The "Rio Trio"

 Keeping the children's attention by teaching a little English!

 

  Being welcomed "Brazilian Style" by Pastor Marco!

With very little sleep on their overnight flight to Rio, our Trek-7 team, or as we affectionately call them, the "Rio Trio", dove into serving the Lord within a few hours after their arrival!  

As they ministered together at a local community, we were thrilled to see their maturity, great attitudes and unlimited energy!

We've already had some excellent time together in prayer and planning and are looking forward to the plans that the Lord has in store for us.

It's going to be an AWESOME 5 weeks with this talented trio!

Please pray for effective ministry, continued unity and fruit that remains!

Blessings,

Diane, Jeff and the "Rio Trio" :)

We are God's Experiments....

We are busy preparing to receive three Trek-7'ers this Thursday morning to work with us here in Rio and Sao Paulo for 5 weeks and we are looking foward with great anticipation to what God will do through them!

To quote a few words from Oswald Chamber's book, "My Utmost For His Highest," 'If you will give God your right to yourself, He will make a holy experiment out of you---and His experiments always succeed.  The one true mark of a saint of God is the inner creativity that flows from being totally surrendered to Jesus Christ.'"

We are all created uniquely and so we will watch with great expectation as God works creatively and originally with each believer on our Rio Trek-7 Team as we work together to make His name known.

These three brothers-in-Christ are offering themselves as living sacrifices and we ask for your prayers that we may soon be singing together the praises of how God has manifested Himself through their work and how He has used each one! 

Romans 12:1, "Therefore, I urge you brothers, in view of God's mercy, to offer yourself as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God.  This is your spiritual act of worship."

Giving our Utmost for His Highest,

Diane and Jeff

Believe and Have Faith....

Yesterday at a Rio City Team meeting as we studied God's Word, I was reminded and encouraged by the fact that during his time on earth, all that Jesus did and said came not from his deity, but from his humanity empowered by the Holy Spirit.

In Mark 6: 4 & 5, Jesus said to them, "A prophet is not without honor except in his own town, among his relatives and his own home.  He could not do any miracles there, except lay his hands on a few sick people and heal them."  The reason being that there was a lack of faith.

Every day here in Rio we see God doing the miraculous! 

A recent miracle was during our time with our daughter Hannah and her boyfriend Jake.  They have been staying and serving here together with us for a month.  Early in their time with us, Jake got a high fever of 102 degrees with a headache and sore joints.  All these symptoms are symptoms of dengue fever, which is a common and dangerous illness here in Brazil.

In faith, we prayed.  In faith, many people in the States were praying.  And very quickly, he was healed---within a day and a half!  It normally takes a person several weeks to heal from Dengue Fever!  What a mighty God we serve! 

How encouraging to be reminded with these words, as well, in John 14:12, "very truly I tell you, whoever believes in me will do the works I have been doing and they will do even greater things than these, because I am going to the Father." 

How blessed we are that the Father desires to use us all and has even greater works for all those who choose to follow Him and serve Him!


Believing, having great faith, and looking forward to greater things than these,

Diane, Jeff, Hannah and Jake

Faith and Deeds

Hannah, Jake, Jeff and I have been having wonderful times in the Word together!  

This morning we were encouraged by James 2:14-26, 

"What good is it, my brothers and sisters, if someone claims to have faith but has no deeds? Can such faith save them?  Suppose a brother or a sister is without clothes and daily food. If one of you says to them, “Go in peace; keep warm and well fed,” but does nothing about their physical needs, what good is it?  In the same way, faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, is dead. But someone will say, “You have faith; I have deeds.”  Show me your faith without deeds, and I will show you my faith by my deeds.  You believe that there is one God. Good! Even the demons believe that—and shudder.
You foolish person, do you want evidence that faith without deeds is useless? Was not our father Abraham considered righteous for what he did when he offered his son Isaac on the altar? You see that his faith and his actions were working together, and his faith was made complete by what he did.   And the scripture was fulfilled that says, “Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness,”and he was called God’s friend.  You see that a person is considered righteous by what they do and not by faith alone.
 In the same way, was not even Rahab the prostitute considered righteous for what she did when she gave lodging to the spies and sent them off in a different direction?  As the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without deeds is dead."
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As we are serving here together this month, we were reminded, especially in verse 24, that a person is justified by what he does and not by faith alone.

Putting our faith into action,

Diane, Jeff, Jake and Hannah