Sunday, February 22, 2009
Monday, May 12, 2008
Gislaine's Story
Interview with Gislaine Freitas
Founder & Director of REAME
September 10, 2007
Reaching out with hope and education to children in at-risk situations
Responsabilidade : Responsibility towards society
Evangelho : The Gospel as the hope giving message
Atingir : Reaching out to the needy
Meninos de rua : Reintegrate children-at-risk in society
Educação : Education
I believe the Lord can always use our lives to glorify His Kingdom.
I had a childhood that was very solitary and sad – I was lonely. When I was a teenager I was presented with a choice: either I would become bitter because of my life, or I would use that sad story of my life as an opportunity to give happiness to other children. I accepted the Lord when I was 14 years old and this was the choice the Lord gave me at that time.
I grew up being told and believing I was worth nothing and I would never amount to anything. But when I accepted the Lord, the Lord showed me I would work in His service. And so I made the decision the devil would no longer be able to speak in my ear, that I had no value. I said to the Lord, “I’ve learned that you, Lord, think I’m a beautiful person and I can accomplish something for Your kingdom.”
Almost right from the time I accepted the Lord it was placed on my heart to work with people on the street – indigent people -- beggars and prostitutes. So right from the beginning I was burdened to work with people in the street. I started seeing street children and realized they were no different from me.
It impacted my life so, to get to know these children who lived on the streets. I started loving and embracing them, and found I could love and work with them in ways I could not in working with the beggars and prostitutes.
When I was 19 years old I started working in the office of the Brazilian Baptist Home Missions dept. I was happy working there, doing the Lord’s work and helping Home Missionaries in various parts of Brazil. Even during this time on Friday nights, in the middle of the night I was on the street, mostly working with street children.
It so happened there came a time the Home Mission board was making a manual to teach their people how to work with street children. Once they started this writing project, statistics began to come into the office and I began to realize how much bigger the problem of street children was, more than I realized, here in Brazil. Children were addicted to drugs, working in prostitution.
I found my heart became very burdened to work to a greater degree with these children – more than I was currently doing. I went to my bosses in the Home Mission office, telling them I wanted to work more with the children on the streets of Rio. There were not many people working with them, and the Lord had burdened me to do it. There were some ministries to poor children in the slums – but to children living on the streets who sniffed glue, smoking marijuana, doing cocaine – there was no ministry to help these kids yet.
The response I got was, I was asking at the top (national level), and it needed to start at the grassroots level. At this point no one on the state or local church level was saying they wanted to start a ministry like this. I felt a very heavy burden that I was supposed to do this job, but didn’t know how to start, where to start, who to ask, or what direction to go.
In 1992-93 I was engaged to be married, and both my fiancée and I felt like God was leading that I should leave my job and work to a greater degree with the street kids. At this point it was not to work during the night, but in the afternoon or evenings with the kids in a park. I talked with Marcus about it and he agreed that this was something I should do.
I was still young – about 23 years old. I resigned from my job and started to work with the street kids. I didn’t know how to do it, but I was burdened so just started – I decided I would play with them, tell them Bible stories. The first day I arrived in a park with my hand puppets, some juice and bread and just said to some kids there, “let’s sit down and play!”
Because I switched (to afternoons), this was a different group of kids than I had known. Two boys came up to me and asked, “Did you come to get the children?” I said “No, I just came to play with them. Why are you asking that?” They said that sometimes the juvenile justice system would come looking for kids, (and were telling the truth), and other times persons would say that, but later we find out they killed the children.
I said, “No, no! I am just here to tell you about the love of the Lord for you.” So the boys stayed and we started playing. I told them I wanted to come daily from 3 to 5pm, and they should tell their friends to come too. Even by the next day the word had spread, and some of my kids from the middle of the night showed up. These kids I already knew were excited to see me, and said “Auntie! You’re going to come every day?” (they called me Auntie). I said yes, every day, from 3 to 5pm.
I was there by myself and sometimes there was a lot of chaos – kids fighting, some of the kids trying to steal things. It was out of control. So the Lord gave me an idea to help bring order.
I told them “In our church we have deacons, to help the pastor. So, I’m a missionary and every day when I come I’m going to choose one of you to be a deacon, and you’re going to help me!” And all of a sudden they were all good… they wanted to be the first deacon! They all wanted a chance. So I told them “Today, whoever acts the best –quietest and most attentive, can be the deacon for the next day.”
When it was time, for instance, to pass out the juice and bread, the deacon of the day got to tell the kids to stand in line and be nice. He got to be the boss, was excited and the kids were accustomed to obeying other kids who had authority. So I got to rest a bit while the Deacon was in charge!
What it came to be called was ‘Deacon of the Day’. If someone stole my purse or the bread, the DOFD would say “don’t worry auntie. I will see that it’s okay.”
Usually the reason they would try to steal something would be, if a child had disobeyed and I had to discipline them, they would try to steal something of mine-- purse, etc. to get back at me. Frequently I would get a phone call in the middle of the night from the Deacon of the Day saying “OK Auntie… the thief has been captured!” This was the idea the Lord gave me to help provide physical security and safety. In choosing the Deacon of the Day I would try to choose one of the natural leaders.
I would look for children on the street, particularly younger ones that I didn’t know, and invite them to stay at the park with me. Up to now I worked with 10-12 year olds. I started noticing the younger children and called them to me. What I didn’t realize was that the street kids hung out by general age groups. Each group usually had a “boss” that looked out for them. When I invited these younger kids to join us, it caused problems. When the younger kids came (as a group) one day, the older kids actually started stoning them. I had to get between them and stop the stone-throwing. I said, “No! I invited them to join us. Why are you doing this?” The older kids told me “They (the younger ones) cannot be with us.” They were very angry. So I told the younger ones to go away – toward a little fast food place (like a McDonald’s) nearby. I told them I would come and talk with them in a little bit.
