José Oliveira tells his own, unfinished, story. Part 3 of 4 episodes
The crossing
Our food sales grew for a couple of months, then they stabilised. We had investment offers which we couldn’t accept because we were ‘illegal’. For months we waited for an update from Brasilia… But nothing happened.
One day, after lunch, while I was driving and planning my afternoon activities in my head, suddenly I felt that my head, my thoughts were switched off. Then I heard a voice saying: “I trust in you”, and that was it. My thoughts returned…
Owner of a sinful heart, my first reaction was: I wasn’t thinking about trust. The second reaction was: “It wasn’t me. This came from God”. And then sin kicks in: “And if I fail God?…”
You see, God gives you an empowering message and your sinful heart tells you that you aren’t good enough…
About two weeks later, we received a phone call from our lawyer with bad news … We had a meeting with him, and we were told that our papers would stay on a desk for 5 years… The Federal Government would neither decline nor accept our process…
Speaking to a Pastor later, he advised us to start packing to return to Portugal… It was official, God had closed the door… I was still in state of shock, trying to understand the “why”… But His wisdom is much greater than ours and we must trust. Not easy for a ‘newbie’ in the Faith…
At that point, we were stuck. And to make things worse, due to immigration from Haiti, illegal people were now having problems to moving money between accounts…
When we received money from Portugal to buy our return tickets, there was a strike in the banking system running for about two weeks… We managed to get cheap return tickets but now, I had to go to a bank to withdraw the money… I had less than one hour to return to the travelling agency with the payment… I drove to a bank which I thought it was closer to a car park and with fewer people to speed things up.
When I was attended-to and asked for my money, I was struck by this answer: “Even in on a normal situation, it would be difficult to give you the money! …”. Facing that, I replied “What should I do? I have 30 minutes to return to the travel agency …”.
The cashier paused and spoke these 3 declarations:
“Today, is a special day”.
“Today, we received an extra amount of money”.
“Today, I will be able to give you the money”.
I was silent, in shock, looking at him and I only was able to say “Thank you”… I returned to the travel agency and immediately said to Susy: “I had doubts about leaving… Now, I don’t have any doubts anymore…” It was time to return to Portugal…
When God says to go, you go. You don’t drag your feet. You run or walk… We were packing, slowly and still selling food. That was about to change…
Toughest bit of metal
One evening, I had to do a delivery to the city centre, and I felt that, for some reason, I shouldn’t go… I thought, I’m not doing anything wrong here, so I went.
I remember that I was tired. It has been a long day, like many others, so I drove carefully… Downhill, on a hump, the left tyre pops and car turns to the opposite direction, and slowly bumps into the sidewalk… I picked up the phone and I asked Susy to warn the client what had happened. We had to postpone that delivery… The car was towed and left outside a mechanic’s garage…
When I visited the mechanic, he had a funny look on his face … I asked him “what’s wrong?” and placed a cracked piece of metal on my right hand… “Is this normal?”, I asked, waiting for bad news… He said “that is the toughest bit of metal of the car… It is a solid block of steel with a hole… Is it normal? Man, I don’t know! What I do know is that I am a mechanic for over 20 years, and I never saw such a thing!”… Message received and understood. I immediately picked up my phone and called Susy: “Cancel all the sales, we are going against God’s will. I will explain later…”.
We just packed and that was it. Until our departure we stayed in Brazil roughly 2 years and 3 months…
We can’t easily forget the day when we returned to Portugal. By mistake Daniela’s passport had expired and we hadn’t noticed it, and days before, Rafael while playing with Daniela bruised her face …
The flight from Campo Grande to Brasilia was a torture for Susy and I was totally unaware of that. Susy sat with Daniela next to a guy who started to speak about terrorists, and that he would blow up the plane. The flight was packed, and Susy couldn’t move to another seat … At Brasilia’s airport, the same person demanded Susy to carry his luggage. Susy complained and when I managed to reach Susy and Daniela, the oddball was being escorted by the police… The Devil never gives up…
At the border check, the Federal Police saw Daniela’s expired passport and her bruise, and the agents immediately thought that we were trafficking the children and they put us in a waiting room for checks… At this point, I remember the report that was written by the Federal Police in Campo Grande. We hand it over to the agents and waited …
José’s story concludes next month …….
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Besides his professional life, Jose produces some punchy Christian videos and hopes to develop this ministry further. Here is some of his work:
Why?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rid0fSmUqfQ
Why was Jesus hated – to death?
Immanuel
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nkvlchs_tj0
Who is this Man born at Christmas-time, 200 years ago?
Please pray this ministry will ‘go’ where Jesus wants it to go ………..
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