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AGWM personnel, John and Beccy Rodli, serve in the Azore Islands of Portugal. One of his ministries is that of directing the Global University (International Correspondence Institute) for Portugal. Over the last several years, a number of evangelism and discipleship courses have been published for Portugal. One of these was the evangelism booklet "The Great Questions of Life." A testimony was received by the Rodli's telling of how God used this resource
to help a man see his need to receive Jesus.
 "This is a short testimony about my father-in-law, Francisco Cruz, who is currently eighty-seven years old. At the beginning of last year (2007) he came to live with us on a full-time basis, due to his advanced age and difficulties in walking. It was hard for him to continue living alone. He had always been a practicing and devout churchgoer in the traditional church of Portugal, but he did not have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ. For this reason he would become very angry with his son or daughter (both Evangelical Christians) when they would try to broach the subject of salvation through, and only through, Jesus Christ. He always found these conversations offensive. Over a long period of time, perhaps thirty years, my sister-in-law, and also my husband prayed for him that he would give his life to Jesus.
When he came to live in our home, my husband and I began to notice that due to his
health problems he feared death. Because of this, it encouraged my husband to speak to him again about the salvation that we can have in Jesus. When my husband spoke to him, he confessed that all he wanted was for God to forgive him all his sins. That same
day, I decided to bring home the International Correspondence Institute (ICI) booklet "The Great Questions of Life". I had already read it and thought it was very appropriate for this situation. My father-in-law loves to read, so I gave the book to my husband so he could encourage his dad to read it; something he repeatedly did with great interest.
After several days, I was home with our daughters (five and three years old at the time), and while I was cleaning house and the girls were playing near their grandpa, I saw that my father-in-law was sitting on the couch and again reading the book "The Great Questions of Life". But he wasn't only reading; he was repeating something from the book out loud. Curious, I came closer and asked him what he was doing. He told me that he was trying to memorize a
prayer that the book taught, but he wasn't able to do it. As I looked at the prayer, I saw that he
was trying to memorize the prayer for salvation. Not wanting to miss this opportunity, I stopped cleaning, sat down next to him and clarified that the prayer was not to be memorized, but confessed. I explained the plan of salvation and asked him if he wanted to accept Jesus as his Lord and Savior. He said yes he would. I called my daughters and the four of us confessed Jesus as our Lord and Savior. It was a very important day for all of us... now my father-in-law
faithfully reads the Bible, the Word of God, for literally hours every day. We are rejoicing together as a family in God.
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