Cafezal, Belo Horizonte, Brasil

I have been in Brazil for 11 days now, and it has been a time filled with many adventures, relationships, and lessons from God.

Adventures: Climbing some mountains, jungle creek walk, door to door evangelism, floorball (floor hockey), night walk in community, house visits, firefighting, peeling and cutting dozens of potatoes, eating cheese and sweet corn ice cream, and helping with a roller skating kids' program.

Relationships: I have made lots of new friends in meeting my brothers and sisters in Christ here. I have five roommates: 4 Brazilian and 1 Swiss, who are involved in the YWAM DTS program here at the base.

Lessons: Two big lessons have stood out so far for me: Having a servant heart and releasing all fears in my life.

The verse Philippians 2:3 stood out the first morning after arriving, “Do nothing out of rivalry or conceit, but in humility consider others more significant than yourselves.” I have been meditating on that verse throughout the day as I seek to allow Christ to reign more and more in my life. In past ministry involvement, I have been so easily distracted by wanting to be liked and appreciated and noticed for my work, but God has been speaking to me about what He desires in ministry. He desires me to be faithful and ministering with a humble, servant heart, so that when people encounter me, they don't just see me, but they see the Living God within me and through me.

God also impressed on my heart His desire for me to let go of all fears in my life. Friday night February 4^th I wrote: “I was looking down on the city and just taking in that i was looking down on literally a few million people, and it occurred to me that my fears were getting in the way of my faith. I am freaked out by big cities and I have already felt that since being here, when we drove here the first night thru the city, and today on the bus in the main part of the city I was pretty intimidated.
Then I remembered another thing that David (one of the team leaders) had said in the session he led about perfect love casting out fear. And I was just making an inventory of things that cause fear in my life such as big cities, stepping out sometimes for Christ especially with peers, or a mild fear of death or trials.
And I realized that I wasn't letting God into those areas completely because He is love, perfect love, and He casts out all fear. So I was praying over those things and asking Him to cast out the fears that I have and asking Him to make me fearless. Then right after that, a couple bats flew by right in front of my face and were circling around me, literally within inches. and I tensed up and then smiled as it seemed that God was already throwing this at me as starter material so I sat there, slowly relaxing as they circled me and then once I felt pretty much completely calm, they left.”

I am excited to see what else God has in store in these upcoming weeks.