Heiderich News Brief - January, 2009
Family Institute of Latin America Website
Friends and Family Day for the Brasília Team
The Brasíli
a Team is on their way to their new home. They each have found an apartment and are in the proc
ess of making their move to Brazil’s capitol where their training will continue with teachers from CGC and the Family Institute. Before their departure, we invited them and their friends and families to a special goodbye party at the Ninth of July church in São Paulo. In 30 years of ministry, this one is among the most memorable weekends we have experienced. This is the first Brazilian team recruited by CGC. It was the first “Friends and Family” workshop for a mission team in Brazil. This inspiring Saturday included testemonies from Bryan and Jacqueline Bost and Maria Dutton, long term missionaries and 
mentors to many on the field. They shared their inspiring stories of faith, courage, defeats, rejection and discouragement, victory, changed lives, churches begun, and families and supporters who sacrificed and tenaciously supported them. António and Ju Borges, from the Brasília leadership, were there to assure the parents that these three couples will be well cared for in Brasília. The team shared their dreams for the mission they feel called to embark upon. Each family unit was able to get together separately to share their love for each other, express their concerns and hopes and pray specifically for the success of each couple. The highlight of the day was the baptism of Otávio’s mother. Sunday was the “sending off” service for the team at Nove de Julho and João De Marco, one of the elders, blessed them. Jerry’s sermon challenged the church to remain focused on God’s mission in Brazil. This weekend was the culmination of months of preparation by the Family Institute for the event and more than two years of preparation of the team.
Here are some of the team’s thoughts after the event.
God gave us a grea
t gift when my mother decided to give herself to Jesus. I have been praying for her and studying the word with her for 15 years. On this day I witnessed the baptism I have most wanted to see. God presented me with the joy of going into the fields to find the lost knowing that my mother is no longer among them.
This weekend helped many people to get a more mature idea of what missions is all about. Our families are feeling more comforted about us being far away from them. Today they understand how important this work will be for the Kingdom.
It was good to share some of what we have been through in this training and to hear the experiences of those who have worked in ministry for so long. I feel we have gained allies and supporters for this work. I loved being able to tell my family what they mean to me and how much I will miss them.
A Personal Note
At the very time this amazing day ended, six thousand miles away, the celebration service for Prentice Meador began. It was Prentice, with two other men, who first scouted out Brasilia thirty years ago.
We were so blessed to have our children here with us over the holidays. We thank Joel and Angela and Kris for spending the time, energy and money to give us the best Christmas present: time together.
This week Jerry is in Honduras teaching at the Baxter Institute. He is helping to train a Hispanic team that will soon be going to begin a work in Mexico City. Please be in prayer for Jerry and for this new church planting team.
Jerry and Gail Heiderich
posted in Missions, South America | 2 Comments
Most of our family news revolves around trips to the doctor or emergency room. Konner had to go twice at the end of September! The first time was because he split his bottom lip. He ended up spending the night in the hospital to get seven stitches in his mouth. A few days later as we were walking out the door for a Bible Study he decided to stick a rather large bead up his nose. We had to go to the emergency room again, and after a short procedure the bead was removed. The good news is that since that time we have not returned to the doctor with Konner. That is not to say that he has not continued to bust his lip or hit his head– he is very adept at both.
We left well-prepared leadership couples in Curitiba: they will be appointing elders by the end of next year. They have 8 full-time evangelists and 2 full-time church workers. We counseled, mentored and discipled 40 couples and 75 individuals in our six years there. Many leadership couples were saved from divorce, others from leaving the church or their walk with God. Dozens grew and matured and were prepared to equip others to grow. A new congregation was started and we were able to play an integral part in preparing the students from the training school to become church planters by mentoring them after graduation. We were blessed to be part of amazing transformations in our six years in Curitiba.
We spent the months of July and August in the US on our furlough. When we were in Dallas we stayed at Angela and Joel’s house along with Kristofer. It was wonderful to have the family all together. Gail’s mother and her husband even spent a few days with us. We visited all six of our supporting congregations where we met with the elders and Jerry spoke before the congregations. All of them were very supportive about our move and our ministry. Jerry spoke at the Global Missions Workshop for the Brazil Interest Group on the state of leadership development in Brazil. He also spent a day with a new team that is heading to Rwanda sponsored by the Richland Hills Church in Fort Worth. He led the three men of the team in a team dynamics workshop. It is so rewarding to be able to show our supporters the kind of work we do here on the field.
