Two weekends away

Easter

We’re sitting at the table out the front of my Brazilian family’s holiday home. It’s a hot Easter Saturday and we’re in the middle of a typically rowdy board game that’s pretty similar to charades. It started off with just the immediate family, my friend Georgia and Clara’s friends who have come away with us, but with every round more and more Brazilian cousins keep emerging from the nearby houses to join in, making it louder and rowdier and funnier by the minute!

In Gravatá

We are in a city called Gravatá, a couple of hours inland of Recife. As it’s a bit higher up the temperature drops a tiny bit - I’m not in any way convinced it’s “cold” as people keeps claiming – but everyone’s enjoying the annual chance to whip out a cardigan! Earlier on we were walking around the market in the centre of town, stopping for a coconut and an ice lolly and trying to remember all the names to the thousands of strange looking fruits. In the meat section we bought lots of goat for lunch (a Gravatá speciality!) and stared at the rather gruesome animal parts lying around. My Brazilian Dad’s cousin had brought her 91-year-old father-in-law, who told us proudly how he had been married for 63 years when his wife died, and is now being pursued by many widows!

Georgia and I in the meat market

It’s Easter day and we’re all dressed up heading out for church. I’m excited at the chance to see a different church, to come back to the real meaning of Easter, to worship with my Brazilian family. However as we finally find the Anglican church, we discover it has no service this evening, nor the Presbyterian church, nor the Baptist one. Why is everywhere shut on Easter day of all days? “It’s because everyone goes away for Easter” I’m told, and yet from the look of the main square at night, the whole world seems to have come to Gravatá for the weekend. Eventually we give up and troop into a café, looking very overdressed. I’m frustrated and disappointed but we have a nice evening and, after all, whether we go to church or not today isn’t going to stop us celebrating Jesus’ death or resurrection or change for one moment the incredible price that he has paid to give us life.

With Emily in Barra de Jangada

A Viagem Missionária – The Mission Trip 
(will try and get hold of some of the photos to share with you soon).

It’s 8:30pm and we’re gathered around a minibus trying to fit in lots of mattresses and fans and bags. We are about to head to a town an hour or so away called Camela, and as we set off, I’m feeling both excited and apprehensive about the task ahead of us. We are going to work with a small Baptist Church to share The Gospel, putting on activities for children and teenagers, health talks for adults, drama, dance and lots of other things. We are a group of people from the seminary where I have my theology classes, some young people from my church and people from a church in the next city down from Recife and it’s exciting to be part of a team made up of all different ages, denominations, and backgrounds.

Saturday morning and I’m standing in the town’s Sport’s Court talking to some 12 year old girls. We are sleeping on the floor of a school here (that incidentally has no water at the moment) and last night none of us slept more than a couple of hours. However now the day is underway the tiredness is put to one side and we’re about to start a kids’ event with lots of different games. I head out briefly with Diego and Mariana (friends from church) some of the children to pick up more of their friends in the community where they live. We are winding round little alleyways and cobbled streets and I stop briefly to invite a little boy and his Dad to our events. As the conversation finishes I say “It’s going to be great” and take a step backwards, only to discover that there is a hole in the road behind me. Before I know it I am stuck in said hole up to my waste and Diego has to pick me out of it! In my extreme embarrassment/relief/imagination of how funny it must have looked I can’t stop laughing and gradually the others start to laugh too! Diego reaches down the hole to rescue my flip-flops and we all agree how good it is that it was just a hole with rubbish in and not a drain/open sewer. With a slightly bruised ego and a very red face I walk on, feeling somewhat like Miranda!

My team at the kids’ event is the Pink Team and we have pink sashes tied round our wastes. Team spirit is at a high after winning the first two games and we chant “ROSA ROSA ROSA” (pink in Portuguese) and then I teach them “PINK” which, as with most English words in a Brazilian accent, gains an “eee” sound at the end (Faceybook, footyball etc!). We walk around chanting “PINKY PINKY PINKY”. When we lose our first game the team spirit drops hugely, turns out team Pink needs to work a bit on dealing with losing, but we have a fun morning with some great conversations, followed by some hip hop dancing, a short talk and the presenting of trophies (sadly not going to Team Pink but never mind!)

