In the Height of Ministry 30 Years Later
Odali and Kathy Barros served the Lord in Sao Paulo, Brazil together from 1987-2013. In late 2013, they transitioned to Manaus in Northern Brazil to start sharing the Gospel and planting churches in villages along the river.
February 21, 2017
Dear Brothers and Sisters,
We pray and hope that all have been blessed and are rejoicing in God’s care over each one of us. We have been doing great. It is hard to believe February is just about over. Kathy and I have been in the ministry for over 36 years and missionaries for 30 years. It is hard to believe that much time has gone by. Nearing the age of 60, I believe we are in the height of our ministry. We completed 3 years living back in the Amazon. We have been blessed and truly enjoy our ministry here. At this moment, we have one night free during the week. All the other days, we have some kind of ministry going on and on Sundays we have 3 services. We are really excited and thankful for what God is doing.
Our newest community where we are working, is Açutuba. What has been so wonderful is that God has placed people in our ministry that have opened the doors of their home to be used for reaching people. We started 4 weeks ago in this place. This week we had 22 that attended. What a wonderful blessing.
Not long ago a young man came to our services at the Living Rocks Baptist Church (Igreja Batista Pedras Vivas) and has been coming every week since. This week he told me that he had invited some young people from his community to come. He had 8 visitors and asked if someone could pick them up. Here it’s like living in farm country—people live far away and not everyone has cars. So, we help with transportation for those who need it.
The youth groups are doing great and growing. Kathy and I work with the youth in the city of Iranduba, where we have a mission. It is doing well and growing. This is the only mission that’s really in a small city. Inside the city limits there are probably a population of 20,000 people. This city is about 30 minutes away from our home. We have services there 3 times a week.
At the community of Ubim we are really needing a bigger place. We are meeting on the patio of a house that a family has opened for us to use. We are running an average of 45 kids from ages 1½ years old to 15 years old. We would like to be able to work with this group the best we can. Please pray that God will give us a larger place to work.
We still have 2 children at home with us. They both help in the ministry. Jonas has been great in helping with the children on Sunday mornings and with the youth, and Gabriel with the church band. They have been a great help to me while Kathy is in the US visiting her parents and our other children. We’re thankful that God has used all our children in many different ministries.
THE GREATEST THING YOU CAN DO FOR A PERSON IS THE INVEST IN THEIR LIFE. FROM KNOWING THE LORD AS SAVIOR AND GROWING IS WISDOM FROM GOD! We thank God for calling us to invest in people’s lives day by day—an investment like no other. It will last for eternity. This has been our life and our ministry. May God Continue to guide and bless us each day. We thank each one of you for your love, prayers and support. God bless y’all.
Odali & Kathy Barros
Caixa Postal 1
Iranduba, Amazonas 69.415.000
Brasil, S.A.
odali_kathy[at]hotmail.com
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Praying for New Meeting Places in Ubim & Iranduba
Odali and Kathy Barros served the Lord in Sao Paulo, Brazil together from 1987-2013. In late 2013, they transitioned to Manaus in Northern Brazil to start sharing the Gospel and planting churches in villages along the river.
December 30, 2016
Hope all of you have had wonderful holiday season. We have had a great and busy time.
At the main church, Pedras Vivas, things are doing great. We have been working with members of the church that have been there for a long time, to get them involved in ministries and to reach out to the lost. The church has a bus which has started running in the community where we live and in two new communities past the church. These communities are actually big enough to have a mission. We are limited with workers so for now we will continue to bring them on the bus. Our church has built an addition on to the church building for classes fellowship and also put in air conditioning.
The ministry in the community of Ubim is doing really wonderful. It has grown and the area we work in has reached its limit. We use a patio that a family lets us use, but we have so many small children coming that we need room to work with them so we can better work with the older people. We are asking God to provide a new place. Many teens are coming and need to be worked with to reach them. There is not much in this community for them to do, but there are a lot of bad things as an option. Pray with us that God would show us a place.
At the Iranduba mission we did a special emphasis in reaching out to the youth. The city has so many young people. Prostitution and drugs are very strong there. We hope that this coming year they will continue to reach out to friends. We also are looking for another building there. The building is rented, does not offer options, and is small.
The mission at Multirao community is doing great. We have a team that is working there. They are having four services a week. They are doing well—they have meetings and are making new plans for next year. They are making plans to build a wall around the building. There was a banana tree in the back and someone stole it—can you believe that? Well that wasn’t all…they stole the toilets out of the bathrooms. They didn’t get into the church because there are iron bars on the door and windows. Pray for this team that God will bless them.
We want to thank each of you who have prayed for us and our ministry and have given so faithfully. We appreciate and love each of you. God bless you tremendously.
Odali & Kathy Barros
Caixa Postal 1
Iranduba, Amazonas 69.415.000
Brasil, S.A.
odali_kathy[at]hotmail.com
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Reaching Out to Youth & Training New Workers
Odali and Kathy Barros served the Lord in Sao Paulo, Brazil together from 1987-2013. In late 2013, they transitioned to Manaus in Northern Brazil to start sharing the Gospel and planting churches in villages along the river.
