Let’s Start Talking

A group from Canada arrived a few weeks ago to start our first North American campaign here for LST – a program which teaches conversation English using the gospel of Luke. The Canadian team consists of 6 teachers who study one-on-one with Brazilians signed up for the class. They are teaching an average now of 60 sessions per week (some are students who come twice a week) and there are still new students signing up for the classes every day. There has been so much interest in a beginner class (since many who have come were not yet advanced enough in their language) that one of the teachers began one on Sunday and had over 30 students! This is a great opportunity for the community to become familiar with us and to teach the Good News to many who tipically would not volunteer to listen. Please be in prayer for this work. There are still more spaces open for students, so pray that those are filled soon and that God will touch the hearts of those who are coming!

Brazilian / American Youth Camp

Matt, Mary, Jennifer Porter, our intern Paul and our visitor (hopefully next year’s children’s ministry intern) Heather all went to the south of Brazil for a week of Brazilian/ American youth camp. We offered ourselves as odds and ends laborers: helping with the directory, filling up water balloons, decorating for the dinners, etc. There was a campaign group from Abilene, Texas of about 40 who came to put on this camp for 60 Brazilian campers, 25 of whom were non-Christians. The draw for the non-Christian kids to come to Bible camp was a chance to practice their English and have cross-cultural interaction with American teenagers – a pretty good evangelistic tool. For Jennifer, Mary and Matt who work with the youth in our city, there were some short term and long term goals reached on this trip.
The short term was to bring back some Brazilian games, songs, devo ideas, ect. to use with the kids here. Also, to receive some translation practice, strengthen the bonds between one of the teams’ sponsoring churches, and talk to some of the older Brazilian Christians in the South about possible internships in Salvador in the near future - We have 2 really good possibilities for this coming year: Jefferson (Paul’s – this year’s intern’s - cousin) and a guy named Gusto, both whom everyone loved at camp and work well with youth and teaching English using the Bible! Another short term goal was talking with the speaker of the camp about his evangelistic / teaching ideas for a coffee house night at the church. Coffee houses are just starting to become a new attraction here in Salvador and it would be a great and informal way to reach the 20 somethings that live in our buildings.
The long term goals were more observation oriented. We wanted to see what an American youth campaign that size looked like as well as get an idea for future (way future) youth camp / retreat ideas. Also, we wanted show our support for the Southern churches since their leaders (Paul and his parents especially) have already contributed to our settling in here and beginning the work.
We received a little from the camp along the way that we did not anticipate… new friendships. Mary and Matt got to spend much time in prayer with the American adults who came. Since there are no older Christians from our own culture at our church, we have not had much opportunity to be mentored to ourselves. It was a wonderful time to share and grow and receive spiritual food which we had been craving.

Our First Baptism!

Words cannot describe it! We had our first baptism! Gicilene was baptized tonight at our apartment pool. Believe it or not, it was very cold. It is winter here (not quite the same as winter there but cold water non-the-less). Despite being cold on the outside, Gicilene was just glowing afterwards. Mary and Sonia were too along with the rest of the team. We are so thankful that God brought Gicilene our way and that He has begun to add to our number. After the hugs and songs died down some, Randy said, “I think we (the team) may be as (if not more) excited than Gicilene and Sonia. We have all been waiting for this day for so long.”

We had many non-Christians present as well including several of our teenage boys that we have been studying the Bible with for a long time. Please pray that this will be an incentive for them now that they have seen first hand what baptism is and means. Please also pray that we can give Gicilene the support and new Christian care that she needs during this busy LST campaign that begins next week. May God give our team enough time and energy to kick off a great campaign, bring new people in, and still take care of the many people that we already have coming each Sunday and Friday night.