New News

Ladies Night Out
Breakfast with the Whole Group

Dear Friends and Family

Field Conference
This last week we have been in meetings with our coworkers. We were supposed to have our two bosses--the South American Regional Director from Ecuador and the Vice President of Field Ministries from Avant Headquarters in KC--come for our field conference. But both of them had problems--one with his visa and the other with his tickets. So the Lord in His infinite wisdom allowed us to have all arrived from interior, having arranged for people to take care of our responsibilities for the week, and we took it as the Lord directing us to use the week to continue to pray for each other and our ministries and also refine and focus our vision and goals for our collective ministries here in Northeast Brazil.

It's amazing to see how vast the field is and how huge a work it is, but the Lord IS ABLE! We have no doubt of it and fully believe the Lord is guiding each one of us to our goal of seeing every person in this area with the opportunity to accept Christ as Savior. We know that all men need salvation, and God wishes for none to perish. It is our responsibility and privilege to be the messengers and to train others to be messengers of the Good News of Jesus in this area.

The radio listening area is so huge that we have decided to divide it into Zone 1 and Zone 2. Zone 1 is the inner circle, closest to the radio station, that still has a large number of areas that are less than 1% evangelized. Part of our goal for the next six months is to do research on this area and find out what platforms we can use to reach this area for Christ. We know that the 24 Hour Christian Radio is the main tool God has given us to reach into these areas and we're trying to find out where the most responses to radio are, that already don't have churches, and which will be our next area of focus.

Prayer Points
Some matters of prayer that came out of the field conference that we would like to share are these:
1. One of the men from the home office was bringing some very important things down to Brazil for everyone on the field--parts to fix the mission computer, important documents, homeschooling supplies, our kid's Christmas presents and a wedding dress. They were also going to take back some things for us. Please pray for the more important things to find their way here and back.
2. Elwyn and Linda Goossen--There are a couple of situations with the radio staff that need prayer. Two of the staff are having very serious marital problems--please pray for God's resolution and His healing in these marriages.
3. James and Molly Goossen--In Guaraciaba they have had a very large response with requests for many Bible Studies. There are already a handful of believers that are meeting weekly. Please pray for God to protect these new believers from the attacks of Satan and for those that are so close to coming to know the Lord. Continue to praise the Lord for Molly's health!
4. Ken and Alisia Gustafson--Please pray for Beto and Sebastiao, two young men in the Pires Ferreira congregation who have shared a deep passion for seeing their relatives and friends come to know the Lord. Both of them were saved out of desperate situations--Beto being a drunk who would often be wheeled home in a wheel barrow and every one had given up as a lost cause and Sebastiao being the local drug runner who had a price on his head. Ken is teaching Beto how to read so he can read the Bible. And then he wants to learn how to ride a bike so he can go to a village a ways off and share the gospel with a friend.
5. Ivan and Mary Goossen--They are facing many major events in their lives over the next few months. Their son is getting married in December here in Brazil and the wedding dress is for his fiance. They are also in the midst of a construction project for church and finishing the guesthouse property here where we live to make it suitable for our field's needs.
6. Todd and Julie Hendry--Julie's possible melanoma spot came back negative--NO CANCER! That was a real praise! Todd and Michaela are getting better after bad throat infection and an allergic reaction and asthma with Michaela. Todd has started Cycle 19. We are on a schedule for Todd to reach cycle 30 by the end of February. Please pray for the Lord's speed and comprehension in completing his classes. We are also going to be starting to look for housing in Guaraciaba by the end of March. Please pray for the Lord's provision and blessing in this area. Also, Julie will be working with Christmas programs at church and at Michaela's school (she goes on Wednesday afternoon for Portuguese and they asked me to teach music until Christmas).

