First Baptist Church of Eagle Butte
P.O. Box 170, Eagle Butte, SD
57625
(605) 964-3617 (Office) / (605)
891-1704 (Pastor’s Cell)
August
20, 2014
Dear
Friends,
I
begin this letter with my deepest apologies, since I have not sent out a
newsletter in about three months. The
truth is that so many things have been happening so quickly around here that I
have scarcely had time to write about them all!
The summer began, of course, with the end of the school year. Windswept Academy celebrated the little ones’ graduation from Kindergarten, and the older childrens’ completion of another grade level. The ceremony was crowned with Windswept’s school play, an original piece written by our own Rachel Cowan. Not to go into too much detail, but I played two roles-the Philistine giant Goliath, and an emissary of a top-secret government agency! The children played their parts well, and their families were all exceedingly proud.
As
the summer progressed, our church sent a number of our Sunday School kids to
Victory Center Bible Camp-a Christian Camp near the outskirts of Pierre,
SD. Here, they played games, sang songs,
ate good food, and enjoyed all the joys that Summer camp usually affords. But unlike most Summer camps, Victory Center
exposes the children to a healthy amount of Biblical teachings and Christian
testimony on a daily basis! On most
years, our church sends about three of our Sunday School children to the
camp. But this year, God opened the door
for us to send more-fourteen, to be exact!
We rejoice in His miraculous provision to extend the reach of this
ministry, and look forward to continue sending children to camp for years to
come.
Baptisms! Woo Hoo!
If there’s one thing Baptist ministers love, it’s a good baptism-and I am no exception. This summer, I had the great pleasure of baptizing three young people from First Baptist Church-Precious, Kaydance and Allisa. Above, you can see Allisa coming up out of the water. Each of them prayed to receive Christ months ago, and I have since put each of them through a discipleship class, so they could know what they were getting into. After each of them had a better idea of what the Christian faith entailed, I asked them if they still wanted to follow Jesus. After each of them had given me a resounding “yes”, I scheduled their baptism. What a joyful day that was!
A Great
Stride Forward for First Baptist Church
Recently, the Heartland Baptist
Association decided to bless our church with a special honor-the deed to the
property on which our church and parsonage stand! President Brad Maupin himself was on hand to
present the deed to us, which I joyfully accepted. This marks a great gesture of the association’s
confidence in the future stability of our church for years to come. God is good!
A Visit From Some New Friends
In the summertime, First Baptist
Church plays host to mission teams that arrive from all over the country to
minister to the Lakota people. These
teams provide the additional assistance that we need to accomplish our biggest
goals. This summer, our teams were used
of God to accomplish great things. I am
happy to honor them here.
The
first group to arrive was from United Bethel Mennonite Church in Cincinnati,
Ohio. This group, consisting primarily of
young people, brought Vacation Bible School to Eagle Butte, as well as to the
outlying settlements of Iron Lightning and Bear Creek. In the evenings, they would sing songs of
beautiful harmony in praise to God. Every part of their work was deeply felt and
appreciated.
When
they were not engaged in doing Vacation Bible School, they were doing service
projects in the church and general community.
One woman in our community had a garage that was covered with graffiti. But the young people of United Bethel painted
it over to look like new. On of the
light fixtures in our kitchen stopped working, so they kindly replaced the
light fixture. We were overjoyed by the
work that these brothers and sisters in Christ did among us, and we hope to
work alongside them again in the future.
A Visit From Some Old Friends
The
people of Hamilton Baptist church have been leading a confederation of churches
to Eagle Butte every Summer for the past 14 years, and each time the effect has
been nothing short of magnificent. This
Summer was no exception, as they put on a Vacation Bible School in Eagle Butte
for all the young people of the community.
All week long, everyone from age 4 to 94 had something at the church
that they could go to. There was a
regular VBS for the children, a special VBS for teenagers, and an evening Bible
study for the adults. I’m happy to say
that three children professed faith in Jesus Christ during this VBS!
