Autor: eabrazil

EAB’s facebook English language page has now passed the 550 “likes” point! It just shows what can be done! Please spread the word folks! This is a brilliant worldwide means of communication. Visit us at https://www.facebook.com/eabrazil

Thanks to my sister Jean for the 2015 diary which arrived yesterday! Thanks to Joyce & Alex Sims, Mrs. Yoakley and David Shearing for Christmas cards which have also arrived.


My youngest daughter Sacha continues her one month Cambridge Teacher Training Course in Recife and has received news that she passed in the highest level (CPE – Proficiency) Cambridge language exam so well done Sacha all round! Well done to our eldest grandson Felipe who not only surprised everyone by getting into the Modern Languages Course at University in first place but has now received news that he has passed the FCE Cambridge Language exam which is the third in five levels. He obtained a very good mark – so well done to Felipe too.


The 10-day Outreach starts today at Soledade. Those going from the Patos church have already left. Please remember them all in your prayers that many will be won for Christ in this outreach. 


I have a meeting with a non-EAB/ACEV pastor who has asked to speak to me this afternoon who is travelling a long distance to come for this. I understand that he likes our approach to integral mission and is interested in joining the cause. Please pray for God’s guidance on this and possible subsequent meetings on this matter.


I will be preaching, conducting communion and dedicating two children and the small town/village of Passagem tomorrow. Please pray.

We follow the news on the awful violence in France with much concern as this is exactly what I have referred to with concern in the past on this blog. A mutually tolerant pluralistic society is fine as long as everyone plays by the rules but there are those who openly declare they won’t play by the rules and infact want to impose their own laws. May God help us as this is a difficult nut to crack! Nut being a wholly appropriate word!

Tonight’s mid-week service in the Patos church was a wow service! Really blessed, relaxed, flowed – good content and numbers up. The P&W was superb, the prayer time was equally good and the Bible study hit home strong. PTL! Real good! Thank you Jesus for such an encouragment. 


With the adjusted weekly schedule, as from January 1st, it has freed up the Tuesday evenings for house groups and the likes. This meant that dear Sandra (Down’s syndrome) was given communion at her home as she is unable to come to church these days. It went beautifully.


Tomorrow is launch day for the 10-day outreach at Soledade. Please pray for much fruit!

EAB’s Action Child programme, in partnership with our Brazilian brethren of ACEV, has today finally launched the new policy adjustments to the excellent work this programme does so as to improve and refine the work with children yet further. We will eventually tell all in the UK about the adjustments to the programme, but ask you to, in the meantime, pray for this and be patient as we put all the pieces in place spread over a vast region with busy workers who have so many other things to do as well as this. We only want to explain the changes overseas to sponsors and EAB supporters in general when we are certain that the new policies are fully functional in Brazil. This takes longer than we would like sometimes, but with God’s help we will get there.


I am pleased to announce that EAB’s English language facebook page has now passed the 500 “likes” point. For the uninitiated let me explain that this means that over 500 people have now expressed at least interest and some sort of appreciation for EAB’s work and ethos, and our news will appear on their “pages feed” on facebook from time to time for them to check out if they want to. It is an excellent way of keeping people informed about the work of the Mission and spreading the word to people who have perhaps previously never heard of EAB.


I just wish that more EAB supporters would spread the word about EAB to their friends on facebook. This would mean we would spread the word to many more. I have asked so many times for this help, it doesn’t cost whoever does it a penny, but few have done it. So hear I go again making this appeal for help PLEASE!

Once again QPR were slaughtered at the weekend in the FA Cup beaten 3 x 0 at home to a team 2 divisions below them! I think it’s 13 years since QPR managed to win a game in the FA Cup! Every time the excuse given is that we’re concentrating on the league! Oh well… let’s hope so! 

I actually couldn’t care less about the FA Cup as our team can hardly keep its head above relegation waters in the Premiership so I guess the team felt the same and were not motivated to get stuck in in the FA Cup. Now we’re away to Burnley in the Premiership where the most we can dream of must be a draw!

EAB is steadily increasing its number of readers/followers on its exclusively English language facebook page which has regular news snippets, photos and explanations of EAB’s vision. Please help us spread the word about this important communications tool by first of all visiting our page https://www.facebook.com/eabrazil and clicking on the word “like”. 


