Hi Everyone! Hope you are enjoying the blessings of the Lord in your life this week!

We had a good week-end here in Manta! Sunday morning we had a great attendance again, with 124 present. A great blessing was that Mirian's husband, Fernando came to church. Fernando accepted the Lord many years ago, and was instrumental in bringing his whole family to Christ, but then he got away from the Lord, and has been out of church and not interested in the things of the Lord. We understand that the Lord still has a lot to do in his heart to bring him back, but we were thrilled with the victory of seeing him in God's house!!!

I enjoyed a couple days away last week. I had the opportunity to make a trip to Guayaquil with my friend, Mirian. We enjoyed shopping, visiting, and just the fun of having a couple "girl days". :-)

Sunday evening we had a Teacher's meeting. There was a good attendance, and we feel that we were able to address a few things. Please keep our Sunday School ministry in your prayers. We are really a young church, and the majority of our workers are very young in Christ. We are trying to figure out how to have the best ministry for our children, and at the same time give everyone an opportunity to continue to grow in Christ.

Our nursery is working out really well. I was very "hands on" the first couple of weeks. I had spent so much time and energy, to get it set up, and it was hard to just turn it over, but the last couple weeks, I have stayed out of the way, and let the ladies in charge, do their job, and they are doing a great job, getting it all figured out! :-)

This week, I have been working on trying to sort out and organize the school room and the office. I have made quite a bit of progress and that is a great feeling!!!

We are awaiting the last document to arrive from the US, so that our adoption file is complete and we can take it to Guayaquil. It is suppose to arrive this week! Thank you for your prayers with us about this. The last time we checked, it had arrived in Quito and been released from customs!

Friday afternoon, the young women, (35 and under) are suppose to meet at my house. I appreciate your prayers for me, as I work on the devotion to share with them. This is a great group of ladies. All are new wives and young mothers. Most of the are very young in the Lord. There are about 6 of them that have been very faithful to get together once a month, and they are forming great friendships.

I pray that you have a wonderful week and that you sense the presence of the Lord in your ministry and work.

God Bless,
Joy

Good Morning!!!

Good Morning, Friends! I have lost track of time, and keep thinking about posting on here, but then things happen, and it just hasn't gotten done! So sorry about that!

I will try to catch you up with our life, without writing a book, which I know no one has time to read, or even that much interest! :-)

My trip to the US with Teddy was wonderful! I got great reports from my doctors, and we were able to see all 3 girls and the 3 wonderful grandchildren!!! Spending time with my Mom and Dad was a treat too. Teddy also got to celebrate his birthday a week early, on the Monday before we returned, and had a great time at the "Bounce House" with his cousins Evan and Estella Jane.

While we were gone, Tony continued with the work here. The Youth Retreat was a great blessing. One young person accepted Christ and many other decisions were made. VBS went well too, with many children attending, and hearing the gospel.

Since we returned we have made a trip to Quito, which had 2 purposes. 1st we went to pick up some things donated for our church nursery. These are things that Stacey Smith had stored, since closing her home for abandoned babies. I can't even begin to express how grateful we are to have all of this wonderful stuff! We would have never been able to afford to purchase all of this, or even this quality of furniture and toys! The 2nd reason that brought us to Quito, was to meet with the director of "For His Children" and with our lawyer, (and theirs) about adopting 2 precious children. We returned home to Manta, with the news...

We are adopting Carla, age 6 and Mateo, age 5. They should be joining our family around September 1st!!!! We are very excited about this news, and praising the Lord, for the way he has led and guided each step in this process.

Here in Manta, we have been working at church. We got they Nursery set up and running. Sunday was our 3rd week to have it operating and it is going great!!! We have also had a Mini Missions Conference, where our church was challenged, and hearts were touched. Please pray for those who feel that the Lord is calling them into full time ministry.

On May 8th, we had a special Ladies event, in honor of Mother's Day. 28 ladies attended and had a wonderful time! Sunday, May 9th, we had a great service with over 30 mothers in attendance.

Last week, we had 124!!!! There were no first time visitors, which was sad, BUT to have 124 without visitors, WOW!!!!

Please be praying as we get the next part of the building underway. Pray for the different ministries in our church. Pray for workers, we are desperately in need of someone to come along side of Tony, full time to take on some of the pastoral responsibilities of the church. We know that God is in control and he has to right plan and the perfect family picked out already!

