MISSIONARY PROFILE
Clint
& Rhonda
Rardin
Missionary Update 03/02/2018
Dear Praying Friends, Thank you for praying for my trip to visit the church in Mexico City and for the missions trip of twelve people from my sending church, Fairhaven Baptist in Chesterton, IN. Our people from Fairhaven were such a blessing and encouragement to Liberty Baptist Church. Two of them, Rebecca Schreiber and Paul Hawn, taught on children' s ministry, and Clint Schreiber taught 21 hours of Greek to our Bible Institute students as well as preached and taught in our church. Two young men taught the teens and Jr. Church and Bruce Leake, a former missionary to Wales, taught adult Sunday School. The missions team was a great help in our Bible clubs both in helping get thousands of invitations out and helping in the preparation and execution of the programs. We had never done Bible clubs before, so I had some apprehensions about how they would turn out. We held three open-air Bible clubs on Saturday in the three areas where we have bus routes. We had consecutively at least 110, 120, and 50. Many who attended heard the gospel for the first time. Several children were saved, and several new adults attended. On Monday, we held two Bible clubs. One in an apartment complex and one in a home. The first had 38 attend; and the second, 25. In the first, two women, sisters-in-law to the host of the Bible club, trusted Christ; and in the second, two women said they wanted to attend the church with her children. In total, at least 343 attended the Bible clubs, including 107 adults. The weekend before the group came, it was a pleasure to see 20 of our church out knocking doors for Saturday visitation, apart from them that visit the routes. We had two baptized that Sunday: Santos and his wife, Magdelena. Santos was saved last November when I preached the church's anniversary and has been faithful ever since. The following Tuesday, thirteen other people came out to pass out tracts to the nearby Jewish population. On the next Sunday two other women were baptized: Ada and Lizet, a woman saved in our absence. In the evening, Raul and his wife, Mariela, joined the church. Raul, an officer in the Mexican army, decided to be faithful to all the services last fall. His wife had been a great help to us in VBS last summer. Raul and his wife now go out on Tuesday night visitation. We are happy to have this new serving couple in the church. Thank you for your prayers that made this last trip such a great success, Clint Rardin PS. Below are photos of the Bible clubs. https://www.dropbox.com/sh/1sfq085vdvjl6r8/AACLjf116NIdVmUgtTx3I2F0a?dl=0
Missionary Update 02/12/2018
Dear Praying Friends, It had been a long time since I had the privilege to preach in a nursing home, but Bro. Josh McGee gave me the opportunity a few days ago to preach in the Addison Point nursing home in Chesterton, IN and I am so glad he did. Before the service, I visited a lady there named Barbara Martin who was there temporarily for therapy. We had a very pleasant conversation and invited her to the service, and then wheeled her there. At the end of the salvation message, Barbara raised her hand for salvation as well as another woman. Returning Barbara to her room, I was able to talk to her and lead her to the Lord. With tears in her eyes and under conviction about her lost condition, she in her own words called upon the Lord. Afterwards, she spoke in the terms of before and now and clearly made it plain that something significant happened to her in her heart. I left a woman rejoicing in her salvation and I myself rejoicing in my heart as well. The other lady, Roxanne, was dealt with by Bro. Josh. He was surprised how open this Catholic woman was to the gospel and was under conviction about her eternal destiny. Her husband, Bill, who is staying with her and was in the service, also wanted to know how to be saved and asked a lot of questions and realized that it was by faith alone that they could be saved; then, in their own words, they also asked Christ to save them and asked Josh for more Christian literature. Bill and Roxanne returned to their home last Thursday with Bibles, literature, and salvation. Praise the Lord! I am now in Mexico City for two weeks. I was so please with the crowd that went soulwinning on Saturday. Last year, we began with few soulwinners to knock doors, although we had people visiting on bus routes. Then, after weeks of teaching on personal Christian growth, our group grew to six men, then when I visited Mexico in November it had grown to a dozen, and now it has grown to 20. I asked if there were any new soulwinners that came out on account of my return and they answered that they were those who usually go and that; in fact, some were missing. I thank God for the order and firmness of the people in our absence. As far as the attendance of the church, it has not dipped in our absence, and we had 214 this Sunday with over 150 adults filling the auditorium again. We had two baptisms as Santos, who was saved last November when I preached the church's anniversary, and his wife were baptized. They have been faithful attending since last fall and even are bringing out Magdalena's mother and their nephews and nieces. A woman named Lizet, who was saved at the beginning of this year, asked to be baptized as well as a woman named Ana, so we will do that next week as well as receive some as members who asked to join the church. Many people in the church made decisions to get involved in the work of the ministry, our theme for this year. Saturday night, we held a banquet for the married couples of our church and the Cromwell's did a great job organizing it with great food (some even prepared by Bro. Cromwell.) All I had to do was preach. The Cromwell's have done an outstanding job these last three months and are returning on Tuesday. On Sunday night, 101 people came to church to give them a sendoff. Please pray as we have a dozen people coming from our home church to help teach a workshop on children's ministry and help the church begin a new ministry of Bible clubs. We even have a college professor with a great command of the Spanish language, Clint Schreiber, teaching a block of 21 hours of Greek to our Bible Institute students. Please pray for wisdom, safety, and God's power as we pray and work to see many people reached through the Bible clubs and our church people equipped for the ministry. Thank you for your prayers. For His Cause, Clint Rardin