As
if this were not enough, the group also put on two basketball camps-one in Eagle
Butte, and one in the outlying settlement of Cherry Creek. The young men of both communities absolutely
loved playing at the camp. But they also
heard the personal testimonies of those who were running the camp, and were
exposed to the Gospel.
While
all of this was going on, some of the more construction-minded men of the
church set their minds to fixing things around the church. I thought it over and asked them, “Could you
take a look at the foundation of my house?
I think there might be something wrong with it.” In the picture above, you can
see what my basement wall looked like.
When these practical-minded men saw
my basement wall, they were immediately alarmed, and offered to build a
retaining wall to strengthen it. I was
floored by their generosity, but happily consented. You can see their finished work in the above
picture, right below the first.
But while they were trying to build
the retaining wall, two other horrendous problems reared their heads. First, they uncovered a nest of forty
snakes! FORTY! Using snake repellent, they expertly managed
to drive out the plague of snakes. I
killed the last one with a cinderblock.
Above, you can see me holding it as a trophy.
As soon as this problem had been
dealt with, one of my water pipes burst, flooding my entire basement. Fortunately, there was at least one
experienced plumber on hand to replace the leaky pipe. I later learned that the pipe had burst in
February, and that only pressure had been holding it together this whole time!
Now, see the grace of God: My basement had three huge problems lurking
within it, but God saw to it that none of them gave me any trouble until just
the right people were on hand to fix it!
Such is the kindness of almighty God.
God’s
Servants from Tennessee
Sevier Heights Baptist Church, from
Tennessee, has been coming to Eagle Butte for several years now. Their chief focus has always been on the
outlying settlements of the reservation.
These small communities are very far removed from the main roads, and
they often go unnoticed by those intending to do missions work. It is for precisely this reason that Sevier
Heights makes it their business to seek out these settlements and form
relationships with their people. Some of
the youth of this group, who have been coming for a few years now, have formed
long-lasting friendships with the children of these settlements.
This year, Sevier Heights went to
the communities of Red Scaffold, Thunder Butte and Iron Lightning. They carried VBS to each of these
communities. They played games, sang
songs, did crafts, and presented the Gospel.
I am happy to report that two children prayed to receive Christ while
attending this VBS! Please pray for
these children, as they live many miles away from any church that offers
regular services.
Our Church Was Broken Into
For the third time in two years, our church has been broken into. According to the deductions of the police
department, it happened this way:
One Sunday evening, two young men
climbed over the back fence and began leaning up against the church wall, where
they drank a soda and threw it on the ground.
Then, they decided to try to get inside, so they tried all the back
windows. Having no success, they went
around to the front and shattered one of the windows leading into our women’s
restroom. That window proved to be less
convenient than they hoped, so they shattered the other one. Then they climbed through, one of them badly
cutting his hand in the process. Then
they went through the fellowship hall, opening all of the cabinets and bleeding
all over the place. Next, they found our
First Aid kit in the kitchen and bandaged the hand wound. Finally, they stole some juice and peanut
butter, and left. Seriously-they went
through all of that for juice and peanut butter!
Police took DNA samples of the
blood and are on the lookout for suspects.
Our church leadership decided that, in an effort to prevent this sort of
thing from happening in the future, we should put bars on our windows. Though it grieves me that this should be
necessary, we will work to make the church secure. It was built through the sweat and sacrifice
of God’s people, and we refuse to let people pick it apart.
The Church Comes Together in Support of
Its’ Missionary
On a related note, if any of you
are interested in finding out more about Miss Benson and her ministry, you can
visit her website at oboejo.wix.com/foundfaithful.
A Visit from our New Friends in Iowa
We enjoyed the great treat this
year of receiving visitors from a church we had never known before- Earlham
Church of Christ, based out of Iowa. The
group they sent out was primarily construction-oriented, but they also
sponsored two community meals, each of which was attended by over a hundred
people. But when they set to work
building things, they truly began to shine.
