Our church Soup Run Team was out late last night again distributing 110 litres of soup + 160 loaves of bread to the hungry around the slum areas of Patos. The dear old Kombi was the transporter as usual. We praise God for this excellent team which cooks the soup which is thick and full of vegetables and meat. They also distribute the Word with the soup!
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The terrible plane crash which killed nearly the entire squad of a Brazilian football club on their way to the South American Cup final in Columbia has shocked the country to the core. The team has risen from almost nowhere to reach the final, on a similar scale to Leicester winning the Premiership last season in England. The club is from the extreme south of Brazil a vast distance from us, but the whole nation in reeling with the sad news. 21 journalists on the British Airspace plane were also killed. We pray for all the bereaved families.
Continue ReadingOn the Sunday before last I started a new series on the last of the 4 Gospels to be written, probably in the last decade of the 1st century, and I continued this series in John’s Gospel this Sunday too. At the end of the service one young man raised his hand to express faith in Christ and comittment to Him. PTL! The praise and worship was particularly blessed this Sunday. Our band is really good and in a great spirit.
We had a nice visit from Miriam Price who was over for a couple of weeks or so from the UK to visit her family. She kindly brought us a few Christmas things (pudding, cake etc.) sent by my sister Jean. It was nice to chat with her and catch up on her news. She has now returned to Blighty.
Talking about my sister Jean – she held a Musical Charity Concert again for EAB last Saturday with lots of her students taking part. It raised over £300 for EAB which is excellent! PTL! Many thanks Jean for this effort.
We have a problem with some of our workers and value your prayers. I can’t go into details, but it has created a lot of tension and stress unnecessarily. These things are sent to try us!
This week I will be having a meeting with our deaf pastor to discuss that section of the work, and on Saturday I will be preaching at the EAB/ACEV Portelo Church in the rural area near Campina Grande. The Patos band will be going too.
We have the boy scout cubs camping at Green Pastures at the weekend. I will do a guided tour of part of the Reserve with them. On Sunday night I will be preaching again. Philip will be taking the Bible study on Thursday.
Today we had a meeting with lots of our leaders discussing ways to develop further and expand the Action Child programme. Please pray.
I love preaching the Gospel and I love practising the Gospel. I’m not perfect at either, but I’m working on both! This morning was one of those lovely mornings where I was able to serve a bit in practical ways in a community where I’ve preached a lot.
Last year EAB received funds from Larbert Pentecostal Church’s Sunday School with which we supplied a goat to a very poor family. The goat’s milk helped Francisco and Mirele feed their little boy Paulo Silas until one day the goat became sick. The Vet’s endeavours were to no avail and eventually the goat died. Now the family has grown and they also have another little boy called Josué – but no goat milk! Hence EAB stepped in and donated a new goat with two female kids. Granddad Paulo is in the photo helping out as his son was at work. The family was overjoyed to receive another goat.
I then went on to give a food hamper to an unbelievably needy family of 11 kids where Dad cares for all as Mum has switched husbands. Dad wasn’t in but I left the hamper with the children who were.
Whilst in the community I checked over the well EAB/ACEV has drilled there. It supplies piped water to 22 homes, regularly supplies water to another 5 homes and supplies another 10 homes when the droughts are at their peaks like now. Hence this well provides water for 37 homes and about 260 people. Thanks for your prayers and support.
This year’s Leadership Conference went very well although it was exceptionally tiring. This was because the senior leadership team had to meet not-stop prior to and during the event to deal with a number of problems and issues which had accumulated. Hence the event started on the Friday at Green Pastures at 6pm but the senior leadership team went flat out all day prior to this – morning and afternoon. The free fellowship time on Saturday morning was also non-stop for the Board of leaders and so it went on.
One or two problems we faced have still not been solved regarding Ceará State and Barra de Oitis. We value your prayers.
The ministry of the Word by visiting speaker Carlos Queiroz was very good. He was the speaker last year too. The spirit of the gathering was beautiful with much unity. Thanks for your prayers.
