It's not too often that Jeff and I get to hear back how God used a short-term mission trip after the missionaries return to the United States.
As most of you know, we've been back in the States the last 4 weeks and we were blessed to have a cup of coffee with Lizzie and Derek, a young couple that served alongside of us and our Brazilian partners in May.
They had recently married and wanted a honeymoon of a different kind---they wanted to serve the Lord together and not just waste the time vacationing!
Lizzie forwarded me a copy of the e-mail below that she had sent out to a few of her friends upon their return and has given me permission to post it.
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Hey Ladies,
Rio was great! It was so fun to hang with Jeff and
Diane (missionary friends) and see the work they are doing down there.
Their ministry is effective and solid. They work alongside of different
Brazilian churches in training pastors and encouraging ministries. They
also apply the principles of "When Helping Hurts". We were able to see a large
portion of Rio, enjoy to the beach and experience an authentic churrascaria
(Brazilian type of restaurant- if you have a chance to go to one in the states,
Go :0) ).
One church Jeff and Diane are working alongside is
growing like crazy. They focus on making disciples that make disciples.
They have a small group and in the small group each soon have a mentoree
and a mentor. Since their start they have grown from 5 to 650 and the
Church is about 6 years old. Their goal is to have a small group in every
small area community. They recently split and planted another church body. We walked around that area Friday night.
It was recently pacified by the Brazilian army. Areas called
"communities" are mostly controlled by drug lords.
Pacification is when the government goes in and takes control of the
area, driving out the drug lords. In hopes to make the pacification less
violent the Brazilian government announces the day they will be entering the
neighborhood to take over the community in their local paper, then they bring in
tanks and troops taking control of the area.
It's helped us see that the priority of making disciples can effectively grow healthy churches. Often times here in the USA, we are too busy and make excuses,
because IT IS time consuming. I think it's the devils safest community to
himself, those that are too busy. It's also hard to submit. You have to
have a kind of submissiveness to reach out to be discipled or let be discipled.
Accountability and submissiveness can be hard for us to handle, because
our culture screams, "you can do it your way", "whatever seems
right to you", "you control your own", "you can do it by
yourself" when we weren't meant for that.
The devil manifests himself in main ways. In Brazil
there is a lot of demonic activity and devil worship. There are
spiritists, many spiritists. Those that worship ancestral spirits
"demons" and the earth. In Brazil the dark and the light is
very contrasted. The dark and light isn't as contrasted in the United States.
We make other things our objects of worship that don't seem to be evil or
indeed weren't meant to be idols, yet blessings.
This church is a self-funded, growing, and evangelizing church.
One of the healthiest examples of a Church that I have ever seen.
It was truly a blessing. And a super great honeymoon.
:0)
Love you guys.
Elizabeth (E-liz-a-bet-chee) in Portuguese.
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We celebrate Lizzie and Derek's creativeness to use their honeymoon in this way. We applaud and support these types of mission trips!
If you have that desire in your heart to serve with us in Rio or Sao Paulo, Brazil for 10 days, 2 weeks, 1 month or more, please don't hesitate to contact us at jeff.droogsma@efca.org! The harvest is plentiful and the workers are few!
We believe that it's a great way to put your faith into action and it is God that places a desire to serve Him on your heart! Say, "Yes" to God!!!
Blessed to be serving,
Diane and Jeff
