Tuesday, May 8, 2007
Prayer Please...
We woke up yesterday morning to emails, telling us that our son-in-law, Mike Lewis, had an emergency apendectomy Monday, which was Sunday night for us...(I still have a hard time keeping the days and times straight between us and Korea!) He is doing fine now, recovering in the hospital. Please pray for his continued recovery and for our daughter Mandie.
Weekly Update
How are each of you this fine week? We had a great week-end. After working a couple days to get the downstairs apartment cleaned up and set up, we were able to use it Sunday morning for the Ladies Class and our youngest children's class. This week we will be starting a new class for children, in which the youngest children, through age 3 will be separted from our 4 to 6 year olds. That should help those teachers a great deal! Please pray as this means that we are having to add 3 more workers to our children's ministry. It is exciting to see how the Lord is blessing this work though!
Sunday morning we had 69 in Sunday School and 76 in church. We had a young family visit for the first time. Please pray for Xavier and Cecila.
This week we are gearing up for a special Mother's Day reception, that we will have for all the ladies at 9:30, Sunday morning, and then of course we will be doing special things to honor all the mothers present in the church service. Then on the 20th in the afternoon, we will be having our first Wedding Shower! Melanie and Luis will be getting married on June 15th. This is the first young couple to be getting married from our church.
Thank you so much for your prayers and support of our ministry here in Manta!
Joy
Sunday morning we had 69 in Sunday School and 76 in church. We had a young family visit for the first time. Please pray for Xavier and Cecila.
This week we are gearing up for a special Mother's Day reception, that we will have for all the ladies at 9:30, Sunday morning, and then of course we will be doing special things to honor all the mothers present in the church service. Then on the 20th in the afternoon, we will be having our first Wedding Shower! Melanie and Luis will be getting married on June 15th. This is the first young couple to be getting married from our church.
Thank you so much for your prayers and support of our ministry here in Manta!
Joy
Monday, April 30, 2007
Busy Week... (aren't they all?)
Good Monday morning to each of you! The last week was pretty much a whirlwind for our family, but we are so excited at all the Lord did and allowed us to do!
Wednesday afternoon, as Tony was taking me to the doctor, he got a phone call and the owner of the apartment we rent for church had decided that they would like to rent the first floor apartment to us after all. This was after getting word from him earlier that they weren't interested in renting it to us for the price we could afford to pay. So now we have some more rooms to use for Sunday School and will be spending time over there this week to get it cleaned up and ready for at least 2 classes to move into this coming Sunday and hopfully we will be able to add a nursery starting the 2nd Sunday in May.
The annual Ecuadorian Pastor's wives retreat was a great blessing this year. There were 32 Ecuadorian ladies that participated and we had 7 US missionary ladies attend. It was a great time of fellowship and studying God's word together. I will try and post some pictures later on today.
We had good services yesterday. There were 53 in Sunday School and 73 in church. We had 2 first time visitors. After the service we celebrated the Lord's Supper. Teddy was sitting by me and after the "bread" had been passed out, he was looking very intenting at the little piece I was holding in my hand and then he looked up at me and whispered, "That's a piece of his body?!" :-)
In the afternoon, I had the ladies that have been participating in our Ladies Bible Study, "Jesus the One and Only", over to the house. We had our last study and then just enjoyed a special time of fellowship together. It is always so humbling to me to hear the testimonies of what the Bible Study has meant to each of the ladies. So often I feel that I have just failed miserably to communicate in Spanish, and then to hear how the Lord was able to take my feeble attempts to teach in Spanish and use it to work in their hearts! It is such a blessing.
We hope to actually sign the contract to buy the property for the church this week. Tony will be putting down a 1/3 of the cost and then we will hae 90 days to raise the rest of the money. Please be praying with us that the Lord would touch the hearts of our churches to make this a reality. The people at the church are very excited as we take this next step.
God bless you as you serve him this week, wherever he has placed you!
Love,
Joy
Wednesday afternoon, as Tony was taking me to the doctor, he got a phone call and the owner of the apartment we rent for church had decided that they would like to rent the first floor apartment to us after all. This was after getting word from him earlier that they weren't interested in renting it to us for the price we could afford to pay. So now we have some more rooms to use for Sunday School and will be spending time over there this week to get it cleaned up and ready for at least 2 classes to move into this coming Sunday and hopfully we will be able to add a nursery starting the 2nd Sunday in May.
The annual Ecuadorian Pastor's wives retreat was a great blessing this year. There were 32 Ecuadorian ladies that participated and we had 7 US missionary ladies attend. It was a great time of fellowship and studying God's word together. I will try and post some pictures later on today.
