From Olinda Brazil,
Sitting here looking out the window of Casa de Meu Pai, (My Father’s House) with suitcases half packed, waiting for the phone to ring, so I can find out from my friends how the balance of our luggage will ship, I am assailed by mixed feelings. Mixed because of our calling to this area, our love for the people here, and my sincere belief that there is a great powerful move of God coming to this area within a very few years. Mixed because we are leaving before we have been able to accomplish all the things I had in my heart to accomplish while we were here.
This past four months has been difficult physically, the noise and turbulence of living in a house with this many people and the noise generated by a dozen and a half teen-age boys and 20-something workers has worn on our old nerves till it has affected our health, Sandra’s health has been affected to the point that we considered cutting our trip short, but we are believing this move will give her a chance to recover. That is the bad side.
The good side is the friends we’ve made here in Recife. We’ve preached in several churches and been received whole-heartedly everywhere we’ve gone. We’ve been able to make acquaintances across the spectrum of the church body here, and we’ve preached for many different organizations.
The message God has given us concerning a coming revival in this area has been heard, and in every place, has been verified by others, as well as by the Holy Spirit.
We’ve had some powerful meetings with visitations of the Holy Spirit bringing healings, deliverances, and impacting peoples lives by His power.
In every meeting but one, we’ve finished on a high note of worship with people being slain in the spirit or taken to a place of deep intercession and worship.
There is so much need here of revival, so many places where the gospel needs to be shared, so many lives that need hope and power to overcome. Perversion and the occult are strong here. Sexual immorality is prevelant, but everywhere you look, there is a body of believers, highly visible proclaiming the gospel, and I believe that a spirit of unity is beginning to take seed here.
We came here primarily to learn the culture, language, and to make relationships that would support our next trip here. We’ve done well with the relationships and we’ve done well learning the culture. Both of us feel confident in our ability to live here now. Where we are lacking, however is the language.
In our present circumstances, we are not learning quickly enough to accomplish what we need to, and in answer to our prayers, we got an invitation from a friend of ours in the west of Brazil, who is both a language teacher and a missionary to the river people of the State of Rondonia.
So, Wednesday, we are saying goodbye to our friends in Olinda and Recife for awhile and going west. Like so many other things the Lord has done with us, we only have the next step and we’re not sure what will happen beyond the journey there. We have a trip down the river and up one of the tributaries to minister to a settlement so far from the beaten path that there is no communication or electricity.
We have plans to study the language with John and Eulalia, and since the city where we are going is a fairly large one, we should be able to maintain our communications once we return from our week-long river trip.
As always, we covet your prayers. your communications and e:mails, and we delight in hearing news from home. This past month or so, we’ve been blessed with internet broadband in our house and have enjoyed so much being able to read the local news from home and IM with our family, and are going to miss that tremendously if it isn’t available there.
We don’t know whether those things will be available where we are going, so I am posting this and inviting you to visit our photo stream at http://www.flickr.com/photos/theroadtobrazil/ and our blog, which will be updated again within the next day or so at http://roadtobrazil.wordpress.com/ (since I haven’t figured out how to imbed the link here, you may have to cut and paste or type in the url for the flickr photo stream,)
I’ve already uploaded a couple of sets of photos from our last two visits to different places, and am planning (today or tomorrow ) to update the blog with stories from those visits.
Once again on TheRoadtoBrazil, Carl and Sandra
