Rio Preto: Consolidation and Ministerial Conference

After passing through the "Encounter with God", the new converts were welcomed by the Community on the "Feast of the Consolidation", held on September 23rd, four days after the weekend. 
During the celebration, we remember what God had done, reviewing some photos of the event. It was preached a special word, based on John 15, where Jesus spoke of the need to abide in Him. We welcome the new participants to the community through a dinamic moment with hugs and prayers.
Each new convert received his "guardian angel", the disciple, an elder brother in faith, to help the new-christian the first steps in Christian life.We are happy to see that they all had a profound experience with God during the weekend and have experienced major changes in their lives. Our community is growing healthily. 
Glory to God!
 

MINISTERIAL CONFERENCE 
On October 2nd, a Ministerial Conference took place in our region, the West São Paulo State. The synod Pastor Jorge Schieferdecker was among us.The subjects were the 2011 agenda for the region and the Synod, the local Churches that need a new missionary or pastor in the region, Bible School and others.We took a walk to the new church building in Três Lagoas, which was inaugurated on October 10. It's great to see this realization of the local Church. On the way there we saw the damage caused by the storm that left the city in a state of calamity. The rooms of the church building were seriously affected by the storm.Pray for the churches in our region. Each one has their own challenges.

Rio Preto: Meeting God II

On September 18th and 19th, we had a Meeting with God Weekend. This was the fisrt time we prepared everything on our own. We were so excited about it and a little anxious because it was a challenge for a new team to prepare such a great evangelistic program.
Everything went well: The words, the schedule, the food and everything else. We managed to bring eight people to the weekend.  Five of them were new.
God is so kind! He was present all the time, leading people to brokenness and to understand their sins, but also His love and grace. The Holy Spirit came upon us in such a special way, with forgiveness, soul and body healing. It was tremendous!
On this Thursday we have a Welcoming party to the five new participants in Church, that came to the Weekend . Pray for them so that they manage to keep moving towards God's purpose. Alécio, Anderson, Paulo, Natalia  and Elaine are their names.
José, Josefa, members in Church were also there and they could also experience God’s Love, watching their nephew and son, Alécio and Anderson, being changed by God.
After some years working in the work of God, I can see this church experiencing a little of what happened in the early church:

            “And the Lord added to their number daily those who were being saved.”
Acts 2.47

Rio Preto: Meeting God

Last weekend we were involved with the "Meeting with God", a special retreat for evangelism. The focus is to give the non-Christians the opportunity to have an intense time to reflect and have their lives changed by many different preaching and prayer moments.

The word of God was preached concerning character, the love of God, the passion of the Christ, restoring dreams, libertation, our inheritance in Christ, multiplication and the Holy Spirit. The gospel and the plane of God are preached in one weekend. After most of these preaching, there was a time to receive prayer and take decisions for God.

We managed to take eight people to this weekend. Six of them have never visited our church.

What a tremendous experience! Five of them took the decision to follow Jesus in our church. The weekend “Meeting with God” is a great tool for evangelism.

On Tuesday we prepared a Welcome Party for the new Christians. After a worship moment, I preached about abiding, based in John chapter 15. After meeting Jesus we must keep our faith and abide in Christ. We had a special fellowship prayer moment welcoming each of the new participants in God’s Family. Then, every new Christian got a “Guardian angel”, an older Christian to help walking the first steps with Jesus. Finally, we had some food together. 

After all these happenings, we are about to start a worship group in Church, a youth cell and multiply the adults cell. The next meeting with God is going to be in September.

Hopefully, God will bless us with these achievements.

Thank you so much for your prayers and God bless you as he has blessed us!

We are praying for you in Norway

In Christ,

Tiago Seilert.

Rio Preto: May News

In Brazil, Mother's day is celebrated on the second Sunday of May. In Church, the children prepared a little tribute to the mothers present in the service. After reading a funny and sweet poem, they gave them a book about Mary, a special mother in Bible. We ask God to bless our Children Ministry, so that is grows.

After Meire's Birthday, we celebrated Maristela's Birthday. Again, we did it in the cell meeting on May 26th, having many visitors to experience the fellowship. Maristela’s sisters and other relatives were there and could hear the Word of God.

Yet in May, I had the opportunity to participated for three days in a very special pastors network discipleship in Goiânia, 500km away from Rio Preto. This meeting has the purpose to help and guide pastors in cell churches. I fell so blessed for being part of this group, getting much inspiration and ideas. We meet every 45 days. This is not only about strategy but about vision and prayer life. From that day on I started praying every day in the church building and I see pleasure in everything I do serving God. The Church is growing in vision, and soon, in number.

Our goal for this year is to achieve three cell groups and 30 participants. We believe the weekends “Meeting with God” are fundamental to change lives. We want to make every new Christian a disciple and help them grow with God.

