It's party time woody. We like to use that phrase from Toy Story around the house. As I looked at pictures on my phone of the last month to think about what to write on it popped in my mind! I like to tell people that the name of our church (Koinonia) is greek for fellowship, which basically means we like to party. This month we went to birthday parties, dinner parties, grill out parties, a family party (referring to another family’s party that I crashed, although at the beginning of this month we were actually just leaving my family’s week long get together in Florida), neighborhood party (we invited the neighborhood to the church to snack at our kitchen with good food at low prices), and then Sarah had a beach party with one of her discipleship groups. 
Although we do organize lots of church events and strive for structure in ministry, some of our best ministry opportunities come in informal moments around a table or sitting in a yard. This last weekend Sarah took one of her small groups to the beach and they just had fun together for a couple days. They had a good group Bible study time one night but most was informal and they came back refreshed and encouraged. Most are moms with jobs that rarely ever get away from the rat races they are in.
We are starting to see a decent comeback from the pandemic. One person we are very glad to have is Roger Smith who is our senior pastor in Arcoverde. He was gone for nine months and so it will be great to divide tasks with him again. His wife had to stay behind for a few weeks because of a family situation but has now arrived and so it will be good to have Marcy back as well. We sat down earlier this month to talk about goals as they will be retiring in a couple years and so we want to be on the same page. We are both excited about the leadership that is being raised and hope to even raise a sanctuary beside our current building that will hold more people. We had seen the need pre-covid and hadn’t seen that need again until this month. Pray for wisdom as we look at our options in that regard.
Speaking of construction; the construction began this week on the church in Tupanatinga! We have a pretty simple building and so hopefully it will not take that long. There is also a decent chance that we already have the funds for this first phase, although I don’t know for sure cause of rising prices and because they are just estimates! Construction usually costs more than what you think! I had mentioned the beginning of the year that we were starting, but the workers have not been available! As we held out for reliable workers our ministry funds have built up, which we have been trying to save for the construction project.
Pray this month for the women’s meetings each week, new discipleship groups to pop up, two separate groups studying systematic theology, a new contact in Pesqueira, our New Testament module Saturday and Sunday, and new opportunities for outsiders to come to the church!
Thank you so much for your prayers and support! God bless!
All for HIS glory,
David, Sarah, and my two little missionaries Evelyn who takes care of little ones while their mothers serve and Anna Claire that gets along with all these little girls and includes them in the church activities.
