Since our move to Joinville 3 months ago, we have been doing more observing than anything. Why, because we can’t assume that what we know about planting simple churches where we were will work in the cultural context we find ourselves in now. What we are finding is that even though Joinville was founded by Germans, the city itself is very Brazilian with an international feel to it. Some of the cities surrounding Joinville also have distinct cultural identities.

For the past 5 weeks or so, we’ve been getting to know a house church in a city about an hour from Joinville. In the past, we said that we have experiences from which they can learn and that they have things to teach us as well. This past Sunday they invited us to share the Lord’s Supper with them. It was a great day – we shared a meal together, praised the Lord together, and continued to get to know each other. It has been very good seeing the way they share life together. The leader of that house church was talking with another guest they had invited that day – we were sitting around while the food was cooking. He said something along these lines, “I don’t know Stan yet. All I see is the perfect Stan who comes to visit. The others in house church I know because I am with them all the time.” He was not slighting me in any way, but rather stating the reality of our relationship. Only when we spend a lot of time together, hours a day, week in and week out, do we get to know the real person. This is life together. This is what house church is all about. In fact, it is Christianity as Jesus intended it to be.

In our three visits with this house church, maybe 15 hours together, God has been showing us how He wants us to go about planting simple churches in Northern Santa Catarina. We want to plant organic (Brazilian), reproducing, simple churches through the making of disciples. Do we have it all worked out? No, but we are getting there. God still has a lot more to teach us, but He is answering your prayers already.

We asked you to pray that God would bring us a man of peace in Joinville. We believe that God has brought him into our lives.

About two weeks ago I received an email from a colleague. He had been at a meeting of Baptist pastors. On Friday, September 18^th, he sent me contact information for three pastors in this region who were interested in meeting with me to see if we might be able to work together. To my surprise, the following day one of those pastors (who lives in Joinville) was knocking on my door. I met with him yesterday (Wednesday, September 23).

Normally when I explain house church to members or pastors of institutional churches here in Brazil they look at me with blank stares, as if I were speaking another language. But, I really am speaking Portuguese with them. The blank stares almost always turn into rejection of house church as a valid form of church. Very few Brazilian pastors, in my limited experience, accept that house church is truly church. And, of the few who accept it as legitimate church, none that I know have embraced it as the path they want to follow for church planting. So, I was not overly encouraged going to meet with yet another pastor to talk about reaching Joinville through house churches.

I was well received by this pastor. He truly has a desire to see Joinville reached. He’s been reading a lot about how to go about that task. He already understood that the usual approach of institutional churches in Brazil isn’t going to reach the city – the birth rate minus the death rate is still greater than the growth rate of the institutional churches. So, he had been trying to figure out if the answer would be found in small groups, a cell church model, or even in house churches.

I laid all the cards on the table. I walked him through house church in the New Testament. I explained what I see as God’s purpose for the church and how that is fulfilled in house church. I explained how leadership functions in house churches and house church networks as I am learning it from the Scriptures. There are still a few places that I’m sorting through things, but much of it is coming together. Usually when I lay this all out people just don’t get it. This truly is a different language than the language of the institutional church. Each step of the way he either had already seen what I was explaining in Scripture, or understood it as I was explaining it – the pieces were fitting together, the light bulbs were coming on.

When I finished explaining these things to him, he simply asked how we get from where he is – institutional church – to what we see in the New Testament – house churches networking together to make disciples in cities and regions and among all the peoples on earth. That’s the part I didn’t have an answer for yet. Nonetheless, he wants to walk this path together. He wants to reach Joinville with the gospel of Jesus Christ and he is willing to lay down his traditional ways of doing things in order to accomplish this task. He asked if we could start next week.

I believe God has given us this man of peace in Joinville. But, God did not give us this man of peace until He taught us some very valuable lessons. God’s timing is perfect in every way. This pastor is new in town. God brought him here about two months ago, just about the same time He brought us here. The road ahead will not be wide and smooth, but narrow and rough. But, the burden of my Savior is light and He does not leave me to walk it alone.

Thank you for your faithfulness in praying for us. We will keep you updated as we walk this road.

Blessings – Stan, Wendy and Ariana