A Blog Tour

Have you ever heard of a blog tour?  Well I have the privilege of being on this blog tour and the exciting job of introducing to you a dear friend, and author and her new book A Home for Pheobe.  I met the author Yvonne Blake many years ago when I stayed in her home during a youth group mission trip to Maine to help with a VBS.  She also designed the Title artwork for my blog and I think of her often when I see it!

I read her new book 2 weeks ago and LOVED IT!  I love reading and historic fiction books are some of my favorites. So as I said this is a blog tour and all this month there there is a different blog every few days or so introducing A Home for Pheobe.  Zeke is a peddler whose love for God and other people have a significant role in caring for and connecting people in need.  Zeke is guiding us through this blog tour on his wagon. 

Zeke the Peddler wears a floppy hat and a gray coat, whose sleeves seems much too short for his arms. His eyes sparkle and his mustache twitches, and he seems as tall as a weather vane on the top of the barn. Removing his hat, he bows low. “Well, good day, folks. What can I help you with ? This here is a regular gen'ral store on wheels! Anything you want or need. I have it. Needles or tubs, buttons or pans - jewelry and fancy perfume, too! “ As you walk around the strange wagon, your eyes widen with wonder. There are pans, kettles, tools, and things you never saw before hanging on the sides. At the back is a door that opens at the top. You can see bolts of cloth, kegs, wash tubs, and hundreds of little boxes. 

 The Author:  I know Yvonne Blake as a loving mother of a large family, who know enjoys posting funny stays her adorable grandkids say. I call her my Maine Mom and have been encouraged spiritually by her in many occasions. 




If you are looking for a good book to read I highly recommend A Home for Pheobe.  I hope you enjoy it as much as I did!  Check out the links below to learn more. The book comes in both an ebook or a paperback.

Synopsis: A Home for Phoebe is an historical novel of an Indian woman and a young girl wandering the hills of the Hudson Valley during the mid 1800's. One flees prejudice, while the other yearns for a home. Through the friendship of a peddler, a blind granny, and blacksmith's family, they learn of forgiveness and faith.

If you want to continue the Blog tour with Zeke the next stop is on the 22nd at:

 http://christinabanks.blogspot.com

Yvonne will be giving away a free copy of A Home for Pheobe at the end of the month. Drawing a name from those who follow the tour by commenting on the blogs or on her author page on Facebook.  Happy commenting and Good Luck!

https://www.facebook.com/?ref=logo#!/YvonneBeverlyBlake

LINK TO FULL SAIL BOOKS

http://fullsailbooks.com/a-home-for-phoebe-ebook-2-00-paperback-12-00/ 

LINK TO AMAZON 

http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=Yvonne+Beverly+Blake

LINK TO YVONNE BLAKE'S WEBSITE

http://www.yvonneblake.com  

LINK TO YVONNE BLAKE'S BLOG 

http://mybackdoorministry.blogspot.com 

LINK TO YVONNE BLAKE'S FACEBOOK PAGE

https://www.facebook.com/#!/YvonneBeverlyBlake 

I have Internet!

Hey everyone! I forgot to write last week when to my surprise the Internet company showed up after 6 weeks of promising to come "this week." It took about 2 months in total but I now have internet in my room and I love it!  It is so nice to be able to use the internet on my schedule instead of having to go down the the Library on Campus to access it.  I have been so thankful for that ability to use the Internet from the Seminary but I am even more thankful to have this freedom.

I am hoping that I will be able to be connected more with my friends and family in the states.  So please call anytime!  I am on Skype joy-baxter or at 978.822.8546.

Encouragement

I thought I needed encouragement. And I did, but I was looking for the wrong things.  I have been feeling discouraged lately.  God has been good but I have been feeling overwhelmed.  The new challenges of teaching 2 new classes in Portuguese were daunting for the first couple of weeks, and now have settled to a level of difficult.  I am not only teaching 1 1/2 hours each in two different subjects, completely in Portuguese, but I am also creating my own course as I go.  Two things I have not really done before.  I wrote in my last blog post of my tire incident, it is fixed now but it took almost an entire week, and thus left me without transportation for that amount of time.  I have enjoyed having wireless internet in my apartment when I was here last year. But, with my time in the states as well as another missionary's time there we cancelled our plan and have have been trying, to no avail, for the last month to get internet.  Without internet in my room I am not at liberty to call friends and family as often as I would like, which has led me to feel disconnected and somewhat lonely.  To add to it I recently received many insect bites and what I can only assume as stings which have increased to my discomfort. Money has been tight and I have been questioning if I should be here if I am still trying to raise full support. So I began asking "Why me?" and telling God I needed encouragement not more bad things.  So have you enjoyed my whining?  I find myself whining entirely too much looking at myself and seeing only the problems.  I told you that I asked God for encouragement and I think I am finally beginning to look at my circumstances differently and starting to see the many many blessings and encouragements that are waiting for me if I choose to accept them.

