Report of Reed Olson for Pitching DCC's Portuguese Language Story of Jesus

Re: Brazil Trip Report (August 8-14, 2011)
Date: August 14, 2011

Reed Olson, David C Cook (DCC) Global Program Director, spent five days in Brazil building relationships with 4/14 Brazil committee members and church leaders, pitching DCC’s Portuguese-language Story of Jesus (SOJ) booklets as an effective youth evangelism tool and striking agreements with denominations interested in using it to fulfill their ministry objectives.

In April, 2011, Luis Bush – renowned Argentine missiologist, founder of the 10/40 Window Movement and co-founder of the 4/14 Window Movement -- introduced Olson to Odijon Ribeiro, Brazil’s 4/14 National Catalyst, and encouraged them to work together to equip Brazilian churches with the SOJ. Ribeiro came to Christ in 1991, graduated with a B.A. in Theology from SEBIMI in Sao Paulo and will soon receive a Masters in Global Leadership from Fuller Seminary. He began his ministry career planting churches in northern Brazil, followed by seven years with World Horizons in Paraguay, Wales, Niger and the UK. In 2003, he returned to Brazil and worked with Bush to research and publish the “World Inquiry”, a study on global church involvement in fulfilling the Great Commission, leading to the birth of Transform World and ultimately the 4/14 Window Movement. Between 2004 - 2010, Ribeiro served as Director of World Horizons in Cairo, established and managed a business school and introduced the 4/14 Movement to Egypt. Today, he resides in Sao Paulo with his wife and two children, dividing his time as a missionary pastor with Casa Firme Church and advancing the 4/14 Window Movement throughout Brazil.

In May, 2011, Ribeiro traveled to Curitiba, Brazil to showcase the English SOJ to Paschoal Piragine -- President of the Brazilian Baptist Convention (BBC) – and received a request for a Portuguese-language version for 9,000 churches. DCC responded by developing the Portuguese SOJ, and in early August, Olson was invited to share it at the BBC’s annual board meeting in Rio de Janeiro (an honor rarely extended to outsiders). Olson fulfilled this request on August 10^th, introducing the publication to 200 top Baptist Convention leaders. Piragine called for a vote immediately afterwards to determine the church’s interest, and the majority responded with great enthusiasm! Nilton Antonio de Souza -- Executive Manager of Evangelism and Discipleship (and point person for Billy Graham’s Brazilian crusades and member of the committee to host the 2016 Olympics in Brazil) – requested one million SOJs for his member churches. A Memo of Understanding outlining the parameters of the BCC/DCC alliance Is still in the works, but Piragine plans to equip 100,000 volunteers with enough SOJs to share Christ with one million 4-14 age youth to kickoff “Jesus Transformation,” an initiative the BBC hopes will spawn 5,000 new churches by 2016.

News from the BBC was followed by a request from Pastor Joseph Dantas – assistant to Senior Pastor Joao Nunes – that the Rio-based Assemblies of God Madureira Ministry (a spin-off of the 15 million-member AG Convention) also desired an as-yet-undetermined number of SOJs for their many churches. Nunes is a close friend of Nam Soo Kim -- Senior Pastor of Promise Church in Flushing, NY and co-founder with Bush of the global 4/14 Window Movement -- and is fired up about the 4/14 Movement. Final details are under discussion. 

The trip concluded with a visit to Belo Horizonte, Brazil, where Ribeiro and Olson shared the 4-14/SOJ vision with Pastor Marcio Valadao. Senior Pastor of Igleja Batista Lagoinha (IBL), resulting in an initial request for 1.5 million copies (500K for his church and one million copies for area churches to use in a variety of evangelistic outreaches, to include targeting students in 17,000 schools in Minas Gerais state). IBL – which has grown from 7,000 members in 2000 to 47,000 members in 2011 -- is perhaps the largest of thousands of “renewed” Baptist churches, with  300  pastors overseeing 200 community  impact ministries touching millions

 of people (i.e. children and youth, prisoners, slum dwellers, television viewers, prostitutes, orphans, etc.).  “Years ago,” Valadao said, “the Lord used the Jesus Film to reach millions for Christ worldwide, and I see Him doing the same with SOJ.” If other independent Baptist churches capture the same vision and follow IBL’s lead, the 2 ½ – 3 million SOJs requested will scarcely meet the demand in Brazil.