After the little kids left, the older kids told me, “No, we cannot mix, and this is the reason why. The little kids spend their time stealing fruit from the fruit stand or from someone on the street, to get money for it. We’re smarter than that. If someone on the street has been robbed and they see one of the little kids with us, they will assume we stole it, and we’ll get in trouble. We can’t have anything to do with them. We’re smarter than them. Now we rob on the bus or wait until nighttime.”
Once I understood this is how it had to be, I told the older kids that, since I also wanted to spend time with the younger kids, I would be with them every other day, and be with the little ones on the other day(s). They said, “No! We want to be with you every day!” But I just had to say “No, this is how it’s going to be.” They need to hear the gospel too, so this is how it’s going to be.
And this is how it was, until I started going out to churches to talk about the ministry. Then the Lord began to raise up a team to work with me and we could work with both groups every day. It continued this way for four years.
During these four years a lot of children died. A lot of times I‘d be awakened by children coming to my house saying “We need to go to the morgue; you need to help us identify a child.” Many times I had to identify children I knew and loved. If the body was not identified the child would be buried as an unknown person. They bury people within 24 hours here. So I would try and identify the child and find the family. This was the only way the child could be buried knowing who they were.
It came to a point where I found a place near the park where I could kind of clean the kids up with a washing up and take them to church. The problem was, after the worship service I had to take them back and leave them on the street. This was such a burden, I told the Lord, “Lord, I need some place for these children to live.” I felt an urgency to find a house for them.
In the meantime, though I didn’t know about this, because there was such a large population of street kids, the mayor of one of the neighborhoods was establishing a house as a shelter for street children. They had identified this house they wanted to use as a shelter so they decided to send out a social worker to gather some information – they wanted some of the specific statistics of the situation they had to deal with. More girls? More boys? Just needed some information. And all the children they talked to were mentioning some woman named “Gislaine.” One day my phone rang and it was the mayor’s secretary saying “The mayor would like to meet with you in his chambers tomorrow at 10am.” I said “What did I do?!” The secretary said “I’m sorry I don’t have any information. All I know is the mayor wants to meet with you at 10 am.” I was really afraid! I had no idea what I had done!!
So I arrived with fear and trembling, but he very nicely said, “Have a seat!” I was impressed because he didn’t even know me and he was so nice! The federal Public Defender had given the Mayor (of Nauvu Iguasu), because of this huge problem with street children, a 3-month deadline to come up with some solutions. Every city has money given it from the government for social assistance. Many times they don’t use it, or use it for other things. In this case the Fed Public Defender said “You’ve got a big problem and have 3 months to begin to address it!”
So they were given this 3-month deadline; the government said the money is available, and if you don’t use it within 3 months we’re going to start fining you every day past the 3 month deadline.
So the Mayor told me, “We have this house we want to use as a shelter and we want you to be the coordinator of it.” I understood he was not paying me a big compliment – he was going to have a mountain of kids in this house and because they knew me, he figured I would provide some kind of security. I did not see this as any kind of compliment!!
So even though I went into this knowing I was probably being used, I also knew I had this burden for a house. I thought who knows what God might do with this?
I agreed to do it, but said I would do it only as long as everything was honest and above board. So the partnership only lasted six months! After 6 months I went on a 4-month maternity leave (for my first child); after 6 weeks (of my 4-month leave) I found out the mayor was doing a lot of things I didn’t approve of. My name was going to be dragged through the mud as a result of what he was doing. I went to him and told him I was quitting. He said “but you shouldn’t! You can have this nice 4-month maternity leave!” I told him no way! I had told him I would stay only as long as business was conducted with honesty and integrity. It was my reputation that would suffer and I was not going to be a part of it. So I quit.
So I was sad, but went back to working with the children on the street. I was sad because I realized I’d have to rebuild this ministry; when I got there (back on the street) I realized there were more kids than ever. I also realized (after I left the shelter) that some of the kids were so attached to me that they refused to stay at the shelter – they preferred to live on the street and be with me in the afternoons. I said to the kids, “You don’t want to stay on the street! Go back to the house!” But they said no, they didn’t want to – they loved me and wanted to stay with me.
I was saddened that this first attempt at having a shelter, a house for the kids, didn’t work out. However, I had not changed my mind about wanting a house for the kids. This one didn’t work out, but the burden was still in my heart.
In 1995 a group of 5 individuals from various churches established an NGO (non-governmental organization). They wanted to work with street children. So they did the same thing – started interviewing street children – and again, started hearing the name “Gislaine.”
So they found me and said, “We’d like to open a shelter, a house, for street children, and we’d like you to be the director.” I was so excited. I thought, Wow! These are Christians, doing just what I want to do.
For my work ministry in the park with the kids, I had established a legal organization and named it “REAME” (hey-AH-me). Well, when you register a legal organization you have to have an address. I couldn’t give the park address (where I met with the kids) so I registered it with my home address. When these believers came to me about starting a house, they were in the organizational phase. Now in our discussions the president of this NGO was saying to me, “You need to change the name. REAME is the name of your organization. For this shelter we have to change the name.”
So we come to an important meeting which was held at a church. There were 50 of us sitting in a circle at this meeting. We had to decide on a name. I was in one spot in the circle and opposite me was the president of this NGO. He looked at me and said, “We need to decide on a name. Your organization’s name is REAME.” I told him we could change the name; the name wasn’t important to me. But then something happened.
Now I’m a Baptist and most of the people in this circle were Pentecostal in faith. But at this meeting something happened that is outside of my understanding and religious experience. To this day I don’t understand it. A woman left her place in this circle and came to stand before me and said, “I see before you flags of different nations, and people from many nations will come to you. And you are not supposed to change the name REAME. This is the name you are to keep.”
