We're not out of the picture yet!

But we have more pictures from Rio Grande. Our readers have probably severely dwindled now that both of us are back in the continental 48, but we had a wonderful time in Rio Grande and still want to throw forth the fotos. I wish I could devote more time to describing all that happened. Here is the least I can do.

The city of Rio Grande, the oldest in the state of Rio Grande do Sul, has about 200,000 inhabitants who live very close together in the center; there's no downtown to speak of (in the sense of what I imagine a downtown to be). Espaço Cristão is a growing congregation with Pentecostal roots that has five or six branch churches around Rio Grande. The Anderson family moved down from the Sovereign Grace church in Pasadena to serve Espaço Cristão with Fabiani. They were a hotrockinawesome bunch! Below is me with Brianna and Mrs. Anderson.

While I was in Rio Grande, David and I stayed with Marco and Adriana, who attend Espaço Cristão. Marco is quite the churrasqueiro...he cooked up some mighty good meals while we were in his home (and at his restaurant).

David and I spent some hours (David probably spent a lot more hours after I left) in the church office. We loved getting to know Fabiani (left) and his brother Milton (middle), who is the pastor of Espaço Cristão.

Much of the city looked like this street, which is right in front of Marco and Adriana's home.

The Andersons, the Medeiroses, and a few other friends all went out with us one Saturday to the longest beach in the world, twenty minutes from Rio Grande. Pablo and David below. Technical difficulties prevent more people from being included in the photo selection.

A huge inlet of water that extends all the way to Porto Alegre (4.5 hours' drive north) begins at this point of the beach. From this opening extends two parallel rail tracks. Sightseers can ride rail cars to the end of the tracks for a striking view of the Atlantic.

And a view of dolphins and sea lions. David and Jordan Anderson below.

This shot was taken from the very end of the track, looking back toward the mainland.

The Andersons and the Medeiroses (both pair!) and two very privileged youth

Much more could be said. Dave and I still think of and pray for this precious work being done in Rio Grande, and are excited to see where the gospel will take Espaço Cristão.

obrigada

THANK YOU FOR YOUR COMMENTS!

O, happy and tired am I...on the eve of another adventure...

(The following was meant to posted last Friday.)

We´re home again! That is, back in the city where we were born...a Cidade Maravilhosa, Rio de Janeiro, River of January. We more or less laid low the last few days in Contagem, Minas Gerais. The mission work we did with Street LIFE was good--and intense, and tiring. I can count on one hand the times I´ve slept in past noon this year, and Monday was one of those times.

So we flew into Rio today, and tomorrow we fly to Rio Grande do Sul to meet Fabiani Medeiros and family and church!!

But first, pictures.


Me and some translators! We had a great time talking together. They were invaluable members of the team.



The first Sunday David and I went with the team to a Baptist church. The team led worship, preached the word, and prayed for the congregants afterward.


Praça Sete: the busiest downtown plaza in Belo Horizonte. The team led worship, conducted skits, and called for people to commit their lives to the Lord and receive prayer.


In front of this brothel we did the same thing as at Praça Sete. I couldn´t believe how much business that place got--I counted 7 men exit in 15 seconds from one of the two entrances.


Some team members here are standing in front of a rehabilitation center in the city of Contagem, where we also ministered.


Ye Olde Trailer. This guy carried equipment everywhere for us.


Dave praying for a fella at the rehab center


Wednesday night we had worship and teaching at the YWAM base in Contagem--with everybody living on the base. Here are a few youth from the Church of Grace and Peace doing a skit.


Thursday was churrasco (Brazilian grill-out, sort of) and leisure day. Here´s David having leisure.


This is what I mean by churrasco. yummmmmmmmm.


The next day we went to a favela that has a mission for kids. Here are a few houses in the favela.


A view of the city from the favela.


Many hangings of Scripture decked the walls of the mission.


Some kids. Some, if not all, receive help from the ministry.