So enough with the bad let's here some of the good .....   God has been good. I have been busy, but that keeps me from being homesick. My new challenge with the teaching is increasing my ability with the language while expanding my mental capacities. =)  (I am praying that the students are somehow learning something as well!)  I have my car now and in hind sight I did not really need my car the week I was without it. A seminary student brought me to church on Wednesday night with him, I am able to eat  in the Seminary's cafeteria so I didn't have to worry about running out of food. I  have found time to talk to my family through the internet and I have my fiancé, Neto, here who is a wonderful person to talk to when I am feeling lonely.  I received a gift of support from a family at church which is a huge encouragement. My stings, and bites are healing, (our bodies are amazing at that ability to heal itself).  Last night it rained and again this morning giving a nice relief from the relentless sun and heat as well as making beautiful music as it hit the roof and trees around my apartment.  I continue to rest in the knowledge that I am exactly where God wants me to be, and that the challenges and seeming trials are only there to make me rely more fully on God and to transform me into the likeness of Christ, and for that I can be truly thankful.

There are so many more things that I can now look around and see as blessing. That doesn't mean that all of the hard things are gone but I am choosing to look at the good things first and that has helped a lot with my attitude toward the hard things.

Do you find yourself doing this as well?  If you would please attempt this with me this week and look for the blessings and encouragements that God so freely gives us and see if it doesn't change your attitude as well.

Ecclesiates 3:1 -8 For there is a time for everything under heaven!  This is the time for Encouragement. =)
Thanks for listening! God bless you!

I forgot to post my most recent Newsletter.  Please read!

Jan/Feb Newsletter


God bless you!
Joy

Blown Tire

Blown Tire - I have had a number of things happen to me while driving. I have had my car completely die and drive no more and a number of other things but I have always just called AAA to come and help me out.  It was a requirement my Dad put on us once we were driving that we needed to have AAA available in case anything happened.  Well, there is no AAA here in Brazil and even if there was a similar service you need to have cell phone signal to make a call to that service.  Well, that is how I found myself on my drive from Petrolina (home of my fiancé) to Crato (my home) last week.  I have seen flat tires before and I have heard them called a blown tire.  Well, I can for certain say that I have truly seen a blown tire, my rear tire was destroyed blown completely out as you can see from the picture below.

The guy in the next picture was my company for the trip as well as my mechanic, as it turned out.  His name is Samuel and he valiantly changed my tire on the side of the road.  Fortunately I had a spare tire ready to go and was back on the road in good time. Praise God because there was no cell phone signal, and the next town or anything was a good distance away.  So buying new tires is high on my list now, just trusting God to provide the money for them which I know He will.

Newsletters

I did not post my newest newsletter and here are the 2 previous ones as well.

September Newsletter


June/July Newsletter

August Newsletter

Nearing the End

So, I guess I have not posted on here in a really really long time. I knew I had been neglecting it, but I didn't realize for just how long.  Oops!  Well, I am here now.  I think of things I could post on here but just never write it, and I actually don't even know if anyone reads it. So if you get this please let me know if this is a worthwhile use of my time. =)

The title of this post is "nearing the end".... and if all goes as planned I will be back in the states in 2 months. Thus, ending my year and a half stay in Brazil.  This has been a wonderful year and a half full of too many blessings, trials, learning experiences, and adventures to write here.  But, my prayer is that it is just the beginning. I have begun making my plans for the future here in Brazil. I knew being here long term was an option when I first decided to come to Brazil. But, I wasn't ready to think about that then. Now I am sure that God wants me to live and serve here I just still don't know how the details will work out.  My time is coming to an end but there are still many many questions yet to be answered. Will you please pray for me as I take steps of faith, trusting that God is going to hold me in His hands and guide me in these coming months.  I will be sure to update you by newsletter and blog of the progress and how things change for me to return this coming year.

I have a few requests of you my blog readers, would you please pray with me about these things?  