So I left the meeting totally crushed. I didn’t understand what was going on, I left in tears. I went back to my ministry in the park. I was willing to change the name, but now evidently couldn’t. I didn’t know what to do with this prophecy that I was to keep the name. But I couldn’t keep the name and work with the group.
However, 3 months after that meeting this group was all infighting among themselves and the NGO dissolved and came to nothing, after 3 months. I could see the Lord’s hand in it then, but it was a very difficult time.
The Lord sent women to work with me and they brought food with them; every day they served beans and rice to the children, a lot of food that was like a banquet. During these next two years the burden for a house never left me and I continued to plead with the Lord for a house.
My husband has worked in a bank for 24 years. At this time my husband was given a promotion opportunity to be a bank manager. He had been working in middle-management, and when he received this promotion to serve as General Manager it came with a huge jump in salary. We looked at each other and wondered what to do with all this money. I looked at him and said, “I know exactly what to do with this money!” He grinned back and said, “Let’s get a house!” I said Yes! Let’s open a shelter! So I went out the next morning and started looking for a house to rent.
As I was looking for houses I’d talk to the owners and tell them I was looking for a house to open as a shelter for kids that I’d been working with for four years. The owner(s) would look at me and say, “No way am I renting my house to you for street children!” So I told the Lord, “What am I to do? You’ve given me money for a house but I can’t find anyone who will rent me a house!”
One day I came across a house that was beautiful – a big yard with a fountain. I could picture the house with children playing in the fountain. But I thought, “No way. No one up to now will rent me a house, and these owners certainly won’t rent me this beautiful house.
So I continued to look at several smaller houses. When I got home I couldn’t stop thinking about it; it would be so fun for children to play there. So I decided to just ask. All he could do was say NO.
I found the owner of the house and went with fear and trembling. I told him I wanted to rent his house. I‘d been working with children for 4 years and wanted a house for them. He said, “What a wonderful ministry you have! Yes, I’ll rent you my house.” I thought, He must not understand. So I said to him, “No, this isn’t going to be a daycare. This is going to be a shelter where street children will live.” He replied, “Yes, I think that’s a wonderful idea. I’d love to rent you my house!” Then I thought, “I don’t believe he understands me; I couldn’t believe he would rent me the house.” So I said, “No, I don’t think you understand me. These are going to be STREET children living in the house!” And he rented me the house.
I had been afraid that if he didn’t really understand what I wanted it for, there could be legal problems in the future.
I will never forget when the children arrived at the house. When they saw the fountain, they were so excited and all jumped in and were actually bathing in it! Behind that house there was an empty property, so there was so much space there for the children. It was wonderful. We had that house for two years. The first week I had four children and 3 more joined shortly after, so we had 7 children in this house.
In 1997, once I had the house and starting to pay rent, I had no one to live there and take care of the children! And I didn’t think God was calling me to do that. I had a friend named, Eliete (El-ee-etch). I went to my friend, who is a real woman of prayer. We had a wonderful time together and at the end of our prayer time Eliete looked at me and said, “The Lord is calling ME to be that person.” I was very surprised. Eliete was married and had 4 children, one of whom was 8 years old, blind and still in diapers. I looked at her and said, “Are you sure? I think this will be too much for you!” But she was sure.
The house had 3 bedrooms. When they moved in, Eliete and her family moved into one bedroom, with an armoire in the middle for privacy. Eliete and her husband slept on one side and the 4 kids on the other. The other 2 bedrooms had the other children – about 7 or 8 per room (we had 15 kids most of the time.)
Some of the women who helped in the park came as volunteers to help us in the house. But since they were volunteers though, they didn’t always show up. So we had 15 kids plus Eliete’s 4, plus my own child. On some days (if a volunteer didn’t show up) it was just me and Eliete with all these children!!
So we had all this work with these children and often volunteers didn’t come. The Lord gave me another idea. I talked with Eliete and asked, “What if we packaged lunches to sell? We need more money so we can pay someone to come regularly [and not depend on volunteers].” Eliete asked if I was crazy! I had a friend who was a pediatrician at a nearby hospital. I went to her and asked, “If I started making lunches, would you promote it among your hospital colleagues and encourage them to come buy from us?”
She was willing to do this, and so we started making and selling lunches for people. Eliete and I decided to do this, though she thought it was an awful lot of work. I would go in the morning to the hospital and take lunch orders (2 options: rice/beans with something else – salad, chicken or something). Then we’d cook it. In order to get it delivered, we asked the children to help us. Of course the children weren’t too good and didn’t really know how to do deliveries too well. I’d get phone calls from people, “There’s a child here trying to give me lunch, but the orders are all mixed up!” They understood though and just grinned and bore it, and paid me money for their lunch anyway.
Soon we found we had plenty of money because people felt sorry for us and knew it was a good cause! Even though people were buying lunches, it just wasn’t working very well and I was ashamed of it a bit.
So I approached the pastor of a church with another idea. I wanted to approach doctors to donate their time for community clinics, but we would charge people who came 10 Reals (about $5) to see the doctor. The proceeds would go to help underwrite REAME expenses. The doctors were willing to do this.
Once I had this arranged, I would leave Eliete with all the children (and hopefully a volunteer.) I would go hand out leaflets to people in the street advertising that they could go see a doctor for 10 Reals (which is a good price.) Then in the afternoon I would go to the church and serve as a receptionist for the doctor. With this arrangement then, we were able to hire a cook to prepare food for all the children. This was a big help, since the house parent didn’t have to prepare meals on top of working with the kids.
The pastor of this church was impressed with the industriousness of our workers. He went to the head of the state (Brazilian) Baptist Convention and brought him to see the work of REAME. This pastor brought the State head and he said, “This is a strategic ministry! We need to help this ministry!” I said to him, “You know, years ago I worked for the national Home Mission board. If you’ll go to them and tell them about what you want to do, I know they’ll help you!!” So we were able to stop the medical work when we started receiving money from the State Convention for the work of REAME. It wasn’t a lot of money but we started receiving money from 3 places: that church, the State Convention, and from the Home Mission board. It was enough to help us get established.
