NEWS FROM HQ

Ministering for the Lord in Brazil

“And he called his ten servants, and delivered them ten pounds, and said unto them, Occupy till I come.” (Luke 19:13)

Dear Friends,

Recently the man who had been the last remaining Japanese holdout to surrender from World War II, died. He had been left on a Philippine island with three orders: Keep fighting, never surrender, and wait for reinforcements. He surrendered thirty years after the war ended when his original commanding officer came and gave the order to surrender. When asked what he thought about for thirty years in the jungle, he said, “Obeying orders.”

We who are still “fighting the good fight” against error are today in the same situation as this Japanese was on his island. We have received the same orders. Our cause looks hopeless and the vast majority of our fellow Christians have stopped fighting. We must keep fighting, never surrender, and wait for Christ to come back.

Five Year Review

We have just completed five years here in Brazil, not counting furlough time, and we think it good to review a bit of the history of this mission and our past five years. This is especially for those who are not very familiar with, or new to, our mission and also to refresh the minds of others.

Dr. and Mrs. William Le Roy were missionaries here in São Paulo for 38 years until 1991. They published a newspaper, “The Biblical Presbyterian” for many years and also worked with the CIEF (Confederation of Evangelical Fundamentalist Churches), the local arm of the ICCC. After Dr. and Mrs. Le Roy left Brazil these works stopped functioning for almost twenty years.

We arrived in Brazil in 2008 and Ken studied Portuguese for a year. In 2009 we started up the newspaper, “The Fundamentalist,” in the tradition of the newspaper of Dr. Le Roy. We took our name from an earlier paper of CIEF. We have been putting out the paper every three months with 3,000 copies each time which we send out to every corner of Brazil. Our paper is fighting for sound doctrine against the many errors in the church and world today. It is the only periodical of its kind in the great field of Brazil, which has more people with the name “Christian” (both Catholic and non-Catholic) than any other country in the world, with the possible exception of the U.S.

In 2009 we also helped restart CIEF to fight for the faith and have had meetings of CIEF every six months since then. There have been two meetings for the first time ever in the Northeast of Brazil. We helped host the International Council of Christian Churches (ICCC) Congress here in São Paulo in 2012, with six continents and 16 countries in attendance. This was the first time the ICCC had been in Brazil since 1958. We are getting ready to help host a Congress of the Latin American Alliance of Churches (ALADIC) in Recife in January, 2015. The last time ALADIC was in Brazil was in 1988.

Over the past five years we have also tried to continue to follow up our previous ministry in Cameroon. Ken has made three trips back, going once every two or three years. We have tried to get the nationals involved in the work of film evangelism that we have done in the past and have left a video projector and equipment each time for different ones to use on their own.

Current Bits

Ken and Ira traveled to the Northeast of Brazil (Patos, Paraiba) this past January to attend the synod of the Fundamentalist Presbyterian Church of Brazil. Ken gave announcements of CIEF and a brief report on the São Bernardo church and why he had resigned as interim pastor. Arrangements were made to hold a third meeting of CIEF in the Northeast on November 15 of this year in Patos.

The summer edition of our paper has been mailed out. We spent Christmas (see picture bottom left) with Ira’s family here in Brazil, and Ira also helped take care of her mother (93 years old and in a wheelchair) while her mother’s regular maid was on vacation. Our son Luke is continuing to do well at Clearwater Christian College, and is now engaged. He and his fiancée, along with Mark, Priscilla and her husband and baby are planning to visit us in May.

Thanks again for all your support and prayers. Please continue to pray.

In His Service,
Ken and Ira