Sunday  September 7th we held our first session of Águas Vivas (Living Waters).  We have 3 guys, 4 gals  in the group and one guy and gal who we are training as leaders.

We meet every Sunday from 9-11:30am

The gal we are training is Rute (Ruth). We have shared quite a bit of her story with you over the past 9 months. God is continuing to work in her life in ways that are  remarkable. She has grown up with so little, with every boundary imaginable broken and God continues to heal her, train her and strengthen her.  “I feel like this young child being securely embraced by God.  I no longer feel anguish nor a deep hatred towards my parents.”  We are so excited that she also felt she was to be trained. 

Emerson is the young man who I am training. He is such a gifted young man who has sincerely been impacted by God thru this ministry of Living Waters. The other day I sat him down to look at his schedule and to have a realistic look at everything that he is doing. In the process I said that he needs to figure out how he is going to take care of himself and those he loves. I  also said that he  is going to need to decide what things he is to put his hands to and what things he needs to let go of. He is doing way too much and has literally no time to take care of himself and his daughter.

I listed all the things that he is doing and said, soon you will need to cut out some of these things. One of the things that I listed was Living Waters. When he got to that ministry he said, ” I can’t let this one go. I am only doing well in the other areas of my life because of what God has done in me thru Living Waters. 

I certainly don’t know what the future holds for Emerson and Living Waters, but what he has made very clear is that his health as a person and a follower of Jesus is connected to what God has done and is doing thru Living Waters.

Both of these people have walked through some very deep things in their lives and have received a fair bit of healing. They have gained a lot of wisdom and peace from God and you can see it as they interact with others who are very broken.

Each of them have retold recent stories to us where they have counselled others and ended up sharing a depth of wisdom that is quite remarkable. We feel honoured to have the opportunity to train these two.

Outside of our Águas Vivas group, Cyndi and I are both working with 2-3 other people. So in total, we are working with about 14 people , taking them through the Living Waters material. It feels good to have jumped right in there:)

We are really enjoying the Sunday classes. We both feel a whole lot more comfortable with the material in Portuguese and the ministry times at the end of the sessions have been amazing. 

As for counselling and taking people through the material individually, we are not sure if this is the best way to do things. It is extremely tiring and these individuals do not have the benefit of hearing other’s stories, and observing how God is meeting others in their brokenness. However, we are here to help as many people as we can and for now this is what we feel we need to do.  At the same time, we are meeting more and more people whose marriages are on the verge of exploding apart. There is so much infidelity and secrecy. We are being asked to jump in and help these folks as well.

Please pray for wisdom to know how to help these hurting people. On the outside they look like they have it all together. They have jobs, house and beautiful children, but the depth of hurt and the choices that they have made continue to rip their families apart.

Pray also for Emerson and Rute. That they will continue to receive more healing in their own lives and that they will have wisdom from God when they are helping others.