McKinney Report

I traveled to Feira de Santana, which is in the state of Bahia. It would have been about an 11 hour drive non-stop by car. I took a plane, which was cheaper anyways, a two hour flight and then a two hour ride from the airport. I went to teach on "The Mission of the Church". I had read a book called: The Mission of God's People by Christopher Wright and decided to base the direction of the class on chapters from his book. The church in Feira de Santana began about four years ago and now has around 40 members. I taught for about 14 hours on this subject and also on contentment as a way of life for Christians. I was greatly encouraged by their love for God and their desire to see God's kingdom grow. Most are young in their faith and still have questions about the Christian life. We read a lot from 1 Peter and saw that we will eventually suffer if we are perseverant in doing God's will. We talked a lot about being a blessing for others and continu

There are days that will stand out in your mind for weeks, some months or even years.  Other stories may live on through your children and grandchildren and still other stories may die with you.  I don't know which category this story will fall into but I do hope you enjoy it.  Don't feel bad if you laugh.  I did. Monday : A couple of weeks after arriving back in Brazil, I took our car to the mechanic.  You can't work on your car here or people will start complaining.  It was a rainy day, we had a hard rain early on and then it began to taper off.  Anyway, I was at the mechanic and I went walking to buy a part for the car.  There is no sidewalk.  I was walking along the side of the road, just off to the edge, to stay out of the way of the cars.  Because of all the rain there were some puddles of water in my path.  I came upon one puddle that I did not want to step in so I stepped off in the road where there was a wet board leaning up against the curb (a curb with no

AME is João Pessoa's AIM-type program that gives kids training and opportunity for hands-on mission work. For six months we have worked with about ten part-time students, but this week the full timers begin. These are six young people, who are at the age to begin college, but have decided to put that on hold for two years to dedicate themselves to God's mission. Coming Week's Activities: Saturday - Inaugural Dinner for Students, their families, Teachers, and supporters. Sunday - Presentation of the New Students to the Jardim Luna congregation. Monday-Thursday - Classes (6 - 8 hours a day) Friday - Rest Saturday and Sunday - Involvement/assistance in local congregation/getting experience in the work. More details later. Join us in prayer for these six missionaries in the making – May God be praised!

    We took four carloads of teenagers to Campina Grande for a short campaign in the AME program. These kids spent three Saturdays (Morning and Afternoon) preparing to share Christ there. The plan was to hand out pamphlets, make friends with local teenagers, invite them to group dynamic games and to a Bible study at night. But once on the campaign, things did not go as planned: The central park, which is always open and filled with tons of people, was closed for fifteen days for renovation,   Therefore local teenagers that had been invited had no where to meet up with us for the afternoon of games;   A new building for the church had been rented and was to be inaugurated during the campaign, but the owner delayed on fixing something and wouldn't hand over the keys;   So the meeting was set up outside in a yard with chairs, powerpoint projector, etc, but even though we are technically in a drought, it rained and everybody had to rush to cram indoors;   And one of our cars brok

While in Patos teaching, I met with the workers from Belém, Patos, Emas, and Caatingueira. We discussed how they are doing in their efforts to train other men to replace what they do so that they will be able to travel, evangelize, and maybe even move to another city to establish a new congregation. Their goal for this meeting was to have someone trained to organize and guide the worship service and also be able to teach. They all met this goal and seemed excited about things going on in their congregations. We discussed our overall goal which continues to be to establish a congregation in Pombal, a city an hour's drive from Patos. We also set new goals to be accomplished before the next meeting: train one more person to do the same as the one just prepared, train the one you just prepared to train someone else, and train a woman to be able to study, disciple, and mature other women. There is a lot to be done. Please pray that: These men of God will contin

Think of coming out of a freezer and walking into an oven. That is close to what I felt when I arrived in Brazil after spending 2 ½ months in the States. I know it was not all that cold this past winter, but I still felt the difference. Thank you, God, for giving us winter, spring, and then summer. Jumping from winter to summer is a shock. Well, after a couple of weeks back I traveled to Patos with Elias who is one of our full-time workers and coordinates the SEARA (Servants Sent to Announce the Kingdom of Love – I know the acronym doesn't match but it does in Portuguese). He taught 1 & 2 Peter and Judas, and I taught on the book of James. It was nice to hear someone else teach, and he did a great job. Elias is leaving us to work with a church in the South of Brazil. He will be greatly missed. I am now coordinating SEARA courses and classes in Patos. While we were in Patos, we were told of two baptisms just a couple of weeks before. We also had the privilege of

I first went to Alagoinha around the year 2001, because someone with whom I was studying the Bible insisted I go tell his in-laws. I went and taught many times (maybe for a year) and then stopped going for a time because no one seemed interested in following Jesus. After a year or so, I kept getting calls that someone wanted to begin the church in this city. I went along with Ricardo and talked with Antônio Germano. He had been baptized biblically so he began a meeting in his garage, and the church grew. After some time many of the members left for different reasons, most of which were personal problems that they could not (or should I say did not want to?) resolve. The church, though, is still meeting in a rented house close to the center of the small city. Last night, I saw for the first time the in-laws of Rodrigo, the one that insisted I go and teach. Almost the entire family is now excited about studying the Bible and asked me to come back and study with them. Twelve ye

     It wasn't planned, but four missionary families returned to Brazil on the same day, on the same flight: the Newlins, the Palks, the Hagewoods, and my family. There was talk of having a Gospel meeting in the sky or even hijacking the plane to heaven, but since we boarded at 11pm after a full day of traveling to Miami, we sort of conked out.     Our stay in the good ole United States of America was refreshing (especially getting away from Brazil's tropical summer), renewing ties, reporting on the work, some of us traveling all the way from Georg ia to Arizona, spending time with friends and family, hopefully encouraging everyone we made contact with to love the lost and continue to invest in missions, and being encouraged by seeing the Father working in your lives. We didn't get to see everybody we wanted to, but we ask God to take care of you until we meet again.     We have been here a little under a month, but it seems like six months with getting the kids st