34 years since our last autumn, Johan in S-Africa, and 60 years!

The sun shines on trees that are decorated in the most vivid yellow, orange and red autumn colors, in stark contrast against the dramatic dark gray sky—we are enjoying a wonderful autumn in Holland!

We just calculated that is has been 34 years since we spent an autumn in Holland! All these colors call our attention to God’s beautiful creation.

I guess it helps that I am doing a little photography course—only five classes—but it seems that it has sharpened my attention for all I see around me. I enjoy this very much!

Temporary move to Holland

We have moved our “office” (read: two laptops) from Brazil to Holland for a few months and are working for a while from Ermelo, Holland. One of the reasons is that our youngest son, Davi, had to undergo a serious operation in October to receive a urinary stoma. And of course we wanted to be in Holland for that occasion. The surgery was done at the University Hospital in the city of Utrecht.

Davi had his surgery

It went well, but a big hurdle was that it took a long time for his intestines to start functioning again. At a certain point he even said: “Maybe I should never have done this”. But there wasn´t really any other option. 

His kidney function had deteriorated badly two years ago, and he ran the risk of needing hemodialysis. For nine days after the surgery, he couldn´t keep even a sip of water in his stomach. That was tough for him. But after that ninth day and lots of prayers, suddenly everything changed for the better. His intestines started working again and his kidney function improved. Now he is at home and recovering quickly.

The first Children at Risk School in South Africa

Johan went on a trip from Holland to South Africa for two weeks at the end of October / beginning of November, to teach in the Children at Risk School in Cape Town. We started this school 25 years ago in Belo Horizonte, Brazil to train our own staff. 

Since then, we have run the school every year, and Johan has taught in every single school--hasn´t missed a single one—quite an accomplishment! In addition, we have started this school in many other cities of Brazil and in other countries.  It is a very good and practical school that helps students immensely if they want to start a new project with children in need or improve an existing one.

Andrew from India

Some years ago we lead a Children at Risk School in Kolkata, India. One of the students, Andrew, was a very gifted Indian young man. A year later he came to Brazil to co-lead a school in Belo Horizonte (and happened to meet his future wife, Eliane, but that is another story!)

.At the wedding of Andrew and Eliane

Multiplication of the school in Africa

Since then he has lead the school in different Indian cities, and we have been there various times to teach. Last time in Mumbai, we also spoke at an international conference, where we met Toby and Aukje Brouwer, a wonderful couple from Holland who started a project for children affected by HIV/AIDS 20 years ago in Cape Town, South Africa. 

They wanted to bring the school to South Africa to train African young people and see projects for children multiplied on the continent of Africa. We couldn´t go this time to lead the school for three months, but Andrew and Eliane were available.

So they are leading the school, and Johan went to teach for two weeks. It is wonderful to be able to invest in young people, passing on different principles and encouraging them in their dreams to minister to children.  Toby and Aukje plan to lead the next school then start multiplying them into the continent of Africa.

Next year: the first Children at Risk School in the Amazon region.

Andrew and Eliane are going to Brazil next year to lead a school in Porto Velho (Eliane’s home city), which in the Amazon region. Here the children of the ribeirinhos (people from communities along the big rivers) are seriously at risk. Afterwards they plan to return to India and start a work with children in one of India’s poorest regions.

Every year

In the meantime the school in Belo Horizonte continues under the leadership of Oseias who is the King’s Kids leader on the YWAM base. In Curitiba, a city in southern Brazil, there is a school led by Regina, and in Recife in the northeast region, there is a school led by Mati and Julie (he is from Samoa and she´s from Canada). In Perth, Australia there is a school with a focus on Thailand and other countries in Asia, led by Cloe (from Kenya). Enough to confuse you.

Who wants to go to Rio?

In each of these schools, we teach whenever possible. New schools are being planned, like the one in Rio de Janeiro during the Olympic Games in 2016. Wonderful! A great reason to spend a couple months in one of the most beautiful cities in the world and reach out to the kids on the streets and in the slums. As one of our sons-in-law mentioned, “Who doesn´t want to go to Rio?”

A picture taken in a special mirror!

