Getting Ready to Go

A New Chapter For My Blog :) 

Thus begins a new chapter for my blog. Same country, same person going, different role and time frame. Same passion to share God's love and hope with others, and to work with children at risk.

I am almost ready to go back to Brazil, I need a visa yet. Please pray with me that it will come through soon!

Recife, Brazil

 Thanks for reading my blog!

Back in the US

Hello all! I've been back in the US for just over a week ago, which many of you may very well know that because you've seen me in the past week. :)

I do not have pictures to share of graduation, but we had a nice ceremony with testimonies, worship, laughs, and handing out of certificate of graduation from DTS. Then we celebrated with food, fun, and dancing....Latin Americans love to dance! :)

Just another short story of an impactful experience from Brazil. The day before I left Brazil I accompanied one of the guys who is a part of the street ministry team to go into Recife and do some house visits. This was the first time that I went along for a house visit, and it was quite an experience to go into one of the slums, walk through the side streets that are only wide enough to walk on, and arrive at one of the last houses which was built on the edge of the river. It was a very poor looking home by far, and was filled with the smell of smoke. We visited the adults and two children living in that very small shack-like home. It was heart-breaking to see the circumstances that they are living in. We also visited some other families, and also went to see an area of slums that had accidently burned down recently and left a hundred families without their homes. YWAM works with building relationships with the kids on the streets, the kids' families, and many more people who they meet as they are in the slums doing house visits.

Please continue to pray as I seek direction from God for the future.

Back in Brazil

Hello all! Late Tuesday night our team arrived back in Brazil. Now we are doing some wrap up and preparing for graduation on Saturday. I just give a quick overview of our time on outreach in New Zealand and Samoa, and hopefully can share more in person when I get back to the States.

NEW ZEALAND

In New Zealand we worked alongside Life Church.

 We also went to a few schools. In the elementary school we did some presentations and dances.

We also helped out with their "fun Friday"




We helped out at Life church's building, which is not ready yet to hold services, they currently rent a high school auditorium for their services.

Organizing at the church warehouse

Gabi and I stayed with three different host families during our time in New Zealand. Each experience was very different and we enjoyed getting to know different people and ministering to them too. We were also so blessed by them!


Two afternoons we went to an elderly couple's house to help out with some sanding, painting, and cleaning. I also was able to spend some time chatting and listening to the lady share about different experiences and her family. It was a good time.
(The guy in this picture is a guy from the church who worked alot with our team)

We went to some other churches as well to do some presentations and share testimonies.

Sui and me, one of the girls from Life Church. We had fun getting to know people from the church! :)

SAMOA

In Samoa we spent alot of time with Mati's (our Recife YWAM base leader) family. We stayed at one sister's family's house, and spent time at two other sister's families' houses. We had a good time getting to know his family, and ministering to them.

Beautiful Samoa
 
 
Spending time with our host family
 

We went to a preschool for three days. It was a drastically different experience that working in preschool in the States. It was a neat experience too and we enjoyed spending time with the children!
 

Tupe and me
Tupe is mostly blind. Her mom and her shared a bit of her testimony with us, which I can share sometime, just not in this post. Please pray for healing for her


learning how to make Samoan food (this picture gives a good idea of a typical Samoan kitchen)
 

Tala, one of Mati's nephews who spent alot of time with our team. Our team spent some time at his family's house too and the guys dug a hole for the septic tank for the bathroom. Currently they live in a wall-less house, with an open kitchen, open shower, and enclosed bathroom. One of our goals was to work on the construction of an enclosed shower and bathroom. Eventually hopefully they will be able to build some enclosed bedrooms too. (In this picture he is grating coconut for some typical Samoan food)


We enjoying a meal at Tala's family's house...Samoan style.


This is a picture of the other house where we helped out a little with construction. They hired some builders to do most of the construction and we basically just helped carry rocks for the foundation of the two bedrooms that they are building behind this open house.


 

One night we took two of the teenage girls from our host family to McDonalds to get out of the house, enjoy some ice cream, and have some discipleship time.

Another glimpse of beautiful Samoa. We took a vacation day to spend some time at the beach and see some of the gorgeous scenery of Samoa.


Thank you for all your prayers, and support!

Samoa

 Beautiful Samoa. This gorgeous waterfront is just a few minutes walk away from the site where we´ll be doing construction.

 

 

Some of the family we are staying with here

 

Some crazy foreigner....lol, with another Family member

 

yeay tropical fruit!

 

Beautiful scenery!

 

 hanging out with kids

More Outreach

Hello everyone! Our time in New Zealand is coming coming to an end for now, and our time in Samoa is coming up....Monday! Again, we´ve faced several challenges in getting tickets etc but we are thankful to the Lord for his faithfulness, and excited to go to Samoa and see what he is going to do there too! The last three weeks have been fantastic. Here are just a few pics.

 

I didnt know that the sun was shining on Rodrigo like this until Gabi and I were looking at the pics on the computer, very cool!

Sharing at a youth service

 

Host families

New Zealand!!!

Where to start? Our time so far here in New Zealand has been so so good. We have been staying with people from Life Church, and have been working alongside the church in different ministries that they are involved in. Just to give a glimpse of what we´ve been doing...we have visited some families, helped out with some repairs and cleaning at an elderly couples house, helped give out bread, did some clean up and organizing at the church, joined the team that goes into Auckland Friday nights for street evangelism, visited a family that cares for children that are in foster care, visited a high school, did some presentations and sharing testimonies in churches, and went to an elementary school to do some presentations and spend time with the children. It has been so good to get to know the people here in New Zealand, they are so friendly and its been a joy to build relationships.

Joining in woodworking class at the high school

                                        Spending time with the children at the elementary school.

Presentations in the elementary school

part of the street witnessing team

Taking a moment to capture a site in Auckland

Please keep praying for us! :)

Outreach!

Today is the day we board the first of several planes and start out trek around the world to arrive in New Zealand. The journey to get to this point has been a challenging one for our team, for some it was financial challenges, for others it was different challenges. I trust that God is directing our steps though, and I anticipate seeing God move in great ways in our two outreach locations.

Please be praying for our travels and time on outreach. :)