September 30, 2016
Dear Brothers and Sisters,
We pray that all of you are well and enjoying blessings from our Lord and Savior. We are doing great and enjoying blessings from our Lord in our lives and ministry.
We have been saving an outreach for youth in the 3 communities where we have churches. The purpose is to reach new youth and also train new workers. We will have a total of 8 weeks, then we will leave the workers in these churches and go to new communities. We have had around 100 new visitors, plus the ones who belong to the churches. Although we live far from the city and with little commodities, it is unreal how much drugs are in these communities. Contact with these youth has reminded us so much of the Alpha & Omega Home. So, we are working in these churches with teens with the same needs. Pray for them and for the leaders as they reach out to them. There has been several saved. We are going to plan a baptismal service and a time of fellowship.
The mission we have at Ubim is going well. We are praying for God to show us a place to buy to build a mission. We have service on the porch of a couple’s home. It is getting a little hard to work with the group. We have a large range in ages. Pray with us that God will show us the perfect place. Kathy is training 5 of our youth to work with kids. It has been great to see them get involved.
We want to thank all of you for your prayers and support. God bless each of you.
These are pictures of the youth program Odali & Kathy are having in three communities: Iranduba, Mutirão, and the mother church Pedras Vivas. They have planned eight weeks of reaching out to lost youth and training new leaders.
Odali & Kathy Barros
Caixa Postal 1
Iranduba, Amazonas 69.415.000
Brasil, S.A.
odali_kathy[at]hotmail.com
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Outreach & Training in Mutirão
Odali and Kathy Barros served the Lord in Sao Paulo, Brazil together from 1987-2013. In late 2013, they transitioned to Manaus in Northern Brazil to start sharing the Gospel and planting churches in villages along the river.
September 14, 2016
Odali and Kathy Barros are reaching out to several different communities in Brazil.
The outreach stretches for eight weeks in three different communities.
Pictured below is a gathering in Mutirão where they had 150 people present.
The building pictured is 8 meters x 15 meters (~26 feet x 49 feet).
They are using this ministry to train some of their people and then plan to move it to cities far away. Pray for those serving and for those who will hear the Gospel!
Odali & Kathy Barros
Caixa Postal 1
Iranduba, Amazonas 69.415.000
Brasil, S.A.
odali_kathy[at]hotmail.com
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Outreach Festival at Main Church, Growth in Iranduba & Multirão
Odali and Kathy Barros served the Lord in Sao Paulo, Brazil together from 1987-2013. In late 2013, they transitioned to Manaus in Northern Brazil to start sharing the Gospel and planting churches in villages along the river.
July 27, 2o16
Greetings to all our friends and supporters!
Hope you all are doing well and rejoicing in the Lord. We are doing great.
We have had great things happening in our different missions. Here at the main church we have had great blessings. We planned an outreach festival. The area here is rural, so we asked the members to bring friends that were not church members—and especially lots of people. We started planning for 150, but, as time went on, we realized that people were really getting excited and that we better plan for more people. Good thing we did! We had 300 hundred come. It was exciting! We had the youth group from the mission in Iranduba do a skit and then I spoke. It was great! Last Sunday we had a family that came as a result.
At the mission in Iranduba we have started a new program for the youth to reach out to lost youth in their community. They are really excited. It’s called “Missiom” Rescue.
The mission at the community of Multirão is doing well. We are training a team to work here. They are doing well and keeping the number of people and visiting. The mission at Ubim is doing great and growing. The families where we have been having services have been so gracious, but with the growing number we are limited. We are praying and looking for God to show us a place to buy and or build.
Also the mission at Iranduba, we need to look for a place to buy land to build. The place we meet is rented and really is not cheap for the size it is. And we don’t have any class space. Please pray that God will direct us to some good deals and good locations.
We praise God for all of you that have faithfully supported our ministry. God bless each of you tremendously!
Love,
Odali & Kathy
Odali & Kathy Barros
Caixa Postal 1
Iranduba, Amazonas 69.415.000
Brasil, S.A.
odali_kathy[at]hotmail.com
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Missionary Update: Odali & Kathy Barros in Brazil [March 2016]
Odali and Kathy Barros served the Lord in Sao Paulo, Brazil together from 1987-2013. In late 2013, they transitioned to Manaus in Northern Brazil to start sharing the Gospel and planting churches in villages along the river.
March 4, 2016
Dear Brothers and Sisters,
We pray that all of you have had a great start to this year of 2016. We are all doing well and rejoicing in what God is doing in the ministry here. We had camp for the first time. We had a good group that came and stayed three days. Others who had to work came different times during the camp. We made it a family camp this time to help everyone get acquainted and just have fellowship. Every one enjoyed it so much we are already planning another one.
There are several small communities close to the church where I pastor. Since they are so close we have started a bus route to bring them to church. We started this month. We thank God and Paul Hatcher for giving us the buses to use. There are many people around the area that do not have transportation. We have a group that does visitation on Saturday afternoon. Pray that those who come will trust the Lord as Savior and for safety as they are brought to church.
