Click on a picture for an enlargement.
Click on the caption under the picture only if you
get an error message when clicking on the picture.
For best results, get Internet Explorer version 6.

Right-click on the enlargement to save it to disk.
If a picture does not display after the browser's
activity has stopped, click Refresh to try again.

Campos - Pastor Size: 88k	Campos Blessing Size: 111k	Incredible Prayer Size: 75k	Ipanema Beach Size: 73k
Rodrigo Testimony Size: 62k	Segunda Igreja Batista de Campos Size: 94k	Sheraton - Our Home Size: 105k

THE REAL POWER SOURCE

After another short night, your ministers of music, wives and travel staff rose for breakfast and the appointed departure time to Campos at 9:30. If you have ever taken an extended guided bus tour, you know that you become quite attached to the tour guides. They can make your trip boorish or fun. On this trip we had two different guides. It has been the journalist’s pleasure to travel on Bus B with our guide, Licia Andrade. Along the way, we have had information, laughs, camaraderie, and just outright fun! For example, as I am typing this section of today’s journal, the aisle way of the bus is a beehive of activity with Brazilian Reals (R$) changing hands for a rainbow selection of zippered purses made from 6 meter zippers. They are selling for R$10,00 each or 3 for R$35,00. With the current exchange rate in the vicinity of 2.65 to 2.75, that makes each one about $3.80 or 3 for $9.25. (FYI, sales tax is already included in the prices that we pay, not calculated as an additional amount.) The entire purse, available to us from the shoulders of now three different street vendors who are suddenly traveling along with us, unzips in a descending circular pattern that is hard to describe unless you see it action; the purse unzips to absolutely nothing! She has recognized that her “children” in the bus, as she calls us affectionately, like to have fun!

Licia is a single mom, having one son, Gabriel, who is 12 years old who enjoys tennis more than the number one Brazilian sport of soccer. In her early life she attended an American school that was for the children of the English speaking government officials. At the age of 12, the capital of Brazil moved from Rio to Brasilia and the school she was attending went bankrupt. After finishing in public school, she went to a state supported college to study chemical engineering. Concurrent with her upper level studies, she started as a tour guide at the age of 18. Progressing rapidly in this vocation, she was invited to chauffer groups to the Middle East and Europe. In this responsibility, she traveled four non-stop years. When her son was 7˝ years old when she quit the business due to its heavy demands on her time and went to U.S. She lived for two years in the Orlando, Florida area from December 1999 until December 2001, having returned after the 9/11 tragedy. Her employment utilized her engaging personality as a problem solver in the relationships her American credit card company had with Brazilian Banks. Although successful in time there, she grew homesick for the culture of her homeland and returned to Rio to work as a freelance tour guide. Her knowledge of facts and figures is quite vast with quick recall, but as she says, “Don’t ask me about trees, flowers, birds and insects!” Upon her return to Brazil, she was asked to work as an assistant to the director in the United Nations Habitat office, talking with mayors and ministers from around the country. But after 9 months, she grew to miss her former travel experiences, and so she returned to the trade of her you; to summarize her feelings, “she would rather be anonymous and making people feel good about their time in her country. This is her service to God.” // Please accept my apologies that Marcia Dias, our other tour guide, for not featuring her—but as journalist, I only got to know Licia!

We turned northeast after crossing the bay bridge to head toward our destination. We traveled through the outskirts of Niteroi into the open fields of the bay area. The trip took us through rolling hills via a mostly two lane highway cut through pure red clay. It seems that the topsoil is only about 8 inches thick to support either grasslands or the cane fields as we drew closer to Campos. The southern stretch of highway that leads into the city is lined with the very poorest of dwellings. The buildings are made of red clay bricks, sometimes plastered over. Hovels under brick shingled roofing are sometimes behind fences that are sometimes ramshackle pickets or sugar cane stalks. Sadly, the remnant towers of a modern water park rise to our left just up the road from multiple city dumps where people pick through the garbage bare handed. The buildings are right up to the edge of the road allowing rain that falls to most surely flow into their pitiful sheds. The children that we pass are playing in the margin of the road. To effect slower speeds, road humps over a 2 mile stretch of highway slow the traffic to a much more reasonable speed due to the mindless drivers that insist on speeding, passing on curves and driving in the middle of the road. Kind’a like IH35 in Carrollton-Farmers Branch on a rush hour morning! Perhaps we could take instruction from these Brazilians that where signs don’t work, impediments to travel might.

