What to say Lord? Its you who gave me life!

I just wanted to take a moment and update everyone with all that is going on :)

Amazon Valley Academy
 
The first day of school was on Wednesday. I was able to pass out the Bibles that we raised the money for. The Students love them! They wanted me to make sure that I told everyone how much they appreciate them and how thankful they truly are for the Bibles. Personally, I want to thank you as well. Your giving has opened up a whole new opportunity for these kids - to grow closer to God, fill their hunger for His Word, and "sharpen their Swords" to better defend their faith. The students wanted to write y'all some letters thanking you for the Bibles.... I will have them posted on the site ASAP.

God has opened the door for Liz and I to take on some new challenges within our ministry here in Belem. Liz is serving now as the lead teacher for the upper school at AVA. In addition to the Campus Chaplain role, I am also serving as the Campus Administrator. We certainly have a new respect and appreciation for the school administrators that were over us back when we were in school. None the less, God is showing us new things everyday so that we may learn to be more effective in His work that he has called us to.

The English Service

Today was the first day back since Christmas break came in. It was incredible how hard it rained before the service started, and yet so many people managed to "wade" in - I don't believe that will ever cease to amaze me. The service was on Matthew 7:7-12 "Ask, Seek, Knock".

Go Ye Therefore.....

God opened the doors for Liz and I to take a day trip to a Riberino village called Caicaua on Saturday. A newly started Baptist church was hosting VBS this week with the help of a missions group from Sao Paulo. The purpose of this trip was to help serve at the VBS, but also build a relationship with the church planter, Wilson, for future opportunities to help plant churches in Riberino villages. On Saturday, we had over 80 kids show up for VBS! It was truly a blessing to see the church growing so strong in just over a year. Currently, the church serves mainly children and younger youth. The goal is to harness mission efforts out of AVA students and affiliates to host evangelical events targeted at growing this churches "older" populations. Below are a few photos of the trip (there are a couple extra too)....

 Our street when it rains!

 The new church building!

 This was the original church building

 The new parsonage!

My friend!

 This is Wilson, he planted the church!

Well we love all of you are miss you a bunch. May God bless everyone that we may serve Him well and bring glory to His name!

New Number

Liz and I have a new number! It is through MaginJack and acts like a phone from Columbia, SC. So, if you can call your granny in Timbuctoo - you can call us :) The number is 803-343-9155!

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

Liz and I want to wish everyone a Very Merry Christmas! Thank you all so much for your willingness to give to the ministry God has called us to!  We look forward to a good and prosperous 2012, and can't wait to see what all God has in store for His ministry in Belem, Brazil! We will be returning December 31st to get things set up for next semester at AVA. All of the Bibles have been purchased! A huge Obrigado (Thank you) to everyone who gave and prayed so that we could get the Bibles! May you be mightily blessed this Christmas season and into the New Year!

SURPRISE!

I am still a little hesitant to put this up because there are a few people we want to still surprise, but I also feel like everyone deserves an update :) Hopefully you remember the post about the visas we put up a couple of weeks ago! If not, the title is: "The Battle is Over, We Have Won The War".... Our appointment with the consulate in Atlanta was scheduled for December 27th. We were pretty excited about the chance to come home for the holidays until we started looking at the cost of tickets. $6000.00 in some cases. Yeah right! Normally, flying into Miami is the cheapest route by thousands of dollars - but that comes with a 10 hour car ride after flying halfway around the world. I was looking for tickets all around the 27th into Miami $2,700 here and $3,600 there and that was just for one person. I was pretty bummed because that meant we were going to have to reschedule our visa appointment, which just put more time in the mix for things to get messed up, again. Four hours in to my ticket search I stopped to pray, "God please show up here, please get us some tickets home for this." Apparently, I should have started praying sooner! I decided to GO BIG, and simply put what I wanted on the ticket search engine. Fly out the 21st stay till the 28th : $6000..... UUUGGGHHH! Sometimes God wants us to go even BIGGER . Fly out the 19th, come back the 31st, skip Miami and fly into Charlotte with a car rental: $1100.00 WHAT! We will take that one! Surprisingly enough, the trip went really well until we got to the car rental place. "Yea we have a reservation for you, but it has not been paid".... I knew that price was too good. Although, I did have a receipt that said it had been paid in full. Apparently they only charged for the reservation fee - I asked the lady if we would be able to get the rental for the same price as we had on the reservation. The answer was a big fat NO.... Actually, it was twice as much and at $800.00, Liz and I were backpacking, hitch hiking, or hanging out at the Charlotte airport for 12 days... I told the lady that. I looked her dead in the eyes and said, you are really going to make us stay at the airport for 12 days over Christmas.... "Let me see what I can do" - The Lady
         Liz and I brought back 4 suitcases of stuff back for other missionaries since we could do it for free. We had our 4 big suitcases and 2 carry on items a piece. The Budget lady looked at all that stuff, figured it wasn't going to fit in the compact car we had checked out, and hooked us up with an SUV for the same price as the compact car. So, God hooked us up with better tickets than we have ever gotten before at Christmas time, messed up our car rental stuff so we could get something better for the same discounted price, and we got to surprise our family for the holidays! You should have seen everyone's faces! My mom actually thought that the rapture had happened and that we were all on our way to heaven! LOL Vicky just busted out into tears! It was certainly an awesome Christmas Gift for Liz and I to see our families for the Christmas holidays! God certainly takes care of those who seek after Him!