Sharing

We are enjoying this new beautiful and natural phase of our lives. After having started various projects, ministries, shelters and community centers for children in need in Belo Horizonte, having helped start various other projects around Brazil, and having lead the YWAM base in Belo Horizonte for so many years, now is the time to share with the next generation about our experiences—the mistakes we made, the goodness of God, the things that worked well and all the lessons learned.

A gift

Johan is a wonderful teacher and enjoys teaching. The students will listen for hours at a time to his stories and classes. This is a real God-given gift, which is still developing.

So much suffering of children

Now that we are not leading the YWAM base in Belo Horizonte anymore, we are able to focus more and more on teaching, as well as multiplying the Children at Risk School and seeing projects for children opened in many more locations. There is a huge need for this.  When we read in our daily newspapers about the suffering of children in the Middle East and other parts of the world, we want to see more schools and projects happening everywhere.

Writing a book

Together we are compiling a book of lessons we have learned through the years, which we can use in future schools. It is quite a job!

60^th birthday!

Last week we celebrated Johan´s sixtieth birthday. We are thankful for good health and for all the family members and friends who were able to attend the party. So much to thank our faithful heavenly Father for!

Thank you so much!

We are also grateful for all our friends who have stood with us through gifts, carried us in prayer, encouraged us with emails and cards, shared a coffee with us, listened to us, laughed and cried with us and reached out to us in many different ways. 

Thank you so much! We pray that during this holiday season of Christmas and New Year, your eyes, ears and hearts may be open to the love of Jesus who came for all the world, so that whoever believes in Him will have eternal life. Glory to God in the highest!

We wish you God’s richest blessings!

On the road to recovery

 

Here a quick update about Davi! The surgery for the urinary stoma was successful, but afterwards his intestines didn´t want to start up again. He couldn´t eat or drink anything, and whenever he tried, it would come back up. This lasted nine full days. He lost quite a few pounds and became very weak. But he stayed in good spirits.
 

A visit from Olaf (!) with Johan and Dilma

With his brother Pieter

Hundreds of people prayed for him, and his hospital room is decorated with lots of get well cards. Whenever there was a little emotional dip, he had his daddy’s shoulder to lean on!

  

If everything progresses well, he should be released from the hospital in the next few days and will be able to recover at home, which will take another four weeks, the doctor told us.
 

We would like to thank everyone who has stood with us in prayer, has come to visit, and has sent cards, emails and messages. We have felt carried by the love and faithfulness of so many people and especially by our heavenly Father.

The surgery went well.

The surgery Davi went through yesterday went well! Thanks to all who prayed, sent emails, texted, phoned etc. It was a great encouragement to know so many people stood with us on behalf of Davi. Please continue to pray for a speedy recovery.

It took a little longer than expected for Davi to be admitted to surgery, so it was quite late in the evening when he returned to his room. I had been allowed to stay with him until anesthetics put him under and was allowed to sleep in his room the first night. It’s been wonderful how nice all the doctors and nurses are towards us. To fight the pain they put him on a morphine pump, which works fantastically! Besides this, he’s got lots of drains and lines hooked up to him, but we hope they will be taken out over the next few days.

Right now we are listening to some of Davi’s favorite music from Hillsong!

Okay, now I am ready to help the nurse with his general cleanup.

Please pray with us for Davi during the coming weeks. We´ll try and post regular updates on our blog and Facebook.

Thanks for standing with us. We wish you all God’s richest blessings!

Davi's surgery

Here is some news from our side, especially about the upcoming surgery of Davi. As some of you may remember, our youngest son Davi (27), was born with Spina Bifida and as a result became paraplegic. 

One of the other symptoms is that his bladder keeps cramping all the time, which in turn deteriorates his kidney function so much that 2 years ago, his doctors told us he needed hemodialysis. 

But against all expectations, we believe because of a miracle, his kidney function improved to about 45%. To keep this stable he will need another surgery to create a urinary stoma. This is a big surgery in the abdomen and is planned for the 8^th of October. If all goes well, he will still need about two weeks of hospital care.

Davi has already undergone lots of operations, mostly on his spine. In Brazil it was always possible for me, Jeannette, to go into the operating theatre until the anesthetics took over. We thought that might not be possible in Holland, but to our surprise both the surgeon and the anesthetist approved it. This is a great consolation for Davi who also has an intellectual disability, and is a bit fearful to go into surgery.