Even though it wasn’t a lot of money, the fact that it was these three places helped when I started visiting people and churches. Then I was able to say “These three organizations are contributing to our ministry” and it really helped to encourage others to give. So we started seeing some growth in the funding base for the ministry.
In 1999 the Baptist Home Mission board said to me, “We want to support REAME more, but this is how we want to do it. We think your work is important and we would like you to become a Home Missionary. We will support you as a home missionary.” So that’s what we decided to do. This was good in that it was another open door in churches. I could identify myself as a missionary of the Home Mission board (of the Brazil Baptist Convention).
Even though I now had money coming in from various places, I was using my salary to support REAME. The money was growing but it wasn’t enough. We now needed to hire a second staff member, and the money just wasn’t sufficient to support running the house.
I was at a state convention and one of the speakers was a pastor from a large church in Sao Goncalvo. I knew who he was: he’s well known in the Convention, leads a big church, and I knew he could be a big help. But I was very nervous. So in spite of my fears I went up to him, introduced myself and said, “REAME could really use your help.” At this point, this pastor (the lead pastor) poked the associate pastor next to him and said, “Well, we’ve already found her!”
When we started talking, the pastor said to me, “Our church owes a debt to the street children of Sao Goncalvo. When we first started our church, we started with a work to street children. As our church grew, the ministry stopped, and I have felt a debt to them, but I don’t have a way to start that.” So they were looking for me specifically because they’d heard of me. They were interested in helping the street children of Sao Goncalvo specifically.
Seven years ago he started helping REAME with 5000 Reals a month [that’s about $2500]. With this help we were able to hire more people and the structure began improving.
Out of time for interview… but the story isn’t over!
Founder & Director of REAME
September 10, 2007
Reaching out with hope and education to children in at-risk situations
Responsabilidade : Responsibility towards society
Evangelho : The Gospel as the hope giving message
Atingir : Reaching out to the needy
Meninos de rua : Reintegrate children-at-risk in society
Educação : Education
I believe the Lord can always use our lives to glorify His Kingdom.
I had a childhood that was very solitary and sad – I was lonely. When I was a teenager I was presented with a choice: either I would become bitter because of my life, or I would use that sad story of my life as an opportunity to give happiness to other children. I accepted the Lord when I was 14 years old and this was the choice the Lord gave me at that time.
I grew up being told and believing I was worth nothing and I would never amount to anything. But when I accepted the Lord, the Lord showed me I would work in His service. And so I made the decision the devil would no longer be able to speak in my ear, that I had no value. I said to the Lord, “I’ve learned that you, Lord, think I’m a beautiful person and I can accomplish something for Your kingdom.”
Almost right from the time I accepted the Lord it was placed on my heart to work with people on the street – indigent people -- beggars and prostitutes. So right from the beginning I was burdened to work with people in the street. I started seeing street children and realized they were no different from me.
It impacted my life so, to get to know these children who lived on the streets. I started loving and embracing them, and found I could love and work with them in ways I could not in working with the beggars and prostitutes.
When I was 19 years old I started working in the office of the Brazilian Baptist Home Missions dept. I was happy working there, doing the Lord’s work and helping Home Missionaries in various parts of Brazil. Even during this time on Friday nights, in the middle of the night I was on the street, mostly working with street children.
It so happened there came a time the Home Mission board was making a manual to teach their people how to work with street children. Once they started this writing project, statistics began to come into the office and I began to realize how much bigger the problem of street children was, more than I realized, here in Brazil. Children were addicted to drugs, working in prostitution.
I found my heart became very burdened to work to a greater degree with these children – more than I was currently doing. I went to my bosses in the Home Mission office, telling them I wanted to work more with the children on the streets of Rio. There were not many people working with them, and the Lord had burdened me to do it. There were some ministries to poor children in the slums – but to children living on the streets who sniffed glue, smoking marijuana, doing cocaine – there was no ministry to help these kids yet.
The response I got was, I was asking at the top (national level), and it needed to start at the grassroots level. At this point no one on the state or local church level was saying they wanted to start a ministry like this. I felt a very heavy burden that I was supposed to do this job, but didn’t know how to start, where to start, who to ask, or what direction to go.
In 1992-93 I was engaged to be married, and both my fiancée and I felt like God was leading that I should leave my job and work to a greater degree with the street kids. At this point it was not to work during the night, but in the afternoon or evenings with the kids in a park. I talked with Marcus about it and he agreed that this was something I should do.
I was still young – about 23 years old. I resigned from my job and started to work with the street kids. I didn’t know how to do it, but I was burdened so just started – I decided I would play with them, tell them Bible stories. The first day I arrived in a park with my hand puppets, some juice and bread and just said to some kids there, “let’s sit down and play!”
Because I switched (to afternoons), this was a different group of kids than I had known. Two boys came up to me and asked, “Did you come to get the children?” I said “No, I just came to play with them. Why are you asking that?” They said that sometimes the juvenile justice system would come looking for kids, (and were telling the truth), and other times persons would say that, but later we find out they killed the children.
I said, “No, no! I am just here to tell you about the love of the Lord for you.” So the boys stayed and we started playing. I told them I wanted to come daily from 3 to 5pm, and they should tell their friends to come too. Even by the next day the word had spread, and some of my kids from the middle of the night showed up. These kids I already knew were excited to see me, and said “Auntie! You’re going to come every day?” (they called me Auntie). I said yes, every day, from 3 to 5pm.
I was there by myself and sometimes there was a lot of chaos – kids fighting, some of the kids trying to steal things. It was out of control. So the Lord gave me an idea to help bring order.
