Shew me thy ways, O Lord; teach me thy paths.  Lead me in thy truth, and teach me: for thou art the God of my salvation; on thee do I wait all the day. - Psalm 25:4-5  

Our desire is that the Lord will show us HIS way and lead us down the right path in HIS truth.  We are thankful for all that the Lord has done in our lives.  We don’t deserve all that we have and all that the Lord has blessed us with.  It is a privilege to serve Him.  

Ministry

The ministry continues to go well.  It is amazing how much many of the people have grown and matured in the past year.  At this time last year, the church had been open for less then a year and many of the core group of people that we had were new believers or not yet believers.  Since that time many of the people have matured spiritually by leaps and bounds.  We give all the glory to Jesus for this.  

Adoption

Many of you have been praying for our adoption and I will take the rest of the letter to explain what God has done.  9 years ago, God gave us such a wonderful gift.  Our son Aaron was born and he has brought great joy to our lives.  We love him so much.  Our desire had always been to have more kids.  Deanna was able to get pregnant again however she miscarried 12 weeks later.  Since that time, Deanna has not been able to get pregnant.  After many doctors visits, discussions, and prayers, we decided that we would try to adopt a baby.  In January of 2010, we began the process of filling out the necessary paperwork and fulfilling the requirements for adopting a baby.  We were approved shortly after and the waiting journey began.  

Last June, we arrived back in the USA for a short furlough.  We also had to renew our home study for our adoption.  Our prayer was that the Lord would allow us to adopt while we were back on furlough.  As the end of our furlough began to near, we realized that it was not going to happen.  As we stood in the airport waiting to check in to our flight back to Spain, we got a call from our agent letting us know that we had been matched!!!  We were stunned.  It didn’t seem real.  The thing that we had been waiting for, for so long was finally becoming a reality.  Of course, we were thrilled!  

On January 6th, 2012, Kaira (pronounced Care-Uh) was born.  Her name means, “beloved” or “friend” but also means “right or opportune moment.”  After many years of trying to have a baby, miscarrying, and waiting for the adoption and mentally planning of when would be the best time for us to adopt, God has given us this precious gift in the absolute “right and opportune moment.”  

As I write this letter, Kaira is now 5 days old and she couldn’t be any more precious.  We love her to death and at times it still seems unreal...hard to believe she is really ours.  :)  We couldn’t be more happy and we praise the Lord for this opportunity and for allowing us to care for, love, and raise this bundle of joy!  Thank you so much for all the prayers and kind words throughout this adoption process.  

It is a privilege to serve the Lord.  We feel honored that each day He allows us to glorify His name.

Adoption

I wanted to give an update on our adoption since so many people have asked us how it is going.  We are still in the process of adopting and waiting to get the call or email informing us that we will have a new addition to the family.  We have had some possibilities which have been exciting.  We have had about 4 opportunities so far where we were able to present our profile and allow the mother to consider our family.  So far, none of these opportunities have worked out but the Lord continues to give us other opportunities which is exciting.  Right now there are two possibilities that we are praying about.  Things are moving along and we ask that you would continue to pray that the Lord would give us the right child at the right time.

Ministry

We have enjoyed being able to share what the Lord has done in our ministry in Spain.  We appreciate the investment that each church has made.  We have thoroughly enjoyed seeing old friends and people that we met years ago.  Many of the churches have been really excited about what the Lord is doing in Spain.  We have been in some great churches and appreciate their heart for missions.  I have found that furlough is a great time as it allows you to step away from the ministry and revaluate what is going on and how you can better things for the future.

The ministry continues to move along.  The team in Spain is carrying on and doing a wonderful job.  As most of you know, we were able to complete our evangelistic projects.  The church had been open a little over a year and we have been able to make the Gospel available to our entire city 2 times.  We are excited about that and we have seen much fruit.  At the heart of our ministry is life on life discipleship, training, and church planting.  We have some great people in our church and it is a joy to see men coming to Christ and expressing the desire to grow and serve the Lord.  Our desire is to seed Spain with the Gospel and see more churches planted for His glory.  

The church has been growing during our absence.  When we left for furlough, the church had grown to an average of around 25 people.  Over the past couple of months, the church has grown to average around 35-40 people!  The last two Sundays, there were 48 and 49 people, respectively, in attendance!  Praise the Lord for His goodness!  One of the young men that I have had the privilege of working with and building a relationship with since before he came to Christ has expressed interest in the possibility of being a Pastor or Missionary one day if the Lord so leads.  We are so thrilled to see people who knew not God, coming to a saving knowledge of Jesus Christ and expressing the desire to know Him and His Word more and serve Him in the ministry.  That’s what it’s all about!  