Saturday night and we are in the main square of Camela listening to my friend Paulo explain the Gospel and then part of our team performs some dances and sketches. The square is packed, I am standing with some of the children we met today, behind me a group of men are smoking weed, and teenagers mingle around us looking for something to do on a Saturday night. The dramas are about freedom, life, salvation, hope and as I watch and listen to the music my eyes fill with tears. There is a sudden rush as the police arrive on one side of the square and raid a bar, arresting several people. People run to watch what’s going on but the spell is not broken, as the sketches come to an end I chat to the children and one of them says that she cried too, as she saw the actor playing Jesus take our place on the cross. It is late and as the crowds go home I sit and chat with friends about our day, about life, about the future. A few hours ago and I felt broken by tiredness; I was in our prayer room back at the school asking God to somehow keep me going through the evening and to give me something more to give when I felt empty. Now the tiredness seems to have gone completely, I feel full of energy, I feel grateful, I feel alive.

Sunday morning and after another night of little sleep we’re having breakfast. I’m working my way through my plate of cous-cous and sausage with a big cup of coffee when one of the leaders approaches me and asks if I can ‘direct this morning’s church service’. I’ve never directed a church service in my life, I don’t even really know what it means, let alone in Portuguese (!), but before I know it I’ve said yes and I’m handed a list of the different parts of the service and told to introduce each one. Outside the church I’m being teased by all my friends as one of them retells stories I’ve told him, everyone’s laughing and it stops me feeling nervous. I stutter my way through the service and soon we are heading out to visit houses in the community.

The community is built on a steep hillside and Hoton and I are climbing the narrow steps stopping to chat to people on the way. The houses are packed in on each side and each house brings different life stories, a Father’s desperation for his teenage son, the grandmother who’s just been stung by a scorpion, the woman who has drifted from church to church and eventually given up. We chat, we listen, we share a few Bible verses, we pray, we talk about our own lives. I couldn’t imagine how I would have words to say, talking to people I had never met before with a guy I had only met this morning, but it’s amazing how God gives you things to say. So many people are hurting, unheard, despairing and  it feels such a privilege to be able to share just a few words of an amazing message of hope.  Hoton and I come back to the school moved by what’s been a really special morning and back at base we all come together to share what God’s been teaching us. With each story, we see how we have all been touched by each life we came across this morning, by each tale of pain, by each moment of laughter and in my case by the way in which people were prepared to listen and welcome even a strange English girl with broken Portuguese and a slightly sunburnt face! 

It's been an amazing weekend and one from which I've learnt a huge amount, met some incredible people and seen once again how God is so faithful in giving what we need to keep going, even when exhausted, shy, out of our comfort zone and even down a hole in the middle of the road!

With Rai :)

Reunited with one of the puppies -
Look how big they are now!

More than conquerors

This week I went to see the film Noah with the youth group from church. Despite the film having very little in common with the Bible story we had a good time with the teenagers, who enjoyed some time chilling in the shopping centre as well before we went in to the cinema. I also saw Noah again on Monday evening with my Old Testament theology class, which was fun although led to lots of my classmates exasperatedly declaring that the director has clearly "slipped on the mayonnaise" (got very carried away - my favourite Portuguese idiom to date!)

Some of the teenagers at the cinema!

This week I also had a tapioca making lesson at my friend Dulce's house (one of the other volunteers at the project in Barra). Tapioca is this amazing kind of pancakey, bready, pastyish food, made out of a grated root vegetable - I'm mildly addicted. I'd like to claim those below as my own but sadly they are very definitely thanks to google, however by the end of my lesson my tapiocas were getting a bit less holey and ragged-looking! 

Halfway through tapioca eating, an adorable pair of twins turned up. I had met Davi and Vitória (who will be one in May) once before and so was very very happy to see them again and get to play with them!

On Thursday we went to visit Maria, a lady who came out of hospital last week. It was great to see her looking so much stronger and finally back with her two small children at home. It was also particularly exciting to hear that she'd been loving reading the Bible we'd left with her in hospital and had even decided to go to a church that Sunday. She is still pretty ill but she seemed so much more herself and it was really encouraging. 

I had a quite challenging lesson at the project in Barra on Monday due to one of the children's very disruptive behaviour. However definitely a good way of learning patience and despite this it was great to be there as always. 

I went for a long walk on the beach this morning to think some things over and this combined with the run up to Easter, the book I've been reading and just life in general made me want to write these next few thoughts down. 

