Rural evangelism

Rural evangelism has been resumed in the County of Flores in Pernambuco State by Pastor Nemias (Nehemiah) and his wife Fátima. They have loudspeakers on the top of their car to allow them to conduct short open-air services in farming communities. They feel that the pandemic has improved enough so as to permit such open-air services in this way.

I had a good and long online meeting yesterday with the EAB Action School leaders of our Princesa Isabel and Patos schools. It was very good. 

Our projects team has been visiting market garden projects at Patuscada and Quebra Joelhos (break knees) Communities yesterday. The agricultural expert was with the team to give tips and advice. The team also visited Barra de Oitis to see how the building of the new toilet/shower unit there is going. They were pleased to see the work has advanced a lot since their last visit. I imagine it will be finished next week.

This week I prepared a sermon for tomorrow night's service at Green Pastures. We value your prayers for the weekly service with the farming folk in that region at which I will be preaching.

I finished reading a short 100-page book this week on spirituality, which was written by a Brazilian friend of mine who lives at Fortaleza. In the first part of the book Carlos Queiroz does a critique of Roman Catholic, Prosperity theology and other shallow evangelical spiritualities. In the second part he emphasizes that grace, love, humility, faith and justice are the essential elements of true evangelical spirituality. 

Men's Fellowship

Last night the Patos Men's Fellowship went up the mountain to Teixeira to take part in the service there of the EAB/ACEV church led by Pastor Maésio. It was lovely to see 27 mostly men travel there on a Tuesday evening and take part in a lively fashion. 2 brought words of testimony and 1 preached. The objective of such trips is to encourage fellowship between the 2 churches.

Unfortunately the drug addict who was supposed to be taken to the rehabilitation centre yesterday backed out at the last minute. Our team was ready to take him at 6 am as agreed but he didn't show up. Please pray for this man who can't be named.

Yesterday President Bolsonaro paraded tanks and armoured vehicles in the heart of the capital Brasília to threaten the country with a military coup as he sees it is unlikely that he will be re-elected next year. The man is plain evil yet sadly is backed by the majority of evangelical Christians but certainly not me. Please pray for a peaceful democratic transition of power next year and that Bolsonaro will not be able to imitate his idol Trump.

We were very encouraged to see 11 in the Monday night youth prayer meeting. This week I have been catching up with a lot of administrative work. Liz and I have had a meeting with the architect responsible for the revamp of our Care Centre and it is good to see that the project is developing well. We praise God for funds now in for 2 new wells and 4 new chicken runs. These funds have been forwarded to our projects team. The team has drilled a well today at Saco dos Pintos Community in Princesa Isabel County, which hit plenty of good water I am pleased to say. This well was previously funded. The team is also in the middle of constructing a new toilet/shower unit at Barra de Oitis. 

"Million Dollars"

I led the service last night in Patos and I preached as well. A brother called Dedé came up to me after the service and said I had preached a "million dollar" sermon! 😀 He didn't give me a million dollars but he did make it clear that he'd been blessed which was great. Yesterday was Father's Day in Brazil so we had a special fathers slot in the service too. The whole service went well.

Yesterday saw the maiden flight between Patos and Recife so it was a real historical day. Flights will be daily from now on with the company Azul (blue). This should be a big help for us on trips to and from the UK cutting out the long and grueling 6 to 7 hour road trip.

Tomorrow morning at 6 am another drug addict will be taken by our young assistant pastor Rafael to the Santa Rita, near João Pessoa, drugs recovery centre. This will be the fifth man we have at the centre at the present time. Please pray. The man who is going tomorrow wears an electronic ankle monitor owing to previous troubles with the law, and he had to get special authorization from the judge to be able to travel.

Saturday night's service at Green Pastures was a real blessing. Liz and I went early to sweep the meeting hall from dust and leaves and put the chairs out duly spaced. Normally Francisco, who takes care of Green Pastures, puts the chairs our and his wife Leca sweeps the hall, but they were busy with Francisco's grandfather, Sr. Heleno, who had had an emergency appendicitis operation. Praise the Lord Sr. Heleno is now home and recovering well.

C & A

Our granddaughter Louisa, who is in her final semester of Law School and has now started Bible College, said to us last night that she was going to visit the C & A store with her boyfriend which opened in Patos this week! She was shocked when I told her that I used to go to such a store in Kensington High Street when I was a child. She was also surprised to learn that C & A was founded in Germany in 1841. Anyway Louisa liked the store in Patos which is a sort of tourist attraction!

