"Preach the gospel at all times; if necessary, use words." Saint Francis of Assisi

Thursday, January 29, 2009

The Terrys

Two days ago we put these people on a plane for the first leg of their trip back to the United States.
This is Sascha, Jennifer and Elisa Terry.

This is the last picture taken of them before they left their Brasilian home and got on a plane. For the past 5 years they have lived here in Porto Alegre. They have been our teammates, good friends and, most importantly, part of our family in Christ.

We've been blessed by their being here these last 5 years. We have a lot of history with them.

Benay actually set them up on their first date when she had them "accidentally" meet in our apartment in Abilene, Texas a little over 7 years ago.

Benay and Carys flew back from Brasil to be in their wedding. Benay was a bridesmaid and Carys was the flower girl.

We were there when we welcomed them at the Porto Alegre airport 5 years ago. They arrived when there were many team problems that I'm sure made them want to get right back on the airplane and go back to the states. But they stayed. They were committed to staying and helping to plant something with the goal of having it be here when Christ returns.

They are Spirit led people and we were blessed to be able to be together as God united this team in incredible ways, turned all of our pre-Brasil ideas on it's head and led us to begin a network of house churches.

We've been blessed to see them have their first child here. We know it was tough for this young couple to have a child be born and live so far away from her grandparents.

We saw them make kingdom relationships. We saw them bring people to the Lord who would not be with us for eternity if the Terrys had not come here.

We've had some hard times but they never quit being led by the Spirit and never quit on being open to what God wanted of them here in Porto Alegre and of this church family.

We had a big goodbye party for them last week and they intentionally invited some people who don't know Christ for the purpose of allowing them to build kingdom relationships that would last after they were gone. That is the kind of people they are.....always working for the kingdom to grow in Brasil until the day they got back on the plane. They understand that every conversation has eternal consequences.

Now it's time for them to continue their kingdom work in the United States. We know God will continue blessing this family as they continue reach the lost.

Please pray for them that the reverse culture shock (which we've been told is worse than culture shock) will be as mild as possible. That God will bless them with a great city to live in and great jobs.

We will miss them greatly but we know that our goodbye on Tuesday was really more of a "see you later" than a "goodbye" because we will continue working together for the kingdom.

God bless you Sascha, Jennifer and Elisa. We are the ones who were blessed by our last 5 years together.

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