On the 28th of February 2001, Buck and Luciene moved to the Amazon Basin of Brazil. We lived in Macapá, right on the equator. Why would a web designer give up his career and take his family from their comfortable life in Columbus, Ohio, USA, to live on the Amazon River? We came with a vision to save the Amazon, to tell people about Jesus, and plant a Vineyard church. We have planted a church, and we are turning it over to the national leaders, heading back to the States in Sept. 2009.

 
I just saw something very interesting, called "A Dummies Guide to Chinagate", and it was nice, because it was short and sweet, and to the point. Just kind of laid it all out there. How Clinton was able to sell all of our secrets, and not face a firing squad as a traitor, is beyond me. We have just gotten so blind and complacent.

China has already said that they know they will go to war with the US (there is a quote in the article mentioned above, but I have seen it elsewhere also.) In fact, you can see a book called "Unrestricted Warfare", written by two people in the China military, detailing ways to attack the US. One of the ways mentioned was using hijacked airplanes. On 9/11, they were hailed as heroes.

posted by Eduardo Buck at Monday, May 26, 2003

 
I just got some disturbing news from www.crosswalk.com, they do daily religion news summaries from around the world. Today, there was one about Brazil, charging evangelicals with "hate crimes" for evangelizing in public, being charged by those that practice voodoo, or candomble. This is a disturbing trend, and one of the problems with any "hate crimes" kind of legislation. (see the article below) Christians, stop being complacent, sit up and take notice. It can not be long before they are dragging Christians from their homes, and killing them for being "hateful". They do it in many countries already. They just killed four people in Columbia, because they were Christians.

In fact, there are more Christians being put to death now for their belief in God, right now in our time, than at any other time in the history of our civilization. And some still cling to the hope, or is it the hype? that we are in some kind of age of enlightenment. Check any reputable site that concerns religious freedoms, and you will see that the numbers are striking and horrific. Men tortured and killed, their women and children raped right in front of them.

Look for more of this kind of "hate crime" thing, especially against Christians, both in Brazil and in the US. Please join me in prayer, that some sense of justice would be restored to a judicial system run amok. I just read in the "Cutting Edge", the church planting mag of the Vineyard, about how Christians should really have a sense of social justice. It should grieve us when we see the judicial system not working. I have seen so much injustice. Murder going unpunished, because it is just poor people killing poor people. Those that defend themselves against thieves and murderers being prosecuted- by the criminals no less! The rich just running over the poor, and a sense of despair from the poor, because they could never afford the high-powered lawyers that the rich people that are ripping them off could afford. And lest you think that I am talking only about Brasil, these very same injustices are taking place in the United States also. These types of things should grieve the Christians heart. God cares as much about social justice as He does about anything else. He hates injustice, because He is Just. One of His names in the Bible is Justice. Justice- that gives comfort to me somehow.

>> Evangelicals Tried For ‘Hate Crime’ Violation
Compass News Service

Umbanda and Candomble spiritist groups in Brazil are pressing a lawsuit
against Baptist pastor Joaquim de Andrade, 41, and Aldo dos Santos
Menezes, 33, a deacon of the Anglican Church, in connection with an
annual evangelistic outreach on the beaches of Sao Paulo state.
Spiritists accuse the two men of violating Brazil’s “hate crime” law by
distributing evangelistic tracts that, they say, disparage the African
goddess Iemanja. They charge Andrade and Menezes with “inciting
evangelicals to commit acts contrary to the liberty of religious
belief.” At a hearing on April 16, a Sao Paulo judge found Andrade and
Menezes guilty and fined them each 1,000 reais (about $300). The judge
warned that if they did not stop proselytizing spiritists, they would
face stiffer consequences next time. “This is a precedent-setting case,”
said former Brazilian resident Paul Carden, director of the Centers for
Apologetics Research. “If Christians cannot freely share their faith
with interested bystanders in a public place without the potential of
some punishment under the pretext of having committed a hate crime, then
this profoundly alters the spiritual equation in that country.”

posted by Eduardo Buck at Saturday, May 24, 2003

 
20 May 2003
As I am sitting here, writing this, I am being eaten alive by mosquitoes. I have to put on Off™ just to sit in my office to type on the computer in my shorts, with a fan, in the tropical heat. Well, it is actually cooled down right now, it is probably about 80º degrees F (25º C), at ten PM at night.

We just finished putting screens on the whole house. So this is a huge improvement since we got to this house. We still have to spray poison all the time. And we still always have a horrible amount of mosquitoes.

