Bits January

January is vacation time, drought time (we had a couple weeks with little to no running water), and for us, building time. I had a Brazilian in front of the work, but he could not continue; so it has taken up a lot of my time lately. I am really looking forward to finishing the house in the next few months and taking that load off my back. We are also excited about the opportunities the house will allow us to have with ministry. I asked Sarah the other day what we will talk about once the house is built. Of course, we have launched a fundraising campaign for the church building and will hopefully start that soon! Click here to watch the video!

At the beginning of the month I was able to be a speaker for Adventure week at Camp Paradise. I enjoyed going through Colossians chapter 3 with the group and getting to know them. Sarah and the girls stayed back in Arcoverde and it gave me the chance to miss them quite a bit, but also to get to know more of the campers and camp staff. I had some good conversations with one guy named Henrique and my colleague Dan Cook led him to the Lord on the last night. During February we will all go to the Word of Life camp in Recife where I will get another opportunity as a camp speaker. I grew up going to Word of Life camps, so I think I will really enjoy going back in a different country. 

Sunday is Super Bowl Sunday and we are not missing out on the chance for a party. We have invited a few people from the football team to come over. We will have the Bible study before and then watch the game. Pray that they come for the Bible study and not just the game! This month they asked me to give a short devotional before every practice. Here is a picture of the first one.

This next Saturday we will be running a "Big Meeting" for young people from the city. We will have a soccer tournament during the day and a service at night. We are inviting young people from the area churches in hopes that they will invite others as well. 

We love and appreciate you all. Your prayers are evident and sustaining. 

All for HIS glory,

David, a very excited to get a new house Sarah, my big 5 year old who is on her 109th day of homeschool and in addition will start Brazilian kindergarten on Monday, and my little energy ball, into everything almost 2 year old who is just getting a little cough.

So young

I just found out that a college friend, Jack Blevins, passed away from a 4-5 year battle with cancer. Last year another friend from high school passed away as well. Death is cruel. It does not come at our convenience. Mike was a good father and husband and Jack was an amazing person. Both parted in their early thirties, an age way too young to die.

Before I found out the news today I was doing a Bible study on the return of Christ and was able to share about Jack and the hope that he had and the faith it gave him to live life despite the cruelest of circumstances. It struck me once again how the reality of the resurrection of Christ allows us to look forward to a certain time in the future when we will resurrect with Christ and be with God forever. We have hope like no other. The reality of forever with God puts our life in perspective today allowing us not to worry about our present circumstance, hate those wronging us, and not live in fear of whatever is around the corner.

Jack encouraged me often in the last year through humbling comments that left me in awe. Please be in prayer for his wife Cherri as she goes through this time. She took the last few months off from work to spend with him before he departed. She stood by his side, lovingly caring for him while he weakened and his pain strengthened. Praise the Lord that she lives with this same hope that we can all live with as we put our faith in Jesus Christ.

Bits from Brasil December

It is nice to feel at home. It is not uncommon for missionaries to never feel that way during the holidays. Sarah said she felt that way this year and that makes me super happy. We have not even made it to the year mark here in Arcoverde and we are already feeling like we fit in here.

We had our Christmas party on the 17th and it was a blast. We had around 30 people there, sang for the first time and had a little message. No one wanted to leave and we didn't leave until late. Many expressed gratitude for the group and what it meant for them. We are hoping that the momentum carries to 2015 even though we have taken a couple week break.

Our life right now is divided into major projects and daily tasks. The major projects going on currently include the youth event for February 5-7 that is at a huge building. We are praying for many youth as we could have anywhere from 50-400 youth. The uncertainty of the numbers makes the planning a little difficult. I am also working on a website that will have courses and seminars available for churches in Brazil. This involves networking with missionaries, gathering and organizing material. The house construction is also a major project that we hope to finish in 3-4 months, Lord willing.

On Sunday I get on a bus for Recife where I will speak at Adventure week for Camp Paradise for a week. I will be speaking on Colossians 3. Pray that the time there would be effective and that Sarah will be ok with the girls for a week here in Arcoverde. 

This year we will be trying to build the church and start services, host a church from Alabama that will serve here for a week, have outreach events, host more training events (we will do a Good Soil seminar in April), make more friends and disciples! 

We pray for a prosperous new year for you all and appreciate your faithfulness. A couple weeks ago I wrote this blog about our financial situation and how you all have been a blessing. Thanks!

All for HIS glory,

David, Sarah, our five year old who is growing an inch a day, learning to read, make up songs and stories and ballet, and our little tornado with gusts ranging from 80-120 miles per hour that is starting to talk a little more each day. (Evelyn and Anna Claire, since I never mention their names :)

Support!

This year has been amazing for us as far as support goes. We started off being super blessed in our return to Brazil by people going above and beyond for us to arrive back in Brazil on schedule. We are continually humbled by the sacrifice of many for us; from people who scrape money to get by and send in a once every couple years offering of $60, to one who is facing cancer with little time left and is still making giving a priority, to a big chunk of friends who budget us in monthly. We count it a privilege to serve the Lord and alongside you all.

As I shared the gospel on Saturday with a friend, he told me how he did not want to be religious because he had to be; he wants to do whatever he actually wants to do. I told him how we are here and we serve because we want to, not out of obligation. And I am pretty sure (or at least hope) you all are the same way when it comes to giving to us.

God has blessed us this year to the point where we have not been in the red in our general support account; which used to live in the red! We are still at full support after almost a year of being back on the field (usually people start forgetting about you after a few months). And usually we receive extra gifts around Christmas that make up for lower support towards the end of the year. That has not been necessary.

I just wanted to write all this to say thank you. (We will ask for money later with the youth event and church construction coming up, but not in this post :).