I am now working very intensely with so many issues to do with the work after the Conference. It is hard to keep one’s head above water so to speak! Here is the good crowd of leaders at the Conference. (Click on photo to see it larger)
I have just got back from a quick trip to Green Pastures taking supplies ready for the leadership Conference which runs from Friday through Sunday (as the Americans say!). Everything taking shape nicely with a full scale clean up underway. It’s a bee hive of activity. Liz will be going after lunch again.
I met two scientists who are back there researching lizards. They leave tomorrow in good time for the Conference.
I spent yesterday preparing for tonight’s special school thanksgiving service at our church which I will be leading and speaking at.
Please go and support this fundraising event for EAB! If you can’t go why not get in the Christmas spirit and buy a ticket for a fiver to support the event anyway. Please contact medcraftnorth@sky.com or eabfinance@gmail.com . You can also donate online at
https://www.facebook.com/eabrazil
This Sunday night saw a wonderful communion service in the Patos church. A truly blessed night. PTL! Now down to preparing for Tuesday night’s School graduation thanksgiving service which includes our granddaugher Louisa.
With the Leadership Conference starting on Friday it is all stations go for that. Please pray.
Liz and I have followed the USA elections for a long time… too long! It is the worst example of “democracy” I can remember from a country which purports to be democracy’s worldwide greatest supporter! What a mockery of this image this election campaign has made.
Donald Trump is for me a typical rotten rich spoilt brat who has always been able to say (“Mexicans are rapists, murderers and thieves”) and do to people, especially women, whatever he likes! If he becomes the president of the world’s most powerful nation next Tuesday then it first of all speaks very badly of the USA electorate, and in second place is an unprecedented threat to world peace, human rights, the environment etc. etc.
It staggers me to see statistics showing that 70% of USA evangelical Christians will vote for Trump because he says he has an anti-abortion position! So proliferate nuclear weapons is fine as long as he is pro-life? I say – get a life! Wake up!
That Hillary Clinton is not perfect is to state the obvious, but she is, for us, far less imperfect than her abominable rival.
May God save America and the world!
We had a great Bible study last night on Matthew 18:21-35 all about forgiveness. Numbers are improving again and the service was lovely. PTL!
I’ve been to Green Pastures twice this week preparing for the Leadership Conference, which starts a week today, and Liz is there now for the 4th time this week. So much to do when major events are to be held. We’ve done a bit of building work to improve things and lots of maintenence work.
I am now preparing for Sunday which is a Communion service. I also need to prepare for a graduation service from Senior High School next Tuesday. These are such major opportunities with the church packed out mainly with non-Christians.
The Bible study last Thursday was a real blessing as was the visit to preach at Princesa Isabel on Saturday. We also had excellent services yesterday in Patos and the Teixeira church in the mountains had a great anniversary weekend. PTL!
Today our churches start a 40 day read of the New Testament. Perhaps you would like to join us following the schedule below?
Our granddaughter Louisa (Philip & Gylmara’a daughter) has just got her results in for her university entrance exams and she has passed and is into Law School as from the beginning of next year! PTL! She is just 16 and will be 17 in December! She participates beautifully in church and is a key member of the P&W Band, so we are very grateful to God for this tremendous victory and blessing in her life. We’ll soon have a lawyer in the family! Our other university age grandchild, Felipe (Deborah’s son), is studying to be an architect – so God is being seen to be faithful in our family’s lives for which we praise Him!
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On Saturday night I spent time out in the Green Pastures wilds, with my friend Pastor Fred from the Conceição Baptist church, with cameras and torches in the pitch black of night! It was great and I took some good photos of frogs like this on the edge of the lake:
I also nearly trod on this Coral snake:
There were lots of Tarantula spiders on the move and this one just got down its hole to escape from us before I could get a better photo:
Prior to this the Bible study went great on the Friday and last night’s service was great too with my friend Pastor Fred preaching a superb sermon. PTL! Now it’s down to a lot of administrative work for the Mission and preparing to preach at Princesa Isabel on Saturday and in Patos on Sunday.
Continue ReadingA week ago today was Children’s Day in Brazil so we held a big event and service for the children in the church which went very well indeed. Many of the EAB/ACEV churches did similar events and activities.
On Thursday it was Bible study night and that went off fine. I also had a good meeting with our deaf pastor and also chaired a meeting of the Jabre Peak campaign leadership team. On Friday I took part in the EAB UK Board meeting via Skype and that went very well. I had my hair cut at some point amongst all this – which made me feel quite light headed!
