Colombia Trip - Day Three - The church in Cali

The team visited Javier's church in Cali, Bethany Church of Reform. In the picture you see Tommy & Shannan, Javier & Gloria, Matt and Casey. Below you can see a view of their church place, where they normally pack 120 people for Sunday service. Pastor Javier is coaching three other pastors who have been leading bible studies and are now ready to plant more churches.

Colombia Trip - Day Three - Meeting with Javier's leaders

The team traveled from Bogota to Cali by air and the next day visited our church planter Javier Gil and his wife Gloria. They are expecting their first baby, Tomas.
On Wednesday, March 24th, our team spent the day with Pastor Javier and his leaders.

Colombia Trip - Day Two - Visit to SRC project

The mission site in Villavicencio that SRC is supporting is a place where kids from the community spend half-day while parents are at work. Instead of the kids staying on the streets or alone at home, they have plenty of activities at the mission site, plus they get to hear about Jesus everyday.

Here you can see Pastor Leonel at the Villavicencio mission site.

Colombia Trip - Day Two - Time in Villavicencio

The next day, our team had meetings in the morning, visited our project in Villavicencio and drove through the mountains back to Bogota to catch a flight to Cali. The road was one of those two-lane type with the solid yellow lines in the middle (which means do not pass). The driver seemed to ignore the solid lines, and was leaving the trucks behind... Above you can see a picture with Pastor Leonel and his wife Belgica.

Colombia Trip - Day One - Meeting with Leonel's leaders

On March 22nd Tommy, Shannan and Casey traveled from Sao Paulo to Bogota. They arrived at the airport and our SRC church planter in Miami, Matt Dubocq, was waiting for them. Matt spent the rest of the time in Colombia with our team, as he speaks fluent Spanish and is Pastor Leonel's (our Movement Leader in Colombia) son-in-law. Matt was a great host and he made the time in Colombia an easy and smooth one for our team. Thanks Matt!!

Here you can see a picture of our team meeting with Pastor Leonel's leaders in the hotel in Villavicencio, a town about 2 hours driving from Bogota.

Visit to Colombia

On March 22nd our team left Brazil after serving there for ten unforgettable days.
Tommy, Shannan and Casey continued their mission trip itinerary, now going to Colombia. Rick Krive went to Recife to spend time with SRC church planter, Pedro Albuquerque and his family. The rest of our team returned home safe and sound on a direct flight from Sao Paulo to Miami.

Day Nine: Sao Paulo - Dedication of Vila Olimpia Church

Our team had the privilege of participating at the dedication service of Vila Olimpia Church. Four years ago, Pastor Adrien Bausells (below) started that church plant and a partnership between Spanish River Church, Good News Church, Chacara Primavera and Pirituba Church funded that project to completion and to self-sustaining mode.

 It was a beautiful service where Rick led the worship and Tommy gave the message.

This was the last event of this mission trip to Brazil and it was a remarkable one.

Day Nine: Sao Paulo - Fazendinha and Seed Projects

On Sunday afternoon, the team visited the projects that Alphaville Church has in the Sao Paulo area: Fazendinha, Seed, and Santana da Parnaiba Projects. Everyone on our team was amazed by the work that they are doing in those communities. Pastors Hilder and Carlos Alberto are the movement leaders in that area, and they have other leaders overseeing those projects. Pastor Alessandro (picture above) takes care of Fazendinha and Valdir ministers at the Seed Project.

Day Nine: Sao Paulo - Alphaville Church in the morning

The team left Campinas on Sunday morning and traveled to Sao Paulo to participate at some events there. In the morning, the team attended the service at Alphaville Church, where Rick led the church in a great time of worship and Casey preached a wonderful message.

Pastor Hilder invited our team to go up on stage and the church recognized everyone for their service. It was a special time for us.

Day Eight: Church Service at Chacara Multi-site

On Saturday evening, part of the team participated in the Chacara multi-site church service where Tommy preached the message. Here you can see Tommy and Hilton, who was a great translator for the American speakers at all events of the week. Hilton is the Associate Pastor at Vila Olimpia Church in Sao Paulo. He worked very hard delivering the messages in Portuguese, so the local pastors and communities could be blessed. Thanks Hilton!

Rich and Valette Porter went to Jaguariuna to present the Money Management Seminar. Rich is shown with Pastor Rodrigo of Jaguariuna Church.

Larry and Sonny went to Indaiatuba also to present the Finance Seminar to the community of that church that Pastor Ricardo Makino leads. Sonny is shown above speaking to the audience.

The team ended the day at Aldenir's house and enjoyed Mexican food for dinner. Aldenir is on the worship team of Chacara Primavera in Campinas. He is a Palmeiras fan - we mean fanatic :).
He loves giving Palmeiras soccer shirts to the guest speakers. Aldenir hosted the team twice in his house for delicious food and great fellowship. Thanks Aldenir!

Day Eight: Meeting with leaders in the morning

The team had breakfast at Chacara Primavera with leaders of the CTPI church planting network (above).

