Summer Project 2012: Italy

Ciao, amici!
Now I come to speak a little bit about what I lived during this last January. Everyone knows that the essential part of our ministry is to share the Gospel, to speak about the joy of a personal relationship with God that’s available for whoever truly desires it. That’s a crucial task we have since we become Christians. Every follower of Jesus should assimilate it and thus feel a true passion for letting also others hear and comprehend the love of God. That’s why me and other Brazilian Christian students went to Italy on January, 3^rd.

Italy: how it all began

Since the very beginning I knew that it wouldn’t be an easy task. People usually have a beautiful idea when it comes to Europe. I daresay people don’t even have idea about how is the spiritual reality in Europe. We’re so used to seeing many missionaries leaving their countries to help the missionary work in African and Asian countries or any other remote and poor land around the globe. In the other hand, if you say that you’re going to Europe, it sounds kinda different. I strongly felt this during the months before the trip. Europe is cradle of culture, science and richness. There’s a really big gap between this reality and my country’s. ‘Till the middle of the last year I didn’t really use to give so much attention to Europe. It always seemed to be a very beautiful place, with well-dressed and polite people in a good life situation. However, all of a sudden I started to think about it, about Europe. Since I love English, a curiosity about England just bloomed inside my heart. It would be nice to know a European country in which people speak in English, the language I most love and struggle to improve day by day. We had a National Student Conference in June, and God touched deeply my heart. I really gave a lot of thought about Europe; I prayed for the European people; I reflected about the spiritual situation of that land and prayed for it. In the last day of the Conference I was shocked: they guys announced where would the next Summer Projects take place and one of them would be in Europe. So this is where Italy appeared and showed itself as one of the biggest challenges I’ve ever had. I spent four months preparing myself, raising financial sustenance and praying for it. It was a hard moment for each of us. We prayed God for us to find people with hearts devoted to His work, people passionate by the vision of the Gospel being spread all around the World. Thank God these people appeared in our lives!  All the time I was conscious about the possible difficulties I was about to face up: the cold weather – since I became a lover of Summer-extremely-hot days –, the communication – since I was too used to speaking in English (I thought it would be useless) and my Italian was very poor –, the people’s coldness and resistance to the Gospel. However, I also knew that God would provide with everything.

Campus experience: Verona and Mantova 

We stayed in a city called Mantova, and it is located in the North. We were so well received by brothers and sisters of the local church, the Chiesa Cristiana Evangelica Battista di Mantova. Those loving people also offered their houses for each of us to stay all month long. Our group was led by four Brazilian missionaries; two of them are from the Campus Crusade for Christ in Brazil and the other two – they’re a couple - are full time volunteer missionaries whose ministries help the Baptist Church of Mantova. During the first days we had transcultural training to get adapted to the local culture and people. We went downtown to know the city of Mantova. It’s a beautiful historical city, with palaces, churches, buildings and lots of arts. We also had the pleasure of meeting Agape Italia’s missionaries in Bologna. We’ve learned so much from them when we met at the Università degli Studi di Bologna, the oldest University of the Western World. Together we had a prayer walking around the campus in Bologna.

Our evangelistic work started in Verona, at the Università degli Studi di Verona. We first planned to spend only 1 week there. In our first day there we had a prayer walking and analyzed how the campus is and the student’s routine. I could meet some students and have a little talk to them. They were our first contacts in the campus. Our biggest worry was about how to get connected to them. We really should have a nice connection to them so that we could have space to introduce spiritual conversations and walk by their side. This happened to me in a very crazy way in the first day, when I started to talk about Brazil and showed some students nice pictures of the Sunset I had taken in Arpoador/ Ipanema beach. One of the most special experiences I had happened in the second day, when I and two friends evangelized an Equatorian student and we spoke in three different languages: I was speaking in English, while one of my friends spoke in Italian and the other one in Spanish. It was amazing to see a student opening the mind to think more about God, purpose of existence and eternity! Day after day God was putting new student on our way. They were mostly friends of the students we knew during the first days of our journey in Verona. The conversations were initialized after the use of a very creative and amazing tool called MySoularium. It’s a deck of fifty photographs. Students should answer the questions we made using those photographs, since they’re very subjective and can be interpreted just as the students pleased. It was a great attempt because, as we could notice, they are very attentive to visual materials – we saw a bunch of fliers hung on the walls all around the campus. Therefore, we planed to prepare some visual material to call the attention of possible Christian students at the campus. We’ve done some colorful posters using paints and colored pens and spread it around the campus. 

