August 30th, 2013 Report

Reporting on the Revival Ministry of Evangelist Rick Flanders

We do want to thank the many friends who pray for us for coming to the throne of grace in our behalf this summer.  It has been wonderful.  God is good, we know (see Exodus 34:6, Psalm 34:8, and Psalm 100:5), but we have really seen His goodness in recent weeks.

• TONI’S SURGERY, July 17.  As most of you know, my wife Toni did have her knee replacement surgery in Saginaw on the seventeenth of July, and it was successful.  What follows are many weeks of recovery and therapy, and I positioned myself around home for much of the summer to help her.  We want you to know that she is doing well, and we are praying that she will be back on the road with me by October.  Thank the Lord for His goodness!
• FIRST BAPTIST CHURCH OF FENTON, MICHIGAN, July 28.  On the last Sunday of July, I left Toni home for the first time to preach for Pastor Joshua Gates down in Fenton.  Josh is a graduate of Juniata Christian School, and a young man I have known and appreciated since he was a kid.  God gave us a good day, focusing, as Pastor Gates requested, on marriage and the Christian family.  Fenton is about an hour’s drive from my home in the Vassar area, and so I drove home in the afternoon and then back for the evening meeting.  I sought to emphasize the key roles of the Holy Spirit and faith in the Christian home, and the Lord seemed to convince many of the truth.  I was happy to see what God is doing with this fine pastor at First Baptist Church, and to have some part in the work.
• GREATER CUMBERLAND BAPTIST CHURCH OF HOPKINSVILLE, KENTUCKY, August 4-7.  Of course, I have spread the word far and near in regard to the National Conference on Prayer and Revival that was planned by Pastor Ken Shaver and his coworkers in western Kentucky.  God was good to give us a powerful and effective conference.  Attendance was good, although participation from outside the church was relatively small.  The attention of the congregation to the meetings (morning, afternoon, and evening) was phenomenal, and I believe the impact on the church was great.  Dr. John Van Gelderen and I were the conference speakers, and many said that the Lord helped us in making revival truths clear.  I always learn a lot from Brother Van Gelderen’s preaching and teaching, and was really helped personally at this conference.  So many lives were turned around in these four days, including four who were saved!  You may want to call the church at (270) 890-6040 to see about getting the service recordings.  Pray for Brother Shaver and the church as they travel down the revival road.
• TRINITY BAPTIST CHURCH OF FLUSHING, MICHIGAN, August 11.  Back in Michigan, Pastor Seth Ferguson asked me to spend the day at his well-known fundamental church on the eleventh of August.  He has been shepherd of this flock only a few months, and God had me come at an important time in their lives.  I preached all day on the church, from Matthew 16 (where it is first mentioned) and Matthew 18 (from its second mention in the Bible).  The Lord closed a remarkable day with a prayer meeting based on the promises of Matthew 18:18-20, and the next week brought an amazing answer to our prayers.  I will be back at Trinity for a revival campaign next year (April 27-May 2).
• GRACE BAPTIST CHURCH OF EATON RAPIDS, MICHIGAN, August 18-22.  We love the pastor and the people of this good church south of Lansing, and have worked with them in revival campaigns every year of our itinerant ministry.  And the Lord did a deepening work of revival among us in these well-attended meetings.  Pastor Michalcewicz says it appeared to him to be “one of our best weeks of meetings yet.”  There are three set to be baptized and one more getting ready to join the church.  We had lost people in the services, and pray for their salvation in the days ahead.  Join us in praying for Grace Baptist Church.  This week I travelled back and forth from home to help Toni, and she was able to come with me the last night.
• PLEASANTVILLE BAPTIST CHURCH OF PLEASANTVILLE, IOWA, August 25-30.  This week I drove to Iowa for just the second time in my life, and labored for revival with Pastor in his really good church.  Toni stayed home for our first week apart, and her on her own.  In Sunday school I spoke from Psalm 85 to explain revival.  Then in the other Lord’s Day services I preached on salvation and the Christian life from the wonderful words of Matthew 11:28-30.  On Monday night I preached on “The Wretched Man” from Romans 7, and explained the way to victory over sin.  Tuesday the sermon was on “A Highway for Our God” from Isaiah 40, and the way to revival was laid out.  Anybody would say that God gave us a powerful measure of revival on Tuesday night, and we stayed late to share what God was doing in our hearts.  Thursday’s message was on Moses as “The Man That Saw God.”  The week ended with the funeral of a godly man on Friday night (he went to heaven on Monday).  At a prayer meeting early in the campaign, I heard someone pray that before the week is over, the auditorium would be filled and that many lost people would be present to hear the gospel.  God answered that prayer at the funeral.  Hundreds attended and several responded to the pastor’s sermon on salvation and surrender.

Pray for me as I preach in several important places this next month.  On the first of September I am preaching at the Sycamore Baptist Church of Jackson, Michigan, a church with which Toni and I are very familiar.  Toni was born and reared in Jackson, and I served in my first pastoral position at a church there.  Then September 8-12 I am to preach in a revival campaign at the wonderful Believers’ Baptist Church in Winona Lake, Indiana, the home of Hephzibah House.  Then I will go down to Forest City, North Carolina, for a revival effort at the Tri-City Baptist Church, September 15-20. While in North Carolina, I am to preach in chapel and teach some classes September 16 and 17 at Ambassador Baptist College at Lattimore.  The next week (September 22-27) I will preach at a revival campaign at Calvary Baptist Church in McMinnville, Tennessee. Then I will be back in Michigan for a revival campaign at Manitou Road Baptist Church in Manitou Beach, beginning the 29th.  If you can come to any of these services, I would really love to see you.  But be sure to pray for us, day by day and week by week.  We are looking at 2014 and praying in a special way for our trip to Kenya in January and for the Revival Tour of Israel in the spring.  Pray for us that God will give direction in planning for these events, and that He will supply our needs.  I am attaching information on both of them with this update.  Also let me mention that Ministry 127.com has posted another of my articles under the heading “Christian Living.”

RICK FLANDERS Acts 1:8