On Saturday the EAB annual Celebration was held near Southampton and we took part via a video which you can see here: https://www.wevideo.com/view/752525439 . The service went well I hear with about 50 people present. Pastor Michael Rollo from Scotland was the speaker. On the same day we travelled to preach at Manaíra together with the Church band.That was a real blessing with hundreds gathering in a great street meeting to hear the Gospel.
In Patos on Sunday was the communion service and did we have a packed church. Wow! Fantastic.
On Monday I chaired another public meeting in defense of Jabre Peak and on Tuesday I went to Green Pastures. When I got back from there I went to visit a pastor from another denomination who is 82 and broke his thigh in a fall at home. I am trying to help him get his surgery done in the hospital and had it all sorted today – but the operation had to be cancelled at the last minute as the brother went and drunk loads of water! Oh dear!
Today I have had a Skype meeting with leadership with the Christian environmental organization ‘A Rocha’ and planned some activities together for next year. I am now preparing this Thursday’s Bible study. On Saturday I will be interviewed on the Roman Catholic radio station. Times have changed.
My dear Mum is 92 today! I have sent her an e-card and a video message. Mum just keeps on hanging on in there and we praise God for her long life in service to the Lord. (photo taken a year ago)
I prepared my sermon (most of it) for the Sunday night in Patos on Saturday and at night Liz and I headed for a farm not far beyond Green Pastures where Liz spoke and I preached. It was a good meeting with between 50 and 60 present.
Following the service we called in at Green Pastures to pick up stacks of plates for the ‘Bean Feast’ (traditional Brazilian Feijoada dish) which the youth were doing for Sunday lunch in order to raise funds for their members to go to the Youth Conference next month in Campina Grande. Liz had insisted previously with the cook (Linda) to bring in more giant cooking pots for the event but was told it wasn’t necessary. However as we were entering Patos about 10pm Liz’s mobile rang… and yes it was the cook saying she needed the pots! So we dropped the plates off at the church and then had to turn round and drive back out to Green Pastures to get the cooking pots and drop them at the Patos church too! We got to bed at well gone midnight as a consequence.
Early on Sunday morning we had a phone call to say that one of our church members’ father had died aged 97 – and could I conduct the funeral at 4pm to which of course I agreed. So here I was tired out, had to finish off the preparation of my sermon for the evening service, needed to at least show my face and eat at the ‘Bean Feast’, then conduct a funeral prior to getting to church for the evening celebration at 6.30pm.
The funeral went off fine with a good crowd suporting. I led it from inside a tiny front room in the house alongside the open coffin, with a microfone linked to a vehicle with loudspeakers outside the house. It was extremely hot – especially for me in my full funeral suit and tie.
We just had time to get home after this for a quick cuppa and then charge to church where the service with live broadcast was held and was really blessed. I preached on ‘The Bible and Children’ as this coming Wednesday is Children’s Day in Brazil and in the service last night some of the kids did a lovely dance in which grandddaughters Alice and Bia took part. This Wednesday we will have a special event for children at the church in the afternoon.
Liz and I got home exhausted, but still managed to watch the USA presidential debate as we usually do.
This morning we awoke to church problems to solve and have zapped them (I hope) so we press on. Thanks for all your prayers and support – especially with the Brexit sterling crisis going from bad to worth. Difficult days for missions. Anyway here are the girls dancing before the Lord last night in church.
I finished and sent to the EAB Board of Trusteees in the UK yesterday the annual report from the work here, as is always done in the build up for the AGM. The Board will be meeting on October 14th and the Annual Celebration and fellowship tea will be on the following day.
I am now working on a video message for the Annual Celebration. I also have to prepare the Bible Study for tonight, a sermon for Saturday in São Mamede and for Patos on Sunday.
My Mum, who will be 92 next Wednesday (12th) is very frail. I have spoken to her a number of times this week via Whatsapp. She called my name and said she loved me – which was nice bless her heart!
Whatsapp is very useful for many things, including fast contact between the ACEV leadership team here. We sorted out a serious problem which arose this week very quickly through this means of communication.
