COLOMBIA—As a missionary/pastor, I was excited about the new evangelism booklet produced by ABWE, The Story of Hope. We were introduced to the materials while participating in the mission’s Evangelism and Discipleship Seminar. The booklet is very attractive and provides the opportunity to share the Bible’s “Big Picture” by relating 20 Old Testament and 20 New Testament events, and showing how those events relate to each other.

Almost immediately I was thinking that it would be advantageous to preach through the events in our local church. There were two goals that I wanted to be met through the process; I wanted our church folk to understand how the Old Testament stories relate to and find their completion in the New Testament, and I wanted to train them on how to use the Story of Hope for evangelistic home Bible Studies and in “one on one” evangelistic opportunities. I purchased the CD from ABWE that contains the event pictures, and began the series on Sunday mornings.

We have been in the series for about eight months. I use the video projector to display the event slide and add additional material to that which is found in the booklet. The majority of Sundays I only treat one of the events, but there have been a few times when two of the stories were presented. I am pleased to report that many of our folk have expressed appreciation for the organized manner in which the Bible’s “Big Story” has been presented, and many of our folk are using the Story of Hope for evangelism opportunities.

On a recent Sunday event #36 that deals with the rapture was presented. During the invitation one lady admitted that she was not ready if the rapture was to occur soon, and she trusted Christ as Savior that day. One o f our mature believers, the son of an amillennial pastor, came up to me after the service and said “from today forward I believe in a premillennial rapture!”

Rejoice with us that the Lord is using the Story of Hope in Colombia.