Yesterday Liz and I took 24 new fruit tree seedlings (Mango, Guava, Orange, Lemon) to plant at Green Pastures. We also checked the work being done to revamp some buildings in preparation for the re-opening of the use of our Christian Conference Centre in October (DV).

We will be holding a service again at Green Pastures this evening. I will be taking the monthly communion service.

Outbreak

There is an outbreak of Covid cases at the village of Barra de Oitis which is quite alarming and causing much concern. EAB/ACEV does a lot of project and church work in this village which is desperately poor. So far this week 13 people have tested positive for Covid and many others have the symptoms and await tests. Please pray.

The construction of another toilet/shower unit is carrying on in this village despite the outbreak at the house of Cláudia and Jacleildo. The work is progressing well.

At Belém Village in Tavares County over 50 tree seedlings plus all the equipment were delivered for the setting up of a new market garden project which is under way. The family of Fernando and Sandra are very grateful for everything. This project is a classic example of 'helping people to help themselves' producing income with dignity as a result of hard work. Participants of the market garden project receive specialist advice from an agricultural expert and take part in our online WhatsApp group to share photos, questions etc.

I have finished reading two books this week. I recommend the Blitz Detective series by Mike Hollow. I have finished the second book in the series called the Canning Town Murder. Mike is a Christian friend who used to work for the BBC and Tearfund. It was while he was working for Tearfund that he visited us here in Brazil.

The other book I finished this week was 'The Story of the Church' by A.N. Renwick which gives a good overview of church history through the centuries. The more I study church history the more I find the enormous amount of violence and killings involved between religious factions to be quite unbelievably outrageous.    

Matureia

Yesterday I had an excellent meeting about the EAB Action School in Matureia with local pastor Renilson and his wife Getiane. Matureia is situated up in the Teixeira mountain range and has the highest peak in our State of Paraíba. Getiane is the head teacher of our school there and does a wonderful job. She reported to me on all aspects of the school and it is great to see the school going so well and really impacting this small town through the transformation of very needy children's lives. I also discussed the local EAB church with pastor Renilson and it was good to see him upbeat and encouraged about the progress of the church. Thank you for your prayers.

The neighbouring Teixeira church has a flourishing church plant in the rural area of the County at a community called Sabonete 1. I say flourishing because many people are attending the services there but only one family has made a commitment to Christ there thus far.

Here in Patos I am glad to report that a young woman has this week committed her life to Christ and is being duly involved into the youth fellowship of our church.

We have started this week building another toilet/shower unit at the village of Barra de Oitis. The construction is taking place in the back yard of Claudia and Jacleildo's mud and sticks house. All the family are very happy at the prospect of for the first time having a toilet/shower. Their children are particularly excited just like it was Christmas Eve! 

Saturday break

We had a nice break at Green Pastures on Saturday spending the whole day there with the family to celebrate our granddaughter Alice's 14th birthday. We stayed there for the weekly service that we hold there on Saturday nights and we led that. It was lovely to hear a Tropical Screech Owl joining us in the praise and worship! Surely this was a foretaste of eternity when in the new heavens and new earth all nature will join the angelic and human choirs in praise to God. It was very encouraging to see the local farming folk from around Green Pastures really joining in the service too with enthusiasm. Most of them present have made commitments to Christ and form a nice little farming congregation. One important family was missing because their old old banger of a car, which we jokingly call a Ferrari, completely packed up and left them stranded 6 km from the service.

I led last night's service in Patos and it was very good. The church was full to the capacity we are allowed by State law as everyone must be masked and one and a half meters apart. I say by Paraiba State law because if the president was listened to, at a federal national level, there would be no masks or social distancing!

Things have improved in Brazil as regards the pandemic and we are grateful to everyone for their prayers. Average daily deaths have dropped from 4,000 at their peak to 991. This is of course terribly high but it is a lot better than it was. Elizabeth and I remain very vigilant and careful as we are aware that the Chinese vaccine we have been given only gives us 50% cover for the Covid virus and is much less effective than the other vaccines administered in Brazil which are Astrazeneca and Pfizer. The problem is here you don't get a choice here so we took the Chinese Coronavac as it was better than nothing. We still value your prayers.