At our church, they did two
projects that were long overdue: the construction of a changing table in the
nursery, and the mounting of our two basketball goals in concrete. Our nursery is now much more serviceable, and
our basketball goals are no longer threatened by wind or vandals. Since the Earlham Church of Christ was not
satisfied with only doing this, they also built us some picnic tables.
But despite all these
accomplishments, they did even more at Windswept Academy. They completely repoured the concrete
flooring of the school’s library, which had been badly cracked and broken. They repainted all the downstairs rooms of
the old building, thereby preparing it to become teacher housing. They installed a shower in that same
downstairs area. And they christened the
house to be a residence by building a large dining room table for it. They
acted as though the projects were easy, and that they weren’t a big deal, but
everything is a big deal to someone who-like me-doesn’t know how to do it!
It is worth mentioning (and
rejoicing over) that two young girls from our Off-the-Wall ministry prayed to
receive Christ on the same Friday when the Earlham Church of Christ was
here. This brings the total to seven
professions of faith in Eagle Butte and the various outlying settlements this
summer! What a blessing to be here to
witness it all!
Creative
Arts Camp!
It isn’t often that a Pastor like
me gets a visit from his own home church, but that is exactly the privilege
that I received this summer. The men and
women of Burkemont Baptist Church in Morganton, North Carolina arrived late one
Tuesday evening and immediately began to bless our fellowship. During the course of their visit here, they
put together something that our church has never had before: a creative arts
camp. This was a camp at the church that
celebrated all kinds of arts and crafts, with a Gospel focus. The children of this community, who greatly
love the arts, welcomed it with open arms.
For three days, our church was full of young people enjoying woodcrafts,
puppetry, cooking, weird science, and many other things, too numerous to
mention. In the pictures above, you can see the children learning how to make ice cream in a Ziploc
bag and painting wooden peace symbols with colors that tell the story of
salvation history.
Some men from Burkemont, having
skill in construction, joined their efforts with the Burkemont youth to do a
number of projects that were sorely needed at the church and the parsonage. For example, the roof of my shed was badly
damaged, and had begun to leak, making it unusable. The team stripped my shed of its old shingles
and replaced them with a metal roof.
Then they used the best shingles from the shed to patch the roof of my
house, which also needed repair. They
added a stall in the men’s room, so that two men can now use it at the same
time. They built wooden steps into our
fellowship hall, so the elderly will be able to more easily enter during the
wintertime. They replaced our old dishwasher,
which no longer functioned. They
installed new kitchen cabinets and reorganized the kitchen and fellowship hall,
giving us more space than ever before.
They added additional bookracks to the backs of our pews, allowing us to
store our Bibles and hymnals without damaging them. They replaced all of the broken windows in
the church, effectively undoing the work of the burglars who came in a month
ago. And they even volunteered to make
the bars on our windows, which we need to keep burglars out in the future. What an exciting and successful missions trip
it was! Many thanks to the people of my
home church, for giving so generously of yourselves this summer!
A Confederation of Churches From
Mississippi
As the summer drew to its’ close, a
group four different churches arrived from Mississippi-Crane Creek Baptist
Church of Perkinston, Juniper Grove Baptist Church of Poplarville, Lumberton
First Baptist Church of Lumberton, and Mt. Zion Baptist Church of
Hattisburg. New life Baptist Church of Kingley, Iowa was also represented. All of them working
together brought a creative arts camp to the reservation, as Burkemont had
done…but they brought it to the outlying settlement of Red Scaffold, an hour
and a half away. Working primarily out
of an open field, these men and women shared the Gospel with the children of
that community through art and song. And
while they worked in Red Scaffold, some of their fellows were busy inside of
Windswept Academy! Through their efforts, the entire interior of the building’s
new addition was sheetrocked, complete the first layer of mudding and
taping. As God’s providence would have
it, the building was not ready for sheetrock until the very week when these
people, who knew how to hang sheetrock, arrived! The mention of this good news leads me to a
piece of news so good that it still causes me to tremble at the thought…
Windswept
Academy is Turning a New Page in Its’ History
After
years of planning and building, Windswept Academy’s new building is nearly
completed. Everything about how the
school operates is now about to change.
