Greetings in the Name our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ,
As I sit here and write this letter it is with a lot of mixed feelings. A week from today we will be on a plane headed back to the USA for a 10 month furlough. You may ask why mixed feelings. In the past 6 years we have only taken a 3 month furlough. These people are our brothers and sisters in the Lord whom we have shared our life with over the years, and it is hard to say goodbye even for a short time. There is so much work to be done and the labourers are few.
COLONY – This past Saturday we had our last service at the colony before our furlough. We had a good service and are excited to see that these people are growing in the Lord. Bro. Ely will be helping out with the music and 2 of the young ladies will be taking over the children’s class. Bro. Adilson and Bro. Jerri will continue to go out there and have services in our absence. Please remember to pray for this work.
RIO BRANCO – The 30th of this month (August) will be our last service at Macedonia Independent Baptist Church. The people have really come together and this work is going forward under the care of the national people. God has raised up men and women to take over all the Sunday School classes, and Bro. Jerri and Bro. Adilson will do the preaching in our absence. We have seen several saved over the last 2 months. God is good! Please remember to pray for this work and the people here as well.
Also in Rio Branco, God has been opening the doors for us to have our own radio station. This is something new to us since we have never been involved in radio before. There is a church in the USA that brings down the equipment, installs it, and trains us to broadcast. This is truly a great opportunity to get the Gospel out to the surrounding communities. Stephen has already met with ANATEL (the Brazilian FCC) to see what the procedures are to obtain a license to broadcast. There is going to be a lot of paperwork, but we believe God has opened the doors and He will make it happen. Please pray for us as we need HIS guidance. There is a great cost in maintaining a radio station, and we need partners for this ministry.
Our family has moved to the training center, and once we return to the field, we plan to have it up and running. We already have 6 people from our church that are ready to start training to be better prepared to serve the Lord. Pray for this as well.
PUBLIC SCHOOLS – This past month our family was able to go into a public school and hand out the gospel of John to 5th – 8th graders. The doors are open and there is a great need. We have been invited to work in this school upon our return to Brazil. There are so many opportunities for short term and long term help for young and older people who want to serve the Lord in missions. Would you consider coming?
FURLOUGH – Once again for those that might have overlooked the last letter, we are leaving the field on August 31st for a 10 month furlough. If you would like for us to come by your church and share with you the great things that HE has done and is doing please contact us at this email
doolittle@brazilianmissions.org or stephendoolittle@mwbm.org. If you have skype we can be reached at steverdoolittle. As soon as we have a phone in the USA we will let you know.
FAMILY – As mentioned before there is a bit of mixed feelings. The children are excited about seeing family and friends but sad about leaving Brazil. Pray that our children will adjust well to being back in the states.
We would like to thank each church and individual that makes sacrifices for the ministry here. We appreciate each one of you so very much.
Jesus being baptized.
Eliene
Jessica
This is the rural church at Guajará. We were finally able to get it painted. The man that has painted it is Sr. José. He is a lost man and we are praying for his salvation. He has worked with Steve on and off for about 2 months with many odd jobs we have had. Sometimes he has shown up on Monday morning with his face all beat up from where he has gotten in a fight after drinking too much over the weekend. Pray for his salvation. He has been to church several times and has been witnessed to many times. He is a hard worker and honest, but he needs to Lord.
We were able to go into a middle school (5th - 8th grade) and pass out a small booklet that has the gospel of John and another small booklet that talks about the dangers of the internet. The lady that heads this ministry is a Brazilian missionary. She is wanting us to work in this school when we come back from furlough. We would be able to go into the school once a week and give a Bible lesson to all the studens. Amazing isn't it! The problem is our time is limited. At times I look around and see all there is to be done and feel overwhelmed. One note about this school. The kids were horrible. I was really shocked. There was absolutely no order and several of the teachers hadn't even shown up even though classes had already started. There are so many schools that are wanting this ministry and the Brazilian missionary has more than she can handle.
This is something we saw at our "new" house. We have several açai trees in our yard. There was a parrot (don't know if you can see it in the picture) up in the tree eating the açai. I just love waking up here in the mornings and hearing all the birds. 
We had our 3rd mission's conference this past week. We have a missionary that the church supports here with us. We had 2 precious souls saved and this family was such a blessing. They are Brazilians but are missionaries in Venzeula. They are doing an excellent work there. Our people get so excited after we have a mission's conference. We had some talking about taking a trip to Venzeula to visit this family.
In the area where we are in Brazil, a lot of people just live together and do not get married. Walber (the man in the picture) has done that many times. He and his wife, Michelle, got saved about a year ago and then last week he said he was getting married. He had told us that he did not want to get married because he was afraid that then he would die. On Saturday night the city had a big project called Projecto Cidadão. It is to encourage couples to marry. On Saturday night with about 700 other couples Walber and Michelle got married. I was not able to go because Benjamin was sick but Steve was able to. Walber was so proud to have his pastor there. Oh, Walber told us that we had to buy his coffin if he died. But he is still living! We are so thankful for this family. Michelle cleans the church now for us. She did not want to be paid but wanted to do something for the Lord. And I was able to lead Renato (the oldest boy) to the Lord a couple of weeks ago.
Philip turned 13 on the 3rd of August. It is hard to believe that we are now parents of a teenager (who is still very much a kid!). He said this was his best birthday yet. Hannah pointed out to him that he says that every year. We love you Philip!
This is just some boxes in our "dining" room
Steve and his dad built this trailer the first year we were in Brazil. It has helped us make several moves. Here we are loaded down. It was about a 30 minute drive.
Another view