On a personal note, our good friends, Jim and Sharon Smith, have suffered a great blow, in the lost of their son Zac to cancer. Zac was only 33 years old, but God used him to touch many lives. He had an amazing testimony. I would ask you to please lift up Jim, Sharon and Stacey Smith in your prayers, along with Zac's wife Mandy, and their 3 precious children, Lizzy, Jake and Luke.

Thank you for your support and prayers for our family and the ministry here in Manta, Ecuador!
God Bless,
Joy

In the US

Teddy and I are enjoying a trip to the US. My doctors wanted me to come back for a check-up, and we decided if I needed to do that, we would take a little extra time to visit the girls and their families.

Before we left Ecuador, Teddy kept asking me if there was going to be any snow at Grandpa's house. I kept telling him, I didn't think so, because it was March, and they live in Tennessee. It is the beginning of Spring there. Well, wouldn't you know. Tuesday before we arrived, they had 3 inches of snow. A lot of it had melted, but there was enough left in Mom and Dad's yard for him to have a wonderful time playing on Thursday morning! He managed to make 2 small snowmen.

Yesterday, I had my first doctor's appointment. That went pretty well. My blood pressure is a little high, but he thinks since it was doing well in Ecuador, that it might be the "stress" of traveling and just everything that we are trying to do in the next few weeks. So we will see what happens. I appreciate your prayers concerning this.

Next week, I have another appointment with my surgeon, just to make sure everything has healed properly, from my surgery last fall. That will be on Tuesday and then on Thursday we are heading to Springfield, MO. to visit with Ashley, Lexi and their families. Thank you for praying for our travels.

While we are away, Tony is continuing with 2 Bible Institute classes. One meeting on Tuesday evening, and one on Thursday. Also the construction on building continues. March 12-14, we will be having a Youth Retreat. Please pray that we have a good turn out from our church. Pray for Tony as he works on organizing everything, also.

Then on March 24-28, they will be having VBS. We have already done quite a bit of planning for this, but as you know there is always more to do, and of course just the last minute stuff involved.

We are excited to see how the Lord continues to bless the ministry in Manta! Thank you so much for your prayers. God bless you as you serve him.

Joy

Where did February go?

I can't believe the month of February has gone by. We have been very busy around here! On the 7th our church celebrated it's 5th anniversary. We had over 135! Cliff McGhee came down from Quito and was our special speaker for the day. We recognized 17 people that had been baptized this past year! God has been so good to our church and ministry here.

After the service we had a great lunch that the ladies had prepared! Everyone had a wonderful time.

Tony, Teddy and I made a trip to Quito this month too. We left Sunday afternoon the 14th and drove to Santo Domingo, where we spent the night with our friends, Joe and Sylvia Wells, and then drove on to Quito on Monday morning, the 15th. While there we stayed with Cliff and Neoma McGhee. It was nice to visit the capital again, and we had good meetings while we were there!

On our return from Quito, Tony started Bible Insitute classes again. They will be meeting on Tuesday and Thursday evenings with our weekly prayer meeting in between on Wednesdays. Last Saturday was our monthly Ladies meeting at the church. We had about 25 ladies attend.

This afternoon our younger women had their monthly get together. They take turns hosting this meeting and always enjoy the fellowship. Today it was my privilege to bring the devotion.

On Wednesday morning, Teddy and I will be flying to the US. We will be in the States from the 3rd to the 30th. I have 2 doctor's appointments, and I appreciate your prayers about that. Everything seems to be going very well with my health and I am thankful for that. Because of the problem I had with my blood pressure before we left, my doctor told me he wanted to see me again so here I go....Also it will be 6 months since my surgery and my surgeon wanted to see me again too. :-) (I'm just a very popular person these days! )

We are looking forward to having some time visiting with my parents, and are planning a couple trips to visit the girls and the grand babies! You didn't think I would make a trip all the way back to the US and not see my grand babies did you? :-)

Appreciate your prayers for us as we travel. Also for Tony as he is here. During the month of March there is a planned Youth Retreat and a VBS...(I know it seems weird, but here on the coast of Ecuador, we are actually in the middle of our "Summer Vacation"!)

Have a wonderful week!
God Bless,
Joy