Corredores do Reino (Runners of the Kingdom) is the name of the ministry. This ministry teaches the things of God kids who usually have dead, absent, or imprisoned fathers; tries to prevent the kids from getting into drugs (drugs being the reason people in the lower part of the favela don´t go up to the higher part); offers after-school tutoring; provides meals to kids who wouldn´t eat otherwise; conducts athletic programs; and teaches computer skills. I learned all this as I toured the house the mission operates in. The pastor there is a runner, and he recently took a couple kids to Rio for a race/marathon. That news was the straw that broke the camel´s back--tears came to my eyes when I saw all that this ministry was doing for these kids.


We went to another rehab center on Saturday. There´s a skit the team does to Free by Steven Curtis Chapman--at one point everybody jumps up in "freedom" from sin. Dave caught on might quick.

Whoa, Nelly

Here´s my first crack at a computer since Saturday. My apologies for leavin´ y´all hanging, except the apology doesn´t apply to Peter Schellhase since he otherwise communicated to me his sentiments concerning the loss of Brasil, i.e., that they should´ve lost to Ghana and their loss gives him no pain.

Kidding, Peter!

So, we ended up joining a team of about twenty people plus translators here in Belo Horizonte. The team is made of of youth from the Church of Grace and Peace in Toms River, New Jersey, and a few people from Street LIFE, an urban ministry from New York City. Every day we´ve breakfasted together, then met for worship, prayer, and teaching, then lunched together, then hit the road for a ministry destination. So far we´ve gone to minister outside a brothel, in a downtown plaza, in a rehabilitation center, and a church. Today we´re returning to the brothel after we hit a favela (a very poor neighborhood--see pictures below of one in Rio).

During the ministry session, the team has a time of worship (drums, guitar, keyboard, bass, vocalists), drama (in conjunction with a team from Youth With A Mission), and prayer. At the end of every session we ask for anyone who wants to repent and surrender his life to Jesus to come forward for prayer. We also invite Christians who need to recommit their lives or have a special need to come forward. For outside ministry in downtown Belo, several Brazilians have always come forward for each category. It has been incredible to pray with individuals to make Jesus Lord of their life. The struggle for me has been that I´m not easily able to recommend a church family to them.

David and I are now staying overnight at the church which is hosting the team of Americans instead of at Gilberto and Jussara´s place. This move has eliminated the need for back-and-forth rides and made the sleep thing a little easier. On the 10th we´ll go back to Gilberto´s, since that´s the day the team heads back to the States.

It´s been a good time. It´s definitely been spiritually draining in some ways--for instance, the street that had the brothel and porn theatres had a feeling of oppression that wore off on me. It´s a battle. But it´s awesome to see what worshiping God in public does to transform the atmosphere, and it amazes me how every time we go outside to evangelize a group of people choose to stop and stay the whole time to hear what we have to say and receive what we have to give. I´ve also been extremely encouraged because I´ve been able to translate for people. You have no idea how thrilling this is for me. After five years of informally studying Portuguese I can talk to Brazilians. Not eloquently, mind you--but it is communication. Thank you, God!! All the study over the years and the 100+ hours we spent in the classroom last month in Rio were without a doubt worth it.

I´ve got to skedaddle. Please pray for us to stick close to the power of the gospel, keep our eyes on the Lord, serve, and be fortified against the enemy. Thank you!

Brasil lesson

A carioca is someone born in the city of Rio de Janeiro. David and I are cariocas.

A mineiro is someone born in Minas Gerais (which technically means General Mines, and mineiro means miner). David and I are meeting mineiros right now, or at least people living in MG.

A paulista is someone born in São Paulo. David and I had an easier time understanding paulistas than cariocas (they seem to talk more slowly, clearly, and simply).

A gaúcho is someone born in Rio Grande do Sul. Dave and I will be meeting a lot more of these guys starting 15 July.

Portuguese Lesson #2

lágrima
1. tear
2. many of which are the result of today's World Cup match between France and Brasil

)o`:

Mineiro state

Our flight to Belo Horizonte, the 5-million-person capital of Minas Gerais, was quite all right, though we were surprised by a check-in line of maybe 100 people at the international airport in Rio. Varig, once the classic Brazilian airline, tanked last week and has thus made air travel interesting for all in Brasil. But! The line went fast, the cappucino was good, and Gol (another airline) took us smoothly to Minas.

