McKinney Report

To our Family in Christ, Thank you so much for striving with us in prayer. I'm feeling a little overwhelmed, seeing how serious a health problem my son Samuel had, seeing God working in wonderful ways. It's hard to fathom it all: one week we are trying to cure his diarrhea, the next major intestinal surgery is being performed to remove an 11.2 cm adenocarcinoma. One day the doctors are grim about the swollen lymph nodes that were removed, the next they are amazed that they are clean. Last night the oncologist told us that this tumor is rare in young people. In fact, though he works at one of Brazil`s leading cancer centers, Samuel now holds the record for being the youngest he's seen, 13 years old - Samuel loves breaking records. Today at a medical conference, Samuel's case will be discussed with Brazil's leading cancer specialists. The suspicion is that he has a mutated PT53 gene - Samuel was excited about the possibility of being a mutant. So Samuel

Samuel had major colon surgery on Saturday. Sunday, Monday and Tuesday were rough: pain in spite of all the painkillers, nausea, not wanting to put anything in his mouth, throwing up several times a day, hardly sleeping at night, etc. Each day doctors asking if his intestine started functioning, but we had no signs of that. I kept telling Samuel, "It's going to get better." But he would just say, "I'm tired of all this. I want out of here." Everybody we know has been praying for Samuel, and we have seen God working in wonderful ways. Edda and I have been taking turns fasting this week, but the church in João Pessoa decided to fast together on Tuesday for his recovery. Tuesday started the same: throwing up three time in the morning and constant nausea, but in the afternoon it started to disappear. Though not hungry, he downed some soup and kept it down. The night was restful. Some would say coincidence, but trusting in the all powerful

Dear Family in Christ, Lori Hagewood and her kids, Mathias, Sabrina, and Daniel, tried to estimate how many people were praying for Samuel, and they came up with one thousand, six hundred and forty. But from the messages, we believe that estimate is conservative. We give glory to God for what He is doing in Samuel's life. And we thank each one of you for lifting his name up in prayer. We are now in recuperation stage, 1st day after the surgery. He bathed and is getting used to pain, counted his 14th shot for the year, and is sleeping a lot. His diet is liquid, but he still isn't interested in eating. Pretty soon we are getting up to take a walk. Here are a couple of pictures right after he got back from the surgery. The surgery was a success. Keep praying for a speedy recuperation and the biopsy. blessings to all, Joseph and Edda

I just received a call from Joseph McKinney from São Paulo, letting me know that Samuel will have surgery tomorrow morning on his intestines.  Please pray that everything will go o.k.  God bless you all, Jeremy Newlin

         In times of sickness, our life gets interrupted or put on hold, and our sole desire is to get better, to get back to normal, to our daily routine. We still have a time to wait though. Samuel has been through a battery of tests to see the cause of his chronic diarrhea. The doctors found an "extense, vegetative, hardened, irregular lesion" about 30 cm up his intestine, and it is partially blocking his intestine. We are now waiting for the biopsy to tell us what it is and what to do. According to the doctors, it could be a tumor (unlikely since intestinal tumors in children are very rare), bacterial infection (like tuberculosis, yes, it can get you in your intestine), or Crohn's disease.           Samuel is being a good sport. He is about to be cured of his trypanofobia (fear of needles). He just can't stand his diet: only a special milk for Crohn's disease patients, no food, no water, nothing else.           We appreciate the prayers of everyone.

Please put Samuel on your prayer lists. He has had chronic diarrhea for two months. We have given his treatments for worms, then amebas, then antibiotics for infections, but to no avail. Now we are scheduled to go to Recife on Friday to do every exam possible to find out what`s wrong with him. He is thirteen years old and has lost 5 kg. At this point it could be some sort of food intolerance to something more serious. So please join us in prayer for our boy. Joseph and Edda McKinney

Yes, Brazil has survived another winter – no snow, though, Jack Frost didn’t make an appearance in João Pessoa and was no need to pull out the long sleeve shirts – we did have a little more rain, and the temperature was about 10 degrees cooler in the evenings – it’s pleasant. Some Brazilians think they are freezing, but you would just laugh at them. Most schools have the month of July off for vacation. Yeah, vacation! That means lots of time to spend with the family, yeah right. The first week of July was João Pessoa’s Vacation Bible School. This is the 11 th year we have had it since the Joelton church of Christ’s youth group came down and helped us get it started. The theme this year was True Nature Survivor , and we helped the kids learn to have character qualities that Jesus wants them to have. Monica Newlin managed the team of workers that made this event possible. VBS is always a lot of fun and a lot of work, but children look forward to it all year round. Th