Feature

Growing Locally & Globally

Alliance DNA is alive in Brazil

By Melinda Smith Lane

“The big need outside and inside Brazil is missions,” says Jurandir Itizo Yanagihara, president of the Alliance church in that nation. “The Brazilian Alliance church is working as a light in the darkness. The task is huge, not only in Brazil, but in the entire world.”

As C&MA international workers retire or transition to other ministries in the United States, the Brazilian church is determined to answer the call to take the “whole gospel to the whole world” by developing “healthy, praying, missionary-sending churches.” Within the next 10 years, Jurandir hopes to have 30 new churches in Brazil, along with 100 trained church planters. But during that time, he also has plans to double the number of Brazilian international workers.

Tim Bubna, the U.S. C&MA field director in Brazil for 18 years, is confident that the transition of U.S. international workers out of Brazil has happened at just the right time. “Our team did not go to Brazil to win Brazil for Christ. Only the national church can do that,” he says. “We [were] there to form leaders who will establish a church.”

As church president, Jurandir is trusting God that the spiritual tools of prayer and discipleship will build a vibrant network of Alliance congregations throughout Brazil. “We are at a crossroads in the sense that we are now in the process of emphasizing both church planting and missions.”

He sees the story of the Brazilian church as a global adventure in which “God connects the dots.” In addition to ministry among indigenous people groups in the Amazonian rain forest, Brazilian missionaries are working in Europe, Africa and Asia. In several missions endeavors, the connection is linguistic. Since both nations are Portuguese-speaking, the Alliance church in Angola requested that the Brazilian church send workers to train the men and women who pastor in the war-torn African country. Language is also the strong bond to Portugal, where American and Brazilian international workers are partnering in a new missions outreach.

Brazilians have another cultural advantage that opens doors often closed to other Christian groups. “Soccer is a world-level sport for Brazilians,” Jurandir says. The international workers are using it as a tool in India, where Brazilian players are revered as heroes. After seven years in Calcutta, they have planted two congregations.

The national church is also supporting international workers in Japan, which brings the history of The Alliance in Brazil full circle. Mitsuko Ninomiya was the first Alliance international worker sent to Brazil. In fact, her arrival predates North American Alliance missionaries by several years (see sidebar).

Jurandir is grateful for the presence of C&MA international workers who have instilled the values of planting, sending and training in Brazilian leaders. “We will miss them very much but at the same time, the DNA they planted in the Brazilian church is very much alive.”

He knows that in church planting and missions work, everything is a spiritual matter that requires complete surrender to God. “The moment God calls for a specific task we must be ready,” says Jurandir.

(Videographer Jordan Christopher conducted the interviews with Jurandir Itizo Yanagihara and Tim Bubna.)