I told them “In our church we have deacons, to help the pastor. So, I’m a missionary and every day when I come I’m going to choose one of you to be a deacon, and you’re going to help me!” And all of a sudden they were all good… they wanted to be the first deacon! They all wanted a chance. So I told them “Today, whoever acts the best –quietest and most attentive, can be the deacon for the next day.”
When it was time, for instance, to pass out the juice and bread, the deacon of the day got to tell the kids to stand in line and be nice. He got to be the boss, was excited and the kids were accustomed to obeying other kids who had authority. So I got to rest a bit while the Deacon was in charge!
What it came to be called was ‘Deacon of the Day’. If someone stole my purse or the bread, the DOFD would say “don’t worry auntie. I will see that it’s okay.”
Usually the reason they would try to steal something would be, if a child had disobeyed and I had to discipline them, they would try to steal something of mine-- purse, etc. to get back at me. Frequently I would get a phone call in the middle of the night from the Deacon of the Day saying “OK Auntie… the thief has been captured!” This was the idea the Lord gave me to help provide physical security and safety. In choosing the Deacon of the Day I would try to choose one of the natural leaders.
I would look for children on the street, particularly younger ones that I didn’t know, and invite them to stay at the park with me. Up to now I worked with 10-12 year olds. I started noticing the younger children and called them to me. What I didn’t realize was that the street kids hung out by general age groups. Each group usually had a “boss” that looked out for them. When I invited these younger kids to join us, it caused problems. When the younger kids came (as a group) one day, the older kids actually started stoning them. I had to get between them and stop the stone-throwing. I said, “No! I invited them to join us. Why are you doing this?” The older kids told me “They (the younger ones) cannot be with us.” They were very angry. So I told the younger ones to go away – toward a little fast food place (like a McDonald’s) nearby. I told them I would come and talk with them in a little bit.
After the little kids left, the older kids told me, “No, we cannot mix, and this is the reason why. The little kids spend their time stealing fruit from the fruit stand or from someone on the street, to get money for it. We’re smarter than that. If someone on the street has been robbed and they see one of the little kids with us, they will assume we stole it, and we’ll get in trouble. We can’t have anything to do with them. We’re smarter than them. Now we rob on the bus or wait until nighttime.”
Once I understood this is how it had to be, I told the older kids that, since I also wanted to spend time with the younger kids, I would be with them every other day, and be with the little ones on the other day(s). They said, “No! We want to be with you every day!” But I just had to say “No, this is how it’s going to be.” They need to hear the gospel too, so this is how it’s going to be.
And this is how it was, until I started going out to churches to talk about the ministry. Then the Lord began to raise up a team to work with me and we could work with both groups every day. It continued this way for four years.
During these four years a lot of children died. A lot of times I‘d be awakened by children coming to my house saying “We need to go to the morgue; you need to help us identify a child.” Many times I had to identify children I knew and loved. If the body was not identified the child would be buried as an unknown person. They bury people within 24 hours here. So I would try and identify the child and find the family. This was the only way the child could be buried knowing who they were.
It came to a point where I found a place near the park where I could kind of clean the kids up with a washing up and take them to church. The problem was, after the worship service I had to take them back and leave them on the street. This was such a burden, I told the Lord, “Lord, I need some place for these children to live.” I felt an urgency to find a house for them.
In the meantime, though I didn’t know about this, because there was such a large population of street kids, the mayor of one of the neighborhoods was establishing a house as a shelter for street children. They had identified this house they wanted to use as a shelter so they decided to send out a social worker to gather some information – they wanted some of the specific statistics of the situation they had to deal with. More girls? More boys? Just needed some information. And all the children they talked to were mentioning some woman named “Gislaine.” One day my phone rang and it was the mayor’s secretary saying “The mayor would like to meet with you in his chambers tomorrow at 10am.” I said “What did I do?!” The secretary said “I’m sorry I don’t have any information. All I know is the mayor wants to meet with you at 10 am.” I was really afraid! I had no idea what I had done!!
So I arrived with fear and trembling, but he very nicely said, “Have a seat!” I was impressed because he didn’t even know me and he was so nice! The federal Public Defender had given the Mayor (of Nauvu Iguasu), because of this huge problem with street children, a 3-month deadline to come up with some solutions. Every city has money given it from the government for social assistance. Many times they don’t use it, or use it for other things. In this case the Fed Public Defender said “You’ve got a big problem and have 3 months to begin to address it!”
So they were given this 3-month deadline; the government said the money is available, and if you don’t use it within 3 months we’re going to start fining you every day past the 3 month deadline.
So the Mayor told me, “We have this house we want to use as a shelter and we want you to be the coordinator of it.” I understood he was not paying me a big compliment – he was going to have a mountain of kids in this house and because they knew me, he figured I would provide some kind of security. I did not see this as any kind of compliment!!
So even though I went into this knowing I was probably being used, I also knew I had this burden for a house. I thought who knows what God might do with this?
I agreed to do it, but said I would do it only as long as everything was honest and above board. So the partnership only lasted six months! After 6 months I went on a 4-month maternity leave (for my first child); after 6 weeks (of my 4-month leave) I found out the mayor was doing a lot of things I didn’t approve of. My name was going to be dragged through the mud as a result of what he was doing. I went to him and told him I was quitting. He said “but you shouldn’t! You can have this nice 4-month maternity leave!” I told him no way! I had told him I would stay only as long as business was conducted with honesty and integrity. It was my reputation that would suffer and I was not going to be a part of it. So I quit.
So I was sad, but went back to working with the children on the street. I was sad because I realized I’d have to rebuild this ministry; when I got there (back on the street) I realized there were more kids than ever. I also realized (after I left the shelter) that some of the kids were so attached to me that they refused to stay at the shelter – they preferred to live on the street and be with me in the afternoons. I said to the kids, “You don’t want to stay on the street! Go back to the house!” But they said no, they didn’t want to – they loved me and wanted to stay with me.
