Is photo journalism where the photos tell a story? Maybe this story is about the personality of our worship team, here in Marabá.

Where Was God in All the Goodness of 2012? – Desiring God:

‘via Blog this’

Annika organized an all night party for the youth of the Marabá church, to celebrate bringing in the New Year. The preparation involved scouring the chacará for branches and old wood to build a bonfire. The fire lasted through two cloudbursts, and the party lasted until daylight, the first morning of 2013.

We have been having so much fun with the clay oven, baking bread, squash, fajitas, and pizza. Here our family roasted a chicken, the day after Christmas, just for us! Interesting enough, in all these meals we hardly have any leftovers. The clay oven makes delicious food. You are invited to come for a visit so we can fire it up for you to try.

Christmas is the best holiday for getting people to present skits, and dances. As these young people prepare to do something special, they invite their families who normally do not come to church. Ivanildo bar-be-qued some meat, and people brought other food, and we had a “Church Family Christmas Celebration”. There were about 175 people present, and it felt like a bustling, healthy community. It felt like the first drops of rain, when we know a rain storm is coming. It felt refreshing.

Phil and some others worked real hard to get our overhead projector working. This project was a long time coming. The 100 foot long HDMI cable worked! Some other things worked. We pushed our huge sound cable through the tube under the floor so we can put our sound board at the back of the church. Things are starting to come into focus. It is very cool.

On Christmas Eve everyone who lives on the “chacara”, plus a few more, gathered for a staff Christmas party. Everyone brought a $5 gift, and we played the White Elephant game, where you can choose someone else’s gift, or pick a wrapped one on the table.

We ate bar-be-qued chicken, oven baked buns and other treats.

Fancy coffee cups were the most-traded gifts.

Every year Ivanildo organizes a special soccer game, “marrieds against singles”. Sometimes this is known as “old guys against young guys”. The “marrieds” have always lost in the past. This year some of the youth who are now living with their girlfriends joins the “marrieds / old guys”. Since marriage itself is kind of rare in our neighbourhood, living with a girl counts as marriage. It’s kind of complicated, a part of the culture of our neighbourhood we are hoping to change as we teach and model the benefits of long-term commitments and true love. Still, the game was a lot of fun, and this year, thanks largely to two of the youth who joined the “old married guys”, the “marrieds” won.

The youth all want a rematch but Ivanildo says, “Only next year. You have lost for the year now.” (Huge smile).

I was hoping to play but some other people came over and I could not get down to the field in time. The girls took these photos of the game and the bystanders.