The house right behind us has an open cesspool in their back yard. It is literally their septic tank, that just kind of overflows all over their back yard, especially when it rains. It is the ideal breeding ground for mosquitoes. The city tries to combat Dengue Fever, and Malaria, and other mosquito born illnesses. They send people house to house to check. But no one ever seems to notice this neighbor. I don’t know why. Maybe it is dry when they come. The last time the inspectors came around, we told them to check that house. The owner lives in Germany I think, studying there. It is rented out to another family. This needs to be denounced, because it is a Dengue outbreak waiting to happen.

As I said, the whole house has screens. The master suite also has a screen door on it, from the hallway. We all sleep in the master bedroom. It is the only room where we can get a night’s sleep. The mosquitoes almost lift you off of the beds in the other rooms.

We tried putting the kids in their own room with mosquito nets, but one of the kids always throws a leg out, and leaves space for the mosquitoes to come in. In the morning, the kids are full of mosquito bites, and there are like ten fat, happy mosquitoes that have gorged all night, but couldn’t find the way back out. Those mosquitoes usually die horrible deaths at my bloody hands.

One thing that did seem to work, we put a tent up in the living room. The kids loved it, the fact that they got to sleep in a little house, and it has screens on it, so they didn’t have a problem. But daddy wasn’t real keen about putting a tent up every night, and taking it down every morning. We have considered taking their bed apart, because that would give us room for the tent, and then just making the tent their bed. The mattress fits in there fine. I think I will go ahead and do that in the next couple of days.

It looks like we have to move, so I will have to tear the bed down in any case at some point. The landlord said he is not interested in renewing the contract. (see our prayer requests- you can subscribe to our e-mail prayer letter by sending an e-mail to Schmidt_Newsletter-subscribe@yahoogroups.com) So maybe the place we go won’t have so many mosquitoes, and the problem will take care of itself.

You know, five people between one bed and one hammock is not easy. I guess we could just put them in their own room, but with the risk of malaria and dengue fever, we just can’t bring ourselves to do that.

Of course, if you come to visit, don’t worry about the mosquitoes. We’ll set you up with some Off™, a strong fan (if you put a fan at your feet, blowing the length of your body, it is also one way to reduce attacks from mosquitoes), a sheet, and weights, or a rope so that you can tie yourself to the bed and not be carried away while you sleep. Come visit, we would love to have you!!!!

posted by Eduardo Buck at Tuesday, May 20, 2003

 
19 May 2003 – I couldn’t get online.

I had a little emergency while working out at our land today.

We are putting a wall up around our land. There is no building, no bathroom, nothing. Then along comes a case of the Amazon Revenge. There is no way that I can make it back to our house in time. I run to the neighbor’s house. He is a good friend of mine. His name is Piauí. That is what everyone calls him anyway, because that is the state he is from. I think his name is Raimundo or something, but no one would even know who you were talking about if you called him that. So I ran to his house, and asked him if I could use his bathroom.

I almost messed myself while he looked for a piece of paper or something I could use. They didn’t have any toilet paper. They struggle everyday for their food. Toilet paper is a luxury. It was a stark reminder of the struggle that so many people go through everyday, just to have the basics, just to have their daily bread, and a bit of butter. Of people who put toilet paper at the bottom of the grocery list.

It made me more thankful, as we prayed for our supper, and thanked God for our daily bread, which He provides without fail for us. And it made me more thankful as I ran to our own bathroom for an encore of the Amazon Revenge.

posted by Eduardo Buck at Tuesday, May 20, 2003

 
I didn’t even know what lice looked like until I came to Brazil. Oh, I had heard stories growing up in rural Ohio, corn country USA. I saw kids with their heads shaved, and the ominous whispers behind cupped hands explaining that they had lice. I dreaded getting lice. I thought that it must be one of the most horrible things, to get lice, get shaved, and everyone at school would talk about how your family must be very dirty, and how sick it is to have lice.

Whenever my head would itch, I wondered if it might be lice. Any flake that I pulled from my head, I would scrutinize, to see if it moved, which would thus prove that it was a head louse. As far as I remember, I never got lice. Mom, can you fill in any details? Did I ever have lice?

Lice are much different than I first supposed. I first saw a louse when I came to Brazil. They are black, the adult ones, at least the varieties I have seen. Lice are something that we have had to become accustomed to.

Jesus commanded us to visit the afflicted, to provide for the orphans and widows, to preach the gospel to the poor. I think it is because he knew that it is difficult, and with the additional trials and tribulations people would give up and decide to work only with wealthier people in more affluent neighborhoods. Working with the poor has many trials, things that sometimes makes working with the poor more difficult than working with those from the upper classes. One of them is lice. These parasites seem to prefer heads of the poor. Every Sunday, after church, when we get home, if we see one of the girls itching their heads, we get the lice comb, and a white cloth, and brush out their hair.

