Volunteer Missionary Movement (VMM-USA) | home
We believe that God calls all People to peace and unity through a sharing of
the world resources and goods. We wish to challenge and dissolve the
barriers that divide people and Church and nations. We stand for oneness in
the body of Christ. We commit ourselves to the service of Our God to work
among all people, seeking to break down all forms of injustice and
oppression, and all inequalities of sex, status, color, creed or
nationality.
"And there are no more distinctions between Jew and Greek, slave and free,
male and female, but all of you are one in Christ Jesus." (Gal 3:38)
Spirit and Lifestyle
Just four days ago, I was enjoying a few hours on the beach with my 4
travelling companions after 16 days covering over 3000 kilometres with three
to four meetings a day.
We ordered food and drinks from the restaurant behind us that furnished
chairs and umbrellas. A continual procession of vendors passed in front of
us, offering their wares. By a flicker of a hand signal we indicated that we
were not interested and they moved on.
Several times Joao (John), a handsome man with a beautiful smile and with a
wooden rod for a left leg, went by pushing a large, heavy cart through the
deep, sticky sand. The cart contained dozens of pineapples, bottles of
liquor, all the makings of exotic drinks.
We couldn't help but remark that this was a hard way for a one-legged man
(he lost his leg at the age of one when he ventured out on the train tracks)
to make a living. Marivone, our Brazilian-Canadian companion, decided that
we had to buy a drink from him: a pineapple deftly decapped, cored, filled
with mashed pineapple and lime and the sugar cane liquor of the area. We
provided ice from our restaurant drinks just to be on the safe side and each
sipped using our own straw. It was delicious!
We could not help but feel moved at the way Joao accepted the challenges
that life offered him, just like we had been moved by all those we met in
our 16 days of travel through the Northeast, the poorest part of Brazil.
Cecily
