Autor: eabrazil

For the second time this season QPR win… I think! The internet link has been terrible and I was getting an occasional score line on Twitter. Marian Rashleigh emailed to tell me Rangers had scored the second! Thank you Marian!

Yes – I now have confirmation that QPR have beaten Aston Villa 2 x 0 via an email from Marian! Oh yes! Wonderful! Rangers are now off the bottom of the Premiership! Great stuff!

QPR are in the lead

QPR are 1 x 0 up against Aston Villa at half-time which is exactly what I forecast. It’s not on TV and the internet is slower than a cart horse and I can’t get radio commentary, but I do know we just have our nose in front with a goal from Austin. If the Southampton mantle has come down upon QPR we have 7 to go in the second half. I forecast a 3 x 1 win for Rangers. We shall see!

This blog has today reached the 131,000 visits mark. Many thanks.

I am fed up seeing all the squabbling and nastiness on the internet over the elections. It is sickening.

I should think so too!

BBC online reports: “South African prosecutors say they are going to appeal against the conviction and sentence given to Oscar Pistorius for killing his girlfriend.”

Dear Lord!

I have just got back from Nenem’s mum’s wake and oh dear – what poverty! The whole house is no wider than 9 feet and the first room is only just big enough to fit the coffin and to get round it. Nenem was clearly pleased I had gone to the house right on the southern outskirts of Patos. Nenem will be living between our house and Sacha’s from now on. Her father went off years ago. Please pray for this young woman that she will be comforted by the Lord and give her life to Christ. Alice preaches to her all the time!

The morning after

I got to bed late after such a tense evening with the close calls in both the election for governor and for president… but gratefully all worked out as we had hoped. In the case of the governor it is a great result for Paraíba and in the case of the presidency it was the best option that we had.

I stayed up writing a longish reflection of the tight election results for my Portuguese language blog as many people do seem to look to me for my thoughts.

I will be going to Nenem’s mother’s wake this morning.

Tomorrow we have a meeting of the Action Child project leadership team all day. Please pray.

President Dilma re-elected

With 98% of the votes counted for the presidency the incumbant president is re-elected with 51.45% of the votes. A majority of about 3 million votes out of an electorate of 142 million. It was a very tight victory but she made it! Both the governor and president in which we voted were elected.

Governor Ricardo re-elected

Our Governor Ricardo Coutinho has been re-elected, as with 97% of the votes counted he is over 100,000 votes ahead and in an unassailable position! We are very happy!

80% counted in Paraíba

The incumbent governor continues in front with 52.51% of the votes

Two-thirds of votes counted in Paraíba

Current Governor continues in front with 52.45% of the votes.

Vote count reaches 42% in Paraíba

The incumbent Governor Ricardo Coutinho has 52.9% of the votes and his opponent has 47.1%. It’s tight but looking good for our candidate so far.

Polling ending

8 states in the south + the Federal capital Brasília have just ended voting. Next come the north-eastern states which end in about 30 minutes and then we go across the other Brazilian time zones to wrap everything up at 7pm (10pm UK). Only then will we get the first president results but our state governor’s results will be in before then.

Last minute polls suggest our 2 chosen candidates for re-election have their noses in front, but Brazilian opinion polls are notoriusly unreliable so we will have to wait and see.

As a kid I always used to stay up with my Dad all night on election nights. Nowadays it’s a lot simpler with electronic balloting giving results within 2 or 3 hours over a vast country like Brazil!

Late voters!

Philip and Gylmara have just got back to Patos with about an hour and a half to spare before the voting stations close! Phew! They were in João Pessoa.

Another death

For those of you who know Nenem please pray for her right now as she has just lost her mother who was quite young. Nenem is the young woman who looks after our grandaughters Alice and Bia when their mum Sacha is working. She has been doing this work for years and is very much part of the family and more like an adopted daughter to Liz and I. Nenem’s mum was diagnosed with cancer a few months back and finally lost the battle. Nenem is beside herself with grief. Please pray.

Preached, Praised and Voted!

I led the service this morning which had an early start, owing to the elections, at 8am. It was a really lovely service with even one visitor in to hear the Gospel. PTL! I preached on Colossions 1:1-14 and it flowed great. God is good.

After the service Liz went with Sister Socorro Help to her Mother’s funeral to support her and I went to vote. Voting was very quick today as there were only two votes to make, as opposed to 5 last time. So now we await the results this evening which with the change in clocks in the UK means we should have the result for Governor at about 10pm (UK time) and midnight (UK time) for President. The UK is only 3 hours ahead of us now.