Once you have done this please share the news of EAB’s English language facebook page amongst your friends and contacts on facebook by clicking on “share” near top right on the page and writing a word or two of recommendation like “I recommend” or “this is worth a look at” or the likes, so that your friends understand we are not a load of unknown nutters! (I hope!)


EAB celebrates 77 years of integral mission in the poor and semi-arid north-east of Brazil this year. We believe in saying and doing the Gospel for the glory of God! Please spread the word and thanks for your prayers and support as we start another year of service by God’s grace.

I have completed today the preparation of my sermon for this Sunday’s celebration service in Patos. The subject will be: “The Church’s Mission for 2015 and always”. The month of January is the big holiday month here (like August in the UK) so many go away whilst others turn up in Patos visiting family and friends – so you never know how full the church will be. 


Being holiday month it’s that time again when some give up 10 days of their holiday for the 10-day Outreach with a team usually around 60 strong. This year the Outreach will be at Soledade from January 9th to 19th so please note this down to include in your prayers.


Sacha goes off tomorrow for a month’s teacher training course in Recife linked to the English Language School – so please pray for her too as it is a very intense course linked to Cambridge. Her daughters will stay with us.


Yesterday we received just 3mm of rain at Green Pastures which is very little, but better than nothing. It’s a start to what we hope will be a good rainy season in this first half of the year.

Tomorrow we will be distributing the Christmas, which have become New Year, Hampers to the poor in Patos. Things were put back from the usual around Christmas Eve distribution to the around New Year’s Eve distribution owing to all the work we had finalizing the work refurbishing the church and re-opening it. One can’t do everything, and even less so all at once! Nobody is worried here about it anyway as long as they get their hampers!


Last night’s service went very well. PTL! The deaf had a special worship slot which was lovely and Pastor Angelo from our Soledade church preached well.

Two men were murdered in Patos last night – exactly in 2 of the 3 boroughs where our new project against drugs and domestic violence is starting. These are the boroughs of Placas and Rua do Meio. The police suspect teenagers as the murderers. May the Lord help us!


News on our church leader Tica at Curral Velho is that she has been released from hospital with a broken arm in plaster. She is all bashed, bruised and sore but we praise God that she is alive! Thanks for praying. Please don’t stop.

I hear that the youth, led by Philip & Gylmara, had a great day of fun and fellowship at Green Pastures yesterday. They got back very late to Patos so it must have been good! I await details.


Sabrina, Liz’s sister Esther’s daughter, gave birth last night to a little boy weighing 3.855 kg and named Lorenzo. Both Mum and baby are fine. Congratulations to Sabrina and Daniel!


I prepared my sermon yesterday for the watchnight service on Wednesday.


Now we have Sunday School here in Patos at 9.30am and the big weekly celebration with praise and the ministry of the Word of God at 6.30pm back in our own church of course! Thank you Lord. We no longer have any noise from the busy streets outside with the new acoustic church. Really wonderful!


‘Christians in Action’ went to Ipueira in Rio Grande do Norte State last night for another church plant service where we already have 5 Christians. PTL! This is wonderful in a very tough pioneer place. Maybe some of the folk from there will be coming to the celebration in Patos tonight which would be nice.


The deaf brothers and sisters will be taking part in the service tonight in Patos. They were supposed to a week ago, then it was put off to Christmas Eve, but they finally assure me that tonight is the night! Oh Lord! We just take it as it comes! Watch this space!

Sacha left hospital about 10pm yesterday having spent 24 hours on a drip. She is on the mend. The girls stayed with us again last night. I woke very early (3.40am) and couldn’t get back to sleep. I watched the 5am news on BBC World.


I am now preparing the service for tomorrow in Patos. Pastor Angelo from Soledade will be coming to preach. The youth will be spending the day at Green Pastures today.


I must now prepare my sermon for the watchnight service as well, when we will have communion and baptize some.

As I say every year, Boxing Day is a normal working day in Brazil. We woke up this morning after a complicated night as Sacha was taken into hospital about 9pm with some sort of gastritis which got steadily worse and infected and so she is on a drip and on the mend today. This meant that we had her daughters with us for the night.


Liz woke up this morning, not having slept much, and feeling a bit lost as she didn’t have to rush to the church to sort the workers out! I went off early to Green Pastures for a good walk.


This afternoon I watched QPR lose to Arsenal 2 x 1. I predicted a 3 x 1 loss with 1 x 0 to Arsenal at half-time (correct) and that Austin would score for us (correct) – so I reckon this should keep me in pole position in the QPR prediction league. On Sunday we play Crystal Palace at home which we must win.

