What the young people are up to

I thought that I would share this lovely picture with you. I received these marks playing a game at a young people's meeting. The game was based on alertness. Guess who was caught sleeping? Oh well I had a good time and the person who gave me the mustache got caught in his turn.

Baptism and Super Church

Last Sunday, we had a service in conjuction with all the other congregations that make up the church with which we work. Two men were baptized and an offering for missions was taken up. The pastor preached on GO from Matthew 28 and two ladies were saved. One of them was the wife of one of the men baptized. We had a great service!

I am also involved in something we call Super Church. It is church for children. This is something new we are starting up and will take place during the main service for adults. We are very excited about this new venture and have been working hard on special themes, getting songs together, coordinating the people involved, and planning a special service for March. This special service will allow the children to invite their friends and family to a service where the Gospel will be preached. Please pray for us as we go forward that we will follow the Lord's leading and reach many children for Him.

The Holidays

The Christmas Program went amazingly well. The children had memorized their lines very well and even the smallest person did an excellent job. We had lots of visitors and a guest speaker. He is a missionary here and living by faith. So the congregation took up a food offering for him and his family. We also bought presents for his two sons. We had a food fellowship afterwards. It was a great time of fellowship.

We are moving to a new building. The old one is very small and the children's classroom is right next to the auditorium. It is very hard to keep kids quite so they don't interrupt the services. The new building has an upstairs and a downstairs. This allows the children to be downstairs and the adults upstairs and I have tried it out, very little noise is heard upstairs even when the basement is full of adults not trying to be quiet. YES!!

When I get pictures. I will post them here on the blog.

As far as my knitting goes I have started a new blog with my knitting projects. So if you want to see what is on my needles you can go to the new blog. It is called Knit and Learn.

Christmas is just around the corner

Yes I know. It isn't even November yet and I have talked about Christmas at least twice. I just wanted to update you on what we are doing. In Barcelos, we are using Bible verses as a kind of play. The big plus is after the play all the kids will have memorized a lot of verses.

In Povoa, we will be doing a play with the teenagers about the women in the family of Jesus. This has always facinated me how God used women that others would shun to bring the perfect Son of God into this world.

In Braga, we are having an international Christmas and singing Silent Night in 6 different laguages, English, French, German, Romanian, Spanish and finally, Portuguese. We have representatives of these cultures and more in this congregation.

I have also been busy translating 'Passion and Purity' by Elizabeth Elliot, the Satan's Traps notes, and a set of trivia questions from a Bible Trivia game. The Game is for the teenagers to help them learn more about the Bible.

I would really like to hear what you are doing for Christmas.

Wow Where does the time go?

The last two weeks have been a bit challenging. The last full week of September I attended a Fundamentals of the Faith conference in Southern Portgual. It was a great time of fellowship, singing and preaching. The theme was 'If God is for it then I am too!' There was preaching on music, doctrinal separation, life, marriage, and many more. Each pastor that preached did a great job. I was able to see friends I had not seen in some time and meet more friends that I did not know I had.

On the way to catch a ride to the conference, my car engine stopped in the middle of the highway. I was able to get to the side of the road without incident but it was very scary. I attended the conference and put the matter of my car in God's hands. When I came back, I talked with the mechanic and he told me that the car was just so much junk and that I would be better off getting a new car. SOO to make a long story even longer, I now have a new car. I thank God that no one was hurt when my engine stopped working and that I have a new car so quickly.

On a more personal level, I am busy with translation, knitting for Christmas and Christmas play practice. I am also busy training my kitties. They are such wonderful company but also a lot of work. Oh well, that is the way most worthwhile things are. Hope you all are enjoying God's blessings!

Well the flu came, then it went

Thank you for all your prayers for the campers and I. We were quarentined for about a week and had to take the awfullest medicine I have ever put in my mouth. It was like chewing up asprin, then putting it in water and swallowing the mixture. As I said absolutly gross. (shudder, shudder)

Anyway, I am happy to report that all of us are doing well. We made it through the quarentine with our health intact. So thank you for praying for us.

Camp and The Aftermath

Camp was great this year. We took 36 campers to camp with about half of them unsaved, when we came back from camp that was no longer true. Just out of our group 8 had received Jesus as their personal Savior and many more from our group dedicated their lives to the Lord. That has been the highlight of camp. The lowest point came after camp when several of our campers were diagnosed with Gripe A (Swine Flu). Many of us including myself have been confined to quarters and medicated for the next 5 days. I personally do not have the disease but they are taking no chances that I may develope it because I was in contact with it. Please pray for us as we go through this time of testing.

And now for what you have been waiting for... Pictures!!