News from João Pessoa is of rampant vote buying by the candidate trying to defeat the incumbent governor. Sadly he never changes! In general it would seem that things are peaceful around the country. We watch and pray.

Election Day (final run-offs)

In less than two hours the polling stations will open in Paraíba State where we will be voting in the second round of the general election for State Governor and National President. The top two candidates from round one on October 5th now will find out who is to be the Governor and President for the next 4 years. I am voting for both incumbant candidates – Ricardo and Dilma.

In the light of the election we will be having our service today at 8am so I will have my breakfast now and then head for church. May God bless you this Sunday!

Spiritual Midnight

25 de outubro de 201412 de maio de 2026eabrazil

I have just got home with Liz from a wake where a 91 year old lady is laying in her coffin and will be buried tomorrow morning. She is the mother of Sister Socorro Help – a member of our Patos church.

The atmosphere at the wake is indescribable! It is total spiritual darkness. It is absolute oppression.

I have been to hundreds of catholic wakes over the years… but this was so so different! It hit me the minute I walked in the house. It was like a flashback to the middle ages!

The dead woman was probably one of the leading… perhaps the leader… of radical middle age Mariological ranty catholicism. Catholicism at its worst. The catholic taliban. Liz tells me she has been receiving letters from this woman for years trying to convert her to Mary!

At the wake one shift after another of chanting women, all glassy eyed, keep chanting memorized prayers. It is haunting. It is oppressive. It is spiritual darkness. Everything is Mary. They are all dressed in identical blouses with Mary written all over them.

I thought within one minute of getting in the place… get me out of here… this is serious oppression. Then God spoke to my heart and said: “Look what I have done for Socorro Help (our church member – the daughter)! I have saved her from this together with her family”! And not only saved her but kept her for years despite intense pressure from the taliban! Lord have mercy! Thank you Jesus for your grace! I could almost hear Luther shouting out: “The just shall live by faith”! “He who the Son sets free is free indeed”!

We went and visited Socorro Help to talk to her and pray with her and she commented that she can’t stand it at her own mother’s wake. Please remember this dear sister and her family in your prayers! Her son is married and they go to our church but the taliban tell them they are not married and are living in sin because they weren’t married in a catholic church! Boy… Patos sure needs the Gospel!

Election run-offs tomorrow

25 de outubro de 201412 de maio de 2026eabrazil

The second and final stage of the Brazilian general elections will be tomorrow, with voting from 8am to 5pm. We will be voting for the State Governor of Paraíba and the national President. I have long declared my support for the re-election of the Governor of Paraíba – my friend Ricardo Coutinho. I will of course be voting for him and hoping and praying for success as he has been a fantastic governor in his first term of office and we badly need him to carry on the good work. He has, for example, over the past 4 years tarmacked more roads than could ever have been imagined! This is a fantastic help to EAB as we can get round the field so much easier and quicker. Places like Curral Velho and Passagem are now reached by tarmacked roads. It is wonderful! Even the road which links Ibiara to Manaíra has been tarmacked and that was an unbelievably terrible road.

I have only this morning declared my vote for president as this has been a much more difficult decision to take. I will be voting for the re-election of President Dilma. The decision has been difficult because on the one hand I have long recognized the tremendous social benefits to the poor that her party has brought since it came to power 12 years ago. On the other hand they have serious internal problems with corruption and some positions which I do not like as a Christian. However one never finds the ideal candidate so weighing everything up I have come to the conclusion that the work done for the poor is outstanding and this has tipped the balance and decided my vote.

Having declared my vote I said on facebook that I am just being up front, but will not get involved in arguments about the matter and asked people to respect this. Those who don’t – like one brother who has told me that evangelicals couldn’t possible vote for the re-election of Dilma – and went on with loads of arguments about different things – has had his comments eliminated from my page as I am just not going to be drawn in to arguments about this. I have prayed and thought and read a lot for weeks to bring me to my decision which I take very seriously – so there we are.

We should have the result for Governor probably by 7pm tomorrow (11pm UK time) and the result for President about 9pm I would guess (1am UK time). We watch and pray.

I have just heard that Sister Socorro Help’s mother has died. Sister Socorro Help is a member of our church and her mother was a staunch Roman Catholic in her 90s. The funeral will be at 8am tomorrow morning which is the same time as our church service – so we will have to somehow do both. Liz has just gone charging over to Sister Socorro Help to support her as she is …

Back from Birdwatching

24 de outubro de 201412 de maio de 2026eabrazil

I got back to Patos at 11am after two exhasting but exhilarating days in the dry woods of western Paraíba in the County of Conceição and in the more humid state of Ceará in the County of Barbalha. I made little contact here on my blog as the internet link in my little hotel at night was useless.

