New Life Work Team Blesses PAZ

We were richly blessed to have a team from our home church, New Life Christian Church, with us from November 20 to December 1. John and Joann Utt, Dave and Theresa Shimmins, and Jay Zimmerman packed "Santa's sleigh" (two 70-pound bags plus carry-ons for each of them) with all kinds of presents for PAZ missionaries, Brazilians and the Mission. We celebrated Christmas early as they unpacked their bags - tools for our construction teams and supervisor, Joaquim; medicines, clothes, baseball caps, toys for ministry; and all kinds of things for missionaries. Thank you so much, guys - Christmas was great!

Despite their kindness and generosity, we put the team to work. First, we spent a day at Camp Shalom, repairing benches and thus providing seating space for approximately 150 people. In the photo below, we see some very talented ladies securing a board on a bench with no hands - pretty amazing, huh?


Then the highlight of the trip - five days living on a boat and working on the church building in Uricurituba (although I'm not sure the team would describe the bathing facilities on the boat a "highlight"). This community is situated on an island across the Amazon River from Santarem. Since the flood in 2008, large sections of the river bank have been falling into the river. All of the residents had moved their houses further inland, because they were in danger, and it became necessary to also move the PAZ church. The building had been torn down, moved a few hundred yards further inland, and reconstructed as a much larger building. The team completed the construction, painting, putting up a handrail, doing the plumbing for the bathroom, completing the floor boards, and constructing the steps (well, at least we tried). We were fortunate to have PAZ missionary Jerry Hranka and his pastor, Daryl Kroeker and good friend John Dyck with us, since there was a lot of work to be done. We finished just in time for the inauguration of the new building in the church service on Sunday night.

Bathing on the boat was refreshing but not very private

The steps were our biggest challenge - many great minds were required

The last nail in the last floor board

Nego laying bricks in the septic tank - may qualify as one of the world's worst jobs

Besides the construction activities, the team also spent time ministering to the people in the community. Special ministry activities included activities with children, John Utt teaching children and adults how to play the harmonica (and giving away approximately 140 harmonicas), and visiting people in their homes, inviting them to the inauguration service and praying for them, as we had opportunity.




It wasn't all work and no play, however. The team sated their appetites at a "churrascaria" (Brazilian barbeque restaurant), visited the zoo and Belterra, a community founded by Ford Motor Company, and shopped for souvenirs. John is already planning a trip for August 2011, so get in touch with him to reserve a place on the team!

Sao Miguel - Part II

The first night of our trip we visited Costa do Tapará. This community is still close to the water’s edge. We arrived in time to make visits in the community, inviting people to the evening service. The local PAZ worker is a young, single man, who is desperate for more of Jesus in his life and the lives of people in the village. His mother is a pillar in the church and is helping him grow the church. Two pastors from Belo Horizonte (a large city in south central Brazil) had come to Santarem to learn how to set up a river ministry. They had heard so much about PAZ and our church planting that they wanted to learn from us as they start their own mission outreach. The pastor was invited to preach. Also on this trip was a young girl from Canada who is here for six weeks. In the evening service Melissa, the younger of the two visiting pastors and I did a puppet skit for all the kids between 2 and 150. They loved it and then the pastor preached. Three people accepted Jesus but we need to pray for effective follow-up as the local PAZ worker was so engrossed in praying for people to come to Jesus that he forgot to open his eyes to see who raised their hands!

The next day the Lord laid on my heart a middle-aged man whose wife died of uterine cancer last year. She was a faithful believer to the end. She left behind a family, including a little boy that was born shortly before she died. We had talked to this man and, because God was speaking to me to go talk with him again, I grabbed the mother of the local worker and went to visit him. Jorismo was just sitting there like he knew we were coming. As we chatted, I was impressed by his readiness and so I asked if he wanted to receive Jesus as his Savior. He did and we prayed with him. I sensed that he was angry with God for taking his wife. When I shared about the loss of our granddaughter, Anna Rebecca, in 2008, I emphasized that it was the enemy who came to kill, steal and destroy, and how we have a choice to be angry or not. He is now a believer in Christ. Where there was stagnant, contaminated life, there is now fresh water welling up into an everlasting stream. Pastor Nilton, our head river pastor, had taken the two pastors from Belo Horizonte to the site of our church building in the village. It is quite a distance from the believers in the community and they want it to be more centrally located. On their return, Nilton and the pastors stopped and visited with the same man. They saw the Bible we had given him and were excited about his commitment to the Lord. Pastor Nilton counseled him some more, not knowing what we had shared with him. Pastor Nilton told him that the best place to begin reading the Bible was in John. He grabbed the Bible to show the man where John was and, to his surprise, there was a tree leaf on the first page of John. I had told Jorismo the same thing and we didn’t have any way to mark the location other than a tree leaf. Praise the Lord, the local worker will follow-up with Jorismo and begin discipling him.

Salim (disciple of Pr Nilton), Nilton and local PAZ worker

Evening service - we met outside next to the worker´s house because the neighbor allowed us to use his generator

Church building in Costa do Tapara

Sao Miguel - Part I

Last week, Joanne went on a river trip with Pastor Nilton Cordeiro, the supervising pastor in the Santarem base for church-planting in the interior communities. Following is her story.

