Sixteen years ago two teen-agers from our church were at the gate of our home in Altamira. Ross and I were in my office on a Saturday morning, working on a newsletter. Ross ended up flying to Água Preta with Vagner and Jefferson with his floatplane.
Simone and Jefferson are ordained as pastors for one year.
“Can you drive us out into the bush to get my mom? She fell and broke her hip.”
“Where is it that you want to go?”
“It is an hour or two down the Amazon Highway, then you turn off onto a small dirt road for another hour. We’ll get a boat and cross the Xingu River, hike 2 kms into the bush, and bring her out.”
“Can we get there with an airplane with floats?”
No one at the shore there had seen a floatplane before. Ross heard them speculating whether the president of Brazil was sending someone to their village.
The young guys hiked into the village, and brought out Lourdes in a stretcher. When she saw Ross and the airplane she said (in Portuguese), “I saw you in a dream last night. You came to get me in a really fast speedboat. And this voice behind me said, ‘Only by the God of the Bible will you get healed.’” Lourdes got better for awhile, and she became quite an evangelist. Unfortunately her hip still is a problem and she is now waiting for another hip replacement surgery.
Over time both of these young men fell away from the Lord. Their first love grew cool. But Jefferson came back. Last month we ordained him and his wife as the senior pastors of one of the city churches in Altamira.
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