Merry Christmas & Happy New Year!!

We would like to wish all of you a Merry Christmas and Happy 2008!! We are currently enjoying our holidays with Matt's family in West Virginia. We return to Brazil on January 4 and upon return, we will share what's been happening around here! God bless all of you!

My Brazilian Namesakes

Here in Brazil I go by the name of Mateus - that's the Portuguese equivalent of Matthew. Some people here like to call me "Grande Mateus" - Big Matt! That's a nice nickname. But I'm not the only Mateus in town. I'm going to tell you about two of my namesakes - or xará as we say in Portuguese (pronounced sha-RAH). Let me introduce you to Pequeno Mateus and Médio Mateus.

This is Pequeno Mateus - Little Matthew. He is the newly adopted two-year old son of our sister in Christ, Luzia. She has been waiting 4 years in the adoption line for this moment! Finally, two weeks ago, her adoption was approved and she "gave birth" to a wonderful two-year old boy whose name happened to be Mateus. Coincidence? Providence! Mateus is a real energetic guy, smart, likes playing with construction toys, and loves to eat. Sound like anyone you know?

Little Mateus is also very affectionate. He took to us, especially to me, right away. We are so happy for Luzia, that God has been faithful to her and rewarded her patient waiting & praying for a child. Pray for her as she begins motherhood in mid-life! Pray also that this will continue to strengthen her relationship with her ex-husband, as he & Luzia have been in dialogue over recent months. The coming of Little Mateus may be one more step in God's plan to bring this couple back together!

Now I want you to meet Médio Mateus - Medium Matt. He is 13 years old. He is the son of Dídio and Valéria, whom I introduced in a previous post. Once a month we go to their house church on Sunday nights to encourage them and the others that meet with them. In January, Dídio, Mateus, and several others were involved in a serious car accident; no one was killed, but Dídio and Mateus were both severly injured. The whole incident caused Dídio, who used to be very indifferent to God and church, to rethink his life. He was baptized earlier this year. Two months ago, Mateus decided to be baptized as well! Praise God for how he has transformed this family!

Mateus has an affectionate nickname among his relatives - "Presuntinho" (Little Ham). So does that make me the "Big Cheese?" Yeah, I know, you're rolling over in laughter right now.

It's good to know that these two guys, Pequeno Mateus and Médio Mateus, are doing justice to the name Mateus/Matthew - which for you fans at home, means "Gift of God!"

House Church Retreat

Since the beginning of the year, I've had an idea to do a retreat just with the church that meets in our house - for two purposes: to encourage our members, and to provide an informal atmosphere to which they could invite their friends for evangelism. This past weekend, Dec. 1-2, we were able to have our retreat. We spent these days in the same house in Nova Petrópolis where we had the mens retreat in October. Everybody loves this house and its big, ample green space - I wish I owned this house!There were plenty of fun & uplifting activites for all.

For the guys, there was futebol, of course - that's how men bond. Judging from the quantity of sweat on my shirt, you wouldn't think that I was an in-shape marathon runner!

For the girls, it was reflection and sharing time on Sunday morning. The weather was perfect to enjoy the outdoors.

There were also some pranks, as there are on any good retreat - Renato getting chained up during naptime, and Dariu holding a broken ax for an hour while the glue dried!

Unfortunately, only two of our families (the Signorettis) could go on the retreat - the other families had situations come up that impeded their ability to go with us. The great thing is that the Signoretti clan invited two other families to come with us! They invited Cici, Renato's cousin, and his wife Leticia & son Ryan. They also invited Dariu & Mara, great friends of Renato & Branda, and their daughters Fernanda, Bruna, and Vitória. We had a great worship time on Sunday and talked openly about what following Jesus means in everyday life, and what it means to participate in a church.

L-R: (kneeling) Renato, Vitoria, Dariu, Regis, Vinicius (standing) Guilherme, Fernanda, Wagner, Bruna, Branda, Mara, Ryan, Cici, Leticia, Conceição, myself, and Waleska! We hope and pray that this retreat will spur more spiritual growth in all our lives! I have to include this shot of a butterfly we managed to capture that was fluttering around in the woods - in sunlight, it literally glows a sensational daytime brilliant blue. My camera flash jazzes it up a bit too much...I wish you could have seen this butterfly. Divine poetry in motion!

Cool Pics of Us Two

Waleska doin' some stylin' and profilin' on the hills and in the fields near Camaquã, the town where my in-laws live, 1 1/2 hours from Porto Alegre.

This was taken in Camaquã in the middle of the tobacco fields outside of town. It's a very pretty scene at day's end, as you can see here...

