I first fell in love with the rain while living in Brazil. I moved to Brazil near the end of their winter, which is also their dry season. After about a month of fair weather (and chilly nights!) the rain started to show up (along with the heat.) At first it was only a few downpours a week, but it quickly turned into a daily ritual that could safely be predicted sans crystal ball.
I never had been a big fan of rain before then, but for some reason the morning showers in Brazil comforted me. I sometimes felt very lonely while I was there, despite the fact that I was almost constantly surrounded by people. The loneliness I felt was the lack of true family.
Our family has always been quite close. We’re a very loving family; one that isn’t afraid to show that love to the whole world. And it was this intimacy that I was lacking. I missed my brother and my two sisters, but mostly I missed my mom and dad. I missed being able to hug them whenever I wanted to. I missed telling them “I love you.” I missed their smiling faces and caring hearts. I had a lot of growing to do while I was in Brazil, but I never expected that to be part of it.
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June 18th, 2006 · Permalink · Back to Top · Comments (0) · Tagged: Articles, Brazil, Missions
I love receiving mail. Letters are one of the few means of communication that carry emotion, as if the person were actually standing right there. I don’t think it’s so much the fact that they wrote to you, but that the writing is with their own hand. A typed letter, for instance, just doesn’t carry the same emotional bond that a hand-written letter does. I received a hand-written letter in the post yesterday from a good friend. It is a postcard with a picture of her favorite beach in Puerto Rico, and a simple message about how her life is going.
Ashley and I have been friends for over three years, but we’ve never met. Our friendship started when Pastor Lester introduced us (via E-Mail, of course.) We were both planning on returning to Brazil to help at Domata School of Missions Brazil. However, I didn’t feel that I was supposed to go back to Brazil, and neither did Ashley. Yet, ever since then we have kept communicating with each other, despite the fact we would never work together in Brazil.
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February 3rd, 2006 · Permalink · Back to Top · Comments (0) · Tagged: Articles, Brazil
I decided to write this article because I knew absolutely nothing about the subject when I first spent considerable time abroad. So, in order to help keep other missionaries from being clueless on their maiden venture into the unknown, here is what I have learned so far about living in foreign countries.
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December 29th, 2005 · Permalink · Back to Top · Comments (0) · Tagged: Brazil, Missions
Part One
I remember it all like it was yesterday, although it happened over three years ago. I was in Brazil as a missionary, and this particular night I was staying with my pastor at his house outside of the city. At the time, Pastor Lester held a Bible School in a vacant building on his grounds. Although I’d only been in Brazil for a couple of months, I had already developed close bonds with the students. Class went unusually long that night, and, as it was very late, I didn’t want to go back to the city to my apartment downtown.
I stayed in their guest room on the south-eastern corner of the house that evening. I had slept in that room before; many times, actually. I practically considered the room my own. The setting was very familiar to me—the cracks in the stucco walls, the smell of the cedar closet, even the solitary light fixture that didn’t quite cover the hole in the ceiling—it was all so common, as if I’d lived there all my life. I had my usual routine: I opened the doors to the private porch to let the cool evening breeze blow in, I turned back the skimp covers (which wasn’t a problem, as all covers are skimp in Brazil; the only time you need real covers is during the winter month of July, when the entire nation takes a month off and goes on vacation to Miami Beach), and I climbed into bed to read before drifting off to sleep. For such an ordinary evening, it’s quite surprising that I remember it so vividly. But it was the dream I had that night that would set this evening apart from the others.
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December 22nd, 2005 · Permalink · Back to Top · Comments (0) · Tagged: Articles, Brazil
During the Spring I didn’t focus on the trip to Thailand; the finances, the extensive planning, the supplies I would need for the trip … none of it. It was almost like I wasn’t even the one planning the trip at all. Even now, with the date of the trip less than two months away, I am not concerned in the least. The only description I can give is like that of a soldier who has been dispatched:
1 Corinthians 9:7 (NLT)
7 What soldier has to pay his own expenses? And have you ever heard of a farmer who harvests his crop and doesn’t have the right to eat some of it? What shepherd takes care of a flock of sheep and isn’t allowed to drink some of the milk?
That’s sort of how I feel. It’s almost like this is God’s baby and He’s the one handling it. I’m just the one who’s going. And because I forgot about the trip in October, I was able to focus on the necessaries of leaving. I had a lot of work to finish at my job and at the church. I was glad to have enough time to focus on that so that I could tie up all my loose ends before leaving.
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August 18th, 2005 · Permalink · Back to Top · Comments (0) · Tagged: Brazil, Missions, Thailand
Burn this feed.
