It was on my calendar to send out a prayer letter at the beginning of September. As you can see, I am rather late. I would like to blame the pandemic. No really, Cynthia and I both contracted COVID within the last several weeks. First, I tested positive, and then one day before we were due to come out of quarantine (the Brazilian CDC requires 10 days), Cynthia tested positive. That set our self-quarantine clock back to zero (Yippee!). We praise the Lord, however, that neither of our cases were serious, and we are now back to our regular routine. Due to several church folks testing positive, we had to move to a virtual service for a couple of weeks until everything blew over.
The encouraging news is that while we were “shut down,” our folks did a great job of staying in contact and encouraging one another. Our first Sunday back, we had 8 in the service. That Wednesday, we had 18. Then the second Sunday back, we had 48, with a first-time visitor and a returning one. People were singing, there was good response to the preaching, and you could tell that people were glad to be back in church. I would also be remiss not to mention that since our last letter, we have had many salvation decisions, 2 baptisms, and a family join the church. We have several more families that should be joining in the near future.
We had a huge blessing given to us by the Lord in August when Christian Media International flew a team of four men down to install a high-quality video recording studio in our church. Over a week’s time, they put everything together with the help of some of our men here. They installed all the equipment and gave us a crash course in how to record, edit, and upload Gospel preaching to whatever platform is available to us. I believe this will be a powerful tool in getting the Gospel to many parts of Brazil, not just our local area. Please pray that at the right time, God will open the door to getting Gospel programming on TV here in our area. I am still amazed at how much God provided for this ministry to become a reality.
Would you please pray with us for the following?
• Souls to be saved
• New converts to be added to the church
• The potential TV ministry
• The health and safety of our team members
We are very grateful for your love and faithful support. It is our privilege to be your arm here in the northeast of Brazil. God bless you!
Declaring His glory,
Wesley Palla
Psalm 96:3
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- Our new recording studio with help from CMI!
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- Back to in-person services again–what a blessing!