November 22, 2006
Dear Friends,
Marta encourages missionaries from Brazil during a meeting in
Germany in November 2006.
Two weeks ago Marta and I were sitting in a dining hall in Frankfurt,
Germany, with some 60 Brazilian missionaries. Most of them have
ministries in Europe, and a few serve in the United States, Japan,
Nepal, India, and Lebanon. It was the third annual consultation
of the “Brazilian diaspora,” and we were invited there
to encourage them: Marta on their frustrations and challenges,
Tim on biblical and theological foundations for bearing fruit
in ministry. We received much more than we gave. First, we had
had some previous contact with about a third of them through our
courses, books, and ministry in Brazil over the last 29 years.
And second, we heard their stories of daring ministries, personal
struggles, “failures” and “successes,”
and God’s remarkable grace.
Silvio and his wife work among the thousands of 11- to 17-year-old
girls caught up in prostitution in Nepal. They have established
two houses, with 40 girls in each, where they share good news
of God’s grace and justice, and salvation in Jesus Christ.
Silvio and his wife have personally adopted 40 of these girls,
and many previously troubled faces have been transformed with
joy. His ministry is entirely funded by churches in Brazil, one
of which has a mission training school with 300 students where
Tim taught last April.
Marta with her cousin Gerson, who serves the church in Scotland
by teaching, playing, and singing contemporary Christian music.
Another Brazilian, Gerson, who happens to be Marta’s cousin,
has developed a ministry of contemporary Christian music in Scotland
that aims at church renewal and discipleship among Scotland’s
youth. He and a number of like-minded Brazilian missionaries to
Scotland have been well received by the churches that centuries
ago birthed the church in America, which in turn initiated the
church in Brazil a century and a half ago.
From Frankfurt, we went on to Granada, Spain, last week, to attend
the Third Iberian-American Mission Conference, which is held every
10 years. Over 2,000 missionaries and mission leaders gathered
there to talk about the role and challenges of Latin American,
Spanish, and Portuguese missionaries. Again, we were moved when
we met many former students and colleagues from Brazil who are
engaged in ministry all around the world.
All of that is to say we have much to be thankful for. Even as
our own denomination struggles to be faithful to her call in world
mission, the fruit of that work among other peoples of the world
is multiplying, as our partner churches increasingly respond to
their role in global witness. Thank you for supporting us in this
work, and season’s greetings.
Warmly,
Tim and Marta
Besides the information on our
home page on the Mission Connections site, there is even more
information now at our personal home
page in English and our
personal home page in Portuguese.
The 2006 Mission Yearbook for Prayer & Study, p.
45
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