Missionary Update 11/28/2017
Dear Praying Friends, This message finds me in Mexico City where I'll be until Tuesday. I flew down to preach the church's anniversary and welcome the Byron and Judy Cromwell as they will be here for three months filling the pulpit and helping with our Christian school. Our anniversary Sunday went well with 273. We had 175 adults, 10 of whom were visitors. Three of the new adults trusted Christ. We had 98 children. Please pray for our last campaign Sunday this weekend. The Cromwells are getting accustomed to Mexico. It has been a joy to fellowship with them. This is their third time helping a church on the foreign field in the absence of the missionary pastor. A week before I arrived in Mexico, someone had stolen the side mirror of our 15-passenger van. I went to a place that sells auto body parts and the young man I was dealing with called the boss who was away to come and give the price, availability, etc. While we waited, we started talking about eternal things and he said he would be going to heaven because he was pretty good. Then he let me know he was planning to marry the girl he was living with. I said, "But Juan, you just said you were pretty good, but you're living in fornication and quoted I Corinthians 6. Seeing conviction there, I continued to witness, and at the end, he bowed his head with me and prayed repenting of his sin and trusting in Christ. He later asked where our church was so he could attend. As we were praying, Sergio, his boss came up to us. We took care of the mirror and, while Juan installed it, Sergio asked what we were doing when he walked up. He listened to the Gospel and then he asked if he could pray and trust Christ, which of course I said, "Sure!" and he did. If my mirror had not been robbed, I never would have met Juan and Sergio. Of course, the 90 dollars to replace the mirror was worth it, for "what shall a man give in exchange for his soul?" Thank you for your prayers, Clint Rardin
Missionary Update 11/13/2017
Dear Praying Friends, I will be leaving for Mexico City on Nov. 8 and returning to the States on Nov. 21 so that I can be there for the 13th anniversary of the church on the 12th of November. Sunday was the first of our four-week fall evangelistic campaign. They had 266, 167 adults and 99 children. They had 167 on the buses! But the drive-in was down by about twenty. Oscar's bus had a goal of 40, but had 75 on the bus. It helps having his new wife, Nancy, who is a seasoned bus captain from the old church. Two blessings are that Raul, a lieutenant in our church who has been coming for about a year, and his wife have decided to come to all the services; and Pablo, another soldier who has really been growing this year and whose wife was saved this year, has been coming out this last month on the Tuesday outreach to the Jews. Another blessing is to hear about 6 women and teenagers joining the other four men that go out on door-to-door soulwinning on Saturdays, apart from those that visit on the routes. While I'm writing, I'd like to share the story of two people saved in the church services during our absence: Amerika is a twelve-year old girl whose parents, Anselmo and Katarina, were led to the Lord by one our bus captains, Gaspar, last fall and have been attending ever since. Anselmo has bad kidneys and is on dialysis six hours a day and cannot work. They struggle financially as Katarina does her best to provide for the family with a small store and selling tacos in the evening. Amerika is a big help to her in both tasks and has had to grow up quickly. This summer, Amerika brought the most visitors in VBS, but this fall Amerika was saved under Oscar’s preaching. Sofia and Lucia are two retired military nurses, a lieutenant colonel and captain respectively, who were reached and baptized in this last year. Both are leaders in Amway here in Mexico and had been bringing their associate, Bernabe, to church since our last day in the church in August. Finally, this September, Bernabe was also saved. Please pray for the rest of the fall campaign that Liberty Baptist continues to have good success. Thank you for your prayers, Clint Rardin
Missionary Update 08/21/2017
Dear Praying Friends, We are now in Corpus Christi, TX preparing for our first missions conference on our furlough, we crossed the border on Tuesday, and had our first meeting with a church on Wednesday. We believe we left a church in Mexico City stronger than ever before. We have had people really grow this year and many are left responsibilities in our absence, Our VBS was a great success. Our high day was 126 and 10 adult visitors, and we had 27 children saved. There was a sister of a woman in our church, whom she had led to the Lord, but lives quite a way away where we do not have a route and I have been praying for months about how we could bring her to church. Her sister, Guillermina, told me her Juana, her newly saved sister, had about 20 kids who wanted to go to VBS; so, every day I went early to go pick them up. An average of 20 kids and two or three adults came from there every day. I also was picking up Ana, my orthodontist, and her two boys as she was helping in our VBS. Ana said she knew someone who had a vehicle he uses for public transportation and said she was willing to visit them and pick them every Sunday and, on the first Sunday, 17 children and two adults came, and a new route was started right before we left! Our closing day of VBS was on Sunday, the 6th. We had 251 in church as many of the children came back with their parents to see them do a program and receive their diplomas. A couple of parents were saved in church. Our goal of reaching a couple of whole families were met again as the sister I mentioned continues to come with her grandkids and a couple families of Gaspar's route continue to attend, parents and all. My last week was spent in Salina Cruz, Oaxaca, in a church just a couple of a hundred yards from the Pacific Ocean. I preached a three-day evangelistic campaign were a lady they had reached through their VBS was saved as well as two adult grandchildren of the pastor. Thank you for your prayers, Clint Rardin