Communication Problems
We have felt like we have dropped the ball as far as communication goes with our supporters and family. Part of it was a change over from the e-mail system to a new one that won't allow us to send mass e-mails. We tried to send out a request for everyone to become part of a google group and out of over 300 emails sent we only received 34 replies to join our google group. We are still trying to figure out how to deal with this situation and keep in touch. But mostly it's us--we have let life and busyness side track us for a very important part of our ministry--keeping you informed and letting you know how much you mean to us. We are working on our next prayer letter and hopefully we can establish our communication again with many of you that are probably wondering what in the world is going on with us. Thank you for your faithfully to us despite our weaknesses. You are truly a blessing to us and we would't be here with out you!

Serving together with you,
Todd and Julie Hendry

Burning Hearts

Praise:

• Wonderful trip interior--safety--God protected Todd during a police stop
• Todd still doesn't have a drivers license (was denied being able to make the application) but we have found the law that says he can currently drive on an international drivers license. (We are just concerned that the local police will not recognize it.)
• Faithfulness in support and prayers from our partners back home
• Julie's spot was found early

Prayer:

• Biopsy would reveal benign spot on Julie's leg
• Todd's health to return to full-strength
• Michaela's asthma
• Language school for both of us--especially Todd
• Faithfulness in homeschooling
• Michaela's been having a hard time missing family and friends in the States.

Dear Friends and Family,

We have just returned from a trip interior this weekend, to the town where we will be serving after language school for our internship. The name of the town is Guaraciaba and we have been incredibly challenged and blessed by all that is happening there!

Trip Interior
Part of the purpose of our trip was our field prayer meeting. Since most of our missionaries are spread out, we don't have a chance to gather for prayer on a regular basis, so we have started a weekly prayer program and have decided to meet 5 times per year for a day of prayer for each other. Our time together sharing what has been happening in our ministries and families was so special. We have a great team to work with and we thank the Lord for each one of them!

On Saturday, we all went to a little village called Olho D'Agua (literally Eye of Water) which is about 30 minutes off the pavement on clay roads, and we passed over at least 5 wet bridges (that we hear were way better than normal, but our little car struggled over them!). When we arrived, the leader of the church--a lay pastor--was lugging a sack of oranges he had just picked, for all of us to suck the juice out of. Here the people like to cut a hole in the top of the orange and squeeze all the juice right into their mouths. It's good hydration and so delicious! Then they slaughtered a sheep, and served that to everyone who came. But while that was cooking, everyone who could went on a tour of the area, visiting the local creek, the new water tower, the papaya plantation, along with black pepper plants, paprika, and so much more, concluding the tour with a couple hours of playing in the water falls, that eventually lead to the edge of the mountain and a really tall drop. Of course, no one got close enough to see the drop off, but enjoyed playing in one of the water falls that had about a 10 foot drop and pool underneath it. Everyone enjoyed the day so much--demonstrated by completely filthy but happy children at the end of the day.

In the evening, everyone cleaned up, and the lady of the house served the delicacies of the sheep--namely the liver, lungs and brain. Our family had a little bit of a hard time with that and I made sure I found some pieces of actual meat for the children. But it was a very special thing for them to give us and we didn't want to offend them--and everyone else was really enjoying it!

After supper, came the high light of the day. Over 116 people came for an evangelistic meeting that was done by shining the projector onto the side of a white-washed house. These homes are so hidden in the greenery of the mountains that you'd never guess so many people lived in that area. There was a time if singing hymns that a few of the believers in the area knew and I helped with leading the music. It's been a long time since I've done something impromptu like that and so I was pretty nervouse. But after that, they showed a translated Billy Graham sermon and testimonies of famous Brazilians who have come to trust in the Lord as their Savior. At the end of the service when James said "Good Night", nobody left. So another pastor came up and gave his testimony. They still didn't want to leave, so James did a comercial for the Radio Station and said that if anyone listened to the radio station the next Saturday and wrote in to tell how many times their village was mentioned and got it right, they would win a Bible! So everyone got excited about that! After all that, they decided to go home.