We are in Holland for a couple of months right now, as we knew this surgery was planned. We also moved our office over here as well, which wasn´t too complicated as our office only consists of two laptops! While preparing for the surgery we are busy working on our next book, and doing a lot of planning for future Children at Risk schools around the world, where we train young people to start projects, working with children in need.

Please pray with us for Davi during the coming weeks.

We´ll try and post regular updates on our blog and Facebook.

Thanks for standing with us.

We wish you all God’s richest blessings!

Are there only Christians in Brazil?

It was really fantastic to be able to join with so many people from different missionary organizations, Christian athletes, churches and outreach teams from all over the world to plan, pray, and then see it happen: hundreds of young people who enthusiastically went to the streets at every soccer game, evangelizing, singing, dancing and inviting, not just in one city, but in all twelve host cities of the World Cup!

Biscuits with Bible verses
What wonderful and different people we encountered as we were preparing for the World Cup: pastors who are fanatics for soccer, professional soccer players who love Jesus, movie makers who are championing the cause of sexually exploited girls, a great African choir of more than 50 people from Madagascar, who worked and saved money for two years to be able to be part of this, businessmen that financed the printing of some very attractive evangelism material, thousands of young people from all over the world and even a man from Indonesia who started a biscuit factory in Brazil, to make cookies with Bible verses printed on them, to be distributed during the World Cup. He sent us a big truckload of those cookies!

Are there only Christians here?
Walking through the streets just prior to the games it appeared as if there were only Christians in Brazil; you saw them everywhere. We counted 244 churches that went with their members to the streets before every game (64 matches in total). They sang, danced and made a big party with special drum bands. We had boxes and boxes full of the most beautiful and free evangelism materials in many different languages. We joined to pray at strategic places, just before the evangelistic outreaches, and all groups could take as much evangelism material as they needed.

A great and professional communication team
To communicate everything the Lord was doing before and during the World Cup was quite a job! We made two blogs, one in English and one in Portuguese, and over a period of three month posted 54 articles. Every two weeks we sent thousands of emails with the latest news and also posted many items on multiple Facebook pages. One of those pages even climbed to 80,000 likes! We did a number of video clips and had hundreds of photos taken. Our team here in Belo Horizonte was very professional and also received lots of material from all other 11 cities. It was great to see how everyone was able to use their talents.

In the slum communities
In various slum communities there were mini World Cup competitions organized for the kids who were all on break from school during the World Cup. During the actual World Cup games, TV screens were put up in strategic places so people from the community could watch. Before the games and during halftime we had the opportunity to share about Jesus and what he has done in our lives. In some communities a Bible was given to each family and attendance at the Bible studies was surprisingly high.

Movie based on the life of Hosea
Two YWAMers with experience in movie production, Diego Traverso and Daniel Silva, had decided to use their talents in the battle against human trafficking and sexual exploitation. Together with 48 employees, Daniel produced a full-length feature film called “Internal Labyrinths” in only one-and-a-half years. The movie demonstrates in an impressive way how girls get entrapped in prostitution, how their self-esteem often drops below zero, and how Christians through their ignorance or through judgmental attitudes, often make the problem worse. But it also shows how Christians inspired by the unconditional love of Christ can become God’s answer in the lives of these girls. The story is set in today’s world, but is based on the biblical story of Hosea. It’s really a fantastic movie. Look for more information on the website: www.pontefilmes.com

1 real (50 cents)
Last year Diego filmed the situation of the girls in red light districts in all 12 host cities for the World Cup. It resulted in a 22-minute documentary called “1 Real, the Other Side of the Coin”. This title was inspired by a little 8-year-old girl, who was standing at a traffic light, offering sexual services to the drivers in the cars for only 1 real (equivalent of 50 cents).

Bus
This film is an intense documentary portraying the shocking reality of these problems all over Brazil. During the World Cup, Diego brought a team and a special "1 Real" bus, in which they toured host cities to exhibit the documentary in red light districts, on city squares and on beaches. You can watch it on the internet with English subtitles: www.1real.org

“He offered me the sky” 
During the months prior to the World Cup, we used the program `Libertodos` (“Liberate All”) in many local schools. This curriculum was written by one of our YWAM missionaries to educate and warn adolescents about the danger of lover boys, human trafficking and sexual exploitation.
“Auntie, I think this happened to me yesterday”. One of the girls had raised her hand, and with a horrified look on her face, told one of our staff: “One of the guys from our neighborhood was promising me all kinds of things, too good to be true--now I know what it was all about”.
This program is really good, easy to use, professionally done and is being used by more and more YWAM bases, churches and schools. There has also been interest in some other Latin American countries.

