Great is His Faithfulness

Well...its been 7 weeks and we have almost finished FPO (orientation). It has been a time of joy, encouragement, faith building, relationship building, STRESS, stripping of self, spiritual renewal and growth. We have received awesome training and have learned so much from many heroes of the faith. We have seen God's faithfulness in answering so many of our prayers. One of the greatest blessings and confirmaiton of our call has been getting our visas in 4.5 weeks. From the begining, we were told to expect to be delayed for months after FPO because it was difficult to get visa's for Brazil. Praise the Lord! We will not have any additional delays and are tentatively scheduled to fly out on July 6th.

Even though we have had changes in our location for language school and our first term, we know that God has been guiding and directing for His purpose and for His glory. We are so thankful for this time and for the great responsibility God has charged us with through His great call. Thanks to all our prayer partners and supporters for your continued prayer and encouragement. We are truly blessed!

"Give thanks to the Lord, Call upon His name, make known among the nations what He has done." (1 Chronicles 16:8) -Jenny

Our Time in the Nation's Capital

We needed to travel to Washington DC in order to continue working on our visas, so we scheduled a trip for a few days prior to when we needed to arrive at the International Learning Center for our time of orientation. Quite honestly, after months of gathering documents and taking them through the authentications process, we were anticipating a very difficult experience. However, God honored the prayers of many of you, and He provided many delightful people along the way to make the process smooth. Things were going so well, in fact, that we actually called one of the missionaries in Brazil from the Brazilian consulate because we were concerned that we were doing something wrong:)

Our visa application was accepted on our very first visit to the consulate, which is so rare that all we can say is "praise the Father for answered prayers." Please join us now as we are praying daily that we will have our visas in hand by the time orientation will be over in June. Let me quickly acknowledge those neat folks God sent our way. First, we had driven literally through the night to arrive at the US State Department upon opening. However, we stopped by our hotel and were immediately blessed by the gracious assistance of Nadine. Over the course of the next several days, I learned that she had actually discovered a personal relationship with Jesus Christ through the ministry of a missionary to here homeland in Africa. What an encouragement!

It was necessary to make visits to the authentications office of the US State Department on consecutive days. We had mailed over 100 pages of documents ahead hoping that they would be ready before our arrival. Unfortunately, they had not even been started, but Sonja went the extra mile and had all of our docs ready by the next day!

As we arrived at the Brazilian Consulate, we were not sure what to expect, but the people were wonderfully gracious, friendly and helpful. The girls were so excited to meet several Brazilians!

The process was so much smoother than expected that we had extra time for sightseeing. We had scheduled a Capital and White House tour through the office of our Congressman, Brett Guthrie, but how surprised we were when Congressman Guthrie was the one who gave us the Capital tour himself! We got to see all kinds of really cool things off the normal tour, and he even took Hannah and Haley onto the floor of the House of Representatives!

We got to see many of the monuments and spent some time in the Smithsonian. A surprise treat of the trip was the opportunity to reconnect with a really good friend from college, Jason Pack. Jason works in the FBI press office, so we got another personal tour. The girls got to watch as agents were certified on the firing range. Pretty cool!

Hannah's Experiences at Appointment Week

For appointment week we went to Memphis. My Mom and Dad had meetings while we were with our Mammaw. We had lots of fun. We went to the zoo. We also went to the kid's museum and we toured Graceland. My favorite part was seeing Elvis' house!

We got to meet some other missionaries from imb. I had a blast. My pappaw and grandmommy also came down to see us. We all went to see the appointment service. My favorite part was when the missionaries paraded in. Also when the flags of the nations came in. The president of imb spoke. And some people from our church came to see the service too. Then there was a reception after the service. They served cookies and juice. We had prayer with the group from the church. It was an awesome experience!

- Hannah

Wow! What a Month!

Well, it's been a month since appointment week and it's amazing to see all that the Lord has accomplished. Upon our return from appointment, we began packing up to crate. This was a very exciting time for all of us as we sorted through what to crate, what to keep and what to sell. Rob and I began our inventory list. We shopped for supplies, the girls helped take pictures to add to our list and we all sorted and bubble wrapped. Thanks to our friends at Natcher Elementary, we had lots of boxes to put things in.
During this process, the girls continued to do their home schooling. I was proud of how they were able to stay on task in the midst of this chaos. We were allotted 600 cubic sq. ft. of crate space. As we began sorting, since the boxes were all identical in size it made it very easy to figure cubic ft. By the time we started crating we had already determined we would only need 400 of 600 cubic ft. It was awesome to see how the Lord provided enough space for all we needed and even a little to spare.
After we crated, it was time to have a yard sale and pack up the rest of our things to take with us to orientation and then to Language School in Brazil. God blessed again during the yard sale when we sold everything in just 1 day. Along with crating, and the yard sale, we were able to deliver furniture to family, get all necessary documents to begin our visa process, pack up our remaining items and move out of the mission house, and head to Tennessee to spend Easter with family.
As we look back on the blessings, we are overwhelmed by the way God not only provided wonderful friends and family to love and support us, but He has carried us through this process with very few bumps. A process that began almost two years ago, has finally become a reality. Praise the Lord for His faithfulness. Though the journey has been long and sometimes painful, the rewards and the promise of what is to come is great!

-Jenny

My last day of school was Febuary 5, 2010. I shared about the Amazon Basin and that I was going to be a missionary. I also showed them pictures of Brazil.

After that they showed me that they had a surprise for me. thay made a book called "The ABC's of Haley." The book made me very happy. When they brougt the book out I was very suprised that they made me something like a book! I love it so much!

- Haley Grace

Appointed!!!

Our journey towards international missions passed a significant mile marker on March 3 as we were formally appointed by the International Mission Board of the SBC. The very first conversation that Jenny and I ever had was actually a conversation about summer missions across the lunch table at Carson Newman College. That 1st conversation took place in 1991. I cannot remember a single year that has passed since then that we have not asked, "Is now the time? Is now when God would have us to go to the mission field?"
For various reasons the answer has always been "not yet," but in April of 2008, we submitted our application. As we have taken each step...waited...trusted and took the next step again, God has taught us so much about His character and love for the nations. Our call is not about what we are being called to do or where or even when. Our call is quite simply about who: God is calling us unto Himself and it is the greatness of our God that compels us to follow. Where else would we want to be?

God Moving in Monte Alegre

Eastwood Baptist sent a small scout team January 28 - February 5. The team worked several days in Monte Alegre conducting backyard Bible club, door-to-door evangelism, & providing an eye clinic. Members of the team also prayer walked in Malata and Prianha.
EBC is praying about becoming our first Strategy Coordinator Church. Please pray for God's clear guidance as they seek His direction. Pray also that God will raise up other churches as partners for the work in the Basin.