Nepal, 9 years

Dear friends,

I'd been remembering for several days. I thought I wouldn't write, so as to not bother you. But now, tonight, I thought, "People will be encouraged." So, I am writing.

On this day, November 20, 2009, we completed 9 years in Nepal.

We left Brazil on November 13, 2000, with Paris as our destination. It was where Pastor José helped us carry our seven suitcases and where Rose got out of the vehicle and took a tumble in a water puddle right in Paris. But, being Paris, even the tumble was chic.

From Paris we went to Delhi and Varanasi in India where we stayed some days and on November 20, 2000, we arrived in Nepal. The skies were clear, and I saw the people in the streets and thought everything was beautiful, even the urban chaos. I remember each detail of the trip from the airport to the hotel in Sundara, the center of Kathmandu.

In our luggage we carried faith and a dream: to rescue girls! Ever since the situation in the 90s where Pastor José saw a Nepali girl dead on the sidewalk in Mumbai, this vision had consumed us.

The beginning was so difficult, not just the beginning, but many moments, some even quite recent. Many tears have fallen in different moments and situations, but we sense that each one was worth it. Many gray hairs have appeared ("And that will give you white hair," as Rose says...). But telling about difficulties isn't worth it. We want to focus on the joy of the smiles we have in ourselves and with us.

Many funny situations, if I were to share some of them, would take up a lot of space and tire the readers, but today I was laughing by myself, remembering some very comical ones.

Today we are five homes, almost 170 lives in them, eating clean and healthy food, sleeping in a warm bed, and going to school. We have girls and boys with their dignity restored, dreaming and knowing that God is a real God of love who loves and rescues and presents new opportunities when everything seems hopeless.

Many other victories have arrived: our own school here, rug factory, and the Nepali girls themselves leading almost everything. We have the respect of the government of Nepal that has granted the paperwork for repatriation from India and other countries. (In the last three months five girls repatriated from India and 16 others are arriving by the end of 2009.) We believe we will open another house in the next few weeks.

In Nepal we have an eternal inheritance. I know that we have one in Heaven, where it isn't possible to be robbed or depreciated. But in the same way, we also have a beautiful inheritance on earth and to see the girls today dreaming, singing, loving, smiling, playing, working, studying and so beautiful: they are a marvelous inheritance, priceless, truly diamonds of inestimable value.

They do not belong to us, but to Him: Jesus! Our friend, our Lord, our EVERYTHING!

Don¹t think I am spiritualizing. I need to say this. They are His! Because He brought us, supported us using people to put bread on our tables, using people to keep us bundled up in the cold of the Himalayas, using people to warm our heart with their friendship and caring during lonely moments, using people to protect us with their prayers. So many dear people have let themselves be used by Him.

Many started and stopped. Others continued. Others came each time. I can¹t cite all to thank each one, but He touched people and they blessed us here in Nepal. We are thankful to all.

All the honor is His, because He is who consoled us in moments of sadness, encouraged us in moments of fear, brought hope in moments of disillusionment, and cured us in moments of sickness. We have made some mistakes (or manyS) in all these years, but He always was Perfect, Present, Forgiver, Supplier, Friend and everything else.

Thanks to Him who brought us to this point and will take us much farther.

Thank those of you who dreamed with us that it would be possible.

Thanks to the Nepalis who gathered us into this beautiful land of God.

Thanks to the girls of Apple of God’s Eyes Nepal who are the apple of God’s eyes.

We are not an institution. We are not just a ministry. We are a big, animated and dreaming FAMILY OF GOD IN NEPAL.

“For God’s gifts and God¹s call are irrevocable.” Romans 11:29

Silvio, Rose, Davi, Asha e girls of Nepal