Dear prayer partners,

Thank you for all of you who prayed for my special day.

It was a “for girls only” party. Tim helped me doing the grocery shopping and preparing some food for the party and disappeared until the party was over. Steven went to Asuncion for the weekend. The house was just to us.

We started the Birthday Party Bible Study at 2:00pm with some finger foods and followed by the Bible and by 3:30pm some of the ladies had to go home earlier and did not eat the cake. (Too bad). These ladies in the picture are the ones I invited as prospects to be part of my new EBCI (Community Bible Study International) Bible study and 15 of them will be starting next Thursday. They are from different religions and countries. Four of them are Brazilian, one Lebanese, one Japanese, another one from Germany and the others are Paraguayan. God has put them in my life and I have been praying for them for a while.

A miracle happened, too: It was raining during the past three days and God held the rain between 1:00pm and 5:30pm. What a blessing!

Many people asked me "what did Tim give you on your birthday"?
He gave me a beautiful gift, the one I will treasure for ever, a Brazilian book about how to make bread from all over the world. There are recipes from the 195 member countries of the UN. It is called "PAO DA PAZ"


Thank you for praying for this event.
It made a difference!

Working together for His kingdom,
Iracema Kunkel

Great Poem I dedicate to my Dad, on his 81st Birthday.

My Daddy's walk
By Tony W. Cartledge

My father stays in shape by taking at least one good walk every day, but it's not always easy for him. A lifetime of hard work and a heavy dose of arthritis have played havoc with his hips. He had the right one replaced and the doctor wants to fix the other one, but Daddy's not inclined to go back under the knife.
The pain in his hips and knees contributes to a distinctive limp that I can recognize a hundred yards away.
As years go by and my own frame grows older, I've noticed that my joints are stiffer and sometimes painful, especially when I've been sitting for a long time.
Occasionally, when I get up from a low chair and limp away, Jan will remark that I'm starting to walk like my Daddy.
I wish I could.
My Daddy limps, but he walks as straight as any man I've ever known.
His faith is quiet but deep, understated but steady.
He walks with honesty and integrity.
To his friends and family, he is true, dependable, consistent.
To his church, he is unfailingly supportive, generous, willing to do what needs to be done, with no need for credit.
He is good with dirt in the garden, good with wood in the workshop, good with dishes in the sink, and good with children in his care.
As "Daddy Bill," he is a grandpa extraordinaire.
He played fullback for the county high school 60 years ago, earning the nickname "Bull." He continues to support and follow the team, and they have no more faithful fan.
My Daddy is the mental image I get when reading my favorite verse in the Old Testament: "He has showed you, O man, what is good. And what does the LORD require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God" (NIV).
Walk like my Daddy?
I wish I could.

My dad's 81st Birthday

Today I want to honor my father, Glenn E. Kunkel He turns 81 today. I can still remember riding on his shoulders down the hill of the Galindo St cul de sac. He has been a GREAT father. I often tell people, that I have NEVER seen in him, an act or deed that I would question. A impecable example, a man, of Impeccable character. Dad today I honor you!! I hope you have a great birthday. Love TIM

The following is the letter I wrote him a year ago on his birthday;

Hello, It has been 80 years since you were born… !! My o my how time passes!! What a milestone for you, as for me as well, as this 26/12 I will hit the big 50!!! I can hardly believe it. I still feel like I am a young man. How life passes by so quickly!!!

