Hello,

Happy Easter!  Praise the Lord for He has risen!

Finally!!!  After a two-year hiatus, we had our traditional Easter early morning church service by celebrating the Lord’s resurrection, and serving breakfast.  It takes a lot of work to pull this off, and it is essentially a whole church effort.  Each of the home groups was responsible for bringing an item that would be enough to feed 200 people.  Everyone chipped in and made it a great and inviting time for all guests.

We started by worshipping the Lord, and then Elba shared a short message about the resurrection of Christ.  Then we celebrated the good news that Jesus is alive by eating breakfast together.  Members of the church prepared food at their house and then brought it to the church for all to enjoy.  Elba, Camilly and Alyssa were pancake duty.   A member of our church made a watermelon cake…pretty impressive. 

Also, the day before, some of the children went to the church and painted eggs. 

CDR, our non-profit organization, just had a graduation for 27 students from our English program.  It was an exciting night, and the students worked hard to get to this point to graduate.  It was so nice to have a graduation in person.  We had two students address the audience in English.  CDR’s goal is not only to help empower the impoverished by providing English at an affordable price but to help bridge the gap between the community and the church.  So when I heard the two students speak at the graduation and give glory to God for all of His help, I felt good that it was happening. 

Did you know Brazilians who speak other languages tend to have better opportunities and higher monthly salaries than people who have only a basic knowledge of another language or who only speak Portuguese?  For example, a recent study of 2,400 job positions in 19 thousand companies in Brazil compared different English and Spanish levels.  They found that fluency in another language could increase the monthly employee’s salary by 51%.  WOW!

Here are some pictures of the celebration.  We were surprised by the great turnout. 

Thanks and much love, Steve, Elba, Camilly, and Alyssa

We appreciate your continued prayers:

• Please pray that we will identify the new senior pastor of the Belém / Ananideiua church plant.

• Please pray for our church, leadership, and congregation to help people draw close to God as we navigate this time and leadership transition. 

• The rejection of this virus from you, your family, and friends and to be thrown out of this universe forever. 

• Please pray for our family, especially our girls, in this next phase of our lives.  

• Please pray for our spiritual, physical, emotional, and financial health.  

Much love, Steve, Elba, Camilly, and Alyssa

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