We are also training some of our youth to help in the Sunday School and the different kids clubs we have in the different communities. Also I am sending different men that have shown an interest in preaching and helping with the mission points. A very interesting thing has happened here in our ministry that Kathy and I have not experience anywhere else. Most of the time and in most churches the women complain that the men don’t want to help. We have the opposite here. The young men as well as the married men all help. Wow!
We thank each one of you who faithfully pray and support our ministry. May God bless each of you. Your love, prayers, and support are important to us. We are thankful. Please continue to pray for those that work with us here and for those being saved—and that God would keep guiding us as we reach out to those around us.
Love,
Odali & Kathy
Odali & Kathy Barros
Caixa Postal 1
Iranduba, Amazonas 69.415.000
Brasil, S.A.
odali_kathy[at]hotmail.com
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Missionary Update: Odali & Kathy Barros in Brazil [December 2015]
Odali and Kathy Barros served the Lord in Sao Paulo, Brazil together from 1987-2013. In late 2013, they transitioned to Manaus in Northern Brazil to start sharing the Gospel and planting churches in villages along the river.
December 4, 2015
Dear Brothers and Sisters,
Time goes by so fast that it is hard to believe that it has been 2 years since we moved to Manaus, Amazonas. This past year has gone so fast. The Lord has blessed our ministry here in so many ways. We had visited different villages and communities near us. We wanted to start works in some of them and were praying for God to open the doors. Well, God provided 4 different places, all of them in very exciting ways. We praise God for His blessings! Many people have been saved and baptized. It has also been great to see members from the mother church getting involved and excited about the ministries in the church.
Children at the Mission in the city of Iranduba
We appreciate your prayers for each of these ministries. We have services every day except Tuesday and Friday. Last Sunday we had a baptism. Our baptism may be different for some of you. The last three times we had a baptism, it was down by the river. So we just took advantage and had a cookout for fellowship. Everyone has enjoyed the time of fellowship.
Tonight while we were waiting for church to start a teenager that comes to our house a lot called me to the corner and asked if he could ask a question. I said, “Sure.” He asked, “Pastor, what does it mean to receive Jesus as Savior?” Well what a blessing! At the end of the service when I asked if anyone wanted to accept Christ as Savior, the teenager promptly responded and came forward. Praise God!
Clemersom, the teenager who was saved.
Please pray for all the new converts as they grow in the Lord. We appreciate all your prayers and your support. May God bless each of you!
Love,
Odali & Kathy
Odali & Kathy Barros
Caixa Postal 1
Iranduba, Amazonas 69.415.000
Brasil, S.A.
odali_kathy[at]hotmail.com
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Missionary Update: Odali & Kathy Barros in Brazil [September 2015]
Odali and Kathy Barros served the Lord in Sao Paulo, Brazil together from 1987-2013. In late 2013, they transitioned to Manaus in Northern Brazil to start sharing the Gospel and planting churches in villages along the river.
September 1, 2015
Dear Brothers and Sisters,
We pray that all of you are doing well and rejoicing in the Lord. We are all doing great. The Lord has been good to us and cared for us each day. The works here are doing well and growing. We had a very interesting experience last month. Here where we live, we raise our own fish and other animals. One of the kinds of fish we have is a fish that eats fish. So from time to time, we go to the fish plant where they package fish and get the leftovers. We had not been getting any because the water got so high that the plant was closed for some time. Kathy was going into town for some groceries so I asked her if she didn’t mind going by the fish plant to see if they were already open. The water was still high but Kathy stopped and asked the guard if he had any idea of when they might start back to work. Here is the interesting part. The guard asked Kathy where she was from. He noticed that she had a different accent. She said. “Well, I sound like the south but I was actually born in Manaus. My parents were missionaries here for many years.” The guard quickly replied, “Missionaries?! With what church?” Kathy said, “Baptist!” The man became very excited and said, “We have a mission but we don’t have a pastor. Our pastor left and said we could do whatever we wanted: join another church or shut down.” He had been saved through the ministry of missionaries I know. So the next day I went back with Kathy to the fish plant and met the man. So we got together and talked and they joined our church. So now we have a mission point in the city of Iranduba. This is the city that I was praying about starting a church. It is a city of around 50,000 and growing. Please pray for this work.
Kathy is working with a group of young teens that she is training to work with the kids clubs on Saturday is the community of Mutirão. This has been great—it is so good to see the young men growing and enjoying the work with the kids. Two of the guys like it so much they asked Kathy if they could go with us to Ubim on Monday also. So we have extra help that day also.
We are working on getting people from the church more involved in the ministries. For so long they just went to church and that was it. It is a slow process but things are starting to change. Pray that the members will see and feel a need to reach out to others.
Please continue to pray for us and the ministry: that God will direct each step and keep us safe as we are on the road a lot. We thank all of you for your prayers and your support. You are an important part of this ministry. God bless you!
In Christ,
Odali and Kathy
Odali & Kathy Barros
Caixa Postal 1
Iranduba, Amazonas 69.415.000
Brasil, S.A.
odali_kathy[at]hotmail.com
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