The Mayor I voted for, Dinaldinho Wanderley, was elected today with a 10% margin over his nearest rival and will take up office on January 1st. His Deputy Mayor, Bonifácio Rocha, is a good friend of mine. It was a victory of right over wrong I feel and I thank God for answered prayer. I now pray that the new guy will stay on the straight and narrow.
It was a tense day waiting for the result. Polls closed at 5pm and we had the result by 6.30pm.
Today (Sunday) is the day local elections are held nationwide in Brazil for Mayor and Town Councils. In Patos there are 5 candidates for Mayor and 194 for Town Councillor for which there are 17 places to be had. As usual our church held its only service today from 8am to 9am so as to leave people free to vote afterwards. We don’t hold our main Sunday night service on election day as the noise in town by then is too great. Voting takes places from 8am to 5pm and as Brazil uses an electronic ballot system it gives very fast results so we expect the result in Patos by about 7pm. I voted straight after the service in church.
Things are exceptionally quiet for an election day in Patos which I interpret as a good sign for the candidate I voted for Mayor. There are not a lot of coloured shirts either as there normally are. This is all good in my opinion for the anti-corruption candidate. However we will watch and pray and wait and see!
Thursday night’s Bible study went very well. On Friday I went to Green Pastures and discovered there had been a bust up there between Tarcisio and another worker so had to sort that out.
Tomorrow night we have a special meeting at the request of the College of Physiotherapy in Patos to thank God for the 10 years of the College. Thus I am preparing my message for this. A good opportunity as most there will be none Christians.
The EAB InTouch magazine edition 86 is now back from the printers and going into the post this week. It gives a nice overview of the work in NE Brazil during the last few months so do read it and then pass it on to someone who might find it interesting. There are plenty of photos and short stories and reports – so it’s very readable. Thanks to Marian Rashleigh for all her input into this and to Dave Flowers for the layout and production work.
I went up to Jabre Peak with a policeman from the church yesterday to see the situation after the forest fire. I walked a lot and clambered over rocks like never before! I’m at least pleased that the firefighters managed to contain the fire more than I had thought they had – but the mess is still very sad.
I am now preparing for tonight’s Bible study.
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The disastrous forest fire at Jabre Peak finally seems to have been extinguished today, having started last Friday, but we will have to still be wary tomorrow before we can say anything definite. It does now sadly seem that some of the fires, if not all, were arson. Unbelievable!
Last Sunday’s baptism was great with Philip baptizing 7 and 2 others were received into fellowship. I preached on baptism too. It was a lovely service.
I interviewed a couple getting married last night. The wedding is this Friday and I have prepared the ceremony today.
I was asked to go and speak to a College about the environment today and that went well. In the morning I will have a coach load of 6 year olds (including granddaughter Bia) at Green Pastures to visit the Nature Reserve. At night I’ll be leading the Bible study.
On Saturday I’ll be preaching at Ibiara on Saturday and then preaching back in Patos on the Sunday.
On Monday it was grandson John David’s (photo below) 15th birthday so we had the traditional cake and pop drink late afternoon. Philip is down with the flu, his son Lucas has broken his arm and his other son Luis has Chicken-pox so it’s all happening! Your prayers are valued.
A terrible bush fire developed yesterday afternoon in the special preservation area we have been fighting to save at the Jabre Peak – the highest point in our State. It was probably caused by poachers. The fire burnt all night and the firefighters are up there trying to extinguish remaining fires on the south side of the Peak with the north side almost completely burnt to the ground. It is very sad. I have been heavily involved in coordinating the bringing in of firefighters and police. I had discussions with the State Governor to ask for his support sending reinforcements and this has happened. Please pray for this tragic situation.
Philip’s 9 year old son Lucas has broken his arm and has gone to João Pessoa to get it put in plaster as it needs a special procedure to get the bone back in place under sedation. His baby brother Luis is covered in an as yet undiagnosed rash.
My virus just doesn’t go away. I keep going but do not feel right. I am now taking a 10-day course of antibiotics. So we value your prayers for one and all here. Tomorrow is the big baptism service!