Young people from different countries of the World could listen, talk freely and be incited to think about God, in some cases, for the first time. Besides the Italians, I could meet, at least, students from England, Equator, Morocco, Nigeria, Germany, and Russia. Many of these students have never had opportunity to talk about spirituality and some of them judge it something very important. One of them told me that it is something that they would never have a chance to discuss about among their classmates or friends and, when they would try to do that they would probably end up fighting. People seem never to be friendly when they’re talking about spiritual stuff. Maybe we were making the difference. Praise the Lord!

Along our days at the campus, we met Christian students and it was just amazing! Our hearts got so excited about it! God was doing so much more than we fist expected. Students were getting very open to hear us, we could keep in touch with them all the time, having lunch together, texting each other, talking on Facebook, cell phone etc. Students of other religious beliefs also stopped to chat with us and did MySoularium.

After 1 week working at Verona, we got ready to visit two campuses in Mantova: the Politecnico di Milano and the Università di Mantova. The atmosphere was kinda different from Verona and we realized that we wouldn’t need so much people working at those buildings since we met so few students. The infrastructures of those buildings were very different from Università di Verona. They were smaller, so few open places and the students’ routine were too heavy beside the fact that they were having exams, just like the students in Verona. Considering the great results we had in Verona, we decided to divide our team in two groups: one working in Mantova and the other group would return to keep doing the work in Verona. 

I spend practically the last three weeks working in Verona, having the opportunity to evangelize new students and having a discipleship with one Christian student we met. By the way, perhaps it was the biggest experience I’ve ever had there. Me and one friend of my team met this student for about five days and together we could discuss about the basic steps of a real Christian faith, evangelize students, create a friendship between us and comprehend even more the importance of sharing our faith with our mates. Thank God he has loved that moment and felt encouraged to do that among his friends. Another Christian student was accompanied by another student of our team and he strongly felt that he needed to start something at the campus with other Christian students. That’s amazing! Yes, we can see that God is moving!

On January, 25^th, we had a big surprise. We’ve been told about an earthquake nearby Verona. We decided not to go to Verona that day and thus we all worked at Mantova. I stayed at the Università di Mantova, where I could have an amazing evangelistic experience. Me and a friend – who is graduated in Italian Language – had a conversation with a couple. It was great because it was the first time I had a most complex conversation in Italian at the campus! I remember that during my first days in Italy I got very sad because I couldn’t talk to people in their language. I felt so locked inside a cage, no ground, something braking my tongue. I prayed about it every day and then God just surprised me allowing me to communicate in Italian with those students! WOW!

I faced some hard moments as well, when trying to speak to some students from Germany and Russia, however, they stopped to hear our words and it was very nice. Besides the earthquake, we had other difficulties, just like the day that a railroad workers’ strike caught us by surprise.

Returning to Brazil: lots of work on the way

Our last days at the campus overwhelmed my heart. I just couldn’t see myself leaving that campuses, saying goodbye to the student without knowing when I would come back again. I was so used to them… My routine made me feel just like home and I was very adapted to that reality. I felt pleasure by helping those students to understand more about the love of God, to reflect about their perspectives in life and all. After some photos and farewell words we took the bus and never returned to Verona. We spend someday in Ortisei, enjoying the snow and the cold mountains and recovering our energies to come back to Brazil. I realize it was a very intense month. Each new day we had to face the cold, wait for the train, run against the time, control our financial resources and wear lots of warming clothes. I would do all of this again if I had another chance.

I thank God for allowing me to help the Great Commission (Mathew 28:18-20) working with those amazing students in Italy. I really felt passionate by every student’s life. They mean so much to me and that’s why I wish the best for them. The best thing in all this life is having a relationship with Jesus Christ, I’m sure.

And today, I’m here writing these lines, remembering those marvelous days in Italy. I miss everything I lived there! However, my heart should focus in the reality I have here. I have my campus. I see Brazilian students thirsty for answers and seeking after a compass to their lives. I came back with my heart devoted to do whatever is needed to glorify the Lord at my campus. I wish to see a generation influenced by people who truly follow God. “I don’t wanna see another generation drop”. I believe God can do the same He did in Italy and even more. We live in a free country, where Gospel can be preached. So, what about making efforts to share our faith in our campus? Why not investing more in our everyday place? I want it and I’m sure that He wants it more than myself.

Arrivederci,

Sam