The next day we went to James and Molly's house where the believers from a church in the neighboring town of Sao Benedito come every Sunday to work with the beginning of a church in Guaraciaba. For several months they have been doing research surveys in the homes in that neighborhood asking what people know about the radio, about the Bible, about Jesus. Then they ask if they would like prayer, if they would like Christian literature, and if they would like to do a Bible Study. They have had so many responses to requests for Bible Studies that they have had to stop the surveys to catch up on meeting for the Bible studies. Over 70 people have signed up for them! Then James and Molly, and their Brazilian co-worker, Jordana, also do follow-ups and Bible Studies during the week.

There have been at least 7 people that have asked the Lord to be their Savior through these Bible studies so far and have completed all of the evangelistic studies. Now James and Molly have invited them to meet on Wednesday evenings for group Bible studies where they are teaching doctrine (what the Bible teaches) through narratives of the Bible. They also are working on teaching them some Christian songs. Many of the people are illiterate or barely literate and many have never heard the Bible stories, and they are thoroughly enjoying their new found faith and knowledge. Please pray for all the others that are doing Bible studies in the book of John to understand their need for a Savior and to accept Christ's gift of salvation. It is so exciting--we just wish we could be there now!

Later that night we went to their church and Todd spoke. When we arrived the whole town was without electricity and they conducted the service in the dark until about 10 minutes before it was over. We had several people, including the pastor, hoping that we will end up working with them on another church plant after our time in Guaraciaba. The Lord knows!

Personal
Yesterday we arrived home safely, uneventfully, and so excited to go back. We are really looking forward to being in our ministry and living interior. But we want to be faithful in what he has for us to do here still. So along those lines--please do pray for Todd's continued diligence with language study. And I am trying to work out a way to do my studies while teaching Michaela. It is important, and am planning on handing in cycle 18's work on Thursday. Todd is finishing 17 and will be starting 18 on Thursday.

We have had some health issues pop up lately and we would ask for prayer for them. I (Julie) went to the dermatologist a couple weeks ago and I showed her that there was a small spot of brown on top of the white scar tissue from my melanoma surgery a year and a half ago. Well, it looks like it is cancer returning--it's a very slim chance it is not, and we are praying for that to be the case. As Todd said, "God is a God of miracles!" She did a biopsy last Wednesday and we will get the results from the biopsy about the 9th of October. I don't know what will happen if it is, but we'll keep you updated.

Michaela's asthma acted up this weekend while in the mountains, so we would ask you to pray for us to keep it under control. We haven't found an asthma doctor yet, so we need to do that. Sammy is doing well, so no worries for him--except for all the tumbles he takes getting into things and just being a little boy. Todd has had a sore throat for the last 3 weeks, with no other symptoms until tonight when 9 red spots showed up on his back and neck. They look like an allergic reaction or bug bite, so we're not sure if the two are related or not. We are going to look into a doctor for him. We would also like him to get a blood test, to see how his kidney is doing, since we passed the two year mark on September 27th. Molly is doing really well and has so much energy for this ministry. She is so happy to be able to be involved and keep up with all the running around they do with visitation. And she is so good at it too! We just praise the Lord for her!

I know this is a long update--but so much has happened! I hope you enjoy hearing about the interior and all the exciting things the Lord is doing in the lives of so many people. I think next time I'll share some of the testimonies we have heard so you can be praying more specifically for them.

We truly could not be doing this without you! Our field prayed last Friday these verses in 2 Corinthians 10:3-5 "For though we live in the world, we do not wage war as the world does. The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. On the contrary, they have divine power to demolish strongholds. We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ." There are strongholds in the minds of everyone of these people that are being reached with the Bible Studies--wrong religious teaching through cults and other religions, idolatry, materialism, evolution and humanism, and so forth. Please pray that God's power would demolish every idea they have that fights against the truth of God's Word! That God may be glorified and names be written in the Book of Life from Guaraciaba do Norte! Please pray and know we are deeply grateful for all you do for us!