Continue ReadingThe October 2016 edition of the EAB Magazine ‘In Touch’ – No. 86 – has gone to the printer’s today. Thanks to Marian Rashleigh and Dave Flowers for all their work on this. Watch your doormats because it will soon be on its way!
Continue ReadingWe held a very good Patos church leadership meeting last night and 8 were defined for baptism this coming Sunday plus 2 others who will be received into fellowship. Philip will be doing the baptism.
I have spent all morning today preparing the Bible study for this evening in Patos. So was the money in the fish’s mouth a tongue in cheek comment or for real? You’ll need to get on a plane quick to find out!
Our Pastor Frank Dyer School in Patos has just received a digital whiteboard (replaces old blackboards) from the Ministry of Education in recognition of our school’s exceptional performance once again this year! We praise God for this recognition. To God be the glory!
Continue ReadingYesterday morning Liz commented to me early that the Patos Town Hall was surrounded by the Federal Police! Slowly the news started emerging that the Patos Mayoress had been removed from her post and the Deputy Mayor has taken up office and sacked the entire previous government! The Mayoress’s daughter was arrested, as was her husband, and her ex-husband, who is a State MP and candidate for Mayor again in Patos, had his candidacy banned! The reason given by the police and press is very simple: corruption.
Liz and I are off to Ibiara and Conceição this afternoon. I will be preaching in the latter place this evening. We value your prayers.
I’ve prepared my sermon for Saturday at Conceição and I am in the process of preparing another one for Patos on Sunday. Liz and I have also done a fair bit of counselling this week. Please pray for our travels at the weekend + the Patos church band who will also be travelling somewhere else to minister. The Kombi is constantly on the road with different groups and ministries. Liz and I have to have a careful agenda for it so as not to get double bookings.
Tomorrow we are to receive the visit at Green Pastures of Patos’s biggest and best school’s headteacher + a couple of other teachers who want to take young kids there on visits. This is excellent. There is nothing like Green Pastures anywhere in the region so it is really starting to take off!
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Liz is sweet 16 and never been kissed (+ a bit more) today! We’ve had our traditional family get together and all went off beautifully! Liz is receiving worldwide congratulations for a person much loved by us all.
It’s quite amazing how many new people are coming into the Patos church to hear the Gospel. We praise God for the constant flow of new faces. Last night was no exeption with university professors and medical doctors part of the audience. PTL! It was a joy to preach the Gospel and have communion. Such are the numbers that we have had to increase the distribution of the bread and the cup from 2 to 3 people doing it as it was taking too long with just 2. The new system worked well yesterday. The P&W was great and the sermon of a “Ban on Snoozing” (Acts 20:1-12) went lovely. This was the 17th sermon in the series on Paul’s missionary journies.
This week we have Independence day on Wednesday and Liz’s birthday on Thursday so it’s going to be a different week. On Saturday I’m preaching at Conceição on Saturday and back in Patos on Sunday. The church band will be at São Vicente do Seridó on Saturday and also back in Patos for the Sunday.
Please pray for one of our pastors who is suffering with depression.
I walked at Green Pastures yesterday morning where all is well despite not one drop of rain for three months as the annual drought bites harder and harder.
Following this Liz and I had an excellent meeting with Pastor Oseias (Itaporanga). His church is going wonderfully well. PTL! However the nearby church at Barra de Oitis continues in deep trouble and we had a long discussion and time of prayer about it. We also discussed the painting of the Ibiara manse and the Conceição and Curral Velho churches.
Later I had a meeting with the Patos Bible College leadership in my advisory role which I now have. The College is going well but needs to improve. We had a long worthwhile discussions.
Tonight I am back to giving the Bible Study in the Patos church.
Saturday saw Philip, Sacha and the Patos church band travelling over 4 hours to minister at the 11th anniversary service of the EAB/ACEV Juá rural church. All went very well and the service was really blessed. We thank God for such dedicated young people.
Saturday was our grandson Arthur’s 15th birthday so we had the usual cake and soft drinks all together in the afternoon.
Philip led the Sunday service and Bible College teacher Elaine preached. It was an excellent meeting.
Yesterday I received the visit at Green Pastures of an International Christian Consultant Arturo Menezes at Green Pastures. It was a lovely visit. He has just given a good training course at Princesa Isabel for some of our young leaders which went very well. In yesterday’s photo below he is next to me and that is our pastor Lindon Carlos the other side of him.
