Dear Praying Friends, July 16, 2016
Tired but Grateful. This is how I felt upon my departure from Louisville, KY after spending the week with thousands of teenagers! The nation’s best speakers, thinkers and bands came together to challenge all of us to embrace who we are and to live sent! (living as one sent).
Most of my time was spent accompanying groups of teens in our “Love Moves Brazil” Theme Walk. 2500 students and leaders took the walk and I spoke to half of them- over 15 hours of talking. https://vimeo.com/161804617
“What does a teen from the USA think that the Brazilian urban artist is trying to say through his graffiti?”
40 people from ReachGlobal Crises Response division and 40 Brazilians visiting the conference, worked for three days and nights to set up Love Moves Brazil (there was even Human Foosball).
I am grateful for their hard work as they were able to capture the drastic contrast of the beautiful and “Seen” Rio de Janeiro and the Hideous and “Hidden” Rio de Janeiro. What appears to be true on the surface sometimes hides lies buried deep below. The experience lasted about 45 minutes per session.
After coming out of the beautiful Ipanema beach and the new, billion dollar stadium Maracanã students who apparently took a wrong turn found themselves in a back alley in front of one of Rio’s notorious 1000 slums (favelas) confronted with the hard truth that at the cost of hosting the World Cup and Olympic games Brazil’s poor have been denied doctors in their hospitals and teachers in their schools. The poor paid for the party but were not invited to dance.
After feeling the brokenness of injustice practiced in Brazil the students were asked to examine their own hearts. What are the lies that we have buried deep in our hearts hidden from those closest to us while trying to convey an image of what we want people to think is true?
Teens wrote the lies down on a tile. After passing through another room where God’s truths were read declaring who we are in Christ the teens completed the phrase, I am …… and wrote it on the wall. Then they broke the tile and the bondage of the lie after being prayed over. The broken pieces of tiles were used to build a mosaic of the Christ Statue shown below. The impact was great. Youth groups huddled to together to follow up after the walk and many spent an hour or more working through the healing.
I was representing Caju Life Church and Redemis Sal e Luz. Below I am chatting with Pastor Tinoco my invited guest from Rio, director of Redemis.
Students purchased coffee and were given a blue ticket. The coffee money went to one of five Brazilian missions. They could choose which mission they wanted the money to go to by placing the ticket in a jar on that Mission’s table.
Please pray:
I was very glad to have a small part in ministering to the teens at Challenge. Please pray for American Teens. All around the country teens have been meeting in conferences like this one engaging with the Word of God and being empowered by the Holy Spirit. Pray that that God will raise up a generation that is free to follow Jesus with their whole heart.
On Tuesday Alessandra, Alyssia and I will be heading to the US. Please pray for us as we prepare and travel. Our first stop will be a family reunion. It has been about 15 years since the Weyandts and Drys have made it to the Goodhart’s party (my mother’s side of the family). God seems to be working in the Goodharts and we want to be a blessing.
Pray that God will provide the resources necessary for us to fulfill all that He is calling us to do and be. We are still raising funds for the EFCA Challenge and ReachGlobal Panama Conferences and for US travel while we are on home assignment. If you would like to contribute please see below.
Pray for the city of Rio as it receives the Olympic Games. There is much sadness here. Pray that God will be gracious and bring about true change through a people committed to godly principles (love God and love your neighbor). Pray for a spirit of conviction that would bind corruption and greed, violence, dishonesty, and perversion of what is good and true. Is it possible that the city has hit Rock Bottom on the EVE of the Games for the World to see?
Thank you for coming along with us on our spiritual and missional journey. We will be sending out an agenda of where we will be these next couple of months and hope to hear from you! We will not get many opportunities like this one to visit you as a family! We will do the best we can to receive you or come see youJ
Delighting in Him,
Craig, Alessandra and Alyssia
Partner with us Financially!
Or
Make checks out to: EFCA ReachGlobal
Attach a note that says: I am supporting the ReachGlobal work in Brazil by Craig Weyandt, Account 1409
Please Mail Check to: EFCA ReachGlobal; 901 East 78th Street; Minneapolis, MN 55420-1300
952-854-1300
