Two Weekends - Two Retreats

Over 100 women from teenagers to grandmas gathered last weekend for the first women's retreat for the Grace Brethren Church in Brazil. Over two days they enjoyed studies about the women at the well, living water and studying the stories of the Bible. They enjoyed spa treatments for their hands, feet and face. They spent time playing games together, singing, praying and worshiping together and sharing with one another, ending their time together with a communion service. Some of the ladies comments were....

'Thank-you for this opportunity to minister.”
“It was helpful and encouraging to be able to learn from and share with women from other churches.”
“I really enjoyed the studies and learned something.”
“I had a special time.”
“It was our first time at a women's meeting, we didn't know how it would be, but we really enjoyed it.”
“I was encouraged.”Some of the cost of the retreat was covered by a GBIM ministry grant. Thank-you for making this opportunity available to the women of Brazil. Thank-you to Sue Mathes of Centerville GBC for helping with the retreat and Centerville church for providing supplies for the spa and gifts for each women. Thanks to Sue's husband Denny for his behind the scenes help.


The weekend before some of the high school missionary girls from Amazon Valley Academy (AVA) and their mothers spent two special days together on a mother daughter retreat. They also enjoyed spa treatments and studied the women at the well led by Sue Mathes. Each one made a special gift or card for their mother or daughter. All enjoyed the mother-daughter times together and the makings for s'mores from the USA. Each mother and daughter received the book Closer, donated by Focus on the Family. Missionary Kid Lydia Patton who is a sophomore at AVA came up with the idea, planned the retreat and helped raise some funds to offset the cost.



What did the moms and daughters say?....

“We have to plan so much for others, it was nice to have someone plan something for us.”
“It was a lot of fun and a really worthwhile time for us.”
“It was great to be able to get away and spend time together, it was good to have time together to talk and pray.”
“If someone told us to sit down and have a mother daughter time together it would be awkward, but it was special to be able to get away from being busy and spend this time together talking about some things that needed to be talked about.”

Pictures
(1)Greeting each other in different ways at the women's retreat.
(2)Having fun with a foot rub and treatment.
(3)What would your team yell for women be?
(4)Sue and Lydia wrap surprises and glue Bible verses on Hershey kisses for the mother daughter retreat.
(5)Moms and Daughters
(6)Two of the daughters perform a modern day versions the of the women at the well.

A Tale of Tools

It all looked so easy – the tools of the TMSM building teams were at the last project in southern Brazil. All that needed to be done was to have someone see what was there and send the ones we wanted to keep to us here in northern Brazil.

It all sounded so simple – but this is Brazil. So we sent out the best man for the job, Edson. Edson has been working for the mission here in Belem battling the city offices of Ananindeua and Belem to resolve some property and tax issues.

Edson's job was to get the tools back up here and check on the property ownership down south. He left for the loooooog bus ride south early Monday morning. Some 37 hours later over bumpy roads he arrived in Uberlandia.

After cutting the locks off the tool containers because no one knew where the keys were, one though is that they were in the United States, he inventoried the tools. Just what is the easiest way to get seven containers of hand and electric tools back to Belem? Let's just prepare them and ship them up with a mover he though. Sounds easy enough, but this is Brazil..

Well here in Brazil if you want to transport things you have to have receipts to prove ownership or pay a special tax. Since these tools were brought down from the United States there are no receipts to show ownership. The official evaluated the tools at $25,000 on which they wanted us to pay a tax of $5,000. This is one way they try to prevent stolen items from leaving an area. They weren't willing to change that. Well we were not going to ship them via a shipper for sure, after all these tools were all used and some were fairly old. It wouldn't cost $25,000 to buy them new in the states.

So what about taking them on the bus as baggage? To take the tools on the bus from Uberlandia to Belem would be both difficult since the bus baggage area was usually already packed when it got to Uberlandia and he risked being stopped and asked for papers.

After they looked at taking the tools to Rio and catching the bus there Edson and Eslon decided to go to Brasilia where Edson would catch the bus to Belem. If they got stopped, he could always abandon the tools if they wanted to much in taxes.

So Edson settled in for a 37 hour bus ride from Brasilia to Belem after a 5 hour ride to Brasilia from Uberlandia. He made it through the states between here and there OK, only to be stopped at the border to our state, Para.

The Police at the inspection point for Receita Federal (tax police) took out every suitcase and bag on the buss and searched them all. Finding the seven containers of tool they demanded $1000 in taxes from Edson. Edson, knowing how to talk to them set out to convince them not to charge any taxes since we are a tax exempt religious organization and we did own the tools even if we didn't have receipts. For over half an hour they bantered back and forth. Finally they agreed. Edson would pay $250. the only catch being he didn't have enough with him and wold have to leave his very important identity card hundreds of miles away from Belem at the state border and would only get it back when and if he paid the rest. The rest of the bus? All told they paid out $5,000 total between all the passengers.

So early Saturday Edson arrived back in Belem. Monday morning he returned to the border to retrieve his identity card. After waiting hours at the boarder for the return bus he finally caught the midnight bus for home.

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