I was up at 5.20am today and left for Green Pastures an hour later. I had a walk, took a few photos and chatted to Tarcísio – the usual routine. However I was anxious to get back to Patos as still there had been no link up to the mains by the electricity company and I was feeling unwell with all the stress that this was generating. The infuriating thing is when you have done everything correctly according to the rules and the law – yet still the company does not link you up or guarantee when they will!


I phoned Liz as soon as I got to a place on the way back from Green Pastures where my mobile phone could get a signal at about 8am, and still there was no sign of the company Liz said. I got back to Patos and to say Liz was fuming would be to put it mildly. She asked me to ring the company boss once again and just ask do we cancel tonight’s Christmas service or not? I phoned him and his assistant, but both had their mobiles switched off!


Liz was on the look out at the church and noticed an electricty company vehicle go past and then a bit later go past again! Liz took the bull by the horns – ran after the vehicle and ended up directing the chaps to our church which they were trying to find not having been given the address or anything by the company! Liz phoned me immediately to tell me it looked like the victory was about to be won!


They started work and Liz plied them with coffee and cake and a couple of hours later the job was done and what a relief! All our dear kids and youth have been rehearsing a cantata for ages and it looked like all was lost. But the Lord undertook. It was like scoring the winner in the last minute of extra time!


So it’s all stations go for tonight’s Christmas service at 7.30pm with presents and sweets for crowds of kids – many very poor – at the end. Then we will go to Deborah’s house for the traditional Brazilian Christmas supper. Happy Christmas everyone and praise the Lord with us for the great victory today!

It would seem we are nearly there with the electricity link up for the Patos church. I phoned the director of the Board late this afternoon who said he had emitted the document authorizing the link. We believe and hope this will be done tonight or tomorrow morning. Please don’t stop praying.

With our big Christmas service scheduled for Christmas Eve, as it is every year, here we sit waiting and praying and hoping for the electricity company to link up our Patos church to the mains! How long will this mess go on? Yesterday morning an inspector from the company went to the church and gave the all clear. However he then turned round and said that they can only link us to the mains when authorization comes from the State capital! I phoned this morning and this OK has still not come! This is absolutely ridiculous! Things you come up against in a banana state! Outrageous!

I will be leaving in an hour or so for the re-opening service of the Patos church. What a mammoth task this has been! Today the electricity board people turned up to put the pole in place in the street on the side of our church for the eventual link up – but that will be another day!


We booked the external mobile generator for 1pm, but the driver went to sleep after lunch and only linked that at 3.30pm! There have been a series of last minute complications but… but… praise the Lord we will be back in our church tonight one way or another and we look to God for a great time of blessing! We value your prayers.


Thanks again at this moment to everyone who contributed to this project in someway or other – with little or with much. May God bless you. You have no idea what an impact this project is having in and around Patos. To say it is the talk of the town would be an understatement and we don’t quite know how we are going to cope with the large crowd expected tonight! 647 people have already “liked” the new church’s page on facebook in less than a week! We look to God for a greatly blessed Christmas period continuing into a wonderfully fruitful year for the Gospel in 2015. May God bless you in the same way.

I am just off to lead a service, preach the Gospel and baptize 12 in the pool at Green Pastures. God is good! I am really looking forward to it. Liz can’t go with me unfortunately as she is fixing final details for the Patos church re-opening tomorrow night.


The church is all washed and shining and ready for tomorrow. The team of volunteers today was great. The last 6 pews missing should arrive before nightfall as they all went for a fresh coat of varnish.


QPR did beat WBA today 3 x 2 so that was good. This takes us out of the relegation zone again. Lovely stuff.


I have a lovely nativity photo for circulation when I can get to it to send out as a Christmas card! Watch this space!

I phoned the head of the electricty board yesterday morning who assured me that all was on target for the desperately needed link up and asked me to go and sign some relevante papers in the afternoon -which I did. However that was Wednesday afternoon and still on Thursday evening there is no sign of power! Today we contracted a mobile generator to be able to carry out tests we have been waiting to do.


I went to Green Pastures this morning with Philip, who is on holiday, and had a good walk and both of us did some photography. The environmental people came a bit after 9am and their visit went very well. I brought in to Patos some vegetables from our little plantation, but that is being run down now for lack of water. This will only improve when the rains come or if we had a dessalinization unit for one of our deep bore wells.


