glory in the ordinary: January 2009

Hello from the beautiful, mountainous South American country of Brazil, more specifically the city of Porto Alegre. As many of you know, the IMPACT360 team has been split into two groups. While Team A is hard at work doing projects with an orphanage in the capital city of Brasilia, my Team B (“Dynamite”) is working alongside of summer camp counselors at Palavra da Vida (Word of Life) further south in Porto Alegre. The I360 students that are with me here at the Word of Life camp are Zak, Mark, Josh, Katlynne, Corinne, Tiffany, Bekah B, and Katie. Our leaders are Bethany, one of our Student Living and Learning Coordinators at I360, and Orman Gwynn, a retired missionary of 30+ years in Brazil. Mr. Gwynn has been a tremendous blessing to our group as he serves as one of our main translators. Larry Cox, one of our IMPACT leaders, was with us for this first week as one of our leaders, but he returned to the states today. It was a lot of fun to have Uncle Larry here with us; he always had some way to crack a joke or put a smile on my face.

We left the I360 campus around three the afternoon of Friday, January 9th. The plane left the ground around 10 that night, almost 2 hours after the expected time; welcome to Brazilian culture, I guess! Sleeping on the plane wasn’t the easiest thing in the world, but most of us managed to get at least an hour or two. After a nine hour flight, we stepped off the Delta plane into the heat of Rio de Janeiro. From there we connected to a domestic flight headed to Brasilia. John and Trudy White met us at the airport and took us to their beautiful retreat center, Aqua Viva (“Living Water”).

We spent the first four days at Aqua Viva getting accustomed to Brazilian weather, food and culture. Sunday was a time to catch up on the sleep that we missed from traveling for almost twenty-four hours. We slept in, had a fantastic lunch, and chilled with the White family and some of our translators. That night we went into the city to Terceira Igeja Batista (Third Baptist Church) in Brasilia. Some of the more musical students on our I360 team led a song or two in English and their team followed up with a set in Portuguese. Music is universal and helped bridge the language gap. Personally it gave me a glimpse of heaven, where one day “every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ in Lord.” After the church service, we went out to a Pizzaria for dinner at 11pm!!! We met up with a local youth group who ate an assortment of handmade pizzas, including those topped with banana and chocolate or guava for dessert. Don’t worry, mom and dad, I will not go hungry down here!

Monday was a day filled with tourism. We traveled the city and saw the sites of Brasilia. It was a hot day and some of us got a little bit sunburned! I really enjoyed seeing all the beautiful architecture of their buildings, as well as seeing lots of statues that we had studied or heard about in our presentations before coming down here. My topic in this assignment was Brazilian religion. Because of this area of study, I was particularly interested in a site that we visited that afternoon called “The Temple of Goodwill.” This temple is basically a place where they combine many religions in order to create their own “Brazilian religion.” It is a physical expression and place of syncretism, or as we at I360 like to call it, the smorgasbord or casserole effect. It was neat for me to see that everything that I studied and learned about really does exist. Even though it was sad to see that people actually believe in many ways to get to God, it made my study “worth while.”

Tuesday we went into a neighboring state to visit two orphanages. These orphanages are run by Catholic nuns and are actually really nice! The kids were so happy to see us and play with us. A lot of songs were sung with the older kids, and the younger ones were eager to show us around their fruit gardens and play on their swingsets. My day was finished with a swim at Aqua Viva and eating a mango from the orphanage on the side of the pool (probably the 7th mango that I had since arriving)…ya, mom, be jealous!!!

Wednesday morning, Team Dynamite packed up their belongings (praise God no one lost their luggage on the way down here), said good-bye to Team A (named “Team Skunklings”) and headed back to the airport in Brasilia for a three hour flight to Porto Alegre. We were met at the airport by Thomas Schneider, and he took us to Palavra da Vida where we are currently staying while away from the other team (until February 1st).

Here at the camp we have been hanging out and developing relationships with the counselors, other youth our age, that are here at the camp for the entire summer. This week has been their staff training, and we have been going through that right alongside of them. To be honest, we have had a lot of frustration among our group because of the language barrier. Some members of our team have been battling some physical ailments, as well as a lot of emotional and mental stress since it is very hard to communicate. Keep us in your prayers in this area.

Before signing off, I just want to share with you a few things that the Lord has been teaching me while being down here. The times I have had with the Lord, no matter when, where, how short or how long, have been some of the sweetest that I have ever experienced. Upon getting a new, smaller Bible over Christmas, I decided to start reading it from the very beginning. I have just recently finished the book of Numbers and have moved into Deuteronomy. While reading the story of Balaam, these two verse in Numbers 23 really spoke to me…

“I will speak only the message that the Lord puts in my mouth…I can do only what the Lord tells me.”

If any of you know me very well, you know that I am very outgoing, expressive, and about 99% extroverted. The Lord revealed to me that I have a habit of “spouting off at the mouth” (not it always being a bad thing), but many times I do end of saying something I later regret. He has been increasing the desire of my heart to have a quiet and reserved spirit. I have really enjoyed putting into practice the disciple of silence. I was also privileged with the opportunity to give a short testimony at session last night, and I shared this with everyone that was there. I hope my testimony was a joy to someone else too!

To be “truefaced,” as we in the community of I360 always challenge each other on, a verse in Psalms spoke to me very strongly. I was feeling very inadequate and unwanted in a lot of areas. I opened my Bible to read the Psalms for today and simply asked the Lord to speak to me. Being the faithful God that I serve, he allowed me to read this…

Psalms 45:10b-11
“…forget your people and your family far away. For your royal husband delights in your beauty; honor him, for he is your lord.”

I have noticed in the past few days that they more I focus on Christ and who I am in him, the less I think about my self and the negative thoughts I have about myself. I’ve noticed that the more I am concerned about my internal character, the less I focus on my external appearance, something I have had enormous issues with in the past. I’ve been constantly desiring nothing more than to just be with Christ and just sit at the feet of Jesus. I have a strong desire to soak up the Word like a sponge and not let any of it squeeze out. My favorite book in the Bible is James and just today I have started memorizing it. Already being four verses in, it’s been a hope and sword to my life.

Please keep my team and the other team in your prayers as we continue throughout this month of missions work. I appreciate you and all your support.

To God be the Glory; may His name be praised!!!

P.S. Pictures will be coming soon...

glory in the ordinary

Friday, January 16, 2009

Coming at you alive from Brazil

Friday, January 9, 2009

Olá Brasil (Hello Brazil) !!!

Thursday, January 1, 2009

2009...HERE I AM!