We spent one hour and fifteen minutes walking on sand that shows the effects of the waves on the river bed, now “dry as a bone.” The community we are entering is Sao Miguel (Saint Michael). It is the dry season (some say a record dry season) – the rivers have receded greatly and creeks and canals dried-up. It has left this community with a source of clean, potable water more than than one and one half hours away. As we walked along, we saw skeletons of crabs and one of a venomous snake, holes in the sand where sting rays had spent the night. This community has a small stream that still has water in it, though it is “landlocked”, with no entrance or exit. Thus, they are able to use their canoes to boat out before reaching the vast wasteland that they have to cross to reach fresh potable water. At the time we wrote this, it was a 15 minute boat trip up the river to the sandy wasteland and then the walk across the sand for 1 hour and 15 minutes. As the dry season continues, the stream continues to fall. The stream is very muddy with stagnant, contaminated water. This makes me so thankful for the water in my home, the water that I can turn on and use anytime. The water I use to take a bath, to get a drink, to wash my dog, to throw at the kids in a water fight, to water plants. Did I mention that we saw many alligators on the banks of the stream as we rode in the boat (ie, as the ladies rode in the boat - the men had to walk as the water level in the stream didn’t allow us to take the 5 men)? The walks can be dangerous because of the snakes and alligators that are on the river’s edge. In fact, one of the men who was with us was stung by a sting ray, which is so painful it literally makes a grown man cry.


But in the midst of this dry, stagnant, contaminated and dangerous land is living water. There are villages throughout this area that are growing their churches - giving the living water of the gospel. It says in John 7:37-38, “If anyone is thirsty, let him come to me (Jesus) and drink. Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture has said, streams of living water will flow from within him.” Praise the Lord, in this second village we visited, two boys made decisions to ask Jesus to be their Lord and Savior. The pastor here is a father of three girls. He and his wife oversee 14 churches in their area, and they are seeing growth in the churches. They are offering living water and God is giving it. Many people in these villages have experienced miracles of healing and it has brought them hope and a living faith.

Photo #1 - River bed that we walked on

Photo #2 - Our walk to Sao Miguel - it was hot!

Photo #3 - Alligator we met along the way

Photo #4 - Church meeting in Sao Miguel

On the River

Recently I (Joanne) had the privilege of going on two boat trips. The first trip was to Uquena with the Journey Fellowship team, where PAZ is planting a new church and constructing a building. Our daughter Hannah and friend Leslee Zell were also on this trip. Hannah helped mostly with construction and translation on the construction site and Leslee and I helped in the children’s ministries. The school teacher in Uquena was very open to us and allowed us to minister to the children in the school. She has not been faithful to the Lord but now wants to get involved in the new church and get her life back in line. Her son is really faithful and has inspired her. For three days, in the morning and afternoon classes, we taught Bible stories, played games and provided other activities for the children. The team also included two summer interns, Rebecca and Caroline, who love working with kids and didn’t allow the language barrier to keep them from interacting with and ministering to the children. We even had a day when all the men on the construction team came down and taught a lesson on Noah. Approximately 15 kids gave their lives to Jesus. I asked the school teacher to write down their names and give the list to the local church worker so they can be followed up. They are now ready to start a children’s cell group and discipleship program. You can pray for this community, the children and the local workers that they can continue watering the harvest!

Looks like Leslee and Joanne got caught hitting the sauce

You do NOT want to accidentally step on this sting ray (or do it on purpose, for that matter)

We traveled by canoe from the big boat we ate and slept on from the river to Uquena

The kids visited the guys at the construction site and got suckers as a reward

Joanne, teacher in Uquena, Leslee, Rebecca, Caroline and kids

In June I accompanied a woman and her two daughters, Joyce, Becky and Erica Schorn, on a health trip to the communities of Jaguare, Piquiatuba, Tauare and Pine. We had an awesome time as we went from village to village with a Brazilian doctor, a dentist, a dentist that makes false teeth and several nurses. We saw a multitude of patients and I got to help lead the children’s ministries. We were well received and able to minister to many children. The two interns were again with us. The kids loved the skits that Becky Schorn wrote and the lessons and activities that followed. More than 70 children asked Jesus to forgive them of their sins and live in their hearts. I am adamant with the children that they only need to do this once. I believe if they really understand what Jesus has done on the cross for them, they will want to give their lives to Jesus. I was especially pleased with the children in one village, where 11 kids accepted Jesus the first afternoon of lessons. That night at our church service, Isaura, the head of the team, asked anyone who wanted to accept Jesus to raise his/her hand. The sermon had been powerful, but no one raised their hand. She asked again, and then asked for me to come up front to help. I whispered to her that many of the children had accepted Jesus that afternoon in class. She then asked how many children had accepted Jesus that afternoon. Their hands shot up in the air! I was so excited by their response as they didn’t want to accept Jesus again - they already had done so. So they had truly understood what I had taught them. After that, many adolescents and a few adults came forward to receive Jesus into their lives. The names of all the children, adolescents and adults who accepted Jesus were given to the local workers. I know that God can do a mighty work in their lives. Praise the Lord!

