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Dear Prayer Partners,                                                                           December 2018

We would like to say to all of our ministry partners, supporters and friends have a blessed Christmas and may the new year find you in God’s perfect will.

We are happy to announce that on October 14^th, the church in Castelo Branco was officially organized as an independent local church. It was a blessing to have a group of faithful partners, from a supporting church in TN, help us in a week of literature distribution. We then had special services to introduce the new church to the community. It was a joy to have Bro. Jeremy Rowland, of the Baptist Church Planting Ministry, and pastor Todd Stricklin, from our church in Rhode Island. The services were well attended and we’ve talked to many people in the community that said they received the Gospel literature. Please pray that the Lord will continue to work in people’s hearts through the power of the Gospel message. The organization Sunday was a tremendous blessing. It started with the baptism of a lady that went through our new member’s class. Aura’s parents, Allen and Barbara Newton, the missionaries that started this church plant, we able to be part of the special service via video. At the end 11 members signed the charter of the new church (with an extra one joining two weeks later). In January we will start the second membership class and so far about 12 people have registered to take it. Please pray for all this new church!

In November we started a Bible Study in the city of Fundão, about 30 minutes North of Castelo Branco. So far we’ve have 6 local people attend. We are praying for the Lord’s guidance in this work. May He open the doors and prepare the way. Fundão has about 30 thousand people and no Gospel preaching church of any kind.

Also in November we were able to move to our new house (see new field address). With a small inheritance that I got, we were able have a down payment for a house just 10 minutes South of Castelo Branco. We secured a small loan for the necessary repairs and we are happy to have our very own place, complete with a small back yard and even a doggy door! We are thankful for God’s blessings.

Since it’s been several years since we have reported in person to most of our supporting churches, we are in the initial stages of putting together a furlough trip for 2019. Because of our schedule here in Portugal, we are looking at the months of June-September 2019. We value your prayers and support of the ministry in Portugal, so we would like to give to our current supporting churches, the priority in terms of scheduling our meetings. Please let me know if you would like us to come by and we will do our best to schedule based on your availability and also our travel plans within the US

Thank you for your love and support for the ministry in Portugal. 

In His Service, Mark and Aura Pereira