1. I need to find support for my mission here in Brazil.  And along with that a new sending agency.

2. I would love to find instruments of all kinds to bring back to Brazil with me to start many new music ministries. Would you look in your attics and closets and see if there are any instruments lying around that you would be willing to donate to music programs here in Brazil. Or even ask your friends for me too?

3. Life in general is less expensive than in the states but I have had a number of big expenses recently, my car, my visa renewal, and transferring my Bachelor's degree to an international degree. Please pray that God would continue to provide for my expenses as I end out this portion of my time here in Brazil.

The future looks bright for me and my ministry here, I can only see it getting better as God works. Thank you for being on this journey with me as I am being stretched and I pray God is being glorified. There is still much more to come! Thank you for your prayers and support!  God bless you!

May Newsletter

I have internet back, so I can post my newest Newsletter with news from May 2012.

May Newsletter

God bless you all!

Bowling

I now have been bowling in Brazil. I recently went to Petrolina, a city about 4 hours drive away, to visit a very special person (my boyfriend).  Petrolina is a bigger city than the cities near where I live.  And recently they have added a bowling alley to the many activities to do in their city.  This bowling alley was different than any bowling alley I have ever been in.  First of all it is only open in the evenings, and secondly, it is much a much smaller venue than any I have been in before.  This alley had about 10 lanes I think, and the other very different thing about it was that you could use the rental shoes, or you could go BAREFOOT!  I have never been in a bowling alley before that I would have considered worthy of going barefoot but this one was so clean and bright I played the second string without shoes.  It was a different feeling for sure not sliding on those slippery bowling shoes, but it was fun to try something that I have a feeling will never catch on in the states.

I haven't written a blog post in over a month (bad me).  But, I tend to forget about it, so I hope that this silly one about bowling in Brazil is enough to tide you over.

April Newsletter

Here is a link to my April Newsletter!  Thanks for reading and let me know your thoughts. I love to hear from you!
God bless you!
April Newsletter

~Joy

Squirrels?

I have been living in Brazil for a while now and I am used to my surroundings now for the most part.  The other day I saw a little creature running along the wall around the seminary. Actually, I see these creatures a lot, but the other day I realized that my brain was calling these animals, squirrels. Because, I am accustomed to seeing squirrels in the places I have lived.  I started thinking about it and realized that they couldn't be squirrels, because there aren't any squirrels in this part of the world, as far as I know.  I was going for a walk and encountered these animals again and realized that the fluffy tailed creatures were nothing else than monkeys.  It is funny because I had been lamenting the fact that I had not seen any monkeys recently, although I knew they lived on campus.  So my thinking has been altered and my brain informed, so that now when I see these cute little guys I know they are Monkeys! 

While thinking about the mind I realized just how important how we think is.  I was in error this whole time thinking that Monkeys were Squirrels.  This did not cause any problems, nor did it really affect my ability to think correctly about other things. But, there are some things that are more important that we need to think correctly about.  That is where the "renewing of your mind" that the Bible talks about comes in.  When we were not followers of Christ, or even when we were new believers we probably thought about many things as truth and took things for granted that were in fact errors.  We need the Holy Spirits work in our minds and hearts to help us see the truth of the Bible and not see the Bible through our eyes of experience and what we think is truth.  

I praise God that He has and is creating in me a renewed mind, and I am reminded often when I read God's word that I need His understanding to remove my old mind and world view, and create a new mind, a new understanding so that I can better know my God.

My March Newsletter

March Newsletter

Here is a link to my March Newsletter.  Thanks for reading I hope you enjoy it!

God bless you!

Getting things rolling!

I have been back for over a month now and things are really rolling and picking up steam.  I can't say that I am too busy yet but I am enjoying more activities and seeing progress in many of the areas I am working with.
I have had 2 prosperous meetings with the music team at church and I am excited about the future for this team.
I taught my first english class as a substitute teacher and will now be better prepared for teaching english next semester.
I also have begun my training with Tributos, the smaller music group, here at the Seminary. And am working on my portuguese at the same time as I try to explain musical concept and voice training.

I praise God for His hand guiding me and giving me grace in each of these situations and I am excited for what is right around the corner.

God bless you all!

Be Anxious for Nothing.