Family

Furlough is always a wonderful time because you get to enjoy a lot of family time.  Aaron has thoroughly enjoyed traveling to many different places and meeting new people.  However, one of the things that has been a real blessing is Aaron’s willingness to participate in the ministry.  Since we have been back, Aaron has been able to sing with Deanna and minister to the churches through song.  Check out the video of Aaron singing by clicking here.  We praise the Lord for allowing our family to serve Him!

Thank you for your prayers, support, and love!

One of the great joys of being a father is being able to see your kids grow in the Lord and begin to serve Him with their life.  This furlough, Aaron has been able to serve the Lord by singing in various churches that we have been in.  It is neat to see his willingness to sing in different churches even through nervousness and insecurities.  

Here is a video of Aaron and Deanna singing in one of the churches.   

Many people have been asking about our adoption progress so I decided that I would give an update.  

We are still waiting.  It has been 1 year and 4 months since we started the process.  When we started, the agency told us that it normally takes 12 to 18 months.  When we returned to the USA 4 weeks ago, we had to renew our home study.  The home study is good for 1 year and has to be renewed each year.  

Many of you have no idea how an adoption works (just as I had no idea before we started this) so let me explain the process and maybe it will help you understand a little more of what is going on.  

When you start the process of adopting, you have to fill out lots of paperwork explaining exactly what you want.  You can be as general or as specific as you want.  You really have to make some tough decisions as far as to exactly what you want.  We decided that we would like to adopt a child, boy or girl, age ranging from infant to one year old.  We have also submitted a family book explaining things about our family, home, etc. with pictures and information.  This information is taken and given to perspective mothers who are pregnant and don't want to keep the baby.  These mothers look through several families who desire to adopt and then they choose which family they would like to give their baby to.  So basically, we are waiting to be matched with a birth mother.  In our case, we will most likely be able to be matched with a mother who is pregnant and once the baby is born, we will be able to take the baby home from the hospital.  However, it is also possible that the baby will have already been born.  

So as of now, we are still in the "waiting game."  Some days it seems like it will never happen.  However, so many people who have adopted before have told us that they felt the same way and then one day, all of the sudden, they got "THE CALL" and the next thing they knew, they were home with their newly adopted baby.  

So for now, we wait.  We ask for your prayers in this matter.  We are really praying that the adoption would go through before we leave the USA in November.  However, we know that the Lord's timing is perfect.  

Dear Praying friends, family, and churches:

FURLOUGH IS HERE!

We have arrived in the States and have started visiting churches. We are currently at Beacon Baptist Church, the church where I was saved, baptized and called into full-time ministry. We were able to give an update about our ministry and we have been able to spend a few extra days here while Aaron attends their VBS. The people are so kind and loving and we are so glad to be here.

We will be traveling much during our time here. We will be as far south as South Florida, as far north as Maine and as far west as California. We are looking forward to visiting every church that has scheduled with us and being able to give an update on what God is doing in Spain.

MINISTRY

The Lord continues to work in Spain and continues to amaze us each day. We are almost done with our “Bible in every home” project. We have been able to put Bibles in over 35,000 homes in our city. Just as a reminder, the “Bible in Every Home Project” is a project where our goal is to get a John and Romans into every home in our city. We have made up a packet that consists of a John and Romans, a gospel tract, and an invitation to our church. Pray that God will continue to penetrate the hearts and lives of the people in Spain as they receive the Word of God!

On June 12th, we had a special service and we called it “Friend Day.” We encouraged all of our people to invite at least one friend or family member. We planned many special things for the service including special music, several video testimonies and some video interviews that we recorded the week before of the people in our city. David, my brother-in-law, preached a message titled “How good is good enough” based on the premise that if we use the standard that all good people will go to Heaven, that idea presents us with many problems. It was a great day as many visitors came out and we had a high day of 50 people. Our people were very excited and each one had an integral part in making that day a success.

It is exciting to see our people growing in Christ. At the heart of our ministry is the aspect of reproduction. Our goal is to disciple and train others to do the work of the ministry and for them to continue to reproduce themselves and teach others to do the same. We have seen our people grow through one on one discipleship and we are preparing them to be able to disciple others. We have implemented this on a small scale as I was able to train Eduardo, one of the men in our church, to take over the media while I am gone. He does a great job and it doesnʼt even feel like I am gone. However, we didnʼt stop there. Eduardo has also trained another man in our church named, Juan, how to do the media. So on a small scale, we have seen 2 Timothy 2:2 put into action and we are so amazed at what God is doing in our church.