Day one (Wednesday) saw me undertake the most strenuous decent and climb back out of a deep canyon at Mata Grande in Conceição. I was so pleased with how I coped physically with hours of walking and climbing in very hot weather and stony uneven terrain. The most exiting finds were three new Woodpeckers, which takes me up to 301 registers of Brazilian birds! There was the Golden-green Woodpecker, the Crimson-crested Woodpecker and the Ochre-backed Woodpecker! All are absolutely beautiful! Staggering!

Day two (Thursday) saw me setting out 15 minutes earlier than the previous day at 4.45am, having got up at 3.45am. We drove into the State of Ceará and I photographed again the fantastic ‘Araripe Manakin’ (see photo)

which was only discovered in 1996 and which is on the international Birdlife list as “in critical danger of extinction”. These are breathtaking moments! David Attenborough was a great fan and supporter of this bird.

We got back to Conceição at 7.30pm and still went out looking for Nightjars/hawks till about 10.30pm! My Baptist pastor friend and I are as mad as each other! I got to bed just before midnight having not found a thing for our night travels!

I called in to visit the local EAB/ACEV pastor in Conceição this morning together with his wife. I had a lovely chat with them and was so pleased to hear how well the church is now going there. They are discipling 10 new converts which includes an entire family which used to be a regional music band and who now praise and worship Jesus.

Upon driving through Ibiara on the way back to Patos I spotted Ben Price’s vehicle and tried to see in which shop he was, but as I was unsuccessful I pressed on home as I was ready for a cup of tea! Thank you Lord for a lovely week! “The earth is the Lord’s and everything that is in it”!

On the road

22 de outubro de 201412 de maio de 2026eabrazil

As I am on the road I have little time to blog and I am very tired. I got to Conceição at about 8pm last night and was out birding all day with my friend Fred. I will be off again in the morning early at 4.30am. It has been a very good day with my tally of bird registers in Brazil passed the 300 mark at 301. Today I photographed 3 new species of large woodpeckers! Absolutely beautiful!

Empty arm day

21 de outubro de 201412 de maio de 2026eabrazil

Having had my series of routine bi-monthlyish blood tests done this morning I have survived to live another day despite a morning with an empty arm! The results thus far received online are excellent:

Glucose before breakfast 5.5 / Glucose HBA1C 5.3% / Thyroid T4+TSH levels correct / Cholesterol fine. So PTL!

I have been working on a variety of administrative issues and will be shortly going on a bit of a trip with my Baptist pastor friend who is a nature lover like myself, so I will keep you informed of any good sightings or discoveries.

A good Monday

20 de outubro de 201412 de maio de 2026eabrazil

Last night’s service in Patos was good and the sermon on the “Joy of the Lord is our Strength” seemed to encourage many people, so that’s good.

Today has been a good day. I was up at 5.20 and was off to Green Pastures after an early breakfast. There I discovered that the Mucuna Pruriens giant creeper plants (see photo) I have planted there, and which are appreciated by the animals as food, are being attacked by the wild guinea pigs, so we took emergency measures with old pipes to protect them up to a height that the wild guinea pigs can’t get them. I also collected a couple of carrier bags full of Tamarind fruits as these are excellent to combat glucose in the blood. They have quite a twang to them!

Tomorrow morning I have my bi-monthly routine blood tests to do so no eating for 12 hours prior to these – and another empty armed morning to face tomorrow!

The politics is very hot now with the second round run-offs on Sunday for Governor and President. By Sunday night we will have the results. Watch this space!

QPR score 4!

19 de outubro de 201412 de maio de 2026eabrazil

QPR scored 4 but lost 3 x 2 to Liverpool with 2 own goals. Vargas was brought on with 12 minutes to go and scored twice for the Rrrrs. Definitely lock up ‘Arry in some place for treatment! It’s no good talking about who deserved what. Football is won by who scores more goals and that’s it. But it was heartbreaking to lose it like we did after coming back from behind twice. Very sad. By the way Balotelli is a pathetic replacement at Liverpool for Luiz Soares. Luckily for him the QPR defenders put the ball in the net when he couldn’t despite an open goal.

Oh well – that leaves Rangers more rock bottom than ever. I think I’ve seen this film before.