Mat. 6:34 "Therefore do not be anxious about tomorrow, for tomorrow will be anxious for itself. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble." (ESV)


I wouldn't say I am anxious as much as I am contemplative.  I do not know what my future looks like and at time that can be disconcerting.  Now that I am back in Brazil I have to face the question of what I will do after this year.  I am committed to serving God here in Brazil until December. But what happens after that?  I know that my God will supply my every need according to His riches in glory in Christ Jesus (Phil 4:19 emp. mine), and I know  that I need to "not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let [my] requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard [my heart] and [my mind] in Christ Jesus. (Phil 4:6-7 ESV)

I am glad that in times of distress God brings verses to mind and guides us with His wisdom, I am praying to know God's will for today and to fulfill His purpose for me daily, and to trust Him with the future.  Would you please pray with me that God's wisdom would guide me as I make decisions daily and for the future?  

The question of what my next year will look like is a big one, but the daily questions of how best to spend my time and how to fulfill the tasks he has given me is daunting to me as well.  I find myself pre-occupied with thoughts of what ifs, and how comes, and need to school my thoughts back to Him.  Do you find yourself doing the same thing?  Let's lift us each other in prayer as Christian brothers and sisters so that we can all have victory over the mind and be drawn closer to Christ.

Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable,whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely,whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things. (Phil 4:8 ESV)

Thanks for reading, I think I am quite contemplative today and maybe my next post will be something much lighter.  Please let me know how I can pray for you.

God bless you!  ~Joy

My Newsletters

Hello everyone!  I have not posted anything on this blog in entirely too long. I will have to begin remedying that.  First I have 2 newsletter for you.  I apparently did not post my December newsletter so here it is December Newsletter.

And my newest newsletter for January and February here - Jan/Feb Newsletter

As always please comment on them and let me know what you think.

God bless!
Joy

November Newsletter

Here is my November Newsletter.  God has been good and I have much to praise Him for.  Please read my newsletter and feel free to leave comments!

Patience!

I talked a while ago about learning lessons, and God is continually trying to teach me many things.  One thing I am trying to learn is to have patience.  I knew in coming to Brazil that it would take me a while to adjust to my surroundings and to find where I fit and how I would work best here.  I guess I was thinking that 4 months would do it because I felt very frustrated this week when I looked around and did not see the progress that I wanted.  I am not sure that I gave myself a  timeline before but I must have done so in my sub-conscience because I feel frustrated at my current situation.  I have somewhat gotten over my frustration by looking to Christ and remembering that His timeline is not my timeline and that I am much better off on His timing than my own. So I am again learning to trust and to rely on Him for the strength to get through the frustrating moments, and praise Him with joy when I see that I am fitting in and connecting here in many ways.

One area that I am experiencing both frustration and joy is the music group at church. Although I am accepted and encouraged to sing with them, I am frustrated when I am not included in meetings and can't express my opinions or teach due to my lack of vocabulary to explain myself well.  But, even at the end of a frustrating moment God sends people my way to encourage me and He did that for me last night when a friend at church wanted to tell me how much he enjoys my singing.  So I was humbled and rebuked in such a nice way for my unbelief.  It is in those low moments that I question God as to why he has me here, and in the high moment I thank Him that He chose me to go Brasil because in His perfect plan He knows that I need to be here to learn the lessons He has for me!

Please pray for me!  I know many of you are and I have no doubt that God uses those prayers to give me strength and help me in this learning process.  Please let me know what I can be praying for you about, so that God can use me to bless you.

October Newsletter

Here is a link to my newest newsletter -  October Newsletter.

Caju fruit

The caju fruit is literally falling of the trees here.  I had never seen or had the fruit from the cashew tree before I came to Brazil.  The fruit is a little tart but when you juice it and add a little sugar it makes a great juice.  We have many of the caju trees on campus here and we have been enjoying eating them and making juice with them. Since I had never hear or seen a cashew fruit before I wanted to share a picture here with you.  I wish I could send you all some to try but you will just have to come visit sometime to try it! 

Back into things

I made it back to Brazil with a very smooth trip all in all. Once my passport with missionary visa got to me about 2 hours before I had to leave my house, I left for my flights to Brazil.  I made all connections with plenty of time and made the entire trip in just over 1 day.  A new record for me in speediness!

So I am back in Brazil and back to helping with 2 choirs here, talking to people on campus and taking my portuguese class.  I still have so far to go in understanding and communicating well in Portuguese and so that has to be my top priority.  It seems so easy to let other things get in the way though.

The seminary that I live on and work with is going away for a retreat this weekend.  It is at a camp about 2 hours away.  It is the same place I went to camp before so I get to sleep in a hammock again.  I will be gone for about 4 days.  I may have some stories to tell when I get back.

For now I will just say Bom Dia and Tchao!  (Good Day and Goodbye!)