The best thing in my life without a question is my relationship with God. However that doesn’t mean that life as a Christian is all smiles and easy and problem free, it doesn’t mean that tragedy, illness and pain will not be a part of our journey. In fact The Bible describes the Christian life as “a fight”, a “race” in which we “wrestle” and struggle and are  called to deny ourselves and take up our cross daily and follow Jesus (Eph 6:12, 2 Tim 4:7, Luke 9:23). I see that battle each day, in my own struggles with sin, in the health and money and relationship problems of the Christians around me, in the teenager teased because of his faith, the wife striving to save her marriage, the grieving father. However The Bible does not only tell us that this struggle is to be expected, but that it is already won. We do not have to despair, because as Christians we can have confidence in a certain victory; “weeping may last through the night, but joy comes with the morning” (Psalm 30:5). There’s an analogy that I love by a guy called Oscar Cullmann who likens the Christian life to the end of the Second World War, after D-day, when the decisive battles had been fought, Hitler’s defeat was inevitable and yet the battle was not over for another eleven months. The war was essentially won and yet the fighting went on. If we believe in Jesus’ sacrifice on the cross then this is the position that we stand in as Christians. On the cross Jesus made a way for us to have freedom, forgiveness, peace and eternal life and if we trust in his death and resurrection then we can be sure that we can have these things. Yet the struggles here on earth are not quite over; for now we are still sinners, we still have those moments when we mess up, when our heart and our head seem to be longing for opposite things and when we are tired of pressing on. But how incredible to know that we are “more than conquerors” through Jesus and to see just how worth persevering it is. How amazing would it be to one day be able to say like Paul?

“I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith.” 

Maybe you’re reading this and thinking ‘what an absolute load of rubbish, I wish she’d stop waffling on and just put some cute photos of children up!’ If that’s the case, then I beg you this Easter to think about what it really means, to take a few minutes to read about that man who died on a cross 2000 years ago and changed the course of history. To read the story of his life, (http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=John+1) to understand what it’s all about, as I should have taken the time to do many years before I finally did.

Or maybe you’re reading this and you believe and trust in Jesus but you’re feeling worn down by the battle that the Christian life can be. Be encouraged that the victory is certain, that God is with you every step of the way and that Jesus walked where you are walking; he was tempted, he wept, he felt joy and sadness and excitement and pain. Keep going and remember this Easter how many reasons we have to praise God!

I hope this finds you well and that those of you at home for holidays are getting some chance to rest, sending lots of love xxx

Oceans

I'm sitting on the balcony looking out at the huge expanse of ocean in front of me. Some kind of tanker is moving sleepily in the distance and wave after wave rolls onto the sand below. The view is so peaceful and yet as each wave breaks, I see the huge power held in that water; the strength that is so far from human control.

"He said to them, "Why are you afraid, you men of little faith?" Then He got up and rebuked the winds and the sea, and it became perfectly calm. The men were amazed, and said, "What kind of a man is this, that even the winds and the sea obey Him?" Matthew 8:26-27

What kind of man can stop a storm in its tracks? Can walk on top of these powerful waves? Can create this huge expanse of ocean? 

Living by this sea it's so easy to be carried along by daily life and forget to stop and be amazed at it's beauty and power. It's so easy to forget the creator behind it, to walk on and under this amazing blue sky and not see that it "proclaims the work of his hands". And isn't it the same in the rest of our lives? We talk about coincidences, about how things worked out, about our day and we so often are so blind to God's hand behind it all. 

When I was on holiday with my parents a few weeks ago we got to see just a little glimpse of how much the ocean holds; the sharks, the millions of fish of every colour, the amazing plants, the hidden depths. It got me thinking about just how incredible this creation is and about how amazing it is that the same God, who has such power and made such beauty, sent his son so that our sins could be "cast into the depths of the sea" (Micah 7:19). Who are we beside the God who made this ocean? Beside his son who calmed these seas? And yet this same God gave his very self so that we could be forgiven.

