HEAVEN IS RICHER

You would never believe how many people my friend Agnel packed into and around this very modest church building in Calangute, Goa on Sunday mornings.

A few years ago, straight out of a small training school, he took on the task of building the congregation there from a handful of local believers and grew the church to an average attendance of around 120 people. In the course of doing that, he started to plant in Vasco - around 90 minutes away - and established an even bigger church there.

Every Sunday afternoon, when the service in Calangute was over, Agnel would get onto his motor bike with his wife and daughter and they would ride along the winding roads towards their second congregation which met in the evening.

Agnel took a shorter journey on Monday of this week. He stepped from time into eternity - in a moment - leaving this world and the great work he has done at the age of 42.

It has been a privilege to spend time with him and his folks in Goa on four different occasions over the past few years. Gill and I were there in February when he seemed his normal self, oblivious to the cancer that was already spreading throughout his body. On Monday he went home.

But cancer did not kill him. God took him and for the life of me I can't fathom out the why's and wherefore's. But I trust where I can't understand.

Please pray for Amelia and their five year old daughter Ashna.