"our business is Jesus and business is good"

This has probably been the best week in Brazil so far. God has been so tangibly present in everything and in everyone. (not to mention is was my birthday! )

My beautiful team!

I came into this week rather "spiritually empty" as had basically spent the whole of last weekend on Netflix watching kids TV. I hadn't been reading the word or praying or resting in God's presence for the coming week (always try to get some really good "Jesus time" on the weekend, just to prepare for the week). So when it came to our administration day on Tuesday I had this weight of frustration on me. It was just one of the those days where everything made me angry! I shared this with the group and they just spent like 20 minutes encouraging me! By the end I just wanted to cry (but obviously didn't). I am so glad that I have a team like this, that expels the weights the devil sends with LOVE (and I'm starting to think that's how it's meant to be). Afterwards I got to go to the gym with Jared (some much needed exercise) and skype Simon henry, Youth Carrol and Kerri Todd which was awesome. 

Kerri (far right) and her team in Bolivia

If you can take this opportunity to lift up Kerri Todd in Prayer. She is my friend working with Tearfund in Bolivia with street kids and women effected by trafficking and prostitution. She is struggling a bit at the minute with sickness, frustrations on the team and frustrations in the work, so please just pray that the final 4 weeks she has there are an amazing experience with the Father. 

Wednesday we had a new school (Maia Neto) to go to in the afternoon, so we used the morning to prepare lessons for Friday in floca and then headed off to the school to do a presentation on Pais. It was a difficult setting as they had the whole school (about 150-200 students) in the library at once. But the presentation went well and had a great opportunity to get to know some more kids. We headed back to the church for the youth group and that's when the fun happened. So our team leader was speaking to the kids about "hearing the voice of the spirit" so we did an exercise to "practice it". He got half the room to face the wall with their eyes closed. Someone then puts the hand on the shoulder of the person facing the wall and the person facing the wall prayers for that person asking for a word from God. I wasn't really expecting anything thinking this was more for the kids but when I put my hand on the shoulder of a guy called Abner he said the words (in portugese) "I see a guitar..."! He went on to say some other really relevant stuff to me and then turned round opened his eyes and said "WHAT!?!" (setting the scene in that room there are 2 people that played guitar and one that lead worship, which most of the word was about, and that was me!)  It was serious crazy, like some had done a magic trick in front of me and I didn't know how they did it. Afterwards I was filled with so much Joy (just couldn't stop smiling). 

Thursday we spent a whole refreshing day in the house of the Pastor from the church (Pastor Bryan). It was a fantastic day of just resting in the word and talking about how Pais is getting on so far, as well as playing board games, video games and eating wonderful food prepared by the family. Had another opportunity to have a "Mantoring" session with the other two guys on the team, which was really needed and so refreshing just to chat and to listen! We also watched the third in the series of documentaries about Miracles which will absolutely blow your mind! 

here's the link to the first one, definitely worth a watch: 

http://fingerofgod.wpfilm.com/

Friday after being empowered by our great day of rest on Thursday, we were back into Floca early for our friday morning class. This week we were using the last part of the verb "to be" to talk about "we are" using this to teaching about loving you neighbour. I had great fun in being the man getting beaten up in the good Samaritan story. It was a fantastic morning and was recieved differently as other days have been. The funny thing was the room was rather chatty for most of the classes but as soon as Ramin started talking about God's love and how he loves them the room was completely silent. You could really feel them seeing what God had to say to them which was fantastic. During the interval in the classes Jared brought us all out of the room and said "i think we should talk about something that just came us guys can we go in here for a second", so he pushed me into another classroom were they had a surprise birthday party for me! What was really encouraging was that the students were the ones that organised it! I didn't really know how to react but it was fantastic. 

my surprise in floca 

Later on when we came back to Floca for the break time thing we do each week. This week was fantastic! I had the opportunity to give one of the guys a word from God, to talk and pray with a girl about some problems she'd been having and to talk to one of the guys who said he was a Jehovah's witness. God was so apparent there this week his presence was almost visible!

It gets better! Saturday we had planed to do a "holy spirit treasure hunt". Basically we spent the morning learning how to hear the voice of God and then we tried to hear. We told to ask for a place, the appearance of a person, a problem they are having, a name and something different that would help us recognise them. So we all went to our different places in teams and prayed for strangers all day. Got to pray with a man in a wheel chair, a Grandmother and her children, a husband and wife with boy girl twins (just like me and joy) and a man holding a sign in the street. Not trying to convert them or make them turn from their evil ways but praying for their issues and saying "God loves you". What was really cool for us was that the person that Mijjam (german girl on the team) prayed with had the same name that was on her paper and I got to pray with a guy that looked the same as that which was on mine. Was a fantastic experience just sharing God's love the way Jesus did and some of the guys had experiences even cooler than ours. 

Me and my host parents

Well I got home from that day and my host family were having a big party for my host dad so i was thinking "lets get through this party and go to bed!" Half way through the party my host brother brings me to the back of the house to get "something" then my host dad called me to the front of the house. Opened the front door and half of the church and my team were standing there shouting "SURPRISE!" Turns out my host family had organised a surprise party for me and not only that but had asked me really family to make me a video which was the best present ever! It was amazing and everyone came up to me with words of encouragement. My host mum even said a speech about me and my team leader prayed for me after! I had not expected anything to happened for me so after that I felt so ridiculously loved! Most of the night i was thinking I didn't even know any of these people 2 months ago! 

my surprise party!

It was without a doubt the best week of my stay here so far, God just blessed me so much and I can't stop praising him for that!

In terms of prayer please pray for my visa. I was supposed to hear back from the consulate in London last week about my visa for after christmas but they have not contacted me and they are very difficult to contact. I also have to renew my tourist visa this week so please pray that God will have his hands upon that and that his power would shine through even in the stupidness that is visa!