Look at these beautiful owls filmed in the night this week at Green Pastures. I am waiting for confirmation by my specialist friend as to the species, but I think it is a first at Green Pastures, but am not sure. https://www.wevideo.com/view/724344473
Continue ReadingI have a heavy cold which started on Sunday night. I hope it will soon go away!
Yesterday I started preparing my sermon on Acts 20 for this coming Sunday.
This afternoon Liz and I had a very good meeting with Marah Danielle who leads the project to help very poor women in a Patos slum area. We had an in-depth discussion of the serious difficulties the project team is facing with life threats now common. We have decided that the best thing to do would be to no longer run the project in the rented house we have in the community as it is just too dangerous. We are proposing that the project be run at our project centre next to the church. Please pray.
“They got away with it… just” is how the BBC summed up the Rio Olympic Games. I think that about gets it just right. Well done Team GB who did brilliantly to take 2nd place in the medal table.
The service in Patos went great last night as did the live internet transmission of it too. The new Internet provider worked out really well and we had a non-stop transmission of real quality.
I have had university folk at Green Pastures this morning and a meeting with the deaf pastor this afternoon. Liz is still counselling at nearly 10pm.
This week we changed out Internet server and now have a much better signal to transmit better the Sunday services from our Patos church. Please support this endeavour by watching it LIVE as from 10.30pm (BST) or watch the recording the following day. The broadcast is from the church’s facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/Ação-Evangélica-Patos-PB-773650192729931
Through this Internet ministry we are reaching people with the Gospel all over Brazil and the world. Many people contact us from far and wide blessed by the services.
Our youngest daughter is 30 today! May the Lord bless Sacha! We will be having a family meal at her house this evening.
I hope you like this video message I recorded this morning at Green Pastures for all EAB friends and supporters!
Continue ReadingI have just got in from the Bible study which went very well on Romans 12:3-8. I am feeling steadily better.
Liz has been busy with her counselling work. We now have two new folk to baptize yet this month.
I have been preparing my sermon today on Psalm 84 for Sunday.
I had a good meeting with the candidates for Mayor and Deputy Mayor, Dinaldinho & Bonifácio respectively, this morning. It was very good. That’s the third candidate for mayor that’s visited me in recent weeks. The elections for Mayor and Town Councillors will be on October 2nd.
I see the last 2 years as world public relations disasters for Brazil. The spin-off from such events should be selling an attractive positive image of the country, attracting more tourists, investments etc. However prior to the World Cup I saw people all the time online telling people not to come to Brazil! Now the hostile crowd behaviour in the Olympics basically carries on with the same theme. Some of the Brazilian TV commentators I hear here are disgusting ridiculing the bronze medalists on the podium as “loosers” when a Brazilian had won gold, and shouting at them to “stick it up you”! This of course only incites negative crowd behaviour.
When Brazil won the right to stage these 2 events there was dancing in the streets. Now the sour political and economic climate has changed this. Brazil is essentially focused on football (and not doing well at that anymore) and a few other sports to a lesser extent. There needs to be a whole re-education of the sportculture in Brazil to diversify it, encourage and make possible grass-root participation, and embibe in the Brazilian press and public as a whole (there are good exceptions but not enough) the Olympic spirit.
Philip led the service and preached extremely well last night in Patos. It was a great blessing with 4 decisions for Christ. One blind man, one woman with Down’s syndrome and 2 other people. PTL! I think it expresses a lot about EAB/ACEV with services interpreted for the deaf and a full weekly program for them + one Down’s syndrome member and now another decision + now a blind man. Somehow I think the Church should be just like this.
Continue ReadingThanks to those who have been praying for my ill health which resulted from intoxication from an MRI contrast injected in my vein on Wednesday. I felt terrible on Thursday and Friday but I am steadily improving today. Philip will take the service tomorrow in Patos to let me get completely over this hitch.
Continue ReadingOn Tuesday Liz and I travelled to Campina Grande for me to do a routine treadmill test with the cardiologist. All went off fine.
