A letter from Gordon and Dorothy Gartrell in the U.S., on Interpretation Assignment from Brazil
Late FAll 2014 - Seed Bearing Fruit
Greetings in the Name of our Lord Jesus Christ.
We are back in the United States for six months for our Interpretation Assignment (IA). We are sharing about our work in Brazil with supporters, friends and interested people, and spending time with family. We are very excited that many churches have contacted us about visiting them. Our calendar is not full, so please email us and we can set up a date to visit with you. We are available to speak any day of many weeks, not just Sunday.
It was summer there when we left in October. Our spring (June–August) is usually a rainy season, but this year they were dry months. Many crops sprouted, but when they were in the heat and sun without rain for the roots, they did not produce anything. The year before. the first crop produced semi-decent results if you planted it early in the season. Many of the local farmers are suffering, therefore stores are selling less, and the effects go on. It reminded us of the parable of the sower in Matthew 13. The seeds sprouted according to where they fell. The parable talks about seeds that fell on dry and rocky soil and were not able to produce roots, and seeds that fell in very weedy areas so that the plants were choked out. Some fell in rich soil and they were able to grow roots, which over time allowed the seeds to begin to sprout and in time produced richly.
We can see examples of these situations in our ministry. Our children’s Saturday afternoon program choked and dried up because we did not look at the community’s characteristics and needs before it was started. In other places we lived, programs like that had been wonderful for the church and the children. It was successful for a very short time, but did not flourish, whereas the children’s program during evening worship met two needs. The new children needed some place to go and learn where they would not bother the worshippers. And there were women in the church who had teaching talents that were not being used. Their gifts could be used and strengthened, and they suddenly felt like contributing members of the church when they spent time with the children. Four people spend one Sunday a month with the children so on other Sundays they can also participate in worship.
Gordon challenged the Praise Group who lead a strong part of our worship to enhance their ministry. Two members learned to play songs on the keyboard, so not everything was a cappella. That ministry has enriched its roots and is reaching many people. Another example of the seeds being planted in rich soil was the Women’s Bible Study. Even though some of the women had read through the Bible more than once, each week Dorothy and the other women learned something new each week. The women studied about 50 women in the Bible who God used in a wide range of ways to fulfill His purposes. Dorothy asked the women if after she left they wanted to meet monthly instead of each week. They said they wanted to continue to have weekly meetings. Some of the women taught lessons along with Dorothy. It is continuing because two women agreed to be responsible for making sure there was a leader each week.
Once again, it is always hard to say good-bye to our friends. When we return we will be working in another location. We will still be working in church planting and leadership development, but next term we will be in Governador Mangabeira, Bahia. It is 80 miles from Salvador, the capital. It is a city of about 25,000. We have never been there, but we met two church leaders at a presbytery event. We will begin to work there in May 2015.
After leaving Brazil, we spent two weeks in El Salvador in Central America, attending meetings for PC(USA) missionaries. The first week was a meeting enabling the missionaries who work in health care and evangelism to learn about CHE (Community Health Evangelism). We learned about reaching out to others in a holistic way, meeting their physical needs while enabling them to learn more about God. The second week all the PC(USA) missionaries from the Caribbean and Central and South America met to get to know one another, have a refreshing time, and learn about what is happening in the PC(USA) today, meet staff, be reminded of our responsibilities to you, our friends and supporters in the U.S., and become updated on current PC(USA) issues.
Sometimes we wonder if our job is bearing fruit and if your donations are accomplishing anything. In the last two years we have seen positive evidences of lives we have touched over the years. We attended a national conference on evangelism. About 10 young adults from a city where we had previously worked came also. They were teenagers when we were there and have blossomed into church leaders. Another opportunity to see seeds bearing fruit was when a young man got married in Imperatriz, where we worked from 1995 to 1999. He and his mother expected us to come, even though it was a day and a half drive for us. We saw how many of the seeds we planted while we were there have blossomed in numerous ways.
The older elementary children and teenagers in the church have become well-educated church and community leaders. Those who were upper elementary age participants reminded Dorothy of funny activities they had done together and what they learned from them. Dorothy had forgotten the lessons until they reminded her of the fun they had together. These folks had mostly come from low-income, broken, often abusive families. They had not ever learned about how to treat others as people of value. Today seeing the difference they are making in the community and how loving and caring spouses and parents they had become as well as their strong relationship with the Lord was beautiful and overwhelming. Thank you for enabling us to share Christ with them and touch their lives in very remarkable ways.
Please continue to pray for us and financially support our ministry. Pray about supporting us quarterly, monthly or with a yearly gift. It’s easy to do, just go online and enter www.pcusa.org/gordon-and-dorothy-gartrell, press the "Give..." bar, then the "Make a Donation" bar, and fill in the details.
May your Advent season and 2015 be a blessed time.
Gordon and Dorothy Gartrell
235 Inman Dr. Apt 2B
Decatur, GA 30030
dorothyandgordongartrell@gmail.com
The 2014 Presbyterian Mission Yearbook for Prayer & Study, p. 61
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