I just wanted to take a few minutes today to thank you for the great Dad you have been and were to me. I could have asked for no better. Many times in witnessing to folks I talk to them about the difference a Christian, or Evangelical Christian upbringing means to a person. To never have seen an alcoholic beverage in the refrigerator, to have NEVER seen my dad with a beer in his hand, to have never have seen my dad cuss or use profanity, to have never seen him disrespect or mistreat his wife and my mother. WOW!!!!!! What a heritage… You were and are SO exemplary. I love and respect you so much. I pray you have a blessed birthday… Below are some quotes about dad’s that touched me, and reminded me of you…

" I watched a small man with thick calluses on both hands work fifteen and sixteen hours a day. I saw him once literally bleed from the bottoms of his feet, a man who came here uneducated, alone, unable to speak the language, who taught me all I needed to know about faith and hard work by the simple eloquence of his example." -Mario Cuomo

YOU WERE ALWAYS SUCH!! A HARD WORKER…
"The most important thing a father can do for his children is to love their mother." - Anonymous
YOU DEFINITELY DID THIS..
"A Man's children and his garden both reflect the amount of weeding done during the growing season." - Anonymous
"The greatest gift I ever had Came from God, and I call him Dad!" - Anonymous
"A father is a guy who has snapshots in his wallet where his money used to be." – Anonymous
THIS MADE ME LAUGH…
"He didn't tell me how to live; he lived, and let me watch him do it." - Clarence Budington Kelland

POWERFUL… YOU DEFINITELY DID THIS…
"One father is more than a hundred Schoolmasters." - George Herbert
Fatherhood is pretending the present you love most is soap-on-a-rope." - Bill Cosby

I thought this was funny. We can identify with this, no??
"Small boys become big men through the influence of big men who care about small boys." – Anonymous
WOW!! SO TRUE…

Please also see the Tony Cartledge article attached…
So on this your 80th Birthday, please be reminded once again of my deep love and admiration for you. The times at the Berkley Pier, at Putah Creek, and at Whiskey Slough were great. The watching you eat lunch at the General Tire company (outside in the car with us kids and mom), at the Redwood Park picnic grounds, etc. All great times, and learning opportunities… The long talks when I cam home from seminary etc. Yes Dad you were there for me BIGTIME!
Happy Birthday, and beleated Father’s day too,

Love your son, JT KUNKEL

House cleaning!

HOUSE CLEANING DAY FOR THE LORD



As Sunday approached I started reminding our disciples to go to church. O.M. was one of them who was needing special attention. She prayed to receive Christ in February but had stopped coming for discipleship. Our first meeting was through a phone call. She read a written testimony, distributed by one of our volunteers, on a prayer walk (London Bridge Baptist Church), given out on the street and contacted us. She was glad I called her again and insisted with her to come to church with us. The sermon Tim preached touched her heart and after church, we spent the afternoon together. As we talked, she felt like telling us why she had stopped coming. This was one of the longest counseling sessions we have ever had with anyone!! (6 hours!!) It was late when we learned that she still had many “idols” in her house and in her heart. We offered her to do a cleaning of all the “idols” that were keeping her from following the Lord. We went to her home and took with us two bags. One of them we burned in an incinerator, at her place... The security gaurds watched from afar. Afterwards she told them she was "burning her sins"!! The other we packaged to send back to her parents. They were family gifts and she did not feel comfortable burning them. But at least they are out of HER home...

Her life was a mess. Wherever sin you can imagine she was involved in. She was in a spider web for sure. Her job and her life were in danger. She has a very high position in the government. It was late but we went to her house and there we started doing the house cleaning. She gave us all types of objects that kept her from worshiping only God and some of them were family gifts. We prayed in each room of her house. O. is free today and calls us her adopted parents. Pray for her as she tries to live a holy life. She is a divorced young lady with a 13 year old boy. She is the only Christian in her family. God cleaned her house and her heart. Praise the Lord.

Please keep praying for us, and for the more than 30 new Christians we are dealing with weekly...

Love Iracema and Family

This Blog is a first for me.

God is good and faithful. We have now been involved in missions and church planting in Latin America for 18+ years. We are seeing much fruit of our labors.We are involved in Church planting mainly of house churches, and in the discipling of new converts. We did for 15 + years in Uruguay. We now have been doing the same in Paraguay for almost 3 years. We have started here two house churches called LA ROCA, 1and 2, The Rock 1, and 2. In Uruguay we also started a church called LA ROCA with a national Uruguayan pastor.