Even the combination being flat-packed into a KLM economy seat for more than 11 hours and the familiarity that comes with arriving in a country for the 10th time failed to numb the perennial anticipation or dampen the enthusiasm that surges through my veins every time I arrive in my adopted and much beloved Brazil.  It seemed odd to be escaping the sweltering heat of a balmy London summer for the relative cool of a Sao Paulo winter [which at 85 is my kind if winter] but there it was and here I am.

As ever Sao Paulo GRU buzzed to the sound of travellers.   A forest of placards with foreign names on brandished by disinterested drivers from whom come billows of cigarette smoke hemmed in a sea of emotional friends and family members who had gathered pregnant with expectation to greet their returning loved-ones.  Gales of delight and the smiles fill the air as friends and family spot one another.  The contrast between the arrival and the departure lounge is stark indeed.    Each one reverberates with its own unique brand of joy and pain.  Amidst the throng the street entrepreneurs peddle their wares closely watched by the highly visible and menacing looking police officers welcome to Latin America. 

I couldn t help but notice the absence of anything to do with the iconic Brazilian football team.  All the posters of the under-achieving idols that wallpapered the airport a few weeks earlier had been removed.  Hope had been replaced by the kind of realism that as an English football supporter I am all too familiar with.  What a contrast to when I was last here in April.

Whilst tempered by my wife Hayley s absence on this trip a sense of awe and expectant wonder still flooded my mind. It is a privilege beyond description to be the bringer of Good News.  That the Lord has seen fit to entrust to us the message of freedom in Christ still humbles me so He really does choose the foolish things of this world to confound the wise. 

Brazil will be home for the next 10 days during which time I will be promoting my first book, The Bonsai Conspiracy.  This evening I meet with the publisher and will be given the itinerary, which promises to be action-packed.  We have a couple of TV shows scheduled together with some radio, bookstores, church visits and a Jazz evening with my friend Ciao Fabio who will be launching his new book Reflections.   If this trip is anything like the previous visits then it will overflow with testimonies of God s outrageous love.  Whilst here it will be my goal to do what I seek to do everywhere I go and that is to preach the absurdity of grace. 

Hayley & I love coming to Brazil because the people love to hear about the grace of God but make no mistake embracing it comes to them at a high price.  For all of us if we accept grace and freedom we must reject law and bondage and that means we must rid ourselves of our religion. 

To live under grace by definition means to live free of the law.  Moreover, the grace of which we speak can only be found in a relationship with God that is completely free from fear, or rules or conditions.  This grace is in truth the antithesis of everything that modern day Christianity has become.  Consequently, it is the kind of grace that can only really be experienced this side of heaven by those who are prepared to embrace Christ without Christianity.  I imagine you might balk at such a statement and I wouldn t blame you if you did.  I suspect that I would have reacted the same way had I not spent so much for the last 10 years dealing with devastated Christians whose faith had been shipwrecked by religion.  In this part of the world freedom in Christ all too often means freedom from the church where the staple diet is Christianity without Christ.  However, freedom from the church can all too often mean turning your back on friends and family and results in your being vilified, slandered and alienated. 

As I began writing this morning the smog hung heavy over the Sao Paulo skyline. The Babel like buildings that climb up into the heavens obscured by the pollution that forms a thick blanket will eventually have to yield to the sun s healing rays.  How apt a metaphor is the sight I can survey from my hotel room as the apostle Paul said, first the natural then the spiritual.

I hope to be able to file regular grace-blogs from the trip don t judge me too harshly on the grammatical content what you will read here in the coming days are just my scribbles, and journal entries.  Feel free though to remember the work here in your prayers, the struggle against evangelical witchcraft is great indeed remember we do not war against flesh and blood. Above all hold in your heart those who like you will go outside the camp and bear the reproach He [Jesus] endured. Hebs. 13:13 

Agape

Paul Anderson-Walsh

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