I was saddened that this first attempt at having a shelter, a house for the kids, didn’t work out. However, I had not changed my mind about wanting a house for the kids. This one didn’t work out, but the burden was still in my heart.
In 1995 a group of 5 individuals from various churches established an NGO (non-governmental organization). They wanted to work with street children. So they did the same thing – started interviewing street children – and again, started hearing the name “Gislaine.”
So they found me and said, “We’d like to open a shelter, a house, for street children, and we’d like you to be the director.” I was so excited. I thought, Wow! These are Christians, doing just what I want to do.
For my work ministry in the park with the kids, I had established a legal organization and named it “REAME” (hey-AH-me). Well, when you register a legal organization you have to have an address. I couldn’t give the park address (where I met with the kids) so I registered it with my home address. When these believers came to me about starting a house, they were in the organizational phase. Now in our discussions the president of this NGO was saying to me, “You need to change the name. REAME is the name of your organization. For this shelter we have to change the name.”
So we come to an important meeting which was held at a church. There were 50 of us sitting in a circle at this meeting. We had to decide on a name. I was in one spot in the circle and opposite me was the president of this NGO. He looked at me and said, “We need to decide on a name. Your organization’s name is REAME.” I told him we could change the name; the name wasn’t important to me. But then something happened.
Now I’m a Baptist and most of the people in this circle were Pentecostal in faith. But at this meeting something happened that is outside of my understanding and religious experience. To this day I don’t understand it. A woman left her place in this circle and came to stand before me and said, “I see before you flags of different nations, and people from many nations will come to you. And you are not supposed to change the name REAME. This is the name you are to keep.”
So I left the meeting totally crushed. I didn’t understand what was going on, I left in tears. I went back to my ministry in the park. I was willing to change the name, but now evidently couldn’t. I didn’t know what to do with this prophecy that I was to keep the name. But I couldn’t keep the name and work with the group.
However, 3 months after that meeting this group was all infighting among themselves and the NGO dissolved and came to nothing, after 3 months. I could see the Lord’s hand in it then, but it was a very difficult time.
The Lord sent women to work with me and they brought food with them; every day they served beans and rice to the children, a lot of food that was like a banquet. During these next two years the burden for a house never left me and I continued to plead with the Lord for a house.
My husband has worked in a bank for 24 years. At this time my husband was given a promotion opportunity to be a bank manager. He had been working in middle-management, and when he received this promotion to serve as General Manager it came with a huge jump in salary. We looked at each other and wondered what to do with all this money. I looked at him and said, “I know exactly what to do with this money!” He grinned back and said, “Let’s get a house!” I said Yes! Let’s open a shelter! So I went out the next morning and started looking for a house to rent.
As I was looking for houses I’d talk to the owners and tell them I was looking for a house to open as a shelter for kids that I’d been working with for four years. The owner(s) would look at me and say, “No way am I renting my house to you for street children!” So I told the Lord, “What am I to do? You’ve given me money for a house but I can’t find anyone who will rent me a house!”
One day I came across a house that was beautiful – a big yard with a fountain. I could picture the house with children playing in the fountain. But I thought, “No way. No one up to now will rent me a house, and these owners certainly won’t rent me this beautiful house.
So I continued to look at several smaller houses. When I got home I couldn’t stop thinking about it; it would be so fun for children to play there. So I decided to just ask. All he could do was say NO.
I found the owner of the house and went with fear and trembling. I told him I wanted to rent his house. I‘d been working with children for 4 years and wanted a house for them. He said, “What a wonderful ministry you have! Yes, I’ll rent you my house.” I thought, He must not understand. So I said to him, “No, this isn’t going to be a daycare. This is going to be a shelter where street children will live.” He replied, “Yes, I think that’s a wonderful idea. I’d love to rent you my house!” Then I thought, “I don’t believe he understands me; I couldn’t believe he would rent me the house.” So I said, “No, I don’t think you understand me. These are going to be STREET children living in the house!” And he rented me the house.
I had been afraid that if he didn’t really understand what I wanted it for, there could be legal problems in the future.
I will never forget when the children arrived at the house. When they saw the fountain, they were so excited and all jumped in and were actually bathing in it! Behind that house there was an empty property, so there was so much space there for the children. It was wonderful. We had that house for two years. The first week I had four children and 3 more joined shortly after, so we had 7 children in this house.
In 1997, once I had the house and starting to pay rent, I had no one to live there and take care of the children! And I didn’t think God was calling me to do that. I had a friend named, Eliete (El-ee-etch). I went to my friend, who is a real woman of prayer. We had a wonderful time together and at the end of our prayer time Eliete looked at me and said, “The Lord is calling ME to be that person.” I was very surprised. Eliete was married and had 4 children, one of whom was 8 years old, blind and still in diapers. I looked at her and said, “Are you sure? I think this will be too much for you!” But she was sure.
The house had 3 bedrooms. When they moved in, Eliete and her family moved into one bedroom, with an armoire in the middle for privacy. Eliete and her husband slept on one side and the 4 kids on the other. The other 2 bedrooms had the other children – about 7 or 8 per room (we had 15 kids most of the time.)
Some of the women who helped in the park came as volunteers to help us in the house. But since they were volunteers though, they didn’t always show up. So we had 15 kids plus Eliete’s 4, plus my own child. On some days (if a volunteer didn’t show up) it was just me and Eliete with all these children!!
So we had all this work with these children and often volunteers didn’t come. The Lord gave me another idea. I talked with Eliete and asked, “What if we packaged lunches to sell? We need more money so we can pay someone to come regularly [and not depend on volunteers].” Eliete asked if I was crazy! I had a friend who was a pediatrician at a nearby hospital. I went to her and asked, “If I started making lunches, would you promote it among your hospital colleagues and encourage them to come buy from us?”
