Kokubun Prayer Letter for January 2012

Dear Friends, Life in the plains of Oklahoma has truly been a blessing. From presenting our burden in new churches to being overwhelmed by kindness to being encouraged by like-passions, January has been an uplifting, delightful venture. Sunday evening, the crowd has been dismissed to go home. My wife and I were in the lobby waiting for the pastor go to get done with his Sunday School meeting before going out to eat. Walking around the lobby we stumbled on the most amazing hallway. The corridor that led to the church offices was lined with missionary prayer letters and prayer cards. As we walked the hall we read name after name and country after country of missionaries all around the world. We begin to count. Strangely enough only two of the names we counted did we recognize. Over 100 missionaries were posted on their walls. We were reminded and encouraged by not only the number of other men of God preaching across the world, but also the like passions of a preacher for the Great Commission. Wednesday evening we found ourselves meeting-less. We attended my wife's home church that night. As we took our places in the pew, another young man walked in and sat across from us. My wife grabbed my arm and said, "I know him. His name is Larry. He used to come in where I worked all the time when he was little." When the pastor dismissed for prayer time I made my way over to him. My wife following suit saw two teenage girls in the row in front of him and introduced herself. We prayed for a short time. After the final "Amen" was said, I got to talk to Larry. He told me about his Dad who had cancer and was in the hospital. He shared how he wanted to turn his life around. I had the great opportunity to lead Larry to the Lord that night. I introduced him to pastor, and we got him started on some discipleship materials. I told Larry that I would pick him up that Saturday to check up on his discipleship assignments over lunch. Come to find out, my wife got to lead one of the teenage girls to the Lord at the same time I was witnessing to Larry! Amazing how God works. I got a call the next evening from the Pastor's wife. It was about Larry. I could tell something was wrong. She told the Larry's dad had passed away that morning. I quickly changed and rushed over to the house. Cars lined the street as I pulled up to Larry's home. I couldn't help but think about not 24 hours earlier Larry changed his destiny as his father entered his. Saturday I was able to connect Larry with the the youth Sunday school teacher. Please pray for him in his new journey as a Christian. We have really enjoyed getting to make new friends across the country. Pray for us. February is jammed packed with meetings and conferences. We look forward to seeing you again. Thank your for your prayers and support. It is not taken for granted. For better information for your people we have started a blog site so they can easily keep up with what is going on in their missionary's lives. The site is kokubunkonnection.blogspot.com. Hope you enjoy encouraging testimonies, stories, and prayer request. Serving Him, Daniel and Heather Kokubun