Amy thought she was just going to help her husband, but they needed another female counselor. So, she ended up pulling double duty! It was tiring, but a blessing to her to lead two girls to Christ and have an impact in the lives of the girls in her group.

Counseling Time

Our team flag…and the winners of the week!!

We are so proud of Jaden, who was chosen as one of the “Campers of the Week.” He was very encouraged to get to be around Christian boys his age.

Game Time

Campers of the week from each team

One of the campers from our church, Elias, memorized all the Scripture verses and was able to recite most of them in front of the whole camp for a chance to win extra points for his team. We are so proud of him!

We still have two more groups of campers left to go… Thank you for your prayers!

We are so blessed to have such a great group of servants who were each in their place, on time, doing their part. Each leader poured their heart into their teaching, crafts, or games.

One of the highlights of the week was the mom’s craft table. We invited the mothers (or grandmother or nanny) to stay to make a craft and listen to the Gospel while their children were enjoying VBS. It’s really an amazing ministry as more unsaved ladies came every day! Many solid contacts were made and several promised to come to church on Sunday. Please pray as we follow up with each of these.

Below is a little summary video we put together.  Enjoy!

Thank you so much for your prayers!

By His grace alone,

James & Amy Greenwood

Praise the Lord for seven unsaved visitors who heard the Gospel! Two indicated they would like to trust Christ. Please pray as we follow up with those.

We are also proud of our oldest son, who accompanied James for their first musical special together! You can see the video here.

Please pray for the teens as well as the children who are going to camp in January, that the Lord would begin to work in each of their lives and hearts even now.

By His grace alone,

James & Amy

Stateside: We wrapped up a short furlough in February with basically a zero net support gain, maintaining approximately a 91% support average. We held 23 meetings in those 20 weeks, 4 of which were for new support.

Evangelism: We held special evangelistic meetings throughout the year for the church’s one year anniversary, a sacred music concert, monthly ladies’ meetings, monthly youth meetings, and our first missions conference. For evangelism training, we taught the Netcasters course on Wednesday nights. Several folks have made salvation decisions in these meetings and on visitation. Everyone who shows interest receives follow-up by either the pastor or a church member, but only a handful have shown lasting fruit so far.

Discipleship: Our discipleship program continues to be the church’s primary strength. We held two semesters of Sunday discipleship and Saturday youth discipleship as well as 10 weeks of one-on-one with various new believers. The church body has faced several difficulties from within and without. Praise God for wisdom and patience in dealing with these situations.

Training Nationals: There are three men in James’ Thursday night deacons’ training. They have studied three leadership books and have been involved in visitation and new believers’ discipleship. The church will vote on the deacon candidates in January. We are still praying for a pastoral candidate.

Church Building: In September we began a second service to accommodate for growth. Between the two services, the church is averaging 85 in attendance. The Argentines have given almost 50% of the total $20,000 raised for the purchase of property. We continue to search for land in the city center and are also talking with the owners of our current location about the possibility of buying.

Goals for 2012

Following God’s leading, our goals for 2012 are:

· Begin Saturday morning evangelism door-to-door within a 3 mile radius of the church

· Continue small group and one-on-one discipleship

· After the deacons are voted in, continue leadership training as well as visitation times

· Continue to raise funds for the purchase of church property.

Prayer Requests

· A national pastor to take over this church plant

· Wisdom and funds to purchase church property – our rental contract expires in June!

· Spiritual growth and unity within the church body

· Spiritual and physical protection of and provision for our family

This was the first Christian quinceñera for most of our church people to attend and certainly the first to plan for the family of the birthday girl. So, we talked through each aspect of the event to evaluate how it can glorify God in every way. We are thrilled to say that the music, program, dress, and general atmosphere did honor the Lord and glorify His name. Instead of the birthday girl being focused on herself and her wishes, she was more concerned that her unsaved guests hear the Gospel and accept Him as Savior! That is God’s working in her life and the godly influence of her parents! We were also glad to see so many church folks pitch in to help out the family with the preparations and clean-up so the parents could actually enjoy the party too!

James giving a challenge to the birthday girl and the Gospel to the unsaved

Church update:

· Praise the Lord for continued growth. We’ve maintained an average of 85 since November. Anyone who’s had to go to two services to accommodate growth knows it’s not any fun, but certainly worth it! There is no way 85 could fit comfortably in our building.

· Yesterday there were 30 children in children’s church. No, we don’t have a bus ministry and there aren’t even kids who live nearby since we’re in a commercial district. There are just a lot of families bringing their kids, nephews, and nieces. Lauren brought her neighbor friend too. Later, the mom told Lauren that the girl really enjoyed church and that “Lauren’s daddy is a really good singer!”

If you have questions about this project, you can read more details here. If the Lord would have you to give toward this need, you can send a check to Baptist World Mission marked “Greenwood Church Land Fund.” If you would like to give a smaller amount each month instead of a one-time gift, Baptist World Mission has simplified that process with automated giving: http://baptistworldmission.org/automated-giving.html.

Halt! Change of plans — Let’s have a good old-fashioned praise service at church tonight! And that is what we did…

We formed a circle around the room (something that we have had to stop doing because of the amount of people now attending Wednesday nights) and just spent the evening singing, reading verses on thanksgiving, giving thanks to God, and praying.

It was so wonderful to hear testimony after testimony of how God has been working in each one’s life – folks are growing spiritually; fathers are leading their homes for the first time; families are becoming united; wounds are being healed; and the Lord is taking first place! Praise God for His work among this sweet group of believers! I believe it was unanimous that this will become a new tradition at Iglesia Bautista Independiente del Pilar!

As a family, we are taking the day to celebrate the Thanksgiving holiday with other North Americans. We’re planning on having another praise service – this time in English – and reading a Thanksgiving Declaration from George Washington. So, in whatever corner of the world where you may celebrate Thanksgiving this year, we pray God would give you a day of “declaring his works with rejoicing” (Ps. 107:22).

By His grace alone,

James & Amy Greenwood

Pastor Brent Armstrong, Missions Conference 2011

part 1 –

part 2 –

Coming Soon….

Sunday AM - The Purity of a Mighty Church

Sunday PM - The Family: Love is Spelled T-I-M-E

Friday – The Purpose of a Mighty Church