She was willing to do this, and so we started making and selling lunches for people. Eliete and I decided to do this, though she thought it was an awful lot of work. I would go in the morning to the hospital and take lunch orders (2 options: rice/beans with something else – salad, chicken or something). Then we’d cook it. In order to get it delivered, we asked the children to help us. Of course the children weren’t too good and didn’t really know how to do deliveries too well. I’d get phone calls from people, “There’s a child here trying to give me lunch, but the orders are all mixed up!” They understood though and just grinned and bore it, and paid me money for their lunch anyway.
Soon we found we had plenty of money because people felt sorry for us and knew it was a good cause! Even though people were buying lunches, it just wasn’t working very well and I was ashamed of it a bit.
So I approached the pastor of a church with another idea. I wanted to approach doctors to donate their time for community clinics, but we would charge people who came 10 Reals (about $5) to see the doctor. The proceeds would go to help underwrite REAME expenses. The doctors were willing to do this.
Once I had this arranged, I would leave Eliete with all the children (and hopefully a volunteer.) I would go hand out leaflets to people in the street advertising that they could go see a doctor for 10 Reals (which is a good price.) Then in the afternoon I would go to the church and serve as a receptionist for the doctor. With this arrangement then, we were able to hire a cook to prepare food for all the children. This was a big help, since the house parent didn’t have to prepare meals on top of working with the kids.
The pastor of this church was impressed with the industriousness of our workers. He went to the head of the state (Brazilian) Baptist Convention and brought him to see the work of REAME. This pastor brought the State head and he said, “This is a strategic ministry! We need to help this ministry!” I said to him, “You know, years ago I worked for the national Home Mission board. If you’ll go to them and tell them about what you want to do, I know they’ll help you!!” So we were able to stop the medical work when we started receiving money from the State Convention for the work of REAME. It wasn’t a lot of money but we started receiving money from 3 places: that church, the State Convention, and from the Home Mission board. It was enough to help us get established.
Even though it wasn’t a lot of money, the fact that it was these three places helped when I started visiting people and churches. Then I was able to say “These three organizations are contributing to our ministry” and it really helped to encourage others to give. So we started seeing some growth in the funding base for the ministry.
In 1999 the Baptist Home Mission board said to me, “We want to support REAME more, but this is how we want to do it. We think your work is important and we would like you to become a Home Missionary. We will support you as a home missionary.” So that’s what we decided to do. This was good in that it was another open door in churches. I could identify myself as a missionary of the Home Mission board (of the Brazil Baptist Convention).
Even though I now had money coming in from various places, I was using my salary to support REAME. The money was growing but it wasn’t enough. We now needed to hire a second staff member, and the money just wasn’t sufficient to support running the house.
I was at a state convention and one of the speakers was a pastor from a large church in Sao Goncalvo. I knew who he was: he’s well known in the Convention, leads a big church, and I knew he could be a big help. But I was very nervous. So in spite of my fears I went up to him, introduced myself and said, “REAME could really use your help.” At this point, this pastor (the lead pastor) poked the associate pastor next to him and said, “Well, we’ve already found her!”
When we started talking, the pastor said to me, “Our church owes a debt to the street children of Sao Goncalvo. When we first started our church, we started with a work to street children. As our church grew, the ministry stopped, and I have felt a debt to them, but I don’t have a way to start that.” So they were looking for me specifically because they’d heard of me. They were interested in helping the street children of Sao Goncalvo specifically.
Seven years ago he started helping REAME with 5000 Reals a month [that’s about $2500]. With this help we were able to hire more people and the structure began improving.
Out of time for interview… but the story isn’t over!
Saturday, November 3, 2007
A Few Pictures
I'll be posting more pictures on this blog a few at a time. We took over 1,100 pictures!
Thursday, September 13, 2007
We Did It!
Well we're back, and I already want to get back to a different country! Brazil was awesome! The people, the food, the experiences, they were all incredible! And we accomplished what we went to do! Our main goal was to bless and encourage, whether it was the missionaries, the Brazilian christians, or the unsaved Brazilians. It was a very rewarding trip. A lot of times you don't see a whole lot of fruit from this type of trip; it's not like going to build something. It was really cool to hear Juliana's thoughts on her time with us. She was Flavia's friend who spent the day with us on Saturday and went to the night service on Sunday. She was very touched that we cared enough to come down and pray for her people and her city. She was also very touched by the service on Sunday night, especially the baptisms. And Linda was very encouraged by us, even though it was a bit stressful taking care of us. But we are a test group, so that was expected. She said that she was very excited to have us with her. It was really cool to have a time of prayer with her and Heloisa at the airport before we left. We asked her if we had accomplished our mission of coming to bless and encourage, and she said we did! According to one of the Brazilian's I talked to on Sunday, we will have a resounding impact long after we have left. I just think that is fantastic! One of my biggest prayer's down there was for the people that we worked with down there. The 4 that were really laid on my heart: Helio, our driver, Juliana, Flavia's friend, Aleendro (not quite sure if that's how you spell his name, but hey!), the guy who was helping Kyle out with the computer, and Abraham, who is a Christian, but he is far from following Christ.I thought it would be cool to post pictures of a bunch of the key people on our trip, including team members, translators, workers, etc, along with their name and a two word or less description of them. More pics to come; I dumped a cardfull on Kyle's computer.