It's Thursday afternoon and Dulce and I are sitting on her sofa surrounded by a mountain of nappies, trying to sort them vaguely into sizes. We have just come from a morning at the project where I was teaching an English lesson on Weather and Dulce was making a huge chocolate cake for tomorrow's Festa dos aniversariantes (Party for this term's birthdays). Her phone rings and it is Pastor Roberto... "No" says Dulce "please tell me this is one of your little jokes, Pastor"... It emerges that half of the cake has decided to take a flying jump of his kitchen table onto the floor and he arrived home to find his two daughters cross-legged on the kitchen floor tucking in, worried that the fallen part might be wasted! I'm struggling to keep a straight face as Dulce tries to work out how this could possibly have happened,... the perils of large amounts of caramel sauce between the two layers seems to have caused a minor landslide!

A new cot

Soon, with Dulce still lamenting the cake drama, we head out carrying a cot, many nappies, a New Testament and a cuddly toy monkey. We are heading to visit one of the children's families, we've heard there's a baby there but when we arrive child after child seems to appear. There are at least 3 one year olds and a toddler with a mass of blond curly hair. We hand over the cot into which the three babies are soon put, to their delight. The grandmother invites us in to meet Marcelinho. His is 7 but is the size of a 1 year old, lying on a grubby mattress on the floor wearing just a nappy. I stroke his face and he grabs my hand, waves it around, looks up at my face. Marcelinho has Cerebral Palsy, a sister explains. 

 Later that evening I'm sitting on the sofa back at home telling my Brazilian Mum about my day, I can't get the picture of little Marcelinho out my mind. Where are social services? I remember the library of toys for disabled children in my hometown, the flashing colours, the sounds, the things to hold, to learn. There aren't always answers to all my questions but I know that God hears and that he loves Marcelinho and there will be something that we can do, even if for now it is just holding his hand and handing over the cuddly toy dog that my Brazilian Mum has produced. 

Rai and Emily holding nappies for Rai's sister who's soon to be born 

As I arrive on Friday morning there is an excited buzz about the project as everyone gears up for today's party. Balloons are popping all over the place and I head over to survey the hastily repaired cake... almost as good as new! I get my camera out and there is a mad rush of children wanting to take photos and be in them. It's amazing how many headless photos I now have on my camera! 

Dulce and some of the children

Dulce and the cake (pre-landslide!)

It's Sunday afternoon and me, Diana, Erika and Áldria have just arrived at the metro station. We're heading to Camila's house and then going on to church and the girls are getting excited about the escalator up ahead! I was hoping more girls would be coming this afternoon but God knows what He's doing and we have a really lovely afternoon chatting, watching the film and eating lots of popcorn and brigadeiro (condensed milk cooked with chocolate!) I love moments like these, seeing my friends Camila and Élida laughing with the teenagers, talking to them about school, clothes, life. 

Monday morning and the roads are chaos. I'm already running late and the traffic is at complete standstill. When a minibus finally makes it to the stop it is completely full to bursting. I jump on but I'm standing on the bottom step and every time he tries to shut the doors I feel a bit like Flat Stanley. The driver decides to take a different route and avoid the traffic jam, a good idea I think, but the 'other route,' which incidentally misses out about half the people on the bus' stops, is on unpaved roads and is bumpy to say the least. I don't really have a clue where we are but eventually I arrive in Barra de Jangada, very late but on time to catch the end of a ballet lesson. It later turns out that I actually had a pretty good journey compared with most people trying to get anywhere. It was 50 years since Brazil's Military Coup and consequent protests brought Recife to a standstill. In the ballet lesson 6 girls who have been chosen to dance in the project's Easter show are learning their steps. They don't know their rights and lefts which is complicating things but little by little they're getting there and 10 year old Karina, who is new in the project, is over the moon to be dancing! I head off to eat cous cous with the other children before running an art activity making flowers out of plastic cups. At the end of the morning I read the story of The Women at the Well. The children are noisy and full of "he insulted my mums" and "she hit mes" but I'm encouraged that at least some of them manage to answer my questions at the end and recognise that this man is the "Rei prometido", the Promised King who gives living water welling up to eternal life (John 4). 

It's a new week; learning at my theology classes, laughing with friends, planning classes, chatting with my Brazilian family, buying bread at the bakery across the road, skyping home, reading God's word, a day off to sleep, to read, to pray, to watch Call the Midwife. Life here is flying by so quickly, I want to press pause and just sit here on the balcony and look at the sea and take more time to thank God for all the things he keeps on providing.

Sending lots of love to all of you,