You Never Forget Your First Job

During our "winter" month of July, where temperatures got down to the low 70's and the high's in the mid 80's, Nicholas' worked for 15 hours a week at a mechanic shop. This was during the school break. The purpose was for Nicholas to learn responsibility (getting up and going to work during the three days a week that he set up to go), work ethic (honest and hard work), and financial responsibility (learning that a man must work to take care of his family and how to administer the money received from working).

He received money from Reinaldo, his mentor, the first week. After that week Monica and I paid him for a week's work. I did not tell Nicholas that he was going to receive money for working. Monica and I had decided to pay him 15 reals (the Brazilian money) per week, but we did not tell him. At the end of the month he would finish working and begin asking for his "salary." After receiving it, he had to divide it up into giving, saving and spending.

He said he did not learn anything. He said all he did everyday was loosen and tighten nuts and bolts. But he did take brake pads off, change a tire, help put an engine in and take one out, take a hood off of a pick-up truck, pump the brakes to bleed them, etc...

I saw that he has a different perspective when hearing the word "work". He seems more ready to serve and help without complaining. He did not complain much before anyways now it is even less. As we were going down the road one day, he saw someone with a wrench in his hand, and he said, "Look, that is a 18 mm wrench!" He grew while only working 15 hours a week for four weeks. He is 14 years old and will be leaving home in about four years. It is time to start putting into practice what we have been teaching him these 14 years.

Comments

Our Women: Shining Stars in the Universe

Unity Through The Word

Thank you all for your prayers for the PORMISSOES meeting last month. It was a great blessing. We sat and studied God's Word together for the entire day. There were some differences of understanding on some passages, but we worked our way through them. In the end, everyone was saying how the meeting was edifying. It started around 9:30 am. We broke for lunch at 1 pm. We started back around 2:30 and went until 6 pm. They wanted to keep going, but the SEARA class started at 7 pm. If every meeting could be as encouraging as this one, we would be in heaven. My goal with these meetings is to teach the church workers throughout the state how to listen to someone who has a different belief about God's Word, try to understand their logic, their thought processes and share their own understanding from the Bible. My hope is that God's Word is heard above their personal wants, desires, or traditions. This is no

Sharing Jesus in Mexico

by Renato Menezes Renato is the second young person from João Pessoa to go through the Adventures in Missions program. His 18 months is Mexico is about to end, and undoubtedly he has grown tremendously in his faith during these past two years. Here is his report on his personal Bible studies: Praise God I started studying the Bible with one more person since last month, raising the number of weekly Bible studies to four. Ema is one of the main people that work at the orphanage where we have a ministry (the children from there call her mother). She would visit the church before, but stopped because of work and other things, but in the last months, she not only started coming again, but brought her daughter too. Some Sundays ago I offered a Bible study, and she accepted happily (I was happy too). So then Ramiro and I began to meet weekly with her to study the book of John. We talked about the importance of baptism and about whether her baptism was Bib

McKinney Report

Search This Blog