give fresh news to your communities. You can write to us on the e-mail address apostolike@aep.org.al   Thank you to all that have encouraged us with their words Lord bless you. All the church in Albania greets and thanks you.   Getting to know our Albanian brothers:   Hi. My name is Sokol Shkullaku. I'm 18 and I live in the village of Stopcke. I'm very glad to tell you my testimony. The first time I have heard about Jesus, I was a child, about 10. Like many others I started gladly to go the meetings, where they talked about Jesus. But I come from a family of Moslem traditions and my parents would say to me:" You are not a Christian, but a Moslem and you shouldn't go to those meetings, but to the mosque." So, I returned to follow my religion. However I didn't like it, even because my Christian friends often asked me why I had changed the "way", and that I wasn't following the right "road". I always had a battle, but the amazing thing was that as I was once going to the mosque alone, a big dog that was there ran towards me and bit me on the leg. I believe that God allowed this thing to happen, for me to understand that I should go back to HIM, and that I wasn't doing something good. I was really right!!! After a while, a friend of mine said to me: "Come back to Jesus, because He is waiting for you". So, at that moment I made a serious decision to follow Him, even though I had problems with my parents. For a long time I was not a good Christian and I didn't go to all the meetings, because I was not baptized and I was very ashamed of that. One day there came a couple from Italy, Sandro and Luciana, who started after a short time to build a church in Stropcka. From that moment on I started to come regularly to the meetings, to read constantly His Word and to learn a lot of things about Jesus. In June 2000, I made the decision to publicly witness my faith, and the new life in Jesus, by the baptism in water. Some months ago I started to work with the children, in different villages, together with Luciana, helping her in interpreting. It is beautiful to serve the Lord and I like very much what I'm doing. There is some thing else that I want to let you know: A few months ago, together with another brother, we've decided to pray the whole night in the church. While we were praying I started to speak languages that I didn't understand. It has never happened to me anything like this, even though we were waiting for the baptism in the Holy Spirit. Latter on that night, as we were tired we decided to sleep in the church, where it is not really the proper place. Suddenly there came a thought to my mind that I shared with my brother "God doesn't desire our sacrifices", so we went home. From that moment on I'm experiencing wonderful things. Speaking to Sandro, he encouraged me to pray and to share these revelations with him, even though he has had that indication for me since a long time. In my family, my little sister comes to the children's meeting in the church and my brother, who was a Moslem and was always contadicting me, after I prayed a lot for him, has decided to come also to the church. I thank so much the Lord for this answer from Him, but I desire that He may use me more with His gifts for His wonderful plan to build His church, preaching the gospel to the others.   Sokol Shkullaku

for "Chiesa Apostolica in Italia" - "Fondo Missionario" - Via del Commendone, 35/ab - 58100 Grosseto

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The Apostolic Church in Albania is member of the Albanian Evangelical Alliance, and Foundation