1500 people praying together for a total of 720 hours
The 24/7 prayer rooms in the prostitution areas were a great success. 1500 people had signed up to pray during various hours every week so that there would be 720 uninterrupted hours of worship and prayer in the darkest places in every one of the 12 host cities.

The power of prayer
Lauren, one of the girls from a US/Panama team that came to help us during the World Cup told us: “I could just feel the difference. When I visited the girls in the brothels before the World Cup it was as if I had to push away a dark cloud. It was heavy and sad. But once the prayer room started, this room became like a safe haven to me and the atmosphere in the brothels and the neighborhood changed. It was still difficult, but you could see more joy, peace and the presence of Jesus brought light in the darkness. It was easier entering the brothels, knowing that in the same street a team was praying. It was a wonderful experience to see how the power of prayer brings such an obvious change for the better.”

This World Cup was won by the church!
When the Brazilian team lost 7-1 in the semi-finals to Germany, it was such a big shock to everyone that people still talk and write extensively about it. But for us it didn’t make much difference--it was clear that at this World Cup, the real champion was the church, who went en masse to the streets to demonstrate the love of God in many different ways. Together we showed that our passion was way beyond football. Our passion was the Lord Jesus! This was the World Cup which was won by the church!

Davi, our youngest son came to Brazil.
For our family, it was also very special time because Davi, our youngest son, could come for a visit here during his vacation. We had a great time together, and the half-Brazil, half-Holland soccer shirts I had made for him and Johan yielded many comments!

The Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro in 2016.
So what´s next? We’ve already gone to Rio de Janeiro twice, preparing for a Mega DTS (Discipleship Training School) and Children at Risk School we will conduct in 2016. We´ll keep you posted over the next months!

To the Netherlands
In September we hope to go to Holland for a number of months. Davi needs another surgery in October, and we want to be close when this happens. We also hope to use this time to write our second book, and Johan will teach in YWAM schools at different bases including the one in Cape Town, South Africa.

Prayer points

• Thank God for all the people who heard the Gospel during the World Cup. Pray that the seeds sown will grow. 
• Thank God for all the people who helped in various ways. Pray that each will continue to seek to know God better and to make Him known. 
• Thank God for the film, the documentary and the school program, all directed against human trafficking and sexual exploitation. Pray that together they will reach millions of people, and will lead to prevention of and intervention in forced prostitution. 
• Thank God for all the people who participated in prayer. Pray that we as Christians will grow to understand and experience even more the power of prayer.
• Thank God for Davi. Pray for the operation that he must undergo in October.

We would like to thank everyone who has been a source of encouragement to us over the last months through prayer, gifts and messages. Thank you that you stood by our sides, helped us and supported us.

May God bless you abundantly!

The best World Cup ever! This World Cup Was Won By The Church!

Two years ago we started our team JOCUM KICKOFF and began preparing: the website, a blog, Power Point presentations with information and prayerpoints on the 32 nations participating in The World Cup, meetings with the coordinators of the 12 World Cup match venues, scoring materials in various languages, developing material against human trafficking: school programs, video clips, documentaries etc., and now.... it's all over!

"This World Cup Was Won By The Church!"

What has happened? Thousands of young people from local churches along with international teams of young people took to the streets to evangelize, pray, dance and sing. They used many different strategies to combat human trafficking and sexual exploitation, including handing out 37.300 red cards which had the phone number to dial and report the crime. Others did short dramas at traffic lights; some painted the faces of the fans while they talked about ways to combat sexual exploitation. A curriculum, "Libertodos", was developed to raise awareness of and stand against sexual exploitation. This curriculum is now being presented in our schools. A team traveled by bus to 8 of the twelve venue cities to show a documentary film against human trafficking. And in each of the 12 cities a prayer room was available 24/7.






"This Word Cup was won by the church!" said Regiane, one of the YWAM leaders who works among the women in brothels in Belo Horizonte. We were together in the worship service in the prayer room which was crowded with young people from many churches. 1.500 intercessors had prayed in those rooms for 720 hours. Regiane was beaming, "I could write a whole book of the wonderful things that have happened," she said, "We are so grateful to God."




