Mission 09 to Brazil

Saturday Day 11
We have just returned to aracuai after spending 5 days at lapinha.
All are well (although exhausted, and grubby) after working on the
site, visiting homes and playing with the children.
When we arrived Sue and Fred went to the hardware store and used our
building money to purchase materials. Our original concerns about the
exchange rate did not stop us from buying all the bricks, cement,
re-bar plaster, flooring and roof tiles. Praise God that that the
church will only be lacking a door, windows, and lights.
The church was so excited about getting the materials that on the
Saturday that we arrived 5 workmen went up and started laying bricks
before we even got there.
As a result we are well underway and in the 5 days that we spent on
the site the walls are already up and the roofing supplies at the
ready. Our hope is that next Saturday we will have our lunch at the
church and then a service before leaving to go home.
Our accommodation is amazing, it could not be closer to the building
site and a football pitch. Although it lacks a little space (some of
the girls are in a tent and the boys are crammed into a house) showers
and a flush toilet, we have all we need.
A typical day
7am Breakfast for the team (the Brazilian builders are already at the
site) Porridge or eggs
8am we leave in 3 teams, one to visit homes (sing a few songs, give
our testimony of how God is working in our lives and find out about
the local people) there are not many homes in lapinha and so some of
these visits have been by coach and a long walk. Another team will be
playing with the children at the football pitch, skipping, football
and flying a kite. We also spend a time with the children telling
them bible stories with the help of puppets and songs.
The last team goes to the building site to help with the laying of
bricks, mixing of the concrete, collecting agua (water).
At 12 we break for cooked lunch Rice, beans meat and vegetables.
After lunch we swap teams and do the same until 5pm when we return to
the base for a shower (bucket of cold water) and chill out before tea
at 6pm
By 8 (it is dark) and we have a time of singing and worship with
testimony from all the team and a time of prayer. By 9.30pm after the
washing the dishes we venture to bed ready for another day ..

Tonight we are off to church for Sunday school ( we are taking the
childrens Sunday school) and tomorrow we have the youth service in the
morning, are visiting Leomir?s church a few kilometres from aracuai
and then back to church in the evening for the main service. There
will be plenty of opportunities to share our testimonies, sing and
preach.

Monday morning we are venturing back to Lapinha at 9am via the village
of our cook. She wants us to meet her community and have lunch there.

Mission 09 team
Saturday 15th Aug

It was almost 3 weeks ago when a team of 15 from Eastbourne (and one
from Stockport) joined Sue Fallon(UK director) and Naomi Lane
(translator) and set off for Brazil. EI were partnering with the
Assembly of God Evangelical church in Aracuai to build a church for
the small group of believers in Lapinha. At the airport we met Fred
and Carla Silva and Flavio (our coach driver) soon to become a great
friend and member of the team.
It took us 13 hours by coach north into the arid region of Minas
Gerias to finally arrive at our host church in Aracuai where a warm
welcome was waiting. We quickly struck up friendships in spite of the
language barrier with music and Christ our common bond. Our times
together often ended in a time of worship.
After 4 days we finally reached lapinha a poor farming community 90
minutes off the main road from Aracuai in one of the driest and
poorest parts of Brazil. We were relieved to see that the government
had recently brought electricity and made water tanks for the homes in
the last 2 years.
Our accommodation was cosy and basic (the girls block lacked a toilet
and shower for the first day) but the location was great and we were
well looked after by our fantastic cook (and local church leader)
Claudiane and loved by a family of new Christians who had opened their
home and lives to us.
Our building project had already begun to take shape with the
foundations completed by the partner church and with the money that
the team brought the Brazilian partners had quickly started on the
walls.
Each day we split into 3 teams to visit the local community (there
were not many people locally so it often involved a long walk and a
bus ride). The group would share their testimonies and encourage the
homes with singing and a short word. Another team played with the
children and did impromptu Sunday school lessons, exhausting work in
the early days with the hot sun beating down (This is a Brazilian
winter!!!). However the children could not wait to hear the next
story. The last team worked on the site mixing concrete and helping
with the church building. It was a joy to work alongside our
Brazilian brothers who made the days fun and fruitful.
In the second week we visited the local school and took some lessons
sharing a little about the UK and teaching songs in both Portuguese
and English. Our visits were warmly received and the times of play
were great, skipping, football and jumping the river were firm
favourites.
On our last Saturday we were able to have a service of thanksgiving in
the newly built church building in Lapinha sharing testimonies of all
that God has taught us and worshipping together. God is able to do
immeasurably more that we ask or can imagine?and he has. Gloria Deus
(Glory to God).
Tired and exhausted now yet amazed at all that we were able to achieve
in our short stay here in Aracuai. We will never forget the amazing
time that we had with our brothers and sisters in Christ, the generous
hospitality and our times with God, being refreshed and used by him
for the building up of the church in Brazil. What a privilege.
Thank you EI for making this dream come true.