There are so many bits and pieces to finalize in time for the re-opening of the Patos church on Sunday. Liz is stretched to the limit.


Thanks for Christmas cards received today from Don & Pearl Skivington, Rose Callaghan, Steve & Jose Valentine, Mark, Angela & Emma Chafe, Beth Meachen, Vivien Warne and Gill Parsons. 


My prediction for QPR’s match at home to WBA on Saturday is a 2 x 1 win for us, with 1 x 0 lead at half-time and goals from Austin and Vargas. I will be attempting to stay at the top of the QPR prediction league!

This is a hectic week with the Patos church to be re-opened this Sunday evening at 6.30pm (9.30pm UK time). Hence all the final touches are being given to the building and its new instalations. A new Bible has been made to go on the front of the church and the support for this is in place and can receive the heavy new scultured Bible on Friday. The electricity is still not linked up. I will phone the head of the electricity board this morning. We value your prayers for all the preparations and for the service itself.


I went to Green Pastures yesterday and learnt that my sermon I recorded for them has been listened to three times by the congregation! I also sent them a recorded message about baptism and this has resulted in the number to be baptized this Sunday going up from 9 to 12. PTL!


I had a good walk at Green Pastures reviewing the fencing for the increased nature reserve and counting trees and finding 92 of one variety and 150 of another – both fairly rare.


Tomorrow we will receive another visit from government environmental people very enthused by the Green Pastures project and developments, and at the Federal University 3,000 seedlings of native trees are being prepared for when the rains come to Green Pastures.

Last night’s service went well despite the hangover from the awful morning business meeting. Many non-Christians came to church and a good number turned up in general. The P&W was nice and I  preached fairly well. The sermon was good, I felt, but I don’t think I managed to fully get through to everyone somehow. Deborah did a good resumé and that is online for all to read – so we leave it with the Lord.


This morning we received firm assurances that the Patos church will finally be linked up to the electricity network this week so we have gone ahead announcing the opening as confirmed for this coming Sunday evening. I initially was more explicit as to the assurance received on this matter, but later adjusted announcements and adjusted things for “technical” reasons which I can’t explain here. I will only be relaxed when the electricity company actually does the job but we are doing our part and getting everything else ready down to the finest detail.


In the light of the church’s re-opening I decided to go for it today and create, launch and publicize a new Patos church facebook page, as it is a great way of communicating with everyone and build’s excellent bridges with the community and results in non-Christians coming to church. So it has been a very full hectic day with 250 likes already on the page as opposed to 403 on EAB’s page after yonks! We’ll soon pass that!


I see QPR lost tonight. Oh dear! I will probably actually pull further ahead in the prediction league though, as Zamora scored for us as I predicted.

We had a two and a half hour church business meeting this morning which was far from easy. Very stressfull. Sometimes as pastors we do all we can to be merciful, protect people’s reputations and help them in the process to survive spiritually – only to get our “secrecy” thrown in our faces. May God have mercy. Please pray for us and all who were dragged downwards by an incredible lack of wisdom and grace.


Now to dust myself off and get ready to preach tonight and lead the service too.

Oh my word! I’ve now learnt that this TV interview I did on November 19th at Green Pastures will not only be broadcast nationwide in Brazil tomorrow but will also go worldwide via the Brazilian Globo TV channel which Sky carries! 

All that’s left is from them to broadcast it on that comet via that thingamibog they put there recently as well as the moon I suppose!

My interview on Globo TV (produced by EPTV) and filmed at Green Pastures was broadcast today in the south of Brazil and various people have contacted me telling me they watched it and enjoyed it. Now I have just learnt that it will be broadcast nationwide tomorrow! Wow!


It is online anyway – but it’s nice that it’s going nationwide on TV tomorrow as well. 


I have just completed my sermon for tomorrow based on Matthew 12. In the morning we have a church business meeting.

Sorry it’s in Portuguese (of course) but you see a bit of Green Pastures in the present drought and me being interviewed on Brazilian TV. My part starts after 7 minutes. http://redeglobo.globo.com/sp/eptv/terradagenteeptv/videos/t/edicoes/v/terra-da-gente-pico-do-jabre-bloco-02/3828055/

The actually use two clips of my film with my permission of a wild cat and a raccoons! It’s very good all in all. PTL!

