Hello from sunny and hot Nova Viçosa!
The temperature is rising here as it is going down there in
the US! Enjoy the fall season for me.
Life has been 100 mph since we returned from our trip to the
US. Here are some bullet points so this
won’t be a novel.
·
My home church, New Covenant Fellowship in
Stillwater, blessed us with a walker for a precious lady who is the mother of
one of our members. She has terrible
knees and literally was bending over, using a low plastic stool to get
around. My heart was breaking for
her. At the Mission’s Conference I was
telling Johnny Underwood about it and instantly he said, “The church can take
care of that with a walker!” This walker
comes with a seat, brakes and was able to be adjusted to a lower height
setting. We bought it and brought it
back here. What a joy it was to see her
reaction to this gift. Tears flowed! Tears of joy and gratitude. Now she can get around easier, her back and
hands feels better, and she can even go to her neighbor’s house!
·
One of our dear sisters had a massive stroke
shortly after we returned from the US.
She held on for several weeks but then went on to be with the Lord. This was an emotional time with the family,
her kids, grandkids and many other family and friends. She was 54 years old. Nayara did a wonderful job coordinating all
the funeral arrangements. This was our
first funeral here at the church. God’s
presence was so strong. I will miss her
smile and hugs!
·
In the month of October, Brazil celebrates
“Children’s Day”. It is actually a
weeklong holiday, no school and lots of activities. We had special activities on Wednesday night,
Friday afternoon and Saturday afternoon.
It was a fun time focusing on the children.
·
In October we have started a discipleship time
with the leaders on Sunday morning at 9 am.
This has been a rich time with them.
Paty is leading that time and is doing very well. We will conclude this time in November. Paty is also discipling 2 girls youth age and
2 young adult ladies during the week.
·
When the discipleship time ends with the
leaders, then we will hold some training meetings on Sunday morning. We hope to
start having Bible School in February.
We are using some really cool material from New Tribes Ministry using
the Chronological approach. We will
start with Genesis and end at the Resurrection.
We are looking at having 3 classes; children (Nayara), youth (Paty),
adults (Lisa and Isabell, missionary from Canada). Pray for us, this is a huge step for our
church, a much needed step!
·
We are having about 40-45 people in service now,
which is great! Developing relationships
with people is time consuming but necessary.
Paty is leading worship and is now trying to develop the Praise
Team. She is doing a great job. Nayara and I are praying and planning the
direction for the messages for the remainder of the year and next year.
·
Our English Project is continuing with our in
person class on Thursday. This has been
a great challenge with many people in the class. Many of them are not disciplined and really
make it hard for us to push forward. We
have had a few who have really been working.
We have asked 2 of them already to pray about helping us next year. This will help them continue to learn and
will help us facilitate learning activities.
·
Last but not least, our online English
continues. We had our first ever English
Workshop talking about visiting the US.
This workshop was on video, and Paty edited it to be sold online with
AME. We will be doing more workshops in
the future. We are also working towards
putting our course online for purchase as well.
AME has been a blessing to help us financially. God is good!
This is just a glimpse of our activities so far. We are blessed to be here working. Yes, it does get challenging, but God is
faithful and guiding us each day. Please
continue to pray for us for financial resources, strength, and wisdom as we
serve Him every day. You are a
blessing! Thank you so much!
Lisa