Itu, population 160,000, is in the state of São Paulo about 1 1/2 hours from the huge city of São Paulo. We arrived in Itu on August 30 and began looking for a place to live. Some members of the church here already had a place picked out for us which we saw a couple of days later. We still looked at many houses before deciding the first one was the one we believed God has picked out for us. The owner was remodeling the house and wanted to spend a few more months on it, but we convinced him to let us move in after he finished the projects he was working on. He even lowered the rent since he didn’t get to finish the job. We love the house are so blessed. As of today, we still have a handful of boxes to unpack, but we are getting there. Plenty of room for visitors!
Two women have become our sisters in Christ over the last few months. Pamela Moroni and her husband Claudio attended our 6th Marriage Encounter weekend in Oct. 2006 and were involved in our follow-up marrieds group. Kelley began studying the Bible with them in March, and Pamela finally made the decision to be baptized at the end of June right before our furlough. Claudio is already a Christian and he and Pamela have been attending regularly with their two children and have become actively involved in our Marriage Encounter ministry. Pamela and Claudio are both financial advisor with different investment firms in Santiago. Claudio was introduced to Kelley by church member Sebastian Eterovic who works with him at the same investment firm.
Salvador is the third largest city in Brazil, after Rio and São Paulo. It is 550 years old and was the first capital of the country. The ICOS (church of Christ Salvador) is one of 6 Churches of Christ in this great city. This congregation is being evangelized by 4 American missionary couples. They have 35 members and an attendance of 70 after 3 years of work. We spent 5 days with this mission team at the end of April. This was our second teambuilding workshop with this talented team. Last year they were in the midst of loosing one of their team members and things were very stressful and uncertain. This year we found a team that is working well together and focusing on evangelizing their part of the huge city of Salvador. We admire their desire to keep growing as a team and not to let anything hinder their effectiveness.
On April 11-12 we hosted a retreat for the servant leaders of the Curitiba congregation. Decision-making was the theme. Jerry and Gilberto led the men’s sessions and Gail led the women. The men discussed how to make the best decisions and how to lead the congregation to growth and maturity. The women talked about how to encourage the men and how to avoid conflict. The purpose of these retreats is to prepare competent men to serve as elders in the near future.
During the week of April 14-18, Jerry taught a course on Spiritual Growth for Leaders at the preacher training school in Campo Grande, Mato Grosso do Sul. He teaches this class and one on Lay Counseling to each group of students that pass through the school. The elders at this church and the teachers at the school have been very supportive of our work and often ask us to help out with graduates of the school as they work with congregations throughout the country.
We traveled to Campinas, São Paulo, on April 30 and spent 6 days at our final retreat with the Brasília team before they move to the capital in January of 2009. This was a training and integration retreat with the leaders of the Brasília congregation and the project support team all present. We did individual counseling with each of the 3 couples, group counseling with all of them and integration exercises with the team and the leaders. Others on the support team dealt with financial concerns, moving issues and how to conduct effective meetings.
Jerry had a once in a lifetime experience! He traveled to Europe and met up with Kristofer after classes were finished. They spent three days in London, 4 days in Greece and 2 days in Oxford before going their separate ways, Jerry back to Brazil and Kris to Dallas. They went to Delphi, Corinth, and Athens and took a boat tour of 3 islands. The highlight for Jerry was getting to preach for the Athens Church of Christ where Dino Roussos is the evangelist (he is also supported by Prestoncrest). Jerry’s sermon was translated into Greek, Russian and Belgium. Kris and Jerry were moved to be able to stand where the apostle Paul preached on Mars Hill and where he stood trial in Corinth.
Easter weekend is huge in the Brazilian church. The men have their biggest yearly event, ENOC (National Encounter of Christian Workers), at the camp in São Paulo. The young single women gather at a retreat center nearby (ENOCÍTA), and the married women meet in Campinas at ENOCA. This year Jerry was a keynote speaker for the 450 men at ENOC and Gail spoke to 60 young single women at ENOCÍTA.
At these events we always spend considerable time counseling with Christians from all over the country and setting up workshops and seminars for the rest of the year. The week following these national encounters is an intensive study for church workers in Campinas. This year we were two of the featured speakers. Jerry spoke to the whole group on Family and then we split into men and women where Gail directed the women’s group and Jerry the men’s. These retreats give us the opportunity to spend quality time with preachers and elders and deacons from all parts of the country.
We spent the first week in April in the city of Uberlandia (3/4 Million) in the state of Minas Gerais. Golf Course Road in Midland, TX is supporting a full-time Brazilian coouple in this city and has been looking for another couple to help them out. We interviewed a potential couple and evaluated how the two couples would work together, including psychological testing and group dynamics. It was a very productive week and we believe both couples benefited from our time together. We were pleased to be able to worship with the loving and growing congregation of about 60 members. Jerry gave the Bible lesson and the sermon.
