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Sububana Nov. 05- 7
Originally uploaded by Brazil Bean Brewed.

Russ, Val, Randy, Alicia and I made the trek out to a small church on the Bahia de Todos os Santos. It was the first church that I preached at and it was good to go back. The leaders of the church have asked us to go every second sunday of the month to teach and preach. This is a great opportunity for our team to get practice public speaking in Portuguese. This day was special because I convinced Russ that he was ready to do his first sermon in Portuguese. He did a really good job. I took the class because there is more discussion and sometimes it can be hard to understand all of the comments and questions. Lots has changed since the last time we were there. The church is now one year old, they lost their main preacher who we are supporting as he goes through a preacher training school in Recife. Also the church has had to move from the location they were renting to a very interesting meeting place. Since we have been in Salvador, we have learned that families have taken many years to build their homes, from one floor to the next. One of the families in the church had built their house up two stories but there was still room to build what is refered to as a "cobertura." A Cobertura is what families put on the roof of a house which is a simple tin roof that allows them to have a party room and also stop leaking from all the rain. This family offered to finish their cobertura and allow the church to meet there free of charge. What was interesting about it was when we left, almost everyone said we had just experienced church as close to the first century as possible. We could picture how the young man fell from the window while listening to Paul preach all night. To make matters more interesting, at the same time there was a mini typhoon blowing in from the Bahia de Todos os Santos. For awhile the wind was blowing so hard we thought we would blown away. After church the ladies were trying to raise some money so they were selling juice and cachorros quentes (hotdogs) for lunch. Let's just say it's not the kind of hot dogs we are used to. The meat and bun were about the only thing that was the same, they added a tomato sauce with corn as well as mayo, ketchup as a topping. Never had we eaten hotdogs with corn on it before. It was very different but tasty. Good times and great cultural experiences. Note: The picture is of Alicia standing at the top of the narrowest stairway to a church meeting you could ever imagine.