Alassandra Pistol
Worker at REAME
Abraham
Excellent Translator
Translator
Celia
Randomly Funny
Team Member
Helio (and Mary)Skilled
Van Driver
Mary
Prayer Warrior
Team Member
NancySeasoned Traveler
Team Member
ChrisOrganized
Team Member
Tim Prepared
Team Member
LindaCompassionate
Missionary
Margaret
Hilariously Crazy
Team Member
Monday, September 10, 2007
Snyder's
I'm not really going to do a whole lot of blogging tonight, because I have to pack and it is already 10:15. I had a fantastic time at Reame today! I did pillowcases, played frisbee, played soccer, and just had fun hanging out with the boys. Towards the end of the day I scratched my foot playing soccer. So we went up to the boy's house, and I got all gussied up. Then we just chilled and watched some TV. I proceeded to break out the jalepeno Snyder´s! I passed them around, and the 3 boys that were there thought that was cool, and ate some. A couple seconds later, one of them starts making funny faces, and then the laughter began. They just kept saying "hot, hot, hot," in Portugese of course! Within 15 minutes there were about 10 boys in the room eating Snyder's and wanting pictures taken of them! It was lot's of fun! Then a bunch of the boys went outside and started handing the pretzels out to people! It was so funny! They came back and just started cracking up! It was good times all around!
Sunday, September 9, 2007
Chicken Heart
Today was Sunday, so we went to church in the morning. We went to First Baptist Church of Niteroi. It was intersting, and all in Portugese! I got to meet the visiting pastor, and he spoke perfect english. Apparently he had lived in San Francisco for awhile. I also talked to a guy that was close to my age outside of the church. He was very friendly, like most Brazilians, and he quickly found out that I didn't speak Portugese! No worries, he spoke perfect English! We talked for about 15 minutes. It was very cool, and I was reminded again of how friendly Brazilians are. I just took a break from writing this post to go the bathroom, so I went to the bathroom that is on the roof. I turned the light on, and a mediterranean gecko ran up the side of the wall! Very cool, especially since I was not expecting it! Ok, back to writing! As we were talking, a man from the church came up and started talking to us. He told me how important our trip was, and how we were going to make a big impact, as he had seen other short-term groups do. I got a picture of my new friend, which I posted. He's the one in the green shirt. And that would be me in the black shirt.We also went to a open air market that was very cool. I bought a really cool blanket/bedspread. Then we had the afternoon free. Celia, Chris, Margaret, Tim and I all went for a walk at the beach. It was a lot of fun, and we had a great time racing the tide, as you can see from the video! Then we went back and chilled at the hotel for awhile. A bunch of us met in the lobby at 5:30 to go out for ice cream before we had to get ready for church. I had one scoop of chocolate and 2 scoops of mint. It was quite good, especially the mint.
Then we went to an amazing night service at the church where Gislaine's husband is the pastor. It was fantastic! It was much smaller than the morning church. They had 18 baptisms, communion, and great music from a great worship band. They played quite contemporary music, and I enjoyed it a lot. It was the first church service in awhile that I felt like I did not want it to end! It was simply fantastic. Incredibly worshipful and Christ-centered. I enjoyed it very much! (Did I mention that already?) Oh yeah, I should probably explain the title of the post! I apparently had chicken heart the day we went to the sitio, but I didn't know it. I enjoyed it then, so I got a few at today"s lunch. Oh man, they were good! Especially when I topped it off with some Guaraná!
Saturday, September 8, 2007
Prayer Tour
6:30 AM It´s 6:30 AM, and I am already showered and alive! My neck kinda hurts from doing all the chicken fights yesterday. I´m sitting out on the ledge of our balcony, and it is a beautiful morning. There are a whole lot of cars parked in the alley today. There are very, very few big trucks or SUV´s in Rio or Niteroi. It´s all small cars and maybe a tiny sport truck or two. And they buses just like we do. They also have a lot more motorcycles than we do. I am going to pack my bag and go eat, after I read my Bible.10:26 AM We~re driving to Sugar Loarf now, and we have passed a couple of neat spots on the way over. I´m sitting between the driver and Pat. The driver and I were watching a big (jet) plane fly into the little domestic airport in Niteroi! It was rather amusing! We saw the spot where the 8 kids were killed, and we´re driving along the beach now. We saw Sugar Loaf in the distance with the cable car going from mountain to mountain. It was a little different than what I understood before. As I thought, we rode a cable car across a body of water. But it will be just as exciting! The cable car is very high up! I can´t wait! I am quite excited. I really enjoy sitting up front, because I really enjoy Brazilian driving. I am enjoying the breakfast at our hotel. We´re driving along the beach now, and I´ve noticed that the girls swimsuits are about the same as in America. The guys are a different story! Most of the guys were speedos. Rather interesting.
6:40 PM Well, we are sitting at the cog train station, waiting for Linda, one of our translators, and her friend. Apparently their car of the train had some trouble, detached, and didn´t make it down the mountain. So we got out of our train car, and there was no 2nd car! We´ve just had word that they are on thier way down! We went to Sugar Loaf, and it was ton´s of fun! The cable car was not as adrenaline-pumping dramatic as I was hoping, but it was fun. The view on Sugar Loaf was literally breathtaking!
10:20 PM We prayed up there, and then it was on to lunch! Oh man! It was kinda buffet style, and I stuffed myself! I basically just went down the line and took a bit of everything that looked unfamiliar. I enjoyed everything except for some baked eggplant that was thinly sliced. It was tolerable, but I didn´t enjoy it very much. Then we went on to the statue of Christ, a very, very high point in the Rio area. We rode a cog train up the mountain which was quite unexciting, except for the little bit where Linda´s train car got detached! The Christ statue was interesting, but it was crowded! And the view wasn´t nearly as good as Sugar Loaf. But it was fun. After that we had dinner at a little restaurant/bakery/grocery store. It was very good. Kyle and I had fun being crazy with our translator, her friend, and her sister, who were all at our end of the table. They let the all of us try some yogurt covered peanuts, which were kinda weird. The I broke out the bottlecaps, passed them around, and everybody seemed to enjoy them, especially the Brazilians. Our translator, whose name I am not quite sure how to spell (somthing like Flavia), let me try some of her smoothie, which was acai and strawberries. It was very good! No meeting tonight, we can just chill!
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