On Wednesday we went on to João Pessoa for me to do an MRI monitoring things and this went without a hitch too. However on Wednesday night I became unwell owing to a reaction to the contrast/die used in the MRI. I am now improving, but still feeling rough. I missed the Jabre Peak meeting yesterday as I wasn’t up to going.
We value our prayers at all times. I am a bit out of contact with emails etc. whilst I get over the MRI side-effects.
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Over the weekend a major bush fire started on the Teixeira mountain which is clearly visible from Patos. It is a terrible ecological tragedy. I can only presume that the suspicions that it was started deliberately are correct as this is the cooler time of year here (when it’s warmer in Europe it’s cooler here and vice-versa) and thus not conducive to such fires starting spontaneously. The bush fire has spread 10 km a journalist tells me in the counties of Teixeira and Cacimba de Areia and the firefighters have lost control. Please pray. A friend in Teixeira took this photo yesterday.
Liz and I’s weekend travel went off well. First stop was Itaporanga where we had a working lunch with the local pastor and his wife. This was lovely. Then we went on a dusty earth track with them to Barra de Oitis ex-slave community where the EAB/ACEV church is facing serious problems. The leader went of the rails (financial issues) and has left since being removed from the leadership. The problem is that the nearest pastor to this place is from Vazante and he is proving to be quite a headache and has fallen for a new couple in the problem church who are very domineering. Oh Lord! Such problems are very stressful and there is a lot more I could say! 🙂
From this trouble shooting we went to Curral Velho (Old Cow Pen) where I preached in a jubilant and blessed meeting held in the street in front of the church. We got home to bed at midnight. Tired and with mixed feeling from the good and the bad of the trip. Please pray.
Last night’s communion service in Patos went lovely with just some problems with the internet transmission as my nephew Ben has gone to England for a while with his wife and it was he who had the transmissions off to a fine art. Now a new lad is learning, so please have patience! I’m saying that to me too as I told him not to do certain things and he did them! Such is life!
Continue ReadingI watched part of the Olympic Games opening ceremony in Rio de Janeiro last night and Liz watched it all. I was pleased all went off without hitches. I thought they did well for a much lower budget than 4 years ago in London. I hope and pray all the rest will now go off well and without violence or major problems.
Liz and I are off to Itaporanga, Barra de Oitis and Curral Velho shortly, getting back late tonight. I will be preaching at the latter place and having trouble shooting meetings at the others on the way. I’ll be preaching at the Patos church communion service tomorrow.
Liz drove for the first time in 4 months yesterday. PTL! She had no problems, but just found the whole day very tiring owing to her loss of muscle mass over her period in bed and wheelchair following her accident. I would imagine she will take another month to build up her muscles again and feel totally 100%. Nevertheless she was able to go to church in the day and sort out lots of things there and in the Care Centre.
I have been doing a fair bit of counselling this week and also have been for a routine check-up with my diabetics doctor together with all the routine blood tests. The last were done in March. My results thus far are fine with my main glucose in the blood test dropping from 6.7 to 6.1 which is great. Other results take a few days to get back to us. I have further check-ups in Campina Grande & João Pessoa next week.
I am now busy preparing sermons for the weekend. I will be preaching at Curral Velho on Saturday and at the Communion Service on Sunday. I also have the Patos Bible study tonight. Will also be trouble shooting at Barra de Oitis and having a meal with the pastor and his wife at Itaporanga. Your prayers are always greatly appreciated.
On Friday morning I spent a lovely morning at Green Pastures with a new university professor to Green Pastures + 10 forestry students. They loved it and it went great.
Later on Friday we received the visit of the Brazilian Executive Director of Rocha International – Conservation and Hope. http://www.arocha.org/en/ This is a Christian organization with work in many countries whose headquarters is in London. He had come to visit Green Pastures which was for him a sort of case of love at first sight! As a result I have been asked to join their Council of Reference and Green Pastures is to become their centre of reference for environmental research and conservation for the whole of north-eastern Brazil. The brother preached on Saturday night in a great service at Green Pastures (photo below) and on Sunday preached in the Patos church. Both services were mightily blessed.
Liz has today been given the all clear to drive again by her doctor. PTL! She has to go steady does it – a bit at a time – but she can get drive again which is wondersul. Thanks for your prayers.
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