We had good services yesterday. There were 53 in Sunday School and 73 in church. We had 2 first time visitors. After the service we celebrated the Lord's Supper. Teddy was sitting by me and after the "bread" had been passed out, he was looking very intenting at the little piece I was holding in my hand and then he looked up at me and whispered, "That's a piece of his body?!" :-)
In the afternoon, I had the ladies that have been participating in our Ladies Bible Study, "Jesus the One and Only", over to the house. We had our last study and then just enjoyed a special time of fellowship together. It is always so humbling to me to hear the testimonies of what the Bible Study has meant to each of the ladies. So often I feel that I have just failed miserably to communicate in Spanish, and then to hear how the Lord was able to take my feeble attempts to teach in Spanish and use it to work in their hearts! It is such a blessing.
We hope to actually sign the contract to buy the property for the church this week. Tony will be putting down a 1/3 of the cost and then we will hae 90 days to raise the rest of the money. Please be praying with us that the Lord would touch the hearts of our churches to make this a reality. The people at the church are very excited as we take this next step.
God bless you as you serve him this week, wherever he has placed you!
Love,
Joy
Sunday, April 22, 2007
Weekly Update and Prayer Requests
I pray this finds each one of you enjoying the blessings of the Lord. We have had a very busy week, but exciting too. On Wednesday, we got a phone call from a real estate friend, who had a piece of property that she thought we might be interested in for the church. We went and looked at it, and were very impressed. The location was very good, basically a block away from another piece of property that we had been interested in, and it was quite a bit larger, and lower in price. So that was exciting! Then on Thursday evening, we got a phone call. She had been able to locate the owner of a piece of property that Tony had asked about. The property is even bigger than the 2nd one, and the price is lower than either one of the other two! We would like to ask you to keep praying with us about this. We feel like the Lord is definitely working in this situation, and are excited to see what he is going to do!
This morning we had 64 in Sunday School and 70 in church. We had 2 first time visitors. Maria Bautista, led the one lady to Christ this week, and invited her to church, and she came this morning, and brought a friend with her!
Tonight the older youth and single adults will be meeting at our house for a time of fellowship.
On Thursday morning, our family will be traveling to Santo Domingo, (it is about 4 1/2 hours, if all goes well). Thursday evenings starts our Ecuadorian Pastor's Wives retreat. We have 43 ladies signed up to attend! This year, Sylvia Wells, Sharon Smith, Lois Tignor and I will be doing the teaching. I would appreciate your prayers for me on Friday, as I will be teaching both my lessons on that day. I will open the day teaching the first session, and end the day teaching the last session. The retreat ends after lunch on Saturday. We also appreciate your prayers for us as we travel there and back.
I have 2 other prayer requests for you...
1. The infection in Teddy's tooth returned last week. This is the 3rd time, so he has taken antibiotics for it this week, and the dentist has decided that the best thing to do is to go ahead and pull it, as we don't want to take any chances of the infection spreading and affecting any of his growing teeth. This will probably happen tomorrow. We have talked to him about what is going to happen, and he has been doing really well, with all the dental work he has had done to this point. Please be praying for him tomorrow.
2. I have been having some problems with pain in my neck and arm. I have been receiving treatments, and it seems to be doing better, but is not completely well yet. Please be praying with us, that this situation would improve.
I pray that God blesses each of you for your faithfulness to pray for our family and ministry here in Manta!
Joy
This morning we had 64 in Sunday School and 70 in church. We had 2 first time visitors. Maria Bautista, led the one lady to Christ this week, and invited her to church, and she came this morning, and brought a friend with her!
Tonight the older youth and single adults will be meeting at our house for a time of fellowship.
On Thursday morning, our family will be traveling to Santo Domingo, (it is about 4 1/2 hours, if all goes well). Thursday evenings starts our Ecuadorian Pastor's Wives retreat. We have 43 ladies signed up to attend! This year, Sylvia Wells, Sharon Smith, Lois Tignor and I will be doing the teaching. I would appreciate your prayers for me on Friday, as I will be teaching both my lessons on that day. I will open the day teaching the first session, and end the day teaching the last session. The retreat ends after lunch on Saturday. We also appreciate your prayers for us as we travel there and back.
I have 2 other prayer requests for you...
1. The infection in Teddy's tooth returned last week. This is the 3rd time, so he has taken antibiotics for it this week, and the dentist has decided that the best thing to do is to go ahead and pull it, as we don't want to take any chances of the infection spreading and affecting any of his growing teeth. This will probably happen tomorrow. We have talked to him about what is going to happen, and he has been doing really well, with all the dental work he has had done to this point. Please be praying for him tomorrow.
2. I have been having some problems with pain in my neck and arm. I have been receiving treatments, and it seems to be doing better, but is not completely well yet. Please be praying with us, that this situation would improve.
I pray that God blesses each of you for your faithfulness to pray for our family and ministry here in Manta!
Joy
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