A Trip to Jaciporã

The church's building

March 18 was the third Sunday of the month and the day that Dad routinely visits the church in Jaciporã. Mom, Joy and I take turns accompanying Dad on his trips, and this Sunday it was my turn. Dad and I left Prudente at 5pm and quickly got on Raposo Tavares, a well maintained four lane highway. The next fifty minutes of traveling were a breeze broken only momentarily by the need to stop and pay $2.70 in toll. As we neared the city of Presidente Venceslau, Dad exited right onto a smaller two lane highway. There are sections of this highway where the asphalt has  been patched numerous times and other portions where the asphalt is definitely needing some repair work done. Considering everything, though, it is still a good highway. The scenery along both of these highways was mainly pastures and grazing cattle. This is fitting since this corner of São Paulo state raises a lot of beef cattle. It is likely that many of these cows will eventually end up in Presidente Prudente, where there are two slaughter houses and two leather processing plants.

Bro. Djalma and Dad  enjoy talking

Dad and I arrived in Jaciporã forty minutes before the evening service was to begin. Bro. Djalma, the leader of the church, met us on the main road and took us to his home. Sis. Eva, his wife, had some bread in the oven which made the house fragrant but also very hot. It didn’t take Dad and Bro. Djalma very long to decide that it would be much cooler to sit outside under a tree and talk.

Michelle and Alexandre

I ended up sitting on the small varanda outside of the kitchen door and playing Uno with Bro. Djalma’s son, Alexandre, and daughter, Michelle. Michelle is in her last two years of highschool, and she is studying hard in hopes of being accepted into medical school after she graduates. Alexandre is a little bit younger than Michelle. He is very tall and shy and at the moment he doesn’t see much need to study, 
but he is still plodding along in his schooling with his parents’ constant encouragement.

The snack being served in the kitchen

Michelle won several of the games of Uno, and I was just starting to explain to them the zero-seven variation when Sis. Eva called us to come in and have a snack. She served us fresh bread with butter and two types of juice – guava and graviola. We had only ten minutes to eat and then had to hurry over to the church building, which is a little less than two blocks away.

Looking at books

The service was scheduled to begin at 7:30, but starting time came and no one but Dad and I, Bro. Djalma, Alexandre and his cousin Luan had arrived. This didn't bother Bro. Djalma, though, in his custamarily calm way he was sure that his wife and daughter would be down as soon as they had finished getting ready. Bro. Jonas, he suggested, was probably showering after working on construction all day, and Bro. Roberto and his family were most likely being delayed by their milk cows. Bro. Djalma and the boys straightened the rows of chairs and then enjoyed looking at the books that Dad had brought. Michelle, her mom, and a visiting lady named Salete arrived about 7:40 and Dad suggested that Bro. Djalma go ahead and open the service with Scripture reading and some hymns. He agreed and led in the Scripture reading. Bro. Jonas arrived in time for the hymns, and that was a good thing because he leads the music while playing his guitar. Bro. Roberto, his wife, and two grown children eventually arrived in time for the preaching.

Singing hymns

The Lord gave Dad grace to preach a clear message about sin - the origin of sin, the nature of sin, the end of sin, and the Saviour. They must be harvesting some of the sugarcane fields around Jaciporã, because four times during the service a heavy sugarcane truck would go by on the road in front of the church building. As is his habit, Dad paused in his preaching until the rumbling of the truck had subsided and then resumed where he had left off.

We spent just a few minutes talking with the brethren after the service, before packing the car for the trip home. Our hour and a half drive home was uneventful and we arrived home at 10:30pm.