BIBLE UPDATE

 The total cost on the Bibles for the students at AVA was $1011.00 and some change. We have currently reached $900.00 of the $1100 goal. Plus, the people at Lifeway were awesome in helping us gather the Bibles - they even gave us a little discount to help out! If you are looking for a Bible, Lifeway is the place to go!





As far as the Bibles for Nigeria go, we are working with the Gideon's to get those Bibles out to them. However, we do still need to get the study Bible for the pastor (which is listed in a previous post). Hopefully, we can get those to them soon, Lord Willing!

Great Christmas Present Idea!

So, I went into all of my Bible classes and asked the students to pull out their Bibles....... Crickets..........  Nothing! Only like one student had a Bible...... the others.... walked to the back of the room and pulled some off the back shelf. At this point, I was a little concerned. We are in a Christian school and only a very few select students had their own Bible. Of course the school makes Bibles available to all students, but I think it is very important for students/youth to have their own. So, Liz and I's goal is to raise the money to get ALL of the high school students their own personal study Bible (or just the Bible itself works too!). A Bible they will treasure for a long time, actually use, and be excited about reading. When Liz and I were involved with the Providence Baptist Youth Group, we made it a point to get all of the youth their own personal study Bible. The results were amazing!

There are 22 students altogether that we need to get Bibles for. For the 11th and 12th grade group we need to get either a Life Application Study Bible or a Thompson Chain Reference Bible. Both of these are sold at LifeWay Christian Stores. There are 6 Guys and 3 Girls in the 11th and 12th Group. The links for those Bibles are: Thompson Chain Reference: (http://www.lifeway.com/Product/thompson-chain-reference-bible-niv-handy-size-brown-P005453549)
Life Application Study Bible For Guys: (http://www.lifeway.com/Product/life-application-study-bible-niv-caramel-dark-caramel-P005452372)
Life Application For Girls: (http://www.lifeway.com/Product/life-application-study-bible-niv-P005452374).

For the 9th and 10th Group we would like to be able to get them the NIV Zondervan Bibles. For the guys, the Bible is called "Revolution: The Bible for Teen Guys-NIV" 
The site is:( http://www.lifeway.com/Product/revolution-the-bible-for-teen-guys-niv-P005098288). 
For the girls, it is called "True Images: The Bible for Teen Girls- NIV" The link is:( http://www.lifeway.com/Product/niv-true-images-brown-pink-P005172647) or (http://www.lifeway.com/Product/true-images-the-bible-for-teen-girls-niv-P005098286) There are a couple of different models for the girls and you can choose what you like the best.  There are 5 guys and 8 girls in the 9th and 10th group. 


All of these Bibles are available at the LifeWay Christian Book Store and would be an amazing Christmas present to the High School students of Amazon Valley Academy! Please make sure the translation you get is NIV (New International Version)! (Although we will need a couple KJV's in the 9th and 10th group) Thank you for your willingness to further equip these students to further God's Kingdom!

If you feel led to give a student a Bible you can have it sent to 6051 Columbia Rd. St. Matthews SC 29135 (if you order it off-line). Please be sure to have it there by the 27th of December. If you buy it in person at the store, please make sure you let us know so we can make arrangements to get the Bible by the 27th of December.

If the Lord leads you to get a Bible for one of the students, please email me at: revmlbennett@gmail.com so we can work out the logistics. Thank you for your willingness to support this ministry, and your gift will certainly not return to you void! We love y'all and appreciate everything you do for us and our ministry here in Brazil! Be Blessed!