Connecting with a receptive population

With joy we share this report from Kentuckiana (A), which has now had over 20 new believers in last 2 months. The Bahá’ís are connecting ever more intimately with a receptive population, new believers are rising up to teach everyone they know, and each home visit brings a fresh and wonderful surprise. Teaching is truly bringing the world together! Some photos of the new believers are now posted on the slideshow.

Dearest Friends,

Recently I was in Kentuckiana, and had the great pleasure of meeting __, who originally comes from Burma and recently became a Bahá’í as a result of a neighborhood teaching effort. He has subsequently taught the Faith to 12 others in a month. I asked B, who has been taking the lead for the teaching and consolidation activities with this group of wonderful friends to share their story with us. . . .

With warmest love and excitement,

C

The first time that I met __, I was on a teaching team with J. __ opened his door with a smile on his face and was courteous and hospitable and invited us into his apartment. There was already a small crowd of people in his apartment; some of them gave their seats to us.

I started sharing a presentation about the Faith. Two of the people present were missionaries who were not happy that we were there and kept trying to start an argument. I emphasized that the Bahá’í Faith is all about love and unity. __ asked us to continue, so I continued to the end of the presentation.

At the end, __ asked if he could “buy the book”. So we gave him some prayers and a pamphlet and promised to bring other books later.

The next day, I visited him again, this time with my husband. __ and another friend were there and welcomed us in and brought water for us.

We had brought a book for them. After some socializing, I asked them if they wanted to go over the presentation again since there were many interruptions yesterday when I shared it the first time. They agreed. So I shared Anna’s conversation from beginning to the end, at which point they both declared their faith in Bahá’u’lláh.

I have been visiting this place ever since to share deepening themes with __. Each time I take some different Bahá’í friends. And most of the times I go there I see some new faces. In fact, __ invites his friends over to meet us and hear a presentation about the Faith. So I change the deepening to sharing Anna’s conversation, and each time, __ helps me and translates it for his friends. He now has his own set of materials to share Anna’s conversation and has done this about 5 or 6 times with me.

We also invited __ and some other Bahá’ís to our home. He came will all his Bahá’í friends plus some other people too. Our plan was to have a unity feast with some prayers, some Hidden Words in Burmese and some music from Burma. I asked __ if his friends have come to meet us and to hear about the Bahá’í Faith. He said yes. I asked if he wants us to share Anna’s conversation with them. He said yes.

What can I say? Bahá’u’lláh has showered us with His blessings and has sent us more bounties. Bahá’u’lláh has knocked at my door again. Should I open the door or should I miss the opportunity? So I did it again. I shared the presentation. 2 adults declared their belief. There were 2 children there (their father is a Bahá’í) and I gave __ 2 child registration cards and explained they would need to get their parents’ permission to register.

There are 13 new Bahá’ís as a result of working with __. 10 are adults and 3 are children. __ is eager to meet everybody and wants to learn how to organize a Feast and other activities in his neighborhood.

Here also is a story of a home visit involving many of these new believers. One of the deepening themes from Ruhi Book 2 was shared.

Yesterday, 5 of us went to S’s place. There were 5 other new believers there.

S is moving to another state where his family is. I had a gift for him, a framed picture of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá. We started our meeting with some prayers. __ is always eager to say not just one buy many prayers all in a row.

We shared the deepening theme on the topic of the Bahá’í Fund. __ was translating paragraph by paragraph. We then closed the discussion with some prayers.

We had some good refreshments and good socializing. G took some pictures of all of us all together, and I will send one to S so that his parents can see some of the Bahá’ís. We also got his new address so we can inform the Local Spiritual Assembly there to contact him.

We said goodbye and left, but all of them followed us, as is their custom of showing courtesy, all the way to where our cars were parked.