The children will have an indoor place to have recess in the
winter. The library will not need to be
used as a makeshift cafeteria, but only as a library. The school now has enough space in it for
eighty students, and seventy-five have already enrolled! This represents literally FIVE TIMES the
population of the school three years ago!
And I will have the honor of preaching the Gospel and teaching the Bible
to every single one of them!
But
perhaps the thing that I am most excited about is the fact that the old school
building can now be used as a house by the headmaster and his wife, Clint and
Amy Holley. They will no longer need to
drive an hour and a half, round trip, to get to school every day. And though I have known them for years as
friends, I will soon know them as neighbors, too.
None
of this would have been possible without the help of hundreds of friends from
all over the country. Many of our
Christian Brothers and Sisters gave sacrificially to make this dream a reality. But this summer, some of them sent
construction teams to do the work that we could not hire done. For that we fall on our knees in praise to
God for the kindness he has shown to us through His servants.
We
also thank the brethren of Lancaster Baptist Church of Lancaster,
Missouri, Barnes Academy of Georgia, Hamilton Baptist Church of Virginia, Covenant
Baptist Church of Tennessee, Earlham Church of Christ of Iowa, Gospel Baptist
Church of North Carolina, Underwood Baptist Church of Alabama, Friends’ Baptist
Church of North Carolina, Capital Heights Baptist Church of Pierre, South
Dakota, Crane Creek Baptist Church of
Perkinston, Mississippi, Calvary Baptist Church of Wisconsin, Juniper Grove Baptist Church of Poplarville,
Mississippi, Mike and Anna Levi Chavez of Tennessee, Lumberton First Baptist
Church of Lumberton, Mississippi, Elgin Baptist Church, Mt. Zion Baptist Church
of Hattisburg, Mississippi, and Merryville Christian School of Tennessee. Thank you for giving of your time, your money
and your energy to work alongside us this summer. Though you are no longer here, the mark you
have made on our church, on our school and on our reservation will be impossible to forget.
So
perhaps you are wondering how you can become a partner with us in our ministry
here in Eagle Butte? If so, then we are happy to tell you, since we
welcome assistance from the body of Christ. Here is what we need the most:
Prayer.
It may be
true that our church is getting along very well at the moment, and that God is
doing great things here. But it is precisely when a church is being used
by God that Satan does all in his power to destroy it. So please pray, my
brothers and sisters. Pray that our leadership will keep their hearts
pure and humble, and that we will live at peace with each other. Pray
that we will be protected from the power of the enemy, and that God’s Holy
Spirit will shine through in our lives. Pray that the Lakotas in the
community will come to know the Lord, and that the commitment they make will
not be a superficial group of words, but a real change in their Spirits that
will alter the course of their lives for eternity.
E-mail
addresses.
For those of you who have e-mail addresses, please send them to me. That
way, these monthly newsletters can be forwarded to everyone in your church who
wants one! Just send your name and e-mail address to me at benfarrar777@hotmail.com, and I’ll make sure you
receive this newsletter as often as it comes out.
Financial
Assistance.
Our church is fortunate to have members who are generous in their giving. But
some of our most generous members are, nevertheless, very poor. We have
long been blessed with assistance from outside churches and individuals, and we
try to use those gifts wisely and well.
If
any one of you wishes to bless the church with a financial gift, you may send
it to:
First Baptist Church of Eagle Butte
P.O. Box 170
Eagle Butte, SD 57625
May
God bless you all, and draw you closer to Himself each and every day.
Yours
in Christ,
Rev.
Ben Farrar
Pastor
