When our international ministry partners sow God’s Word into the hearts and lives of the unreached, they trust the results to the Holy Spirit. That is a response of faith for Margarita, a ministry leader in Bulgaria. She leads a weekly Bible study group in a nearby village and welcomes all to attend.
“One day, a woman named Penka* came to our group, and I immediately sensed something different about her,” Margarita says. “I had never seen her before. As she shared her story, she told us that she was a third-generation fortune- teller.”
In Bulgaria, some of the most prominent spiritual figures are the fortune-tellers. They are commonly women who tell fortunes and heal with herbs and magic. This is seen as a profession, and people from all social classes seek and pay for their services.
As the group listened to Penka and shared God’s Word with her, she was deeply convicted to make changes in her life. “I realized that the path I had been following for years was not pleasing to God,” Penka says. “That night I confessed my sins to God and received Jesus Christ as my Savior.”
Margarita and the rest of the group fervently prayed for Penka, asking God to cast out unclean spirits and to fill her with His peace and presence. “After that prayer, I felt as though a heavy burden had been lifted from my shoulders,” Penka says. “Now, I have a freedom I’ve never known before!”
“We are continuing to walk with Penka in her newly found faith,” Margarita says. “We pray that the seeds planted in Penka’s life will take deep root and bear lasting fruit.”
In Mark 4, Jesus said, “Some people are like seed along the path, where the word is sown. As soon as they hear it, Satan comes and takes away the word that was sown in them. … Still others, like seed sown among thorns, hear the word; but the worries of this life, the deceitfulness of wealth and the desires for other things come in and choke the word, making it unfruitful. Others, like seed sown on good soil, hear the word, accept it, and produce a crop—some thirty, some sixty, some a hundred times what was sown.”
*Name has been changed due to privacy concerns.