While Tommy, Terriel, Casey, Sonny, Larry and Fabiana met with Ricardo's leaders in the morning to talk about the status of the church planting projects and future steps, Rich, Valette and Craig went to Chacara multi-site where Rich gave the Money Management Seminar.

Day Seven: Conference continues

In the morning, after a wonderful time of worship with Carlinhos Veiga, Terriel talked about "The Method: the Dynamics of the Preacher in the Contemporary Communication".

Then SRC church planter and partner Fabrini (shown here) spoke about "The Mission". The team went out to lunch in the mall, and visited the Presbytery Museum at the Campinas Seminary.

In the evening, Sonia Agreste (Pastor Ricardo's wife) led the worship, and Ricardo closed the conference talking about "The Call: A New Preacher for a New Reality".

The conference ended and the team went out to celebrate at Romano's Italian Restaurant. Dinner was served at 1:00am!

Everyone had a great time in fellowship with Ricardo and the leaders of CTPI.

Day Six: Conference the rest of the day

After a long break for lunch, the conference participants attended workshops based on their interests or needs. They offered three tracks: initiation (for new church planters), consolidation (for experienced planters), and mother-church (for churches who are now planting other churches).

In the evening, Carlinhos Veiga led worship with emphasis in the Brazilian popular music style, with Christian lyrics. Rick and the band followed Carlinhos.

Tommy spoke about: "The Person: the integrity, spirituality and quality of life of the Pastor". The central point was Acts 20:28 and the importance of pastors taking good care of themselves.

Day Six: Conference in the morning...

This was Tommy's day to talk at the church planting conference. He spoke in the morning about "The Paradigm: Paul's Experience in Athens" and how pastors need to use the message of Acts 2 and apply it to an Acts 17 reality. Although the message remains the same, the language and the methods that pastors use in the new reality need to adapt to the culture that they are in.

Tommy used the music of SRC's own Eric Whitaker (2 Edge) as an example of another method to deliver the message of the gospel in today's language. This talk was fantastic, and created a lot of good discussion for the Q&A panel that followed after Ricardo's talk about "A Way: The Gospel and the Brazilian Culture".

Day Five: The Conference Opening

Rick Krive opened the conference with 30min of worship, and he led us with songs in Portuguese and English. About 300 people were attending the opening night, and we had a wonderful time praising our Lord in both languages.

Terriel followed with a talk about "A Problem: The Preaching Crisis in the New Reality". Hilton translated the talks for the American speakers and he did a wonderful job following Terriel as he spoke, showed examples, and danced (!!), as an illustration of a preaching style.

Day Five: Timothy Project

Terriel and Tommy spoke at the Timothy Project, a network of young pastors in the Southeast region of Brazil that our Movement Leader, Ricardo Agreste, coaches, mentors and walks alongside to build them up for ministry.
Terriel did a wonderful job sharing with those pastors about "Preaching in the Art of Being a Pastor". That happened in the morning and it was followed by a panel with Q&A.

In the afternoon, Tommy spoke about "The Leadership in the Art of Being a Pastor". Both talks blessed those leaders and gave them new perspective in both areas of preaching and leadership.

In the evening, the music workshop happened, where Rick Krive, Carlinhos Veiga and Sonia Agreste spoke to about 100 worship leaders. Rick focused on the participation during worship, Carlinhos talked about the role of culture in the worship, and Sonia talked about the inclusion of non-believers during worship. Our team had a wonderful time this day. We learned a lot.

Day Four - Tommy and the remainder of the SRC team arrive in Campinas

Today, Tommy and Shannan Kiedis, Casey Cleveland, Rick Krive and Terriel Byrd (Professor of Christian Ministry from Palm Beach Atlantic University) arrived in Campinas and joined the team for the opening of the CTPI (training center for church planters) Conference at Chacara Primavera.

Shown at right are Tommy with Pastor Ricardo of Chacara Primavera church in Campinas who is hosting the church planting conference

At left are Tommy and Pastor Ricardo with two of our church planting partners: Pastor Leonardo Sahium of Gavea Church in Rio de Janeiro and Pastor Fabrini Viguier of Igreja Plena de Icarai in Niteroi, Rio.

The SRC / GNC team poses for a group shot below:

Rich Porter, Rick Krive, Sonny Lemons, Valette Porter, Craig Kindell, Fabiana Marques, Nicholas Marques, Shannan Kiedis, Terriel Byrd, Casey Cleveland, Larry Weeks (left to right)

Day Four - Preparing for the Church Planting Conference

The SRC / GNC team spent Monday resting, shopping and sight-seeing, getting ready for a busy week.

The morning was spent helping to prepare for the Church Planting Conference which will begin tonight.

The team is shown here making name tags and assembling information packages for the conference.

Day Two - Evening service at Jaguariuna Church

Craig visited Jaguariuna Church which meets at a hotel in the center of the small town of Jaguariuna located about a half hour drive from Campinas. The church is an SRC church plant that is celebrating its one year anniversary. The service had about 25 people attending (a smaller number than usual due to the very heavy rain that night) and had a guest worship leader, Paulo Nazareth, son of Josue' Rodrigues who is a church planting partner in Niteroi, Rio. Paulo did an excellent job leading worship including several worship songs that he had written.