Through trial and error, we have found the kind of lice comb that we prefer, of the four or five different models that we have, a metal one of good quality. Almost every day and certainly any time anyone is itching excessively, just as a part of daily routine, we break out the white cloth and the lice comb. It is one of the hurdles that we have had to get past, something that we must accept as a cost of working with the poor, part of the cross that we must bear if you will.

It is not something that I had ever read about in books about being a missionary. It is not something that I ever imagined would be a problem. I never got lice as a single missionary. In fact, it is very difficult for me to get lice even now. We joke about the lice trying to crawl on my head, and then hitting the bald spot, slipping and falling off, plunging to their death on the ground far below.

Things change though with kids. Kids like to hug their friends. Kids walk arm in arm, hold hands, exchange hats, and hug some more. Kids are a lice’s greatest ally.

In reflecting on lice, and the fact that I don’t get them, I wonder, am I doing like Jesus said, and becoming like a child? Perhaps I, as an adult, would get more lice if I did like Jesus said, and become like a little child. Perhaps I need to hug my friends more, hold hands more, exhange hats, and hug some more. And buy another comb.




posted by Eduardo Buck at Friday, May 16, 2003

 
I have not been able to get online except at night, if at all. I have some kind of weird radio interference with my telephone line. I have tried everything that I can think of, changed all the wiring in my house, bought a telephone line filter, I've had the phone people here and the ISP people here, and they all just wring their hands, and say that yep, it seems like there is some kind of radio interference. I wondered if it may be shortwave, but I think it is just conventional radio.

I can usually get online if I try before 7:30 am, and at night, sometimes after 7pm, sometimes not until 10pm, or midnight, or later. There are times when I cannot connect for days at a time, one time I went four days not being able to get online. Needless to say, this has been a real pain.

If any of you ham/computerhead gurus has any ideas about this problem, please share them with me, at holylamb(at)pobox.com.

I have been doing a lot of thinking lately, about missions, about what missionaries do, how to plant churches. I just recently read “The Spontaneous Expansion of the Church” by Roland Allen. It was just what I needed, at the time I needed it. I would highly recommend it, especially to anyone that is involved in missions. I am still waiting for the boxes of books that I sent from the States to arrive.

I have been trying to form a philosophy of ministry and church planting. Things like what is really necessary and what are things that are maybe imposed from our western culture, establishing rules as opposed to letting the Holy Spirit be the guide, money and who controls it, how much control or freedom should a new church plant have, should a national church planter have a salary or work in a secular job until the church is established enough to pay his wages, etc.

I have also been reading about house churches at sites like http://www.house2house.tv and trying to think through the whole building rental thing, instruments, etc.

I mean, what is really essential to plant a church? If we need huge amounts of money to be invested, then how transferable is that? I want to develop a model of church planting that does not require huge sums of money from North America to fund church plants in South America. It seems to me that starting a church that reproduces is much more efficient and economical, like the difference of planting something that seeds, and the next year expands all on its own, and something that is grafted, and can never expand unless a branch is cut from it and grafted into another plant. Thousands of seeds with one plant, or one graft from the mother plant, do the math. If the goal is expansion and growth, the seeds are much more efficient. They will grow and adapt to the environment, and many of the plants will look much different than the mother plant due to their surroundings. Adaptation and expansion

If the goal on the other hand is cookie cutter Christians that all mumble the same slogans and agree completely with the head pastor, and churches that are exact clones of the mother plant, then the only way is grafting.

Our goal, our vision is to reach the vast reaches of the Amazon with the gospel, but just how in the world will that happen? What does it look like? It can never truly reach every tributary of the Amazon, as well as expand throughout the world if it is dependant on American dollars, like most missionary models I have seen in Brazil. An umbilical chord is useful for a season, but there is a point when it must be cut, and the baby must grow, and mature, and reproduce without it. Then another baby can be formed and birthed somewhere else by that mother church.

There are also issues such as the local church spending large sums on the rent of a building, instead of really doing the kingdom work of feeding the hungry, and taking care of the widows. Starting house churches may free up the resources for the church to carry out ministry to the surrounding communities. But I know from experience that people eventually want a building to meet in, and bring all the little churches together for a weekly celebration. There is something to the dynamic of corporate worship that is vital to our growth.

Anyways, there are a lot of issues to work through. This business of saving the Amazon can get messy sometimes :-) Share your ideas with me at holylamb(at)pobox.com, would love to discuss these issues further.

posted by Eduardo Buck at Thursday, May 15, 2003