A selfie culture

Smart phones have brought in a lot of time/energy saving resources. They have also put a high quality camera into something you have with you all the time; allowing picture-making to happen much more often. We can see first walks, random acts of kindness, crimes, and all sorts of activities because cameras are always a reach in the pocket away.

Phones also have games on them. All kinds of games from simple word search games, to time consuming games like candy crush to video games where the phone is the controller, screen and audio. The sky is the limit with the apps you can purchase or download to your phone.

Unfortunately the camera and the games have mixed into a new culture buzzword: the selfie. Apparently, the game is to find the most creative way to make yourself look good while still holding your camera. The object is to receive the most praise possible by one picture. This game is almost addicting as candy crush as people take the game to all different levels. Level one started years ago when no one was around to help take a picture and couples had to creatively extend their arm and catch a picture of themselves. Hopefully this has nothing to do with the busy-ness of our culture in not being able to ask someone to help you out when your group is wanting to take a group picture. This whole game might be avoided if we were all friendlier!

The part of the selfie culture I find most devastating is the selfie mirror picture. Find the best angle that will make you look impeccable; put on your seductive smile and BOOM, you conquer the highest level. You can expect dozens of comments on your beauty that should boost your self-esteem for a whole three days!

I tried not to be too sarcastic and brief with the above comments, but the whole selfie culture really makes me sick to my stomach. Not every time; the group ones can be fun, and I realize that. But I wonder what we are trying to prove when we post pictures of ourselves all over the internet. What is the motivation?

It seems Jesus and the Bible highlight thinking of God and others first. I wonder how selfies fit into seeking to bring honor to God and serve others. I know that it is hard to fit that phrase into every aspect of life, it just seems that generally selfies have the opposite effect.

But just so you know, whether you take selfies or not, you are beautiful in the eyes of the most important person in the world and He loves you unconditionally. He wants you to be even more beautiful on the inside than you are on the outside and has provided a way in which you can accomplish this. And I love you too because you are important; God made you in His image! I hope you can receive worth as a child of God and accept the praise of man only as a little bonus.

Bits November

Our small group on Wednesdays has officially passed the small group magic number of 13. We are thrilled to have so many participating. Roger and Carlos are doing a series called God our Provider. On Sunday nights we are starting out small scale. A couple of the football guys have come to the studies and a few others have said they would come. We will continue to encourage them to come out!

I am finishing up the Story of Hope with Breno and am halfway through the Way to Joy with Chico and Bia. We always face other tasks that get in the way, but have still met a few times this month. We are unsure how December will affect all of our groups and discipleships; we will see! We are planning a couple Christmas parties though. Pray that people will have a good time at the parties and be interested in participating in a study group. 

This month we have had meetings about developing the land for the church. We are blessed to have several people around us with experience in church building. We have decided to build in stages as we do not yet need the building to fit a hundred thousand people. :) We are planning to plane the land, sod it, and put up some lights in order to have a field to play on. We will then build a small building on the other side that will have a bigger room that will serve as an auditorium, a nursery, kitchen, bathrooms, office and another room or two. We estimate the cost will be 100,000 dollars and is our first goal for the construction. We are looking at a180 square meter building. The cost right now is around $575 per square meter. Would you consider donating a square meter or two (or 180)? Praise the Lord we are at a great advantage right now with a high exchange rate! (To give, go to www.abwe.org/give, David and Sarah Carrel Account 013323 and sub account 006).

Speaking of construction, they started on the second floor of our house this week. Click here to see the video of me stepping through the roof. :) Thanks for all your prayers; I know they are out there. As I told Cousin Carolyn on Thanksgiving when she said she is praying; “I know, that is why enjoy sending the updates each month, cause I know there are people out there praying for us!” 

All for HIS glory,

David, Sarah, my little school girl that is reading some words, and my climber that recognizes when we are praying and in trying to close her eyes puts on a mad face. :)

Bits October

Boom. We have land for the church. God blessed us with a gift of land from money from the sale of land in a different part of Brazil. We did not even imagine we would receive this and we have been rejoicing since we found out of its probability. This month we will start drawing up plans for the development of the property in phases as the church here grows. We look forward to presenting that to you soon, but if you are just too excited and want to give to whatever it will be you can send money to our ABWE account and reserve it for the church plant construction (David and Sarah Carrel sub-account 006). 

(We have the lots in the middle; 6 lots and 1200 square meters)

Wednesday night we had a party at our training center as we finished going through the Story of Hope this month. We had some good conversations about salvation and are looking forward to one over lunch on Sunday. Please pray for God to continue to work in their hearts in regard to Him. Also pray as we make decisions on our next step as far as studies go. At the moment of writing this, times, locations and child care are issues to work through as we think about what would be best for the work here. At the moment we are planning a Sunday night study and a Wednesday night study. 

This month we traveled to Fortaleza, Brazil for a conference for all the ABWE Brazil missionaries. It was awesome. We have lived on 3 different fields in Brazil and many of our colleagues are great friends. We shared conversation over meals, fun in the sun (or pool) and ideas from ministry with many of them. 

We also stayed a couple of days more for some separate meetings about strategy in Brazil. I have the task of working on some church/seminary education ideas. Please pray for wisdom as we try to organize training that would work for the churches in Brazil as they develop leaders. 

This Saturday we will have the English conversation and the following Saturday we will be watching “Facing the Giants” with the football team. The following weekend we will have the last NT module in Recife. Sarah is also wanting to start an afternoon coffee for ladies. Are those enough prayer requests for you all? We appreciate your prayers so much!

All for HIS glory,

David, Sarah, ms project lady Evie, and the little one that makes her daddy stand at the door before he leaves each day to hear her say bye in a strong southern accent (compare it to what a sheep says).