We sincerely thank you for your prayers and support and look forward to seeing many of you soon!

We will be taking our first-ever furlough and we are very excited about reporting of what God has done in the work here.  We have made a video presentation to show in our churches.  This is a glance of what God is doing in Spain.

You can also view our presentation that we used before we came to Spain. It shows our burden for Spain and what we planned to do. You can view that by clicking on the link below.

http://www.thatallmayknow.net/video-presentations.html

Dear Co-laborers in Christ,

As we begin our 31st year serving as missionaries, we have to say that each year gets sweeter and more exciting. We are not tired, but energized as we see people come to Christ, grow in the Lord and desire to serve Him. We continually receive good news from people who have been saved in our first ministry here in Spain and also those saved in Venezuela and we praise God for how He continues His work in those places.

The work here in Parla is growing numerically and spiritually. In March we were able to baptize 5 converts. In April we began distributing packets of John and Romans along with a Gospel tract and an invitation to our church. The following Sunday a young couple came to the church and said that they were saved, but were praying that God would show them a good church where they could worship and serve God. Their names are Joao and Raquel Goncalves. Joao is from Portugal and his wife from Brazil and they have not stopped attending the services. They are now taking discipleship classes and getting involved in every ministry in the church. Recently Paco and Eduardo finished their discipleship classes and their wives will be finishing soon.

We have been preaching the last few Sundays on discipleship, reaching souls for Christ and that each person needs to be involved in the Lordʼs work. Last Sunday was very special to us because after the service we had lunch at the church and then everyone stayed to help staple our Bible packets together in order to pass them out into the houses in Parla. Everyone participated. They were at the church for 6 hours working with joy in their hearts and sharing sweet fellowship. It was a blessed time for us to see how much these new believers have grown in the Lord! One year ago there were 7 people in the church and now there are 24! God has done great things!

Every day we make sure that someone is at the church during the day so that if anyone wants to know more about the Bible or our church we are there for them. Every day somebody comes into the church with questions and we are able to share the Gospel with them. Please pray for some of these people, Piedad, Blanca, Susana and Francisco. Also continue praying for the salvation of Javier who I visit in the prison once a month. In April and May we were able to distribute 27,000 Gospel packets into the homes of Parla. Lord willing we will finish the remaining 13,000 this month. Pray that we will see fruit from this outreach. Thank you for your many prayers and financial support. We praise God for you very day. May each of us keep on working for Christ till He comes!

In His Service,

Julio and Andrea Velasquez

Dear Praying friends, family, and churches:

FURLOUGH PLANS

I would like to announce again that we will be taking a FURLOUGH this year starting in the summer.  We are planning on being in the states from the summer through the fall.  Many churches have responded since our last prayer letter and our schedule is filling up fast.  If any church would like for us to come and give an update about our ministry, please let us know.  If you have contacted us by one of the methods listed and I have not responded, this means I have not received your request.  Please contact me, preferably by email, with your request.  We have provided a form with this prayer letter that you can mail back to our overseas address or you can email me at the following address:  jefe40472@gmail.com.  You can also go to the web address below and contact us via the form that is available there. 

http://www.thatallmayknow.net/furlough

We would also like to make our supporting churches aware that we will be trying to raise more support while we are back.  Due to the economy and churches that have dropped us or who have lowered our support, we have lost almost 10% of our support since we arrived in Spain.  We need to gain back this loss.  If some of our supporting churches were able to raise our support a little, we would not have to seek out too many new churches.  We are certain that the Lord will provide for this need. 

MINISTRY

The Lord continues to work in our midst.  In our last prayer letter, we mentioned that we finished the Gospel DVD project.  We were able to place a Gospel DVD into every household in our city.  We have now started a new project.  It is called “A Bible in Every Home.”  Bearing Precious Seed donated 50,000 copies of John and Romans to our ministry.  We are placing a copy of the John and Romans, a Gospel Tract, and an invitation to our church in each household.  We have already been able to get the Bible packets into over 13,300 households.  After the first week of doing the Bible project, we had a family visit our church.  They said that they were on vacation and during their vacation they decided to get serious about finding a church.  They prayed that the Lord would direct them to a church.  When they returned home, they checked their mail and they told us that the Bible packet was sitting in their mailbox.  Countless others have received the Word of God and a clear presentation of the Gospel. 
On March 27th, we had our third baptism.  We were able to baptize 5 people.  It was an exciting time in the life of our ministry.  Paco and Veronica, a Spanish couple who recently received Christ as their Savior were baptized.  Carlos, who gave his life to the Lord several weeks earlier, was baptized.  His wife Olenka, who placed her faith in Christ a couple of years earlier was baptized and Angie, who has struggled with the issue of baptism for many years, surrendered her will to the Lord and was baptized.  Each person mentioned is also getting one on one, life on life discipleship.  We praise the Lord for all that He is doing in our midst and we thank our supporting churches for making all of this possible. 