The trip to Campos, whose name is translated as “fields” and was originally almost exclusively a sugar cane plantation area, was a long one. (In an aside, alcohol derived from this sugar cane is now a nationally available alternate fuel source. Different automobile carburetion systems are available for the different fuel sources.) As we approach the beginnings of the city whose buildings rise abruptly out of the cane fields, we pass a representation of an oil field pump with a sign that proclaims:

“CAMPOS – CAPITAL DO PETROLEO

We proceed along a palm lined main road with a modern fitness center on the right and a new multistory building on our left. Originally thought to have been a 4 hour trip, we left at 9:45 am only to arrive at 3:45 pm. We make several stops to ask for directions as our planned guides from the 2nd Baptist Church of Campos were no-shows. Upon exiting the bus, and especially in entering the sanctuary, our olfactory senses are besieged with an unbelievably strong odor that I can only attribute to the pollution introduced into the air by the principal industry in the area now—the oil and gas refineries.

After the buses were loaded, a volunteer quartet finds a regular meeting of senior adults meeting in the basement. Seizing the opportunity for singing were Scott Cameron, Mickey Daniel, Dan Baker, and Jim Clayman. The seniors were involved in a craft creation time so the group received painted soaps to recompense them for their kindness.

After a short rehearsal session to work on cleaning up our presentation, Don brought Miriam Abreu, the music minister of the church before the vocal group for a brief moment of questions and answers. According to Don, this church has a great history of work in this Flumenesa Baptist assemblage. In contrast to FBC Niteroi who also had a female minister of music, she regularly leads her church in congregational singing. She has served here for seven years as MM, and is responsible for all areas of music in the church. She prepares each order of worship as she rehearses and leads a single mixed choir of about 75 members, and one children’s choir. This church had been without a MM for 5 years, and had depended upon recorded music to accompany solos and choral presentations to fill the void of instrumental participants. Their music program was re-birthed with her coming, and now serves their people with one Sunday AM service and two PM services. The Morning service fills the booming sanctuary with 1200 members. The technical crew utilizes a four line red-dot line message sign above the baptistry vis a vis a visual projection system to stimulate congregational participation during the song service.

After this, Rodrigo Rodriguez, our Ecuadorian born solo guitarist captures our attention with a private testimony about his desire to serve God in ministry rather than in “concert, performance or presentation.” He has, for the last four years, returned to his home country and, because of his love for the Lord and therefore the love for his friends and family, shared his testimony and his new Christian playing in progressively larger venues. First it was his own family; next 2,000 people; then 17,000 this last year. He has rented a stadium for 45,000 this next year! He also wants to do a concert with the SMOT accompanied by a rented symphony orchestra. This is to be a matter of prayer for all of us.

We then went to the meal prepared for us: chicken, chicken lasagna, beef in sauce, rice, au gratin potatoes Brazil-style, and drinks. We moved quickly as the time was short. Lining up again for an entrance down the center aisle of three allowed us to move up to the distinctive improvised seating as we sang. The front row of pews was followed by two parallel rows of chairs: the front row remained seated during the entire concert, the second stood on the floor and the third row perched semi-precariously on the seats of the padded chairs during the songs! During one of the songs, a few of the back row baritones have a little fun twirling once around clockwise with single fingers dancing (whoops! The Baptist police caught us, guys!) in the air, and the twirl was executed without falling off any of the chairs.

There were many fine musical moments in the concert and God blessed us graciously to be able to present our final concert in it entirety. There was electricity in the air, and it was reflected in the eyes and faces of our congregation. The rectangular building’s seating was increased again by 50 % by a massive three-sided balcony both again being full all the way around. The sound that bounced around so much during rehearsal was perceived with much greater clarity as the acoustics changed so much—even with all of the quadruple-wide windows and doors to the street open to enhance the temperature.

Our concert also had an unexplained faux paux or two. First, during Scot Cameron’s solo, there was a foible that has never, ever happened before. I mean, Scott never misses anything! And then the next soloist, Trent Blackley, made his way from the back right of the second row down and around the marble platform to the solo mic on the opposite front corner only to trip as he ascended the continuous set of stairs. Wellllll… come to find out, the Cameron error was caused because of a prank as the aforementioned Mr. Blackley had turned Scot’s second page upside down. It seems that the comic in Trent had attempted to reveal this to Scot before the concert by innocuously asking him if he had really checked his music before the concert to ensure his notes accuracy. Scot, not privy to the prank and feeling no reason to instigate a last minute check, failed to correct the error before his solo… And you can say what you want to, but Trent reaped a little of what was sown as he faltered in his own right. Oh, and I am sure that FBC Sunnyvale would never return any of his shenanigans in kind… (wink)

Note from John As it turns out, Scot had earlier in the day exchanged places for the B natural handbell for the B flat handbell, the very bells that Trent happens to play. More information to come as further developments on “Bellgate” emerge. We all thought it was deacon and pastor’s kids that were troublemakers. Seems MoM (Minister of Music) kids are not immune….

