Today a man took me across the street to check on another man who was laying by some trash and not moving. "I didn't know if he was dead or something." As we approached flies flew off of the man's body and some of the pavement was wet underneath him. I wondered if it was true... but as we bent down the man opened his eyes. We did our best to offer him help, but he assured us he was ok and waved us away. Oh God... this is not what You made us for...

thank you for praying...

At a bus stop in Brazil our team was playing worship music live on the streets and our leader called me to the middle of the “stage” to portray some of the things they were singing about since I was dressed as Jesus in preparation for the drama. Wearing simply a robe and red sash I came to the middle and began to extend my hand toward people circled around watching. The music team next sang about Jesus wrapping people in His arms and our leader encouraged me to approach people in the crowd and give them a loving hug. To physically demonstrate these things on the streets is the passion of my heart, but I was definitely nervous too. Some of the people I extended my arms to seemed a bit reluctant, but we embraced anyway. Then I saw a middle-aged woman next to me and I wrapped her up. Her head fit perfectly under my chin. At first it didn’t seem like much was happening until I heard and felt her weeping. I held her tight. After a minute I let her go and a woman from her team comforted her and prayed with her. The woman I hugged was a Christian, but something resonated with her that night that made God’s love real to her once again. And it was her birthday…

One day at a favela in Brazil we gathered around a group of children to love and bless them. I approached two young boys (about 6 or 7 years old probably) and worked with a translator to see how they were doing and what they thought of the music and drama. Another smaller boy came over and he pulled his shirt up and began to rub his inflated stomach. At first I thought he was just joking with his friends, but then they began to point at him and say to the translator that he had an intestinal parasite, or stomach worm. I had never actually met a person, let alone a young boy, with such a condition. Immediately we asked if we could pray for him and he eagerly welcomed it, but afterward his head dropped and a sudden sadness seemed to come over him. Something told us there was more to his hurt than just his physical affliction. We left the young woman translator alone with him to see if she could nurture him more and hear what was really going on, but he never told. Whether it was abuse or something else we don’t know. It was incredibly difficult to walk away from a situation like that knowing that Victor, a young boy, was hurting so badly, but we believe we played our part, loving and blessing him, in the time given to us. God bless those who reach out to that community regularly, those who are a committed source of hope and love to them.

more friends...

back from Brazil.... more to share soon....