Dear ministry partners and prayer warriors,
The days in which we are living are like none that we have experienced before. A global pandemic has affected us all in ways no one could have imagined. However, through it all, God was not surprised, and He has never been out of control.
While our schedule was slow in the Fall of 2020, our Spring schedule has picked up quite a bit. We don’t have any Sunday meetings available, and we only have a few Wednesday night dates open before we head back to Brazil in August. We have been blessed to be able to visit some of our supporting churches, and we have also been able to visit a few new churches.
Covid has hit some of our fellow missionaries. One of our BIMI missionaries that contracted Covid passed away, due to pneumonia and complications that affected his lungs. Brother Larry Barrett and his dear wife, Lydabelle, have been missionaries in Brazil for nearly 45 years. Brother Larry went Home to be with the Lord on January 26, 2021. Please remember Sister Lydabelle in your prayers.
It was in June and July of 2019 that Becky and I held a basic sign language course in the church that Brother Larry started many years ago. Almost the entire church signed up for the course, and at the end of the six-week course, we handed out 98 certificates of completion. Stephen Barrett, one of Brother Larry’s grandsons, had a great desire to continue learning the Brazilian sign language even after the course ended. About a month ago, Stephen wrote to me and said that God had been working in his life and had called him into full-time ministry. Stephen went on to say that he feels God is calling him to work with the deaf! After he raises his needed support, he plans to return to Brazil and begin a new church for the deaf in the city of Jundiaí. Besides the call of God in Stephen’s life, he told me that we, Becky and I, played a big role in his decision. Praise the Lord! Please pray for Stephen Barrett (25 years of age, single) as he goes to Candidate School on June 6-11 at BIMI. We have been praying for a long time that God would raise up more laborers with the deaf. We praise the Lord for the burden that God has placed on Stephen’s heart for the deaf in Brazil!
Lord willing, we will return to Brazil in August/September for our fifth term of missionary service. We could not do it without the love, prayers, and support of God’s people. Thank you for your faithfulness in giving to the ministry of the Lord in Brazil!
That all may “hear,”
Dan & Becky Bennett