Steve Long and Gilberto Lima in Brazil - November 2005

by Steve Long

Well folks, after two weeks of ministry we are now on vacation. Sandra joined me for the last weekend of ministry in a small city of 200,000 in southern Brazil.Gilberto Lima, one of our cell leaders, has established a ministry in Brazil (his homeland) called Intimacy with Father. We had four 3-day seminars in four cities, Sao Paulo and Curitiba being the two biggest cities.

At the first city my first talk was on meeting the Father for the very first time based on John 14 where Jesus tells his disciples that they still don't know the Father. Well, when we invited Holy Spirit to take them to the Father, it was deep. I have never seen such sobbing and wailing at any meeting. Each seminar was slightly different in terms of the host church. Three host churches were Foursquare and one was a Baptist. We built very strong relationships with these places and all the host pastors, except the last church, had been to Toronto.

The president of the Foursquare in the region is a pioneer and one of his pastors had been to Catch the Fire this year. He was so impacted that the president asked if the meetings could be switched to his church, which is far larger. In this small city of 200,000 this pastor has planted 16 churches and his building seats 2000. Each evening we had about 2500 in attendance with standing room, video overflow and outdoor seating all full.Over 5000 different people came to these meetings.The pastor in addition to starting 16 church plants in his city has started 200 in his state. He is also the congressman for his state and when we flew with him in the plane, most people knew him and shook his hand.The mayor of the town was also on our flight today and they spent a considerable amount of time talking together.

From the first step in the door of this church we knew that they were a striving congregation. The senior associate pastor was an older son (Luke 15) and was driven to please his pastor.The first night was very hard; there were 8 of us on the prayer team so we each prayed for about 400+ people.But by the end of the evening we had a breakthrough.One of the deacons got so drunk that he turned striving to receive into an experience of such deep love that he had people crying and laughing at the same time.He was so lost with God that he drew people to God.

Saturday and Sunday the people received so easily. They are not used to hands being laid on them and many did not know how to enter into His presence.Last night we did what we've done in all the seminars and that was to have a miracle healing night.We had folks minister to each other and we had several rounds of prayer: first for pain, then for hearing, sight, teeth/jaws, and then life threatening situations. We had over 500 healed from pain, over 50 at the front testifying of improved hearing, over 50 at the front for sight and about 25 for the life threatening diseases.The host pastors were ecstatic at the healings and we told them that this was a result of intimacy.

One of the highlights of the trip has been the food or should I simplify, the meat.These folks are related to lions as they eat meat like we drink water.Every night we've had a meal after the meeting. At the first city, all the restaurants were closed by midnight when the meetings normally finish so we went to a burger stand. The large burger was 9 inches in diameter! At the last church, they served us a meal each day at noon and midnight. Meat was brought in by the crate load. Last night it was huge roasts and you cut what you want, as often as you want, when you want. Lots of nice seasoning so it was very tasty.I have been to the hotel gyms almost every day but I'm sure I have put weight on.

Love you all!

Steve Long