It is exciting to be serving God and doing His will.  As many of you know, we have finished our DVD project.  The results were innumerable as we know that thousands of people watched the DVD and heard a clear presentation of the Gospel and 3 people were saved and baptized as a direct result of the project. 

One of our goals is to saturate the city with the Gospel each year.  Since we have finished the DVD project, we began the "Bible in Every Home" project.  Our goal is to put the Word of God in every household.  Every Monday morning, we meet at the church and put together a packet that contains a Gospel tract, invitation to the church, and a John and Romans that was so graciously given to us by Bearing Precious Seed in Milford, OH.  We started distributing the Bibles two weeks ago.  In the short time that we have been distributing the Bibles, we have already seen God work through this project.  A new couple came to the church this past Sunday as a direct result of the project.  They told us that they were gone for a week and they decided that as soon as they got home, they were going to look for a church.  So they began praying that God would lead them to a church.  When they arrived home, they found our Bible packet in their mailbox.  Praise the Lord for how He works! 

Last night was a very special night for our church.  Our church has been open for bible studies and services for almost a year and we have seen God do some wonderful things.  It amazes us how God continues to work in the hearts and lives of people.

Last night, we were able to baptize 5 people.  Around 30 people came to the baptism from our church including friends and family members of the ones getting baptized.  I wish I could go through each person's life and their story in detail of how they came to this point.  It has truly been a work of God. 

If you watch the video below, you will meet Angie, the wife of Eduardo.  Eduardo found our website www.estudialabiblia.com.  He typed in a google search engine, "What is the true religion?"  Our website was the first one to pop up.  He read the info, watched the video, and requested a Bible.  We delivered the Bible to Eduardo and he eventually trusted Christ as his Savior.  His wife, Angie, didn't want to have anything to do with us at first.  However, God began to work in her heart and we found out that she had made a profession of faith but had been turned off by a group in Paraguay.  Above all, she was turned off because of their radical and unscriptural teachings on Baptism.  We knew that only God could work in her heart about following Him in this step of obedience.  Amazingly, God did do a work and much sooner then we thought.  Angie told Deanna while they were studying the Bible that she realized she needed to be obedient to God and take this step of obedience.  How wonderful it was to see her baptized. 

You will also meet Paco, a Spaniard who came to one of our services and then left before it was over.  We never though we would see him again but he came back the next week.  We, later, found out that he came because he received our Gospel DVD in his mailbox.  He never missed a service.  Eventually he brought his wife and family.  A couple of months ago, Paco repented of his sins and placed his faith in the Lord Jesus Christ.  We have seen so much fruit in his life.  He has a hunger for the Word of God. 

Carlos came to our church with his wife Olenka in November of 2010.  Carlos has always been a skeptic.  After each message, Carlos would question things that were said and things that the Bible said.  However, he kept coming back.  Slowly but surely, the Holy Spirit worked on his heart until finally he surrendered his will to the Lord.  If you listen to his testimony you will hear a clear understanding of salvation and how he is willing to be used of the Lord. 

Veronica is the wife of Paco.  Paco first attended the church for many weeks and then she finally came.  One day while my father-in-law was over at their house, Veronica said to him, "I would like for you to explain to me the subject of Salvation.  I have seen such a change in Paco, I would like to know what this is all about."  My father-in-law explained it to her and she trusted in the Lord.  How awesome it is to have a husband and wife following the Lord and starting a family as believers. 

Olenka came with her husband Carlos.  She trusted the Lord earlier in her life but was never taught about baptism.  She has seen her husband turn from a skeptic to a believer and has grown in the Lord herself through the teaching and preaching of God's Word and one on one discipleship.  Once presented with scriptural baptism, she made the decision to follow Him out of obedience. 

What a wonderful night.  It is a very exciting time in our ministry and we pray that the Lord will continue to work in our ministry here in Spain.  ENJOY THE VIDEO BELOW!