Serving together,

Todd and Julie Hendry

Way too long

This is the update I tried to send out a month ago, September 6th, and all of them returned--as far as I know. We are still trying to get the kinks worked out so we can send general prayer updates to everyone.

Praise:
Todd reached the half-way point in his language studies
Michaela is doing well in 2nd grade and Portuguese classes
Good time of calm and rest lately
Have a good schedule for the family

Prayers:
Our family to grow closer to the Lord and each other
Todd’s Portuguese would continually improve
Julie’s Portuguese class and homeschool schedule
Documents needed—Todd’s drivers’ license, Permanent Visas, Brazilian SSN
Children’s transition and language learning
Trips interior over the next few months


Dear Friends and Family,

We again want to thank you all for your prayers and support for our ministry as we prepare to go interior to work with church planting in the least reached areas of Northeast Brazil. After all the busyness of taking care of the guest house, finishing 1st grade with Michaela and preparing her 2nd grade work, things have reached a comfortable pace. And we are praising the Lord for this time of calm. It’s the first time we’ve felt that life is at a comfortable, workable pace since, well, I don’t know when the last time was. With all the travelling for raising support, then preparing to come down, then arriving and setting up house, homeschooling in the morning and studying in the afternoons, then the container and preparing for mom and dad to leave—we’ve not had much down time but have always gone from one thing to the next. I know the Lord blesses us when we are active in service for Him, but I know He also provides rest and this time has been good for our whole family in that regard.

Todd has had a whole month and a half of classes with out any interruptions and he has made considerable progress. We were praying that he’d finish Cycle 14 by the end of August and was already in the middle of Cycle 15 at the turn of the month. He finished cycle 15 this week and has reached the half-way mark! What a milestone! It’s been a blessing for me to see him communicating clearly and understanding so much more. We’ve been involving ourselves more at church, attending Thursday night women’s and men’s Bible studies, and Awana on Saturdays and that has given us more opportunities for conversation and practice for Todd. We’ve also seen our children slowly learning new words and feeling more comfortable. Michaela has always enjoyed being around people, but now that she doesn’t know Portuguese, she fears not understanding what someone says and having someone laugh at her. Please pray for her little heart to take chances and learn to laugh at her own mistakes, they are unavoidable. Two weeks ago she started Portuguese classes and she is doing well with learning the alphabet and learning the phonetic sounds so she can sound out words a little easier. And she learned her first verse in Portuguese for Awana this week. It was 2 Corinthians 6:2b—“Now is the day of salvation!” Which in Portuguese is 2 Corintios 6:2b “Eis, agora, o dia da salvação!” She was so proud of herself and we were too! Until now she had been learning them in English and saying them to me at Awana. Sammy is pronouncing words very well and catching on well, but he’s so shy sometimes that it interferes with his interaction with other children. Thank you for praying for our children’s transition and language learning.

Please pray for wisdom for me as I try to fit in studying Portuguese back into the schedule. When I took a break from my studies, I was on Cycle 17 and now Todd is catching up. Our teacher is not really available for any more teaching time, so I may try to do it on an independent study level and then perhaps she can help me work through any problems we come across.

We have greatly enjoyed having all our coworkers back on the field. All of the accounting and care of the guest house have been turned over to Ivan and Mary Goossen, so that lightened the load considerably. We will be participating in our Field Conference with guests from the States the last week of October. The Field Conference is a time of spiritual renewal for the missionaries, a time of fellowship, and a time of rest. We are looking forward to our first field conference in Brazil.