At the end of the concert, the pastor came forward to reemphasize the point made by David Hunt during his testimony that God is a God of the second chance. There were at least 30 or 40 hands that were raised in response to his invitation tucked inside his prayer. Next, at the closing, the pastor again asked for all of the pastors, staff, deacons and deaconesses to come forward to ring the platform. And then he asked for all of the Texans on this trip to poor forward from their seats on the floor and in the balcony. Once assembled, the entire congregation stretched out one arm in a seeming effort to lay hands on us. And then, as if predetermined by God, a young lady was handed the wireless microphone to pray a lengthy and passionate benediction.

There is no doubt that this area which produces so much of the energy sources for the country of Brazil is special. Oil, and its final products of consumption that are refined locally, along with natural gas and sugar cane that is converted into alcohol for automobiles are paramount when you think of Campos. Power and Campos are synonymous!!

But tonight, we were reacquainted with the true source of power! God in the moving of His Spirit among the people of this urbanized band of country folk was the object of, at times, a frenetic visual, spoken and sung energy. They praise God with hands extended upward; they utter prayers with jubilation; they sing with uninhibited gusto—all of which exhibits an eagerness and desire that leaves no question that Jesus is their Lord and Savior! We all as singers and wives were physically embraced time and again after the closing prayer as we packed our instruments for transport. It was as if they wanted to touch us to communicate the power that they knew so intimately… so personally… so vibrantly!

It has been our pleasure to have a quiet Brazilian who’s English is better than my Portuguese: Rafael Moraes who is a photographer with the Brazilian Baptist Convention, traveling even on this last and longest trip.

After snacks and load up, the buses took off on a very scary bus ride home in the dark. It seems that the accepted procedure when passing vehicles in Brazil is to turn off your own headlights until you get fairly far down the road in the wrong lane until you are almost past the slower vehicle. And the yellow line in your lane seems to mean pass at night! Double yellow lines seem to mean “drive faster! on the wrong side!!!” I bit my hands and prayed for safety all the more. When I awoke, I was told that we had made it back safely. Either that, or heaven resembled Rio and you get there on a bus!

-----------------------------------------------------------------------

Bus B Final Comments:

Kent Barnes: His church prayed from him in the center aisle before he left, so it was very moving for him as this became, in essence, his church also.

Ron Ethridge: He testified that as the people sang, how much it gripped his heart that Daniel Solyom Junior was really missed on this trip, and how we should bless him when we see him in Sunnyvale as he made it so very possible for us to bless and be blessed by so many others. (FYI: Daniel, a Brazilian native who has been in the U.S. for ten years and last saw his family three years ago, has his residency status involved in an active court case and was unable to ensure that he could return to the U.S. if he went to Brazil with the group. He arranged a number of our Brazilian songs for us.)

Woody Schober: He gave thanks that Carol, his wife who contracted poison ivy just prior to the trip is getting better. He gave praise for the spirit of the people: their eyes, their singing, and their expression. This was most obvious in the lady on the second row tonight who was attired in a multicolor outfit. And also for the privilege of seeing people come to Jesus. The hugs and kisses received here will be seen again in heaven.

Bob Mathews: This was a difficult trip for Bob to make as Janet, his wife, was not here due to conflicts with her job. At first he did not want to go, but she said he must go! Most especially he gave thanks for the consistency of the warmth of the people of Brazil.

Chuck Bridwell: He remarked that we were the first of many in this new partnership of Texans with the Brazilians.

Gloria Mayo: How that this first trip with the SMONCT that was south of the border and equator was such a joyous trip. And how we should take the example of these people and more greatly show how much we have Jesus in our hearts. Her intent was to “work the crowd” more upon her return.

Larry Wesson: He referenced Blackeby’s instruction to “look for where God is at work and join Him there,” for it was obvious that God is at work in the churches where we sang.

Larry Caudle: He thanked the wives for their spirit, their sense of humor and their desire to shop. Also, for their prayers and support during the trip. He declared, “You are our power team!” Also thanks to Licia. He, Wayne Gadman, and Jim Claymon were the only three on this trip that made the original trip in 1984 to Brazil.

This journalist was asked to close in prayer in order for us to get some shuteye.

P.S.—Wayne Gadman: He expressed his love for children, and in particular the way the kids responded during the worship time, most especially tonight. He said that Fred Himstedt, an SMOT member that was a Brazilian missionary at the time reported that the 1984 Brazil trip was the catalyst for doubling the number of churches. He noted that the kids that were dancing in the aisles and singing might be the Ministers of Music when we come back—but he was not coming back without his wife!

P.P.S.—Chuck Bridwell—He surmised that some 250 to 300 Brazilians were saved during our concerts.

After arriving at 3:00 in the morning, our schedule for tomorrow includes checking out by 1:00 PM and a 3:30 PM departure time.

Click the Back button to return to prior screen,
or close this window if the Back button is grayed.