Friday, June 18, 2004
After the Reformed Baptist Conference.
We arrived back 23.30 on Monday night (14th). All the journeys have gone well; no one so far as we know has suffered an accident or an armed robbery. God chose in his providence to preserve us through hours of travel by car, plane, and a 12 seater van over holey roads at speeds of up to 120 Km/h. The Conference was great! A total of 100 people registered. Other statistics will be made available later. Lots of things to share, but briefly here we will record our thanks to God for the sense of relief from being isolated in our desire to uphold the importance of Sola Scriptura. It was the first time we heard Brazilian Baptist pastors telling of the battles they have had trying to bring reformation in church life through the preaching of God's Word. We were moved by many things. There were also some worries. But overall, a joyous releasing of many hearts excited to discover others who are thinking about and praying for Brazil's need for the true and scriptural Christ to be made known to the people. I have been asked to produce a report in English,for Pastor Gilson to send to English speakers outside Brazil who have been praying,and that includes you! So I will not anticipate that now. In the next week or two I hope to post it on the blog. For now, we give thanks for everything positive and good, and ask you to pray for continuing wisdom for the leaders appointed to serve the newly formed Reformed Baptist Fellowship of Brazil.
Praise and thanks to God too for the completion of all our property negotiations. We now have a home for Bec and Tom when they leave the Nicholls' household in July, and a base for us on Home Assignments/visits back to the UK. We received a letter this week informing us of forthcoming baptisms at Haywards Heath EFC; included were the three Nicholls's children! The only sad thing is we miss their baptisms by just one week, just as we have missed others of people with whom we shared our lives during our ministry in Haywards Heath. But what excellent news! Let's praise God for his mercy in adding more sheep to the fold.
There is much to do in these few days remaining before leaving Brazil. Andrew is on the examining board of IBE this week, participating in questioning final year students on their monographs (Batchelor level). That requires reading all the monographs, preparing questions and being out on Thursday and Friday evenings this week, in addition to his normal classes on Tuesday and Wednesday. Before we leave he also has to mark all the end of term assignments of the students he has been teaching this semester. And fit that around a long weekend visit to Rio de Janeiro. Will post a programme of that weekend later.
In the meantime,the Wednesday evening group continues. The two who come from Campeche have to get three buses each way, but are so hungry to learn they have never missed a study, even on two horrendously wet evenings. This week I started passing on some tips on reading the Old Testament from "How to Read the Bible for all its Worth" (Douglas & Fee) which they all found extremely helpful and somewhat searching. The tendency here is to teach children and adults about OT characters as super-heros, and emphasise their good points, while being embarassed about their failures - aka the "dud factor". This leads to a moralistic and works-based approach in people's relationship with God. Suggest that God is always the hero of every story (even better "narrative") and that he chooses to relate to human beings because of grace, because no Christian is perfect, nor will be in this life, and suddenly there is surprised enlightenment on every face.
Today I had the joy of completing studies in Romans with A, and hope to do so with Z on Sunday afternoon. A is quietly buzzing with excitement and wants to share what she has learned, as she has already done with Mark's gospel. She told me that a woman who lives in the district has asked to study with her. She is praying about whether Romans is the right thing to do. You can too.
Meanwhile, there's A2 exams for Bec and Tom, and the packing.................
We arrived back 23.30 on Monday night (14th). All the journeys have gone well; no one so far as we know has suffered an accident or an armed robbery. God chose in his providence to preserve us through hours of travel by car, plane, and a 12 seater van over holey roads at speeds of up to 120 Km/h. The Conference was great! A total of 100 people registered. Other statistics will be made available later. Lots of things to share, but briefly here we will record our thanks to God for the sense of relief from being isolated in our desire to uphold the importance of Sola Scriptura. It was the first time we heard Brazilian Baptist pastors telling of the battles they have had trying to bring reformation in church life through the preaching of God's Word. We were moved by many things. There were also some worries. But overall, a joyous releasing of many hearts excited to discover others who are thinking about and praying for Brazil's need for the true and scriptural Christ to be made known to the people. I have been asked to produce a report in English,for Pastor Gilson to send to English speakers outside Brazil who have been praying,and that includes you! So I will not anticipate that now. In the next week or two I hope to post it on the blog. For now, we give thanks for everything positive and good, and ask you to pray for continuing wisdom for the leaders appointed to serve the newly formed Reformed Baptist Fellowship of Brazil.
Praise and thanks to God too for the completion of all our property negotiations. We now have a home for Bec and Tom when they leave the Nicholls' household in July, and a base for us on Home Assignments/visits back to the UK. We received a letter this week informing us of forthcoming baptisms at Haywards Heath EFC; included were the three Nicholls's children! The only sad thing is we miss their baptisms by just one week, just as we have missed others of people with whom we shared our lives during our ministry in Haywards Heath. But what excellent news! Let's praise God for his mercy in adding more sheep to the fold.
There is much to do in these few days remaining before leaving Brazil. Andrew is on the examining board of IBE this week, participating in questioning final year students on their monographs (Batchelor level). That requires reading all the monographs, preparing questions and being out on Thursday and Friday evenings this week, in addition to his normal classes on Tuesday and Wednesday. Before we leave he also has to mark all the end of term assignments of the students he has been teaching this semester. And fit that around a long weekend visit to Rio de Janeiro. Will post a programme of that weekend later.
In the meantime,the Wednesday evening group continues. The two who come from Campeche have to get three buses each way, but are so hungry to learn they have never missed a study, even on two horrendously wet evenings. This week I started passing on some tips on reading the Old Testament from "How to Read the Bible for all its Worth" (Douglas & Fee) which they all found extremely helpful and somewhat searching. The tendency here is to teach children and adults about OT characters as super-heros, and emphasise their good points, while being embarassed about their failures - aka the "dud factor". This leads to a moralistic and works-based approach in people's relationship with God. Suggest that God is always the hero of every story (even better "narrative") and that he chooses to relate to human beings because of grace, because no Christian is perfect, nor will be in this life, and suddenly there is surprised enlightenment on every face.
Today I had the joy of completing studies in Romans with A, and hope to do so with Z on Sunday afternoon. A is quietly buzzing with excitement and wants to share what she has learned, as she has already done with Mark's gospel. She told me that a woman who lives in the district has asked to study with her. She is praying about whether Romans is the right thing to do. You can too.
Meanwhile, there's A2 exams for Bec and Tom, and the packing.................
# posted by Andrew and Cora @ 9:32:00 pm 