Kids always love a puppet show

When Brazil plays soccer, all of Brazil stops and watches the game (here the World Cup in Pine)

Can you guess which face belongs to Caroline?

In July even Ken was able to go on a river trip. We went to the community of Campos de Urucurituba, which currently has three cell groups. The church had been meeting in a larger building in the community but now has to move, so we need to build them a covered pole building as a starter building. That night we met in the home of one of the believers (who proudly told us she had had 70 people in her home for a service a few weeks ago – I don’t know where she could have put 70 people!). Pastor Nilton, the leader of missions for the PAZ base in Santarem, gave the message which was powerful. At the conclusion of his message, he gave an invitation for those who wanted to receive Jesus as Savior and Lord, and 13 people raised their hands. Now 13 people coming to the Lord in a city church isn’t that unusual, but 13 decisions in one service in a small interior community is an unusual, wonderful response. So Edilson, the local worker in this community, now has much work to do in integrating these new believers into a cell group and one-on-one discipleship, and we have a challenge to get them a building to meet in as soon as possible – what great challenges to have!

Visitors, River Trips and Curriculum

We will be going on several river trips in the next few months. Hannah and our friend, Leslee Zell, are coming to visit in a few days. We will do a river trip with them. After they leave, there is another family arriving that will go on a medical trip. I (Joanne) will accompany them on the trip and we will minister to the kids in that village. Pray for us as we share the gospel with the kids. Then we are extra-excited about a visit at the end of July from our son-in-law, Aaron, and a team of six teens and three adults from his church in Farmington, Michigan. Pray that God will bless all the teams that are coming this summer and fall and that they will be excited about how God is moving here in the Amazon Basin.

John and Leslee Zell, Joanne, Hannah

I would also like prayer for the new Sunday School curriculum that we are starting to write. Many of you know that we already have about a year and a half of materials that we are using in the river villages. We would like another year and a half of materials, covering many of the stories that were not covered in the first book. Please pray for wisdom as we choose the stories and write the curriculum. We need good illustrations that are simple and can be colored for the Bible stories we are portraying (printing in color is far too expensive). We also need interesting introductory material for the lessons. I don’t like to start a lesson with questions; science experiments or object lessons are much better. I bought some great books on object lesson while in the States but if anyone has some good ideas, I am open to them.

Hooray for grandkids!

We recently returned to Santarém after a wonderful visit in the States. We got to ski with Jed and Hannah, welcome another granddaughter into this world, and meet a grandson born in 2009 for the first time - it´s time to brag! Sophie Joanne Walters was born on April 27 and is just as beautiful as the rest. (No doubt because they take after their grandmas!)


We also met Charlie Farris, born to Shawna and Chris on September 30, 2009, for the first time. Charlie, you are going to have to protect all those girl cousins when you grow up.


Actually, I have a new title for my grandkids, created by a typing error - they will be called grandkis!! Grandmas and grandpas, I am sure, will agree with this. We are always smothering them with kisses, so why not grandkis!

While I was there I ordered a book that I know will be my favorite: A Car Seat in my Convertible: giving your grandkids the spiritual ride of their lives. I began reading it in the airport and was soon shedding many tears. One of the sentences was something like this, “I didn’t sign up for this heartache when I knew I was having kids.” That´s when I started to cry. I had to put my book away until I was alone. It is not all tear jerking stuff - in fact it is an excellent book. One quote (from Theresa Bloomingdale) that you will like especially if you are a grandparent is: “If your baby is beautiful and perfect, never cries or fusses, sleeps on schedule and burps on demand, is an angel all the time —you’re the grandma.” William James once said, “The great use of life is to spend it on something that will outlast it.” We hope to do that with our grandkids.

Please pray for us as we aclimate back to Brazilian culture. It is really tiring for me to speak just English in the States and then return to speaking almost exclusively Portuguese. I was tired from the trip anyway, with two nights of practically no sleep, but then we had our cell group the night that I arrived. Sure enough, the kids were coming out of the woodwork (or was that the size of the termites?) They were anxious to get group going again. Also, it is extremely hot this year. Brazilians don’t say that very often but many of them have expressed that this year. Because it was cold in Detroit and Colorado, I am not ready physically for extremely hot weather. I never used to glow (perspire or sweat for the male population) but boy am I glowing these days!

Special Olympics in Santarem

Many of you know that I (Joanne) have a background as a special education teacher. There is a young girl that lives at the other end of our street who is Down’s syndrome and attends the local special education school that is near us. The school started a dance/arts program last year and it has steadily progressed. This year the students had an opportunity to participate in a type of Olympics of dance for the handicapped. Our friend, Patricia, participated in the competition so I took some kids from my cell group to watch her dance. They really enjoyed the evening and we were able to cheer Patricia on. She didn’t win but we were really pleased that she participated and did her best.



Following are photos of the kids I took with me. Believe it or not, there was always the same number of kids in the car. Can you tell how many kids went with me?







If you guessed 12, you are RIGH...WRONG. See the thumb in the lower left corner? That is number 13!