We’ve received several questions lately that might be good to share with every one:
O What happened to your website? Well, the old one was taken off the air and after a couple months of trying to fix it, we decided to just start over. The new address is http://www.tjhendry.blogspot.com/. It has our updates from the beginning, plus links to photos and videos and other interesting things. We would love to have you stop by every now and then to see what’s new.
O Can we send a package? What should we send? Well, first of all—you don’t have to, but we sure enjoy it! About 7 lbs – 10 lbs was about $50 to send. So it is expensive. But if you insist, (smile) there is a list of items on our website that we can’t find here that would remind us of home!
O Is that crazy dog, Daisy, still chewing all your stuff? NO! Praise the Lord! We don’t know if dogs her age, 1 ½ yrs old, teeth, or what was happening to her. But just as quickly as it started, it stopped. That was a real answer to prayer!
O When are you planning to move interior? Well, Todd reached his half-way point in language school this week. We are estimating that he’ll be done by February, give or take, depending on if we get called away to do ministry trips interior. But that is according to plan. We started language school mid-January and took some time away during the container ordeal. So it will end up taking about a year of language school, which is the norm. We are hoping to go interior more often, to get a feel for the people and the culture where we will be living, and eventually to start looking for a place to live.
O Has the economy troubles in the States affected our support? Possibly. When we left we were at 98% of our support and currently we are at less than 85%. The two biggest setbacks have been due to problems in some of our largest churches. But we cannot fail to mention that two of our churches have increased our support, as well as a couple individuals. We know the Lord is in control and it is He that provides and guides. We still have not spent a bulk of our initial set up fund because we have been living in a fully furnished guest house. So we will start making purchases—things like beds, closets (they don’t have built-ins here), kitchen cabinets, dressers, etc—for our home interior. Please pray for wisdom to make good decisions and buying things that are flexible for different living situations. We have to use this money, according to the U.S. IRS rules, before the completion of one year here in Brazil, and we won’t know where we will be living then. So please pray for good choices in spending the money that others have given generously to us to set up house in the interior of Ceará.
O How is Todd’s driving situation? We have completed some of the paperwork that we have heard is required to get a driver’s license. Right now we are waiting for his Brazilian version of a Social Security Card to arrive. We still don’t know if they’ll allow him to get a drivers license until the visas arrive, but we are going to try.
O And where are you in the visa process? Our applications for the permanent visas were accepted back in January. The next step is for the Federal Police to visit us randomly at our home to make sure we live where we say we do. Once that visit is completed, our applications will be sent to Brasilia to be processed. Only after 6 months there, can we start looking for our name to be published in a Daily Public Journal. It will be in published in the journal for 6 weeks and we must go to the Federal Police and register during that time. If not, we have to start the process all over again. We are still waiting for the visit, and coworkers of ours have been waiting for about 2 years for their visit. So it may not happen for quite awhile. Please pray for patience and wisdom when to contact the Federal Police to check on our application progress.

Last week our church here in Brazil had a week of prayer and a national missionary from interior came to speak. His main point was the urgency with which evangelism must be faced. We’re not talking about some theological idea, but lives of actual people living in darkness and destined for a lost eternity. Our souls burn to be interior and start the work the Lord has given us to do here in Brazil. This week our field had meetings on Thursday and Friday to talk about business and about our vision and strategy for reaching the radio listening area. It was so exciting and encouraging to know that our time to go interior is nearing and to see the heart and passion of our fellow missionaries for the lost here in Brazil. As Ivan, our field director said, “This is what we must live and breath, second only to our relationship with the Lord!” Todd will be taking monthly trips interior and our field will be getting together regularly to pray and do research trips. It’s exciting to see what the Lord has in store as we work for the Lord to reach people for Him. The harvest is ready and we are looking forward to being involved in God’s work of harvesting souls for a blessed eternity with the Lord! The missionary from last week pointed out that every person who prays, gives, encourages a missionary is directly involved in that harvest. Thank you for your involvement, for your sacrifices in giving, for your energy expended not only on our behalf, but on behalf of the people that we will share the Gospel with and will choose to find eternal peace in Christ. Thank you!

Serving together,

Todd and Julie Hendry