Baptisms & Other News

I am going back to Patos this weekend. I will not be teaching a seminar this time. I will be helping to plan the Grande Ceia (Great Supper) for the church throughout Paraíba in October. I will also be conducting a PORmissões meeting with the churches in the desert region of the state.

Their goal for the last PORmissões meeting was to prepare at least one man to take their place preaching, organizing the order of worship and teaching Bible studies. They all did so. The goal for them to accomplish for this meeting is to train the men they prepared to prepare another man to take his place. You may be asking why. The reason is so that they can leave their congregations and begin a new body of believers, not a different body of believers but "new" because they are "new" in Christ.

Two baptisms in Patos with one more close to picking up his cross. The names of the two baptized in Patos are Aldo and DaGuia. Anderson and Jessica, his wife, were baptized just two months before. They went after this couple, studied the Bible with them and are now meeting together in a city about 6 miles from Patos, called São José do Bomfim. A new congregation is born. They meet every Sunday. They bought 10 chairs with their own contribution and want to grow, and they have. Of course, Anderson and his wife were not alone. Two of the men that Luciano helped prepare baptized Anderson and Jessica. That is exciting!

In Cajazeiras, two teenagers were baptized, Leandro and Lucas. The church in Cajazeiras door-knocked around the church building, handing out invitations. One person came, Leandro. He never missed another church event over the 4 or so months before he was baptized. He is a quiet young man but ready to suffer for Christ. Lucas is the younger brother of one of the boys who is now a Christian through participation in the Passo Certo program (The Right Step Program) that teaches boys and girls about Christ using soccer as a means of contact with the kids and family members. The church now has around 40 members and growing. (I don't have pictures at this time but will send them as soon as I can.)

Please pray:

that these new Christians will grow and teach, at least, one more person about their Lord in the next year;
that God will continue to open people's hearts to believe and obey His Word;
that God will give us wisdom to train men and women to live a Christ-like life and share this life with others;
the church needs vision to guide those who do not know Christ back to their Creator.

Comments

"What About Baptism?"

Edda and I went to a nearby city to study the Bible with a family, Genilda (who is already a Christian), Ana, Mariana, Luiza, and Jefferson. While we were reading God's Word, Ana's husband, Silva, came in and sat down, and then blurted out: "What about baptism?" It took me by surprise because he has barely studied with us, but, most certainly, is already thinking about spiritual matters. Our Bible study then took a lot of detours, answering this question or that. Silva said he still has a lot of questions, and we pray that the Lord will use us to answer them, bringing him to understand the Good News!

One More Goodbye

This year has been rough for Borges's family. They lost a pillar in their family, his wife's mother in February. Now her brother has passed, buried today. He was diagnosed with prostrate cancer 18 months ago. A policeman, used to taking care of the family, he had to settle with being taken care of by the family as his body gradually shut down when the cancer metastasized to his bones. Borges and Geilza have spent every free moment taking care of Demilson's needs, and it has been torture watching him slowly wear away. His colleagues in the Military Police carried his casket, played taps on a trumpet, presented his family with a Paraiba flag, and thanked his family for supporting him in defending society for nearly thirty years. It was a nice gesture, but the event that gives us believers hope in the face of death is Jesus winning over the grave. He is our certainty that a grave is not the end.

Prayers and Fasting for our Families

One of the most devastating attacks of the enemy against God's people is when he invests in our families. We pray for protection for our loved ones, but we live in a world that never tires of trying to divide our families, constantly pulling and poking at our faith to find a vulnerable spot. The congregation in João Pessoa, in the face of one difficult situation after another, has taken a whole Sunday this month to stay together in prayer and fasting for our families. We are praying for couples in the church losing hope of solving their differences, Christian wives tearfully bearing the responsibility of maintaining the marriage with non-Christian husbands, mothers and daughters in unrelenting tugs of war, unemployment and financial strains, and the most shocking of all, one of our teenager, who is barely beyond childhood, confessed to the church that she is 8 months pregnant (her own mother only found out a week before). It g...

McKinney Report

Search This Blog