I want to ask you to pray for this weekend, June 12^th and 13^th. There will be five to eight new people participating. Some people in Church are even fasting so that theses lives can really have a meeting with the love of God. The ones who decide for Jesus will be received in Church with a special party on Monday the 14^th, and start the discipleship. After that, they become members in Church. Please pray for these people, so that they get consolidated in the rock, Christ. I have some names so far: Natasha(20), Valéria(50), Jonas(19), João Paulo(41) and Rafael(20) are goint to be there. Some people are not confirmed for the weekend yet: Gabriel(17),Thamires(15) and Rejane (30). Pray for them.

I thank you for all the support and your prayer.

In Christ,

Tiago

Rio Preto: Cell group and Birthday Party

Meire’s Birthday

Our last cell meeting was very special. We celebrated Meire’s birthday. She has turned 31 this Thursday, May 6^th. Meire is part of our church since 2009 and became a member in September, after she decided to follow Jesus and stay with us in Church.

Joana, Meire’s sister, and some other relatives of her prepared the food and all the cell members were there. This was an evangelistic occasion, because we could be together with many people related to Meire and they have seen how God is working in her life.

The “birthday party cell meeting” started with each one of the participants saying blessing words for Meire. After that we sang a worship song and a fellowship song. I had a little word based in Psalm 90.12:

           

            “Teach us to number our days aright, that we may gain a heart of wisdom”

I invited everybody to take a minute to reflect about how we a living our lives and how are going to get wisdom. We can’t just think about our short life when we go to a funeral. Birthday is a glad opportunity to think and take the right decisions for our future.

I prayed for Meire and for all the participants, so that we find all the wisdom in God, following Jesus and focusing in His way and will. That’s the only way!

The party continued with pizza, sandwiches, snacks, soft rinks and much joy! God blessed our evening, touching everybody present there.

Tiago Seilert

For a Better Communication

Hello, my dear friends in Norway. I created this blog to help us communicate. There are three different local churches in Norway we keep in touch. Bogafjell, By Menigheten and Boe Menigheten. The idea is to send news and pictures trough this blog so that you may know everything about the missionary project in São José do Rio Preto - SP, Brazil. 

To make it easier, I'm going to post everything in English. It is possible to translate the texts to Norwegian through the Google translator.

About us

During the first two weeks of April, Gracielli and I took two weeks vacation and went to Rio Grande do Sul, to spend some days with my parents and relatives. That was a blessing.

Gracielli’s mother was involved in a car accident and needed help in Campo Grande, 600km away from Rio Preto. We had to visit her in the hospital and help her dealing with all the insurance and heath bureaucracy. She need a surgery to implant a prosthesis replacing the head of the femur. After one week at the Hospital, she is home and recovering. Pray for her!

About the missionary work

Our church is going through a blessed time now. Recently we had a special weekend called "A Meeting with God". Those who participated in this weekend were very impacted by God.

Some deep subjects were dealt during the weekend, such as forgiveness and others related to personal issues. The goal is to meet God and be freed from anything that stop us from being the kind of person God want us to be. God want to save us not just from hell, but he want to purify us and teach us how to win against the world, the devil and our sinful nature. Many people say they are Christians, but they don’t live the abundant live Jesus had promised to us. This is not about being happy only. This is about living God’s purpose for our lives. “A Meeting with God” is a powerful tool for our church.

Our plan is to invite people to participate in this weekend and welcome them in church through a close discipleship.

Testimony

We have a testimony to share with you. Natalia(15) is Maristela’s(40) doughter. Maristela is part of our church since five years ago. During this time she struggled a lot trying to make her family, her husband and three children (8, 15 and 20) come to church. Maristela managed to bring Natalia to the weekend. Both Maristela and Natalia had a great experience with God. They were very touched during the preaching and prayer moments.

Now, after more than two weeks, Maristela says that Natalia has been a wonderful obedient daughter, like never before. She stopped fighting with her little brother. She was not talking to her older sister for two months and now they are very good friends again. She uses to pray during the mornings and before sleeping. She is now starting a discipleship walk with us to grow spiritually.

Maristela also has changed. Before becoming Christian, she used to participate in a spiritism group together with her husband. When she became Christian, she started to struggle, because of the resistance coming from her husband, but specially a spiritual resistance. The “Meeting with God” helped Marsitela to win this spiritual war. She feels totally free from any link from the spiritism time and she understands that she is more than winner in Christ.

Day-by-day, Maristela conquers her family to Jesus. Praying on her knees and seeking God.

There would be more testimonies and I believe there will be more soon. The next “Meeting with God” is going to be on June 12^th and 13^th.

New Impulse

God is giving a new great impulse in the missionary work in Rio Preto. It is so wonderful when you see God moving and changing lives. I see some of my dreams being realized now. I always dreamed about a powerful church, where people get changed. That’s what I need. God knows how frustrated I was about the ministry. But he has changed me too.

Thank you for all the support you have gave to us! 

You can send comments to this post.

In Christ,

Missionario Tiago Seilert