Lindy and Carol Drake your connection to tribal missions Guanano Church Planting Team Lindy and Carol Drake, Barry and Denise Spor
June 2009
Praise: Mario and Getulio, Guanano Bible teachers, have gained some good experience. They have taught the first 8 lessons of the 68 lesson series From Creation to Christ. They are growing more comfortable standing before a group and teaching without being glued to the paper lesson. As they have taught the stories of the creation of the world and the creation of the first man and woman, they have majored on the goodness, loving kindness and greatness of God. Pray: Teaching anything is hard work. Time must be set aside to prepare and think the material through so that the presentation of truth is clear and concise. Getulio said, "I get on my bike and sell bread door to door all over town. By late afternoon when I get home I’m tired. But I try to sit down and study the Bible lesson some time before I go to bed. About 4:00 am, when I can’t sleep anymore, I get up and prepare to go out on my bread selling route again. But before I go, I sit down and study the lesson some more. Do you suppose God is pleased with me?" I was a little surprised by his question. These guys have come out of such a rough background. They have been beaten down by Satan and told over and over again they are bad. In many ways they have confirmed that evaluation over and over again by the way they lived. What a change the Gospel has made in Getulio’s life! It was my privilege to encourage him. "What you are doing demonstrates to God that you think his Message is important. So important in fact, that you are giving up other things in order to be able to teach it to others. You are doing what he has asked you to do, and I think He is very pleased with you!"
Praise: We finished teaching the believers the book of Revelation. Now they have heard the whole story: how things got started and how they are going to end. They are encouraged with the good things that are ahead for them, and concerned about the fate of their friends and relatives who fail to trust Christ as they have. That’s a pretty good perspective for them to have.
Praise: Translated portions of the Old Testament from Leviticus to Judges are in the hands of Larry Richardson, the consultant, who will begin content and comprehension checks soon. Verification is in process on the book of Exodus.
Praise: We are in Manaus, on our way to Kansas City to attend Kelly’s pinning ceremony at the end of RN training. We are going to be together there with all three of our girls, along with Kelly’s husband Andrew, and our grandson Xander. Xander will celebrate his 4th birthday while we are home. How cool is that? We will also be in NY for five days to visit my Mom and my brothers Les and Lyell and their families. Carol will also get to see her sisters and their families. Pray: that we don’t get hurt with all the hugging and kissing going on.
Praise: Barry and Denise, our coworkers, in our absence, are receiving a work team headed up by their son, Evan. The church group is coming from Wisconsin. They are going to build a system for pumping well water to our houses. Until now we have depended on rain water. Fortunately, since we live in a rain forest, we have seldom lacked water but we would like to be able to have a clean source of drinking water. Pray: for safety, that the team will adjust to the different climate and culture and that their interest in missions will be refueled by their experiences.
Pray: When we return to Brazil in mid-July, there will be big changes in store for us. Barry and Denise are going home to the USA on a one year furlough the end of this month. They are extending that by an extra year in order to help their youngest son Austin. During the next two years, his junior and senior years of high school, they will be helping him make the adjustments from being an MK living overseas with his parents to being an independent adult in the United States. We will have our own adjustments to make here without the Spors. However it’s time to rely more on the Guananos and time for them to rely more on the Lord. This will create the perfect opportunity for both of us to do just that.
Thank you for your participation in the Guanano work through prayer.
