Louissa's Flute Concert

Hi it's Louissa!

Yesterday (25th of November) it was my flute concert. I played a couple of songs:  Lullaby by F. Schubert, which you can see below and Minuet by J.S.Bach. The concert took place at my teachers house, where I have my lessons. My family went along with a student from OM who also plays the flute. 

The teacher, Beth Blanco (in the video) goes to my church and I have had lessons with her for a year - my second year learning the flute. I  am hoping to play at church during the English Service soon!

Quarter-Final football Josh

Hi, it's Josh here!

Warm-up

On Friday the 18th I played a football game for my team called Grêmio. It was the quarter-final and a very important game. We won 6-2 and I scored a goal! It was my first game for the team as I started training with them about a month ago. It has been great fun. 


I am looking forward to the semi-final on Wednesday.

Team Huddle

In action

Answer to Prayer! Car Insurance

Praise God for an answer to our prayers about car insurance!

Our car insurance is due for renewal at the end of this month, and with only 2 weeks to go, someone has offered to pay our instalments for us. This is a great relief, as car insurance here is expensive - around R$2,700 which is about £1,000. We want to say THANK YOU! to the donor (you know who you are!) and to God for His provision through others.

Who's that on the Sound Desk?

This is the Production Control Room at Primeira Igreja Batista (First Baptist Church) Campus Centro (Downtown Campus), São José dos Campos. Yes, and that's me (Mike) at the PA Desk!

We've been attending the English Language Service on Sunday mornings for a while now. They've been asking for volunteers for various ministries, and I mentioned my past Production Team experience at Holland Road. So yesterday (Sunday 13th Nov) was the first morning on the sound team. 

Since the band do their practice at 8.00 in the morning, we had to start at 7.30. It went very well, and they were very happy to have extra help as the PA team is very stretched with another service at the main campus at the same time.

PIB is often asking for musicians too, and there is also a chance that Lou and Josh will be able to help out with their musical talents, either in the main band or maybe in a youth band. It's all in the planning stages at the moment, but Josh wasted no time and sat strumming along with the band during the rehearsal.

The people attending the English Language service are a mixture of Brazilians wanting to practise their English, and also native English speakers. There are old, young, families, couples and singles. The pastor would like to offer Sunday School for the children, which is something Nélia may be able to help with in the New Year. 

So there may be a Sunday to come where the whole Leal family is serving at PIB English Service …

Dutch Ecuadorians from Latin America in Brazil

Yes, that title's a bit confusing, so let me explain!

Operation Mobilisation (OM) divides the world into Areas and Regions and Countries. Latin America is an Area, which consists of Regions (usually groups of countries), and then countries. As Brazil is big it is both a country and a region (and often called a 'field'), within the Latin America Area. Got it? 

Michael and Anneke at OM Brasil

Michael and Anneke are originally from Holland, but currently based in Ecuador. Rather than doing all their work specifically 'for OM Ecuador', they have a role across the Latin America Area. They have experience in communications and in development & planning, and they have brought these skills from Holland to Latin America, and now specifically to Brazil. In some ways their situation is similar to ours - bringing what we know from Northern Europe to South America. 

Over the last few days, they have been spending time at OM Brazil. Before I explain what they were doing with us, I'd just like to say THANK YOU! (in case they're reading our blog), and also to say how amazing it is that although the world is big to us, we are all God's children living together on one of the planets he created. To Him there is nothing odd about a Dutchman from Ecuador helping out an Englishman in Brazil, and it kind of made the world seem smaller.

Michael and Anneke spent time getting to know the team members and their roles and experiences, and learning about the ministries at OM Brazil. Since they have also done this in other Latin American countries, they were then able to help us with the preparation of our annual "Ministry Plans", and also to suggest additional ways in which we might work together or share ideas with other OM organisations in Latin America.

Some of the OM team after a coffee-break

Please pray:

• for a safe journey back to Ecuador for Michael & Anneke
• for wisdom amongst the OM Brazil team as we seek to apply what we learnt
• for a growing relationship between OM Brazil and the other Fields within  the Latin America area

Welcome to our Blog!

Hello and welcome to our Blog!

We've been in Brazil for just over a year now, and we thought it was time we made use of modern technology and provided a source of news for our friends and family. So here it is!

We'll be adding more information, stories, features and photos as we go along, so be sure to check back with us regularly, or subscribe to automatic feeds.

We hope you find it interesting and have fun reading our posts!

Love Mike, Nélia, Louissa and Joshua