Today is the day we’ve been waiting for when the interview I did a while back with a TV crew at Green Pastures will be broadcast. It will be broadcast on EPTV which is part of the biggest Brazilian TV network “Globo”. They have already put a trailer online. It’s in Portuguese of course, but you can see a bit of my interview and Green Pastures. http://redeglobo.globo.com/sp/eptv/terradagenteeptv/videos/t/edicoes/v/chamada-terra-da-gente-13122014/3827763/


I will post the link to the full programme when it is put online later.

I have just got home from a lovely Bible study which covered Jesus refusing to “perform” for the pharisees and masters of the law as portrayed in Matthew 12:38-45. Jesus knows that putting on a “miracles show” is know way to change hardened cynics. Rather He points them to God’s Word as the source of true spiritual life – specifically the Prophet Jonah and the wisdom of Solomon. The study really flowed and was nice and participative too. It was great to have Philip back in church after his India trip.

This morning we received the long awaited news that the electricity board has finally approved our project for a new underground link to the mains at the Patos church. This doesn’t mean we are linked up yet, but it does mean that we have overcome the bureaucracy and now have the green light for them to come and do the job. Please pray that they will do this quickly!


Our target now is to reinaugurate the EAB Patos church a week on Sunday (21st). We are all in gear for this and hoping and praying that this will all now work out.

Today is our granddaughter Louisa’s 15th birthday – the big birthday for girls in Brazil. Louisa is a lovely intelligent Christian girl who loves (and we love) staying at house. Last night her Dad (Philip) stayed up late putting this video together for Louisa. It is beautiful. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AmrzwYFKmRY&feature=share

Last night Liz and I spent a lot of time at the Patos church checking on final details needed to be done in the restoration. It is looking really lovely. We also did some more work preparing for the Patos church administrative meeting to be held this Sunday morning. I also recorded another message for the Green Pastures church.

I spent much of yesterday preparing for our end of year administrative church members meeting in the Patos church, to be held this Sunday morning. There’s a lot to think through and organize for discussion and prayer.


The Patos church revamp still awaits the electricity board’s link up to the mains. They really are being an awful pain. We hope for an answer on the matter this afternoon. Watch this space!


I went to Green Pastures this morning so got a good walk in. I checked the work on the increased Reserve area.


I dispatched the latest EAB Diary Update yesterday too.

I went out to Green Pastures this afternoon as I hadn’t been there for a week and it was good to see all is well there. The water fountain is now functioning better to the joy of the birds! I walked round with Tarcísio (trying out my new walking boots as my old ones are worn out and have a hole in them – and these give me better protection from snakes). I have now defined where to make a new fence so as to increase the Reserve area where no domestic animals are allowed in. Such a reserve increases vegetation and tree growth, wild flowers etc.


Whilst there I picked up the memory card from the infra-red camera and now back in Patos have just checked it. One has to wade through loads of clips of birds, but you never know what might have been caught on camera! Lo and behold suddenly there appeared on my screen a lovely 30 second clip of another Puma Yagouarandi Wild Cat at a different watering hole from where I filmed the last group. This is wonderful! I have seen that Racoons are drinking at this hole as well. Please take a look at the lovely wild rusty coloured cat. https://www.flickr.com/photos/johnmedcraft/15953203086/in/photostream/


“The earth is the Lord and everything that is in it”!

Flickr stupidly stopped the statistics records for some months, but their system is now back up and running. Hence my total number of visitors has passed the 138,000 mark to see my nature photos. The latest posting is a snake from last week. https://www.flickr.com/photos/johnmedcraft/

News just in from Pastor Lindon Carlos visiting EAB/ACEV churches in the State of Ceará is that 5 more new converts were baptized at our Felipe Church in the county of Saboeiro yesterday. PTL!


Add this to more baptized at Juru (I think it was about 10) and you have a real festival of end of year baptisms around the EAB/ACEV churches. PTL!

I gave Liz a cup of tea in bed at 5.45 am this morning! Now how about that? I fed the birds whilst the tea was massing (or brewing – but my Mum always says massing so like mother like son!). The bird food goes on a bird table in our front garden. I can hear a Roadside Hawk calling in the vicinity!

I produced and dispatched the latest EAB Nutshell Update this afternoon so if you don’t receive them, and would like to, just email eabrazil@gmail.com


The communion service went well tonight in Patos. We had a full house which was surprising as so many are away, with tomorrow being a public holiday.