Donating to EAB

19 de outubro de 201412 de maio de 2026eabrazil

Anybody who is able to and would like to donate to the work of EAB (Evangelical Action Brazil) can please do so online at http://www.eabrazil.com/ . The Mission has worked in NE Brazil for 76 years and has an integral mission vision for the work of the Church of Jesus Christ. That is: we believe in and seek to live out preaching and practicing the Gospel – which is the whole of God’s message of love for the whole man – body, soul and spirit. It’s no good just talking about it – you’ve got to DO it!

Half an hour to go

19 de outubro de 201412 de maio de 2026eabrazil

There’s half an hour to the QPR x Liverpool kick-off and ‘Arry has made 5 changes, but still leaves Vargas on the bench who scored 2 for Chile last week! Why buy him? If ‘Arry can’t cope with Spanish speakers who aren’t fluent in Cockney it is a problem. Oh well! My forecast is 0 x 1 at half-time and 1 x 3 full-time. I can’t see us getting even a draw but I hope I’m wrong of course.

I have done a good bit of exercise in the pool this morning early. I need to round off my sermon for tonight in Patos now. Looking forward to it. I love preaching more and more!

Photos of the EAB Celebration

An album of photos of the EAB Celebration is now available at https://www.facebook.com/eabrazil

‘Sweet & Sour’ – My sermon at EAB’s 76th AGM

Normal
0

false
false
false

PT-BR
X-NONE
X-NONE

/* Style Definitions */
table.MsoNormalTable
{mso-style-name:”Tabela normal”;
mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0;
mso-tstyle-colband-size:0;
mso-style-noshow:yes;
mso-style-priority:99;
mso-style-qformat:yes;
mso-style-parent:””;
mso-padding-alt:0cm 5.4pt 0cm 5.4pt;
mso-para-margin:0cm;
mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt;
line-height:115%;
mso-pagination:widow-orphan;
font-size:11.0pt;
font-family:”Calibri”,”sans-serif”;
mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri;
mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin;
mso-fareast-font-family:”Times New Roman”;
mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-fareast;
mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri;
mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin;}

The Psalmist
exclaims in Psalm 126

“The Lord has done great things for us, and we are filled with joy…
those who sow in tears will reap with songs of joy. He who goes out weeping
carrying seeds to sow, will return with songs of joy, carrying sheaves with
him”.

The sweet and
sour of Christian service has been our experience throughout another year
working with EAB in north-eastern Brazil. EAB never hides the tears just to
tell the good stories of joy – and this year has been a roller-coaster ride in
the Mission – but as I come to report back to you tonight I am happy to say
that God is faithful and the final result of the mountains and valleys is
expressed in the words of the Psalmist: “The
Lord has done great things for us, and we are filled with joy… those who sow in
tears will reap with songs of joy”.

The sour side
of 2014 started back in January with my ill health which really was a headache
and saw me having more tests and medical exams over a period of months than you
would want to imagine! I became very ill with eyesight difficulties, hearing
impaired, speech difficulties, concentration problems and even my ability to
walk was affected – and the problem was that the annual Carnival Camp was fast
approaching in the first week of March at Green Pastures and I just couldn’t
lead it as usual.

The sweet
side to this was that God raised up our son Philip to take on this
responsibility and he did a great job. God really used him, gave him the calm
authority needed to lead 400 mainly young people throughout the four to five
day event and the Lord also gave Philip the spiritual wisdom and anointing to
lead all the services. The result was a resounding verdict by those present
that it was “the best camp ever” over the past 35 years since we started when
Philip was just a year old! All glory be to God! “The Lord has done great things for us, and we are filled with joy…
those who sow in tears will reap with songs of joy”.

Prior to this
camp EAB had held its annual 10-day Outreach at Itaporanga with a 60-strong
team from a variety of our churches. This brought a new lease of life to the
local church and a number of new converts. At Itaporanga they are now in the
process of increasing the size of the building to cope with the people.

However it
was immediately after the Carnival Camp that something we had all been
praying for finally happened. For the heavens opened, bringing two and a half
years of drought

EAB’s 76th Celebration was blessed

The annual EAB Celebration has just ended and it was really good. The P&W was excellent and a good number of supporters turned up. The live Skype link worked well as it has done so all day. Thanks to everyone who made the effort to be there. It is encouraging and appreciated. I felt free and well preaching. PTL!

EAB Board Meeting

I have just finished taking part in the EAB Board meeting via Skype and all went very well. Many important subjects were discussed like adjustments to the Action Child programme in 2015 and general discussion on the annual field report.

Now it’s all stations go for the buffet tea at 5.30pm (I filled Hazel in with some last minute recipes) and then the 76th annual Celebration starting at 7pm. May God bless us all!

EAB AGM Day