We were met by Jussara, Gilberto's wife, who took us to where we'll stay until 14 July. Gilberto and Jussara are in leadership at a YWAM base in Contagem, which is an hour out of Belo (see links to the right). David and I are staying at their home, but day to day we'll meet with a team of Americans that arrived a couple days ago to minister. Tomorrow, however, seems to be set aside for an excursion, as we'll all be going to the Feira Hippy in Belo Horizonte, a huge outdoor market that happens every Sunday. I had heard about it but didn't think we'd have the opportunity to hit it. A pleasant surprise.

On a different note, I recently posted a prayer request for fellowship. I realized today that provision of fellowship has been happening just in my relationship with Dave. We're going through Seeking Him, a Bible study by Nancy Leigh DeMoss and Tim Grissom on personal revival. Walking through confession and repentance together has brought us much closer, and God has also been changing us in unexpected but very good ways. I didn't foresee this aspect of God's kindness. He is so kind.

Bona fide tourism!

Yesterday was our first free afternoon in a long while, and, it also being the second to last day in Rio, we hit some of the belezas (beauties) of the city.

A waterfall on the outskirts of the Floresta de Tijuca, a huge park in Rio. We only drove through some of it though it promised to be a marvelous hike. Maybe later.

David and Tio Zi by a map of the forest. You should be able to click the picture to magnify it.

Sometime in the dark decade of the 1980s, at this plaza three cars full of Christians, two being my parents, stopped and released a host of believers praying loudly in tongues. The couples who already were at the plaza high-tailed it.

A bird

Here it is: Cristo Redentor do Corcovado. We were blessed to have both a good view of it and the city given the sky was overcast--oftentimes visitors can´t see anything up there through the clouds. And now I´ve been able to see Rio from Corcovado when it´s sunny and when it´s misty. Both views are breathtaking.

A view. That big rock is Pão de Açucar--more on that below.

Another view from Corcovado. The bridge goes to an island of several cities; if my memory serves right, it took ten or fifteen minutes to cross in 2001. Click to magnify.

All those little houses shoved up the mountainside constitute a favela, where the poorest of Rio live. Favelas are destitute, dangerous places. Contrast them with those nearby buildings and you easily understand why Brasil is the country with the biggest rich-poor extremes in the world.

David in the cable-car to Pão de Açucar (Sugarloaf), the rock you see in the background.

The view from Sugarloaf. We´re actually facing Corcovado, the mountain on which is the Christ the Redeemer statue--it´s the first peak to the left of Dave.

More to the north. It was marvelous to see Rio at night.

To the south and the familial two. The beach you see is Copacabana.

Though I visited Corcovado and Pão de Açucar in 2001, the views yesterday were more meaningful. After having walked through downtown and taken the Metrô (subway) and sat in the bus and greeted the taxi drivers and met the people and spoken the language and eaten the food and bought the ware and breathed the air and stepped on the shore and ate with the rich and passed by the poor, I could appreciate the big picture of the city I´ve lived in for a month, and I longed more than ever for the city to improve and Christ to be known--the real Christ, not an icon or a thing of stone. It was a good day.

Prayer requests

A couple prayer requests--

1. A need I´ve personally felt is fellowship. We´re surrounded by believers, but the language barrier makes it difficult to fellowship on a deep level. I get worn out sometimes in the lack of weekly care group, Sunday meetings, and worship. On the flipside, please pray we can bless others by engaging in biblical fellowship with them.

2. A fuller practice of the mission aspect begins on Saturday when we join a group of Americans to minister on a YWAM base. We´ve had a fun and relaxed time in Rio, so please pray we´ll prepare our hearts for July in faith and humility.

3. We still haven´t quite figured out transportation plans in July--which busline to Rio Grande? which hour? Small things, but we could use some more energy in this executive branch.

Thank you, thank you, thank you!