Brenda’s Bulletin

August 14, 2019 A Quick Report

Posted on August 14, 2019 at 2:59 am by Brenda Matthews

I want to thank you all so much for praying about the visa renewal.  Based on the information I received before beginning my Home Assignment, I should have the visa in hand.  Unfortunately, I don’t, but that’s because God has another plan.

Extending my time here until I received the visa would have meant staying about three more weeks.  That would have really messed up the plans for the 16th & 17th and the 38-day trip I begin on the 18th.

The other option was to request a travel permission and make another trip and the only time to do that would be the few days I had between trips.  Getting the fingerprints and signature done before leaving today was vital.  If I could do that, then I just need one day in La Paz to pick up my visa on this September trip.  If not, then I needed at least two days here and that would have meant canceling or postponing commitments.

Aug Ladies' MtgYesterday morning we had a wonderful ladies’ get-together to celebrate the birthdays of the ladies seated and to wrap up the course I was teaching.  At the end, I went to pick up my Travel Permission.  It wasn’t ready, so I had to go back again a little later.  When it was finally brought for me, I asked about possibly getting the fingerprinting done.  Apparently, they usually do that on Mondays, but the official needed for that procedure “just happened to be there”.  I waited for two-and-a-half hours, most of that being after office hours, before they finally brought the document for fingerprinting and signature.  Praise the Lord!

This means I’ll leave Canada after a medical appointment Sept. 24th, arriving in La Paz the afternoon of the 25th.  The office is only open till 1 pm, so I’ll have to wait until the morning of the 26th to pick up my visa and immediately head back to the airport so I’ll be home for commitments on the 27th & 28th and to start the last trip on the 29th of September.

Aug Ladies' BookletsThis morning I was able to finish a project I had left with the ladies.  For those who took notes and wanted to keep them, I said I’d put them into some kind of a more permanent format.  So, one of the projects I was working on was to design the cover and have the notes converted to booklets.

Another project was to redo the visuals of my presentations in Spanish.  I’m excited about the two Hispanic churches on the upcoming trips and there’s possibly a third one as well.  I’ve also been able to host a couple of follow-up meetings to the conference that the El Faro leadership attended in June and will continue with involvement in that process.

Aug ConversatoriosBelkis has been leading some monthly conversational workshops for the church as an outreach ministry.  The attendance has grown with each event and Belkis does an excellent job leading them.  I was glad to help out with a couple of those.

Other projects included doing some visitation, renewing my driver’s license, taking care of car insurance and check-up, answering emails, preparing videos, fixing or having someone fix things that broke down, etc.  Dealing with the power outages in this heat with high humidity was challenging, but the time has flown by.

I also got to enjoy time at the beach.  Last time I had videos of a Common Octopus hunting.  On my last skin dive, I got to watch a Jewel Moray Eel hunting.  You could watch that video here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Weduxt_pByc&t=15s

I appreciate your prayers as I leave for the airport in a few hours, for all the traveling and for the rest of my Home Assignment.  Please pray that I would be a blessing and that the needed prayer and financial support be raised.

Expectantly waiting on the Lord,

Brenda

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