Pastor Rodrigo Leitao gave a good message on identifying the true church and the service was followed with food and fellowship.

Day Two - Evening services at Campolim Church in Sorocaba

Sonny visited Campolim Church in Sorocaba where Pastor Renato Camargo gave the message at two evening services which had a total of about 135 people attending. There was also a separate program for the many children in attendance. The church meets in the TransAmerica Hotel in Sorocaba which has small auditorium. The services included a worship band and there was a time of fellowship following each service. Good News Church is partnering with SRC to support the Campolim Church plant.

Day Two - Evening service at Renovo Church in Braganca Paulista

Rich and Valette visited Pastor Roberto Ferreira at Renovo Church in Braganca Paulista. Roberto is a very good speaker and gave an excellent message to a group of about 25 people. Rich, an elder at SRC, was invited to help serve communion at the service. Rich and Valette enjoyed the worship time which included a few songs in Portuguese and English.

Day Two - Evening service at Indaia Church in Indaiatuba

Larry and Fabiana attended Indaia Church in Indaiatuba, which is an SRC church plant about one hour from Campinas pastored by Pastor Ricardo Makino. There were about 40 people attending the service held at a school. The service included a time of prayer and praise led by Pastor Ricardo's wife, Luciana. Ricardo gave a great message including a very clear gospel presentation of the bad news and good news. Communion was served at the service which was followed by a great time of fellowship. Indaia is a grand-daughter church of SRC. It was planted by Vinhedo Church, Pastor Ricardo Costa, whose church SRC helped to plant in 2005. Indaia Church leaders are already looking into planting another community in the neighbor city of Jundiai. Pastor Ricardo Costa holds a bible study for 20 people once a week in Jundiai. Another church plant is being born...

Day Two - Chacara Primavera Church in Campinas

The team attended church on Sunday morning at Pastor Ricardo's church in Campinas. The service was well attended with 200+ and included a great time of worship. Headsets were provided to the team with real-time translation so that they were able to understand Pastor Ricardo's message. Following the service was lunch with Brazilian BBQ and a wonderful time of fellowship with Pastor Ricardo, his wife Sonia and their children with several members of the church. After wards, the team split up to attend several evening services at church plants in cities surrounding Campinas. Chacara Primavera is celebrating its 9th anniversary as a church. Pastor Ricardo is shown here introducing Pastor Ricardo Makino of Indaia Church in Indaiatuba and Pastor Rodrigo Leitao of Jaguariuna Church with their families. Both churches are completing their 1st year of ministry.

Day One - Campolim Church in Sorocaba

Rich, Valette and Craig traveled to Sorocaba, an SRC/GNC church plant about one hour driving from Campinas where Rich gave the Money Management Seminar for a group of about 80 people. Pastor Renato Camargo opened the evening with prayer and Rich gave the presentation which included Rich's testimony with the gospel and suggestions for preparing a budget and a plan for reducing debt. Rich was assisted by Nadia, who did an excellent job translating and made some good suggestions for adapting the presentation to a Brazilian audience. Her husband, Anderson, an accountant, helped translate some of the accounting terms. The presentation was followed by a Q & A time and the audience asked some very good questions. The presentation was done as an outreach into the community and was well advertised on radio, television and in the newspaper. Pastor Renato opened and closed in prayer and there was an intermission where he talked about the church and invited them to come to a Sunday service. After the seminar, Rich, Valette and Craig enjoyed a traditional Brazilian barbeque with Pastor Renato, Nadia, Anderson and several others at the home of one of the church members.

Rich and Valette with their translator, Nadia.

Day One - Renovo Church in Branganca Paulista

Sonny and Larry traveled to Branganca Paulista to give the Money Management seminar. Renovo is also an SRC/GNC church plant lead by Pastor Roberto Ferreira and is about one hour's drive from Campinas. Larry presented the seminar assisted by Angela, their translator who gave good suggestions on the flow of the presentation. There were about forty plus in attendance with a broad range of ages and backgrounds. Prior to the presentation there was live music featuring popular Brazilian songs. This presentation was also advertised widely in the community and included an invitation to attend the Sunday service. Paster Roberto took Sonny and Larry out for Brazilian pizza afterwards with several church members.

SRC/GNC team arrives in Brazil

Campinas, Brazil - March 13th, 2010
A team from SRC and Good News Church is in Brazil this week visiting our church plants and helping with the 2nd annual Church Planting Conference hosted by the Training Center for Church Planters (CTPI) at Chacara Primavera Church in Campinas, Brazil. Our movement leader in Brazil, Ricardo Agreste, is the Senior Pastor at Chacara Primavera. The team includes two members of the Good News Church (GNC) missions board, Sonny Lemons and Larry Weeks. Shown here are the members of the team that arrived in Brazil on Saturday (left to right): Larry Weeks, Rich Porter, Sonny Lemons, Fabiana Marques, Nicholas Marques, Craig Kindell and Valette Porter. Another team from SRC will join us starting Tuesday, March 16th.

After a short rest, Rich, Sonny and Larry prepare for their financial seminars Saturday night.