We know that God has great plans for this week. We saw another - mmmm, I would say 15 decisions to follow Christ made today. It's dificult to keep track. We only understand in part what is being said. We have to totally rely on our interpreters. I understand some since I studied Portuguese so much this last year, but there is still a whole lot I don't understand - especially when they speak quickly.
but that is one of the things that has taken us out of our comfort zone. We present the gospel in a very short amount of time and when we say, "do you want to ask Christ into your life today?" they say, "sim" (yes). It seems too easy. We have to remember that God is the one that is in the business of bringing salvation and that Jesus said to come to Him as a little child.
Other ways we are out of our comfort zone.
Last night's desserts for instance.
The food is good, but the spices are so different. Our stomachs are wondering what happened.
Today in one of the homes we were visiting with the mom and two of the children came into the room. They both were covered with chicken pox sores and scabs. At least I am hoping that's what it was.
Then, the very next house when we asked the mom how we could pray for her - she was already a Christian - she said her son was sick and wanted us to pray for him. Then she took us to his room as she told us he had the flu! Oh my! But then she said she thought it was just an allergic reaction to the mosquito spray.
Which leads to a big out of the comfort zone area. There are many, many mosquitos. They were having a convention at the bottom of several of the stairwells. So we spary with "Off" before we go out, but we still fight them off. But Charlie's group - in one of the stairwells - didn't notice the mosquitos because they were running from a rat!
The guy on the back of the motorcycle who was speaking loudly and waving his hands around took us a little out of our comfort zone since he had a pistol in each hand.
The streets are lined with cars like this.
But even though we are uncomfortable, we know God is using us to help reach the people of this community. They are over 130,000 in this 1/2 square mile. The Brazilians are very friendly and almost all who are home will invite us in. They are willing to listen because we are Americans and have traveled so far to talk to them. They listen very politely to us as we share the Gospel. Most say "yes", a few say "no" or "later". We know it is up to God and the local church to follow up and disciple them.
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