Another successful race! Last Sunday Waleska & I ran in a marathon relay (groups form teams of 2, 4 or 8 runners and run the marathon distance in relay format). I ran my 10k and then helped Waleska run her 5k. She is becoming a real athlete! And the best part of the race is the cool shirts we get!

"Mobile Church" - 2nd Edition

This is the Salgado family - l-r: Jennifer, Claudio, Lhoumar, Keity and Rute. They are a great testimony to God's faithfulness! They used to live in the apartment building next to Waleska & I. Claudio works as the maintenance man in this building. Their entire family lived in a tiny apartment (the size of our living room) in the building, not exactly ideal conditions to raise three daughters. Claudio & Rute were baptized and married two years ago in our church. Over the past several years they have managed to make much out of little - with Claudio's income, they were able to pay off over $6000 in debts and make a down payment on a house! Five months ago they moved their new house in Cachoeirinha, a suburb of Porto Alegre about 40 minutes away by car. Claudio continues to work as the maintenance man - he is hoping to be fired so he can receive an indenization package that will allow them to pay off the debts they have acquired in taking on this house. It is the right thing to do, since by law he is not obligated to live in the apartment building, but the residents are giving him a very hard time about it. Yet he remains faithful and patient, as does his whole family.
Last Sunday our house church did another "mobile church" experience - we had a lunch and our worship in the Salgados' home! The Terrys had been going out to Cachoeirinha every Sunday to encourage the Salgados in their worship, and while they are on furlough right now, different groups are taking turns going out to Claudio & Rute's home to be church with them. Twelve of our folks from our group went and we had a wonderful experience of praise, discussion and fellowship. Please pray for the Salgado family as they look forward to a bright future full of the promises of God, especially the fruition of a house church in their own home!

Church in the "Big Corner"

When I first moved to Porto Alegre five years ago, I hired a Christian lady named Valquiria to help cook and clean in my house, and I formed a close friendship with her and her family. Valquiria, her sister Valeria (far left in the photo), their mother, aunts, cousins, nephews, nieces, and various relatives live on the outskirts of Porto Alegre near the federal university campus. They call their neighborhood the "Cantão" (Big Corner) because of its location on a dead-end street in undeveloped wetlands property. Valquiria and Valeria attended our church for sometime, and two years ago left for various reasons. Recently, God has been working in a marvelous way through missionaries in Viamão, the suburb where they live, to reach this entire "clan" for Christ!

One of the obstacles for Valquiria and Valeria to grow in their faith was that it was often hard for them to leave their home in order to come to our services. A relative would arrive unexpectedly, or their husbands would not be able to give them a car ride, and they couldn't attend our events. Well, the missionaries in Viamão, the Diogos and the Whites, decided to overcome these obstacles. They decided to start a church meeting in Valeria's house on Sunday nights!

Valeria and Valquiria, sisters, are married to Didio and Kiko, who are brothers. For years their husbands have been resistent to coming to church - not rude, but just not interested. Didio's life changed dramatically at the beginning of this year when he and his son Mateus were involved in a serious car accident that left major physical & emotional scars - they were very fortunate not to be killed. This episode caused Didio (white shirt in center of photo below) to really examine the meaning of his life, and he began studying the Bible and was baptized. In fact, half a dozen of Valquiria & Valeria's relatives have been baptized this year thanks to the doors God has opened through the Viamão church's involvement!
Waleska & I attended the Sunday night meeting in Cantão last weekend. Twenty people were crammed into a narrow living room to share Christian life together. We were tremendously received with loving hugs, passionate singing, lots of conversation, shared prayers and laughter, and a community snack (I should mention that Valquiria & Valeria are tremendous cooks!) We hope to visit this group at least once a month to encourage them and help the Viamão missionaries in their task of maturing this young house church. Please add them to your prayers!

A Star (Athlete) Is Born!

This post is in honor of my wife, Waleska - she is now officially a runner! Last Sunday we participated in a 5.5K race in the south zone of the city, sponsored by an athletic club whose primary public is teachers in the state school system. It is a simple race - there probably weren't more than 100 participants - but well organized and fun to run, along the riverside. Waleska has been working out (running and weights) for several months now three days a week. Now it was time to put her training to the test. She ran the entire race without stopping, finishing in 37:18 - outstanding for a first race! I ran alongside her the whole way to give her a squeeze of the water bottle and moral support when she needed it. There is a fairly steep hill at the end that almost made her stop, but she kept going like a real trooper! She even got a medal and a shirt for participating, as you see here (when I ran the race two years ago, they didn't give out any participation prizes...) It is exciting to know that we have one more fun activity in common as a couple - running together, "pressing on to the goal!"