"Exceeded our Expectations"

We called all of the leaders and organizers in the other eleven World Cup cities and everyone said the same thing: "Exceeded expectations". So much has been accomplished. In our last count 196.400 people were reached by 5650 volunteers. We worked together with 244 different churches. Several cities had campaigns focused on distributing Bibles in every home in many under-served communities. All together 191.000 Bibles and booklets were handed out. A lot of results we will not see until the future because so much were seeds that were planted in the form of Bibles, magazines, brochures and even cookies with Bible verses. We are praying that the Holy Spirit will use these seeds to convince people of God's love for them.






The fact that Brazil did not win The World Cup was a shame. The 7-1 loss to Germany was a shock. No one expected it. But soon we saw our motto appearing in all kinds of advertisements "Our passion goes beyond soccer," The Lord Jesus is our passion! Hundreds of young people participated in training with ministry events during this time and many have applied now to do a DTS (Discipleship Training School). The enthusiasm is contagious.


Thank You Very Much!
Our thanks goes to a long list of people:

• Our national KICKOFF team who worked with dedication. You're the best! God has anointed you with special gifts and it was wonderful to see how you used these gifts and skills and how they were developed during this time. 
• All KICKOFF coordinators, grassroots leaders, and other YWAM staff who worked so hard. International and national teams were met with great hospitality. Space where there had been none was created. You were available to day and night to reach the masses, but also the individuals with the love of God the Father. We are very proud of our YWAM family. 
• Our national and international partners, churches and organizations, too many mention them all by name; it was spectacular to work with you towards a singular goal: To magnify the name of Jesus! 
• All national and international teams that have invested time and money to work in the 12 cities in outreach and human trafficking and sexual exploitation awareness, identifying with the longing of God's heart in this area. 
• The people who sent finances and sustained us in prayer. Without you nothing here would have been possible. 

And above all our thanks goes to the Lord God, who has strengthened us every day, guided us and loved us more than we can imagine.

To watch a video clip of our best photos during this time, click here.

What's next? We have plans for the Olympics in 2016 in Rio de Janeiro! Look here to find out what we are planning from January to September 2016.

Thank you and God bless!

How can we stop the sexual exploration and human trafficking?

Today a post written by our daughter Michele Lukasse de Almeida

Last Saturday (July 28th), I had the opportunity to join the YWAM Kickoff team before the Brazil vs Chile´s match at the Mineirão Stadium in the city of Belo Horizonte.

Through face painting, we could shed some light on sexual exploitation and human trafficking problem.

The goal was to raise awareness and while we were painting faces we talked with fans about human trafficking and sexual exploitation. While we were doing all this, I realized that many people supported our cause, but they had no idea what to do. Many of them didn´t know how to report, either to call #100 to Sexual Exploitations or Sexual Abuse reports. Others blamed on foreigners who are here for the World Cup consuming sexual services or simply on the government. 

But the truth is that great part of the blame is ours! Brazil is our country and what happens here should be of interest and concern to each one of us! 

We also received good answers when we asked to people if they knew how to fight against this problem. Som of the answers we got were: To report, raise awareness, educate and impose exemplary punishment by law forces... 

But only at the end of the day I got the two answers I was waiting for: "Stop Consuming" and "To Pray".

Everytime a porn-magazine is bought, a porn-webite is visited, sexual services are payed; the sexual exploitation activity is  geting increased, improved and people envolved get encouraged. 

If the demand decreases also the offer will decline! 

The solution is at our fingertips! When we understand the fact that people are not - and should not be - sale, our eyes will get opened and our attitudes will change!

And praying is ours most effective weapon against all evil! 

Our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the powers of darkness in the heavenly realms. We have a relational God who is always by our side, is our greatest ally and the most interested for the end of this evil. In our prayers we shared victories, mourn losses, we support to each other... supporting those who are working in the field... trough praying we get connected with the Creator and receive his strategies.

Let´s pray to God turn the hearts of the trafficker, brake their mean intentions and open the eyes of consumers... to protect and rescue victims and restore families!

We could paint and speak to more than 500 people and I